According to latest reports, two new Galaxy Tab S2 models have been certified in South Korea by the Radio Research Agency (RAA), which is said to be an affiliate of the country’s telecommunication regulator, the Korean Communications Commission (KCC). Both the devices are at the higher end of the spectrum, and bear the model numbers SM-T715 and SM-T 815. While the first of the two devices is the Galaxy Tab S2 8.0 and comes with an 8-inch screen, the other model number belongs to the slightly larger Galaxy Tab S2 9.7, which comes with a 9.7-inch display. What we do know from previous reports is that the Tab S2 9.7 has already cleared FCC certification in the US a few months back. It isn’t clear immediately however, whether the smaller tablet has done the rounds of the FCC thus far. The two tablets are believed to replace last year’s Galaxy Tab S 8.4 and Tab S 10.5, each of which came with a Wi-Fi only and a cellular variant.
While not all hardware specifications are clear at the moment, both the listed tablets are thought to come with LTE connectivity, and will probably be sold in unlocked, SIM-free mode to customers directly by Samsung, rather than through carriers. That assumption is based on the fact that neither of the two tablets are listed with any carrier-specific variant indicator, which would have been denoted by the inclusion of the letters S/K/L in the nomenclature. Both devices are expected to be powered by 64-bit Exynos chipsets, which are designed and manufactured in-house by Samsung. The company has slowly but steadily moved away from Qualcomm’s chips and has been using its own SoCs over the past couple years to power its high-end smartphones and tablets. The two latest tabs are likely to continue on with the trend.
As for the rest of the hardware, the upcoming devices are also expected to feature AMOLED displays with 2048 x 1536 pixel resolution. Both the devices will reportedly come with 3 GB of RAM apiece, 32 GB of internal storage (with a microSD card slot thrown in for good measure), an 8 megapixel rear camera and a 2.1 megapixel front-facing camera. Previous rumors have suggested the Galaxy Tab S2 8.0 could be priced at $440 and the Tab S2 9.7 at around $550. While we’ve no way verifying the veracity of these rumors, we may get more concrete info fairly soon, as Samsung may look to launch these devices officially next month, seeing as the company had launched previous iterations of these devices in August last year.