On the couch and on the go: modern 8-inch tablets

Devices from the young east european company Sigma mobile are sold under the auspices of accessibility. Tablets are by no means the last role in the brand's product line. In particular, the model with an 8-inch diagonal of the Sigma X-style Tab A81 screen attracts attention.

The low-cost orientation of the tablet can be traced both in its external "wrapper" and in the internal hardware. The basis of the target audience of the gadget is designed to be undemanding users, for whom battery life is more important. The model has no problems with it — on a single charge of the built-in 4000 mAh battery, the tablet is able to play a 9-hour video or hold out without recharging for 14 days in standby mode.

The tasks that the MediaTek MT8321 4-core platform confidently handles with are represented by web surfing, video playback and similar simple actions. Under serious loads, the Sigma X-style Tab A81 hardware is not sharpened — it is not necessary to count on high performance in games. But you can make calls directly from the tablet due to the presence of a 3G-enabled telephone module in its communication component. It is best to call using a headset, because it is simply inconvenient to put such a large device to your ear.

The tablet is equipped with an OTG cable, with which you can connect third-party devices to the gadget and share the charge of the built-in battery with them. Only the cameras are quite mediocre in the model — the main module with a resolution of 2 MP and a 0.3-megapixel front-facing camera. But taking pictures on a tablet has never been a rule of good form. Sigma X-style Tab A81 takes its toll on others — extremely affordable.

At the first acquaintance with the 8-inch low-cost from Asus, it seems that a compact clutch appears before us. In this case, the tablet style will fit not only the fair sex, but also men.

In general, the appearance of the gadget can be changed to suit your own mood: the removable panel covering the back of the tablet is available in five colour options. And in its place it is possible to install one of the branded accessories, for example, a Power Case with an additional 3450 mAh battery or an Audio Cover with 5.1 speakers.

In hardware, the tablet is not as interesting as it looks. Its heart is the MediaTek MT8163 entry-class chip (four processor cores run at 1.3 GHz), in tandem with which 1 GB of RAM works. In fact, this bundle provides good responsiveness in all everyday tasks (communication in social networks, browsing the web, watching online videos, etc.), but with resource-intensive applications, it handles "with a creak". During the synthetic AnTuTu test, the model gains about 36K. points.

The user is greeted in front by an IPS display with a resolution of 1280x800 pixels. Despite the fact that the pixel density at an 8-inch diagonal is only 189 ppi, the picture on the gadget's screen boasts high definition. The merit of this lies on the shoulders of all kinds of image "improvers" by optimizing contrast, sharpness, colour rendering and brightness.

In addition to the tablet, it is advisable to purchase a microSD memory card in a separate order, since the volume of the built-in information storage on board the device does not exceed 8 GB. In addition, almost half of the free space is taken by the software shell — Android 6.0 OS with the ZenUI interface rolled on top. It will also be useful to get a more powerful charging, because the complete power adapter has a low charging current, which is why the tablet needs to be kept chained to an outlet for 3-4 hours. These minor flaws are easily corrected and completely offset by the high quality of the tablet's build, as well as the "tasty" price tag for it in most stores.

The unremarkable appearance of the Lenovo Tab 3 8 850 3G tablet is diluted with blue edging around the perimeter of the case, as a result of which the model acquires a touch of individuality.

The back panel of the device is made in the simplest possible appearance — its entire surface area is occupied by slightly rough plastic, and the "peephole" of the main camera with a resolution of 5 MP looks at the world from the upper left corner. Frankly speaking, the rear and front photo modules are very mediocre and you should not count on getting detailed photographs with their participation.

Almost 70% of the gadget's front panel is given over to an IPS screen with a resolution of 1280x800 pixels. Part of the useful space at the display is "eaten away" by the navigation control keys. But with an 8-inch diagonal, this does not play a special role. The tablet screen leaves behind positive impressions, displaying a bright and rich picture.

