Reviews - Nvidia Shield Tablet

[Brewster0101]

Trying to work out if this has more or less power than the Xbox 360 or Ps3?

[CampGareth]

Trying to work out if this has more or less power than the Xbox 360 or Ps3?

In terms of raw numbers it has more RAM, a more powerful GPU, I don't know about CPU because that's a bit harder to test but it's certainly one of the best mobile chips out there (seen some other sites say it beats the ipad air so not sure what's going on here)... the question really is whether you'd see something as good as a console game launching on Android, being ported yes but launching I'm not sure.

[Sumanji]

Perhaps I'm missing the point of this, but I just see this as a solid and cheap high-performance tablet.

Probably going to "early-upgrade" my LG G Pad 8.3 with the LTE Shield.

The front facing speakers, bigger battery and LTE radio makes it worth the upgrade... the
game streaming, stylus etc. are just fluffy bits I probably will never use!

Su

[crossy]

The front facing speakers, bigger battery and LTE radio makes it worth the upgrade... the game streaming, stylus etc. are just fluffy bits I probably will never use!

Not that bothered about the LTE (when there's wifi everywhere these days) but I'll maybe disagree about the stylus. Okay, it's not as good as the one on the Note tablets, but it can still be handy for those "sausage finger" moments when trying to drive a badly designed website. There's also a reasonable review over at SlashGear of the DirectStylus2. If you've got an artistic lean, or just like to dabble, then it could be a useful tool.

Hexus, why compare this to merely two Apple products? Personally I'd like to have seen something like the Galaxy Note 8.0 thrown into the mix. That's got the quad-core, 8" screen and stylus so would be a good competitor surely to the shield. Heck, failing that what about the 8" Galaxy Tab or even the Nexus 7?

[bigmunkey3741]

not sure why they class 1920x1200 as a low res, especially on a 8" screen. that even looks pretty damn good on a 24" monitor.
i doubt you can see much difference between that and the ipad mini new screen res.

[CK_1985]

So, after making a point that this "review" seemed like an advertorial 3 days ago, I've just seen it jump to the top of the front page, with no discernible update to the content. I'm guessing nVidia's cheque cleared?

Didn't they add in all the benchmarks? Hexus quite frequently adds content to an existing thread and bumps it to the top of the page - think you might need ease off on the conspiracy theories

[CampGareth]

Didn't they add in all the benchmarks? Hexus quite frequently adds content to an existing thread and bumps it to the top of the page - think you might need ease off on the conspiracy theories

This article was written (first three pages) when pre-orders started, then a few days later it jumped to the top of the news pile with no changes. Finally a few days after that when they started shipping it got updated with an actual review of the product, bit weird but hey.

I'm not sure what I expected to read, it's a tablet and it's one that clobbers the nexus 7 in terms of specs and performance. This is pretty much what I bought it for, that and the aspects that've been upgraded over the tegra note 7 I'm writing this on.

[crossy]

This article was written (first three pages) when pre-orders started, then a few days later it jumped to the top of the news pile with no changes. Finally a few days after that when they started shipping it got updated with an actual review of the product, bit weird but hey.

Heard of similar behaviour on another site that I used to follow. And like here there were accusations of "bias". In reality the explanation turned out to be a lot simpler (and boring). The CMS that they were using for the site setup the title page based on creation times of the story/article files. So if a journalist spotted a typo and decided to upload a new (corrected) version of the article then it got pushed as a "new" story.

Oh and personally I've zero issue with bias as long as everyone's up front about it. On the other hand nothing gets my back up like a "neutral" site that isn't. I stopped buying PC Pro magazine for exactly that reason.

[Biscuit]

Didn't they add in all the benchmarks? Hexus quite frequently adds content to an existing thread and bumps it to the top of the page - think you might need ease off on the conspiracy theories

There was an actual review added. It was just an overview before. The update comfortably has enough to justify a 'bump'.

Sure its a bit lame to do the whole half and half thing but advertised paid websites is a cut throat market.

[Methanoid]

WHY would you review an Android tablet and not compare the performance to another Android tablet but to two iOS devices? Has the review team at Hexus lost the plot these days?

[slipthemonkey]

I've read elsewhere that one of the apps the Shield can launch is a Steam Big Picture client enabling streaming from Steam to the tablet. Can anyone confirm this?

[naturbo2000]

Steam big picture works on the old handheld, so I'd be amazed if it didn't work on the tablet. You can play games not on nvidia's supported list and add non steam games this way

Edit: you typically need to add custom key or controller mapping (pinnacle profiler) for unsupported games

[mentat]

I gotta laugh at the "low-res" screen nitpick. Really, Hexus? A 1920x1200 resolution 8-inch screen is considered low-res? As if anyone can notice a few PPI difference with the crApple hypePad Airy? And while Samsung still uses 1024x600 resolutions on even their latest 7" tablets and 1280x800 on their latest 10" tablets???

This reminded me of the reviews of the LG G3 phablet's 4K screen on a 6" display, the reviewers kept downplaying the 4K screen claiming you won't notice the difference from a 1280x800 res screen. It's as if all the reviewers just mindlessly parroted the classic Reality Distortion Field marketing propaganda from the crApple iFruitcakes: downplay features/capabilities that you don't have until you (iFruity team) get them, at which point you proclaim it as the "best, most innovative" thing ever introduced. I can't believe Hexus would fall for the same old RDF spin.

