Gadgetory

hello folks this is April you're watching the android authority channel on YouTube Apple has just released its very first mini tablet a 7.9 inch or aptly named the iPad Mini is it a little too late into the 7-inch tablets price or does the ipad mini pack enough punch to intimidate one of the well-loved leaders in the 7-inch tablet game the google nexus 7 find out in this video review of the ipad mini versus the google nexus 7 as always we begin from what are most apparent to the eyes the tablets exterior and physical aspects the ipad now has a smaller sibling called the ipad mini compared to the earlier ipad this new one definitely deserves being referred to as a mini but at least against the Nexus 7 the iPad Mini is not as many it is actually slightly bigger and slightly wider than the nexus 7 what's even more amazing is that despite its bigger size the iPad Mini is thinner than the nexus 7 and is also lighter Apple did a good job in making this tablet thin and light I'm sure a lot of folks will appreciate the thinness and light weight especially those who use a tablet primarily for long hours of reading the ipad minis predominantly aluminum housing shows apple's touch of simplicity and minimalism the Nexus 7 on the other hand also appears simple and minimal but with an air of classiness because of its all black theme accentuated by silver edging on the front of the nexus 7 you find nothing but the front camera at the top center of the screen and the centers nearby on the iPad Mini you'll find the front camera right here and apple's iconic home button down here as far as minimalist design is concerned we give it to the Nexus 7 for not having any physical home button not even the capacitive one navigation is software driven on the Nexus 7 we'll talk more about software later let's check the sides the left side of the ipad mini doesn't have anything same thing for the nexus 7 except for the dock connector pins here here on the right side of the ipad mini are the mute orientation lock button and the volume buttons below it the volume buttons on the ipad mini are not merged into one volume rocker they are separate unlike the volume rocker on the next all the nexus 7 the power button is also here on the right side above the volume rocker these are the only physical buttons that you'll find on the exterior of the Nexus 7 at the top side of the ipad mini are the headphone jack here and the microphone here this one's the power button it's still near the volume buttons but on a different side the top edge of the Nexus 7 is bare there's nothing here at the bottom edge of the ipad mini arts loudspeakers in between the loudspeakers is the Lightning port for charging and data connection in the case of the Nexus 7 here's the headphone jack here and the microUSB port here the iPad minis back is made of aluminum it smooth and slightly textured it feels like suede the Nexus 7's back in contrast is made of rubberized plastic with pock marks although the iPad Mini has a slightly textured bag it is easy to grip without fear of slipping primarily because the tablet is light in the case of the Nexus 7 its back is easier to grip because of the rubbery and dot textured back and it has to be easier to grip because it is also heavier these two devices are actually a pleasure to hold either in one hand or in two as for screen and display both tablets use led-backlit IPS LCD displays both Springs of course have oleophobic coating which is just a high-sounding term for oil resistant coating so no need to worry about oil seeping in terror sticking to your screen both screens use tough glass for protection against scratches the Nexus 7 in particular uses Corning Gorilla fit glass one of the toughest glass products from Corning Google's tablet has a 7-inch screen diagonal with 15 29 aspect ratio resolution of 1280 by 800 and very sharp display because of its 216 PPI pixel density apple's tablet has the bigger screen at seven point nine inches diagonal but it has a lower resolution of 1024 x 768 a 423 aspect ratio which I'm not very fond of when it comes to watching HD movies and only 163 ppi pixel density this doesn't use retina display the touch screens on these two tablets are snappy and very alert to touch in they're very responsive transitions between home screens are very smooth no jitter or lag too I like the better contrast on the iPad minis display blacks are blacker and whites are wider than on the Nexus 7 however the nexus 7 seems much better with colors they're brighter and more vibrant than those on the iPad Mini the Nexus 7 has sharper images too thanks to its higher pixel density let's talk a bit about the processing power of these two tablets the ipad mini uses apple's very own dual core apple a5 chipset but it's one gigahertz cortex a9 cpu and a power vr SG x 54 3 MPT graphics processor it has 512 megabytes of RAM in these days of quad cores and 2gb of ram this tablets dual-core chip and 512mb of ram seem a little behind meanwhile the nexus 7 flaunts a quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 chipset with its 1.3 gigahertz cortex a9 processor and ulp geforce graphics processor this baby has one gigabyte of RAM these are very powerful hardware specs the nexus 7 surely has the hardware for heavy multitasking extreme web browsing or hardcore video gaming as for storage neither of the tablets provides micro SD storage expansion apple lets you choose from 16 32 or 64 gigabyte models google on the other hand offers only two storage models 16 gigabyte and 32 gigabytes apple's tablet uses a lithium polymer battery rated at 4400 mah google's tablet has a lithium-ion battery rated at 4325 mah apple claims that the ipad mini can last up to 10 hours of web browsing on Wi-Fi watching videos and listening to music asus claims that the nexus 7 can last up to nine and a half hours of playing HD videos with gmail running and sinking in the background and with an external headset plugged in all while Wi-Fi is on also while we're at this Apple insists on its proprietary lightning port and cable it's not a standard port or standard charger in contrast the nexus 7 uses a completely standards-compliant microUSB port this may means that if you ever forget your Nexus Evans charger you can just use the charger cable of your other Android phone let's talk a bit about connectivity you can't make phone calls on either tablet but both are capable of Wi-Fi connections both also have bluetooth connectivity the iPad Mini has a Wi-Fi only model and an LTE model the Nexus 7 also has a Wi-Fi only model and the 3g capable model reportedly coming out this month as for data sharing the Nexus 7 has near field communication or NFC which she can use to share files between two NFC devices just by tapping them the ipad mini doesn't have this feature now let's talk about the camera most of us here at Android Authority don't find a bad camera necessary on a tablet it's great and very useful on a phone but not so much on a tablet whether 7 inch or bigger the front camera is usually enough for video chatting and probably for using a mirror app for fixing one's hair both the Apple and Google tablets have front-facing cameras and both are good 1.3 megapixels on the ipad mini and 1.2 megapixels on the nexus 7 these cameras can capture acceptable quality photos and videos especially with adequate lighting Apple slapped a bad camera all five megapixels of it onto the ipad mini even named it I site we still find it a bit too lavish and opulent to have a primary camera on a tablet some will definitely find it useful but I feel it's just an add-on cost regardless this camera is a snappy one there's no shutter lag at all and processing time as quick photo and video quality or of acceptable quality to the nexus 7 doesn't have a bad camera at all I've been using a nexus 7 myself for the past few months and I never missed the back camera these two tablets can play multimedia files quite well stereo sound from the loudspeakers or external headphones is of good quality and has enough volume though I noticed that the ipad mini provides deeper and richer bass though on the Nexus 7 you can adjust the sound levels via the built-in equalizer in the Google Play Music app the ipad mini music player doesn't allow you to change equalizer settings as for video the two tablets can play high definition videos without stuttering or game playback is very smooth let's now turn our attention to the software and user interface on these tablets the ipad mini comes with apple's ios 6.0 out of the box but you can update it right away to version 6.0 point 1 the nexus 7 comes with pure google android 4.1 jelly bean being a Nexus device it's bound to be one of the first to get upgrades to the latest Android 4.2 jelly bean very soon this discussion about the two tablets operating systems software and user interfaces can easily reach a couple of hours or more so let's take a look at some of the important and basic features both Android and iOS are strong reliable and stable operating systems both are equally capable of allowing you to use your tablet satisfactorily they do differ in so many ways and implement solutions differently for instance the lock screen here's how it looks like on the ipad mini and here's what you see on the nexus 7 see this picture frame icon here if you tap this the photos in your gallery will be displayed one at a time in a slideshow right here on the lock screen like this this feature is not available on the Nexus 7 let's see the Nexus 7 lock screen tap and drag the status bar downward like this to access a notification menu you can't do this on the iPad Mini drag the lock icon upward towards the google logo to instantly launch Google now right on the lockscreen alone Android already shows its mighty muscle and already gives you a foretaste of the many awesome things that Android allows you to do to unlock the ipad mini drag the slider to the right on the Nexus 7 drag the lock icon to the unlock icon now we're here at the home screen