Positive emotions from using the tablet when consuming multimedia content are added by built-in stereo speakers with a Dolby Audio sound "improver", which gives the sound more volume and naturalness. Watching movies on the Lenovo Tab 3 8 850 3G screen is a real pleasure. What can not be said about games, because the hardware platform of the gadget can not be called high-performance. It is based on the MediaTek MT8735P chip with a clock frequency of 1 GHz — a solution for everyday tasks, not "heavy" games.

The key features of the model that distinguish it from its 8-inch peers are the support of two SIM cards and the ability to make voice calls. In addition, the gadget works in 3G and LTE mobile networks, providing Internet access from any corner of the globe where there is appropriate mobile coverage. In the dry balance, the brainchild of Lenovo will appeal to those who are looking for a practical tablet to perform everyday tasks and do not want to overpay for unnecessary functions.

The T3 series of tablets from the Chinese company Huawei debuted at the sunset of spring 2017. It includes a younger model with a screen size of 7" (Huawei MediaPad T3 7.0 8 GB ), an average 8-inch tablet and an older version with a 9.6" display (Huawei MediaPad T3 10 16 GB / LTE Price from 3 508 up to 3 999 ₴).

The middle brother is dressed in metal armor, under which an interesting "filling" is hidden: a 4-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 425 chip and 2 GB of RAM. The current hardware platform has been supplemented with the latest version of Android 7.0 with a proprietary EMUI shell. The system shows decent results in multitasking mode and turns over most modern applications. However, it is often necessary to lower the graphics settings for comfortable gaming — still, the processor and graphics accelerator on board the model are not the most powerful.

The tablet's display could be called ordinary if it did not have a technology for reducing the intensity of light in the blue part of the spectrum, which in turn reduces the visual load on the user's eyes. And the comfort of reading before going to bed provides a low threshold of minimum screen brightness (5 nits).

Huawei MediaPad T3 8.0 supports 3G/LTE networks and can be used as a mobile phone for making voice calls and sending text messages. To do this, a slot for one SIM card is provided on the side of the device. Right next to it, a space is allocated for a microSD flash drive to increase memory volumes. Internet access is also provided via Wi-Fi networks.

Together with the built-in 4800 mAh battery, the user has the right to count on 6-8 hours of battery life during gatherings in social networks, diluted with periodic video views. In games, the battery life of the gadget is reduced by about 1.5-2 times. With such data, the tablet will become a faithful companion both at home and on short trips when you need to occupy yourself with something on the way to your destination.

The third coming of the Xiaomi tablet is still focused on "sofa" use. The thing is that the model is able to access the Internet purely through a Wi-Fi connection, and support for mobile data networks was not delivered to it.

The absence of a 3G/LTE module in the gadget's equipment is partially compensated by the presence of dual-band Wi-Fi with a data exchange rate of more than 1 Gbit/s. With the appropriate bandwidth of the home network, downloading a movie to the device's memory will take a matter of minutes. The volume of the drive built into the model is 64 GB. It will not be possible to expand the memory even more, instead it is proposed to use cloud storage services.

Instead of the Intel processor that was installed in the previous version of the tablet (Xiaomi Mi Pad 2 64 GB ), the third-generation gadget is based on a 6-core MediaTek MT 8176 chip. Taking into account 4 GB of RAM, the performance of the tablet in most use cases deserves high praise. In the AnTuTu test, the device scores about 76K points, which allows us to talk about a decent margin of performance for performing a wide variety of tasks.

The real pride of the tablet is the screen with bright and juicy colour reproduction. At a resolution of 2048x1536 pixels, the pixel grid is completely invisible on it, and the visibility of the image on the display is provided at any viewing angles, both in the daytime and in the absence of external lighting. Among the image display modes, a separate line is occupied by monochrome — a kind of analogue of E-Ink, which turns the tablet into a kind of e-book.

By the way, the use of monochrome mode increases the operating time of the model on a single charge of a capacious battery (6600 mAh) by about 10-15%. But even without it, the Xiaomi Mi Pad 3 is able to last without recharging for about 10 hours of screen activity in mixed operation, when watching videos alternates with the consumption of text content. For the "sofa" mode, no other is required, therefore, it is possible to recommend a tablet for purchase for home use to everyone without exception.