Bottomline: 1920x1200 on an 8" screen is great; noticeably better than typical Android tablets with the same size and similar price, and indistinguishable from the Retina marketing name used for the non-standard proportioned crApple screens.

[Biscuit]

I gotta laugh at the "low-res" screen nitpick. Really, Hexus? A 1920x1200 resolution 8-inch screen is considered low-res? As if anyone can notice a few PPI difference with the crApple hypePad Airy? And while Samsung still uses 1024x600 resolutions on even their latest 7" tablets and 1280x800 on their latest 10" tablets???

This reminded me of the reviews of the LG G3 phablet's 4K screen on a 6" display, the reviewers kept downplaying the 4K screen claiming you won't notice the difference from a 1280x800 res screen. It's as if all the reviewers just mindlessly parroted the classic Reality Distortion Field marketing propaganda from the crApple iFruitcakes: downplay features/capabilities that you don't have until you (iFruity team) get them, at which point you proclaim it as the "best, most innovative" thing ever introduced. I can't believe Hexus would fall for the same old RDF spin.

Bottomline: 1920x1200 on an 8" screen is great; noticeably better than typical Android tablets with the same size and similar price, and indistinguishable from the Retina marketing name used for the non-standard proportioned crApple screens.

I must admit, I had a giggle at the resolution comments aswell. It would be interesting to see them side by side displaying an identical image to make a real judgement but there is no way that res will look anything other than brilliant on an 8"er.

I still haven't put my order for one of these in yet due to current budget situations... damn cars

[crossy]

I gotta laugh at the "low-res" screen nitpick. Really, Hexus? A 1920x1200 resolution 8-inch screen is considered low-res? As if anyone can notice a few PPI difference with the crApple hypePad Airy? And while Samsung still uses 1024x600 resolutions on even their latest 7" tablets and 1280x800 on their latest 10" tablets???

This reminded me of the reviews of the LG G3 phablet's 4K screen on a 6" display, the reviewers kept downplaying the 4K screen claiming you won't notice the difference from a 1280x800 res screen. It's as if all the reviewers just mindlessly parroted the classic Reality Distortion Field marketing propaganda from the crApple iFruitcakes: downplay features/capabilities that you don't have until you (iFruity team) get them, at which point you proclaim it as the "best, most innovative" thing ever introduced. I can't believe Hexus would fall for the same old RDF spin.

Bottomline: 1920x1200 on an 8" screen is great; noticeably better than typical Android tablets with the same size and similar price, and indistinguishable from the Retina marketing name used for the non-standard proportioned crApple screens.

I'm going to agree with you to an extent - although if I'd written that post then there would have been less anti-Apple vitriol thrown. But those last two sentences of paragraph 2 is all too true I'm afraid.

<off-topic>
I'll need to correct you on the G3 comments. LG regard it as a phone not a "phablet" and your quoted screen size is wrong - it's only got a 5.5" screen not 6". Like you though I got a bit tired of reading endless drivel that the "QuadHD" screen was merely a feature because LG had the screen available. Heck, if Samsung did the same then no-one would have complained. Other thing I take issue with on the reviews is that the G3's screen means that battery life is "severely compromised". Yes I agree that a 1080p screen would draw less power when lit, but for my usage case my G3 easily beats my previous Samsung S3 (with a 720p screen) for longevity, (and it charges faster to boot). Oh, and while Twitter etc probably don't benefit from that 4K screen, I can definitely see a slight increased sharpness compared to a Galaxy S5.
</off-topic>

One point about the resolution that's been oft-quoted in the G3 reviews is that high-res screens draw more power themselves and need more powerful graphics to drive correctly. Both have an impact on battery life, so I'd argue for the Shield that I'd prefer this "low resolution" screen to one of higher resolution but which would have me reaching for that power brick sooner.

[Biscuit]

I'm going to agree with you to an extent - although if I'd written that post then there would have been less anti-Apple vitriol thrown. But that last sentence of paragraph 2 is all too true I'm afraid.

<off-topic>
I'll need to correct you on the G3 comments. LG regard it as a phone not a "phablet" and your quoted screen size is wrong - it's only got a 5.5" screen not 6". Like you though I got a bit tired of reading endless drivel that the 4K screen was merely a feature because LG had the screen available. Heck, if Samsung did the same then no-one would have complained. Other thing I take issue with on the reviews is that the G3's screen means that battery life is "severely compromised". Yes I agree that a 1080p screen would draw less power when lit, but for my usage case my G3 easily beats my previous Samsung S3 (with a 720p screen) for longevity, (and it charges faster to boot). Oh, and while Twitter etc probably don't benefit from that 4K screen, I can definitely see a slight increased sharpness compared to a Galaxy S5.
</off-topic>

One point about the resolution that's been oft-quoted in the G3 reviews is that high-res screens draw more power themselves and need more powerful graphics to drive correctly. Both have an impact on battery life, so I'd argue that I'd prefer this "low resolution" screen to one of higher resolution but which would have me reaching for that power brick sooner.

Isn't it 1440p rather than 4k?