so let's check it out on the iPad Mini all your app icons are here on the home screen the logic is that of immediate access all your apps are laid out before you ready for you to launch right after you unlock the tablet screen to view your notifications just pull down Notification Center like this notifications are grouped according to the app you can delete a notification group but you cannot dismiss individual notifications you can't even dismiss all notifications at the same time you can however control which apps will display messages in the Notification Center this bar here is called the dock bar you can add your most frequently used add shortcuts to the stock so you can launch your favorite apps regardless of which home screen you're at this button here is the home button it is the central control of the ipad mini and it performs several functions click it once to go back to the home screen click it twice to view your most recently closed apps hold it down to launch sri the voice-activated assistant if I could sum up the ipad mini's overall principle and just one word it would be efficiency on Android things are different not necessarily much better but definitely more flexible clearer and fun on the Nexus 7 you get five home screens which you can view by swiping either to the left or to the right to be your notifications just swipe downward from the status bar to open the notification menu this button here is for locking the screen orientation this one here is a shortcut to the settings menu those are a lot of things that you can do on Android and we're still talking about the notification menu this bar here is a dock bar you can also place your favorite app shortcuts here you can even organize the app shortcuts into folders just tap hold and drag an app icon over another to create a folder the nexus 7 doesn't have physical buttons it has virtual buttons instead these three buttons here are four back home and recent apps on the nexus 7 your apps are kept in the app drawer tap this middle button here to view your app drawer below all your apps are here you can place apps shortcuts on your home screen too if you like just tap hold and drop an app hang on any of your five home screens like I said Android is more dynamic and flexible widgets are a testimony to such flexibility all the available widgets can be accessed from the widgets tab next to the app drawer you add a widget to the Home screen in the same way as you add an app icon let's add a photo gallery widget there you go you will never be able to enjoy this on your iPad Mini customizing your Nexus 7 home screen is easy too long tap on any empty space on the home screen like this and you can easily change your home screen wallpaper speaking of which you can use animated wallpapers better known as live wallpapers let me show you how this breaks cool huh again this is one of the nice things on Android that you can never enjoy on your iPad Mini if I can sum up the Nexus 7's overall principle in just two words they would be flexibility and freedom or choice both Android 4.1 jelly bean and iOS 6.0 have more software features than we can cover in this review so check out our text preview on android authority to find out more about what other software bells and whistles the Nexus 7 and iPad Mini can offer you now we're down to the last bit of this review price how much did they cost in terms of price the nexus 7 leaves the ipad mini and the dust the base nexus 7 model with 16 gigabytes of storage for example costs about two hundred US dollars while the wifi-only ipad mini with the same storage capacity costs around three hundred thirty dollars the Nexus 7 is a hundred and thirty dollars cheaper the upcoming 32 gigabyte model the Nexus 7 will reportedly cost around three hundred dollars while the 32 gigabyte Wi-Fi only ipad mini is priced at four hundred thirty dollars Google doesn't have a 64 gigabyte Nexus 7 but Apple has 64 gigabyte Wi-Fi only ipad mini priced at around five hundred thirty dollars the apple ipad mini and the google nexus 7 are two great tablets each one has something to offer that the other doesn't both run powerful and stable operating systems the ipad mini may be best for you if you're looking for a sleek efficient and lightweight tablet the sturdy build decent but fast hardware a five megapixel back camera and a virtual assistant that you can chit chat with don't go for it if your wallet can't reach its sky-high price for those who prefer an affordable tablet with heavyweight hardware a solid and comfortable build no extra baggage such as a back camera and the flexibility and the freedom to personalize your tablet the Nexus 7 is perfect for you which of the two is your next tablet Apple iPad Mini or Google Nexus 7 let us know by leaving a comment also remember to subscribe to our YouTube channel for more Android news reviews and more visit android authority com this is april from android authority thanks for watching may the light side of the Android force be with you