I have been telling myself for years that I was pissed off at Apple's huge markup on storage, while I was stuck with my tiny 16GB mini 1st gen. Then I was walking through Costco the other day with about $40 left on a gift card when I came across the Galaxy Tab 4, 8" model, marked down to $159, from $229. So, after adding the GC, I paid about $120... then I went to Amazon and ordered a 128GB SD card for $38. Is it a good as an ipad? I don't know yet, but at least it isn't crashing like my mini does. But I think my mini is having too hard a time running new programs. Time will tell, I guess, but right now, I think I have a far better tablet than my mini 1st gen, with more storage than I will ever need, for less than 1/2 the price of a new Apple. I have had Apple stuff since the first iPod, including computers, and I guess I finally have had enough with the high prices for drive space.
Well, totally depends on what you are are going to do with your new android tablet (but you are on a gaming site, so..). Like you I