Reports emerged last week suggesting that the Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7 – model number “SM-T815” – released in September last year has started receiving the Android 6.0 Marshmallow update in Germany. Fast forward to the present day and fresh reports targeting the smaller counterpart – the Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 8.0 – reveal that the Wi-Fi only variant is now being updated to Android 6.0 Marshmallow in the UK.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 series was announced in July 2015 and was first released in September running Android 5.0 Lollipop out of the box. The series consists of two main tablets, specifically the Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7 featuring a 9.7-inch display, and the smaller 8-inch Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 8.0. Now, according to a SamMobile report, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 8.0 is beginning to receive Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow in the UK. Apparently the update is currently rolling out for the Wi-Fi-only variant, which is identified by model number “SM-T710”. Owners of the said tablet who happen to reside in the UK should receive an update notification any time now – assuming that they haven’t already – but as is generally the case with OTA (over the air) software releases, users can also try to trigger the update process manually from the tablet’s “Settings” menu under “About device” > “Software update”. As for the update itself and the changes introduced, the software package bumps the firmware version to “T710XXU2CPD9” and also includes the April 2016 security patch said to fix a number of critical issues. Otherwise, the Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow update includes a series of new native features such as Doze, Google Now on Tap, as well as a new app permissions manager just to name a few. It should also include a newer version of Samsung’s proprietary TouchWiz user interface which should be both faster and lighter.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 8.0 features an 8-inch Super AMOLED display with a resolution of 2048 x 1536, an Exynos 5433 SoC, a Mali-T760 MP6 graphics chip, 3 GB of RAM, a microSD card slot which can read up to an additional 128 GB of external memory, and an 8-megapixel rear-facing camera coupled with a 2.1-megapixel front-facing sensor. The tablet has already been refreshed by a 2016 LTE model running Android 6.0, which was previously spotted online in Germany along with a price tag of €479.