This is pretty unfortunate news, at least from my personal view, but it seems I wasn’t crazy thinking Samsung didn’t really push the Galaxy Note 10.1 during their event, and barely talked about it. Apparently, they weren’t expecting to sell too many of them, even before the announcement, and they even cut the supply orders to match their new expectations. Samsung is now expecting to sell about 400,000 and 600,000 units per month, or 3-4x less than Apple.
I’ve been waiting for Samsung to release a new Galaxy Note 10.1 that comes with a really good processor to handle all that multi-tasking and provide lag-free and accurate drawing with the S-pen. I also wanted a “retina” resolution for it, which meant using the same ultra high resolution as the Nexus 10. The new Galaxy Note 10.1 hit those marks pretty well.
I’d say the only thing I was disappointed about is that it wasn’t the 12.2″ Note that’s been rumored. Also, we’re getting very close to seeing 64-bit ARM hardware next year, which would make the tablet more future-proof, but seeing how this is the “2014 edition”, that means we won’t be seeing the 64 version (if there will even be one anymore) anytime soon.
But why is Samsung expecting such few sales? In part, it’s because smaller form factor are selling better these days, whether we’re talking about 7-8″ tablets or the so called “phablets”, or phones who push the boundaries between a phone and a tablet. People are starting to feel that if they get one of those, they don’t need a larger tablet anymore.
Plus, I think one of the main problems with 10″ Android tablet especially, is that they really can’t be used in portrait mode. I understand why Google is keeping them this way (more unity in resolutions across all Android devices), but they really ought to push larger screens that have at least a 3:2 ratio like the Chromebook Pixel. It’s not 4:3, which is good in portrait but is pretty awkward in landscape, but it’s a pretty good compromise between that and 16:10 or 16:9.
A 3:2 tablet could still be used in landscape mode, and in fact, normal laptop users who do work on their laptops, should love that form factor, because it provides them with more height on the screen for documents and whatnot. This is why I’m hoping that 12.2″ tablet, if still exists at this point, will be 3:2, and that Samsung, along with a big push from Google, would move to such ratio for larger screens that can be used as laptops too, when combined with keyboard accessories, such as the new Logitech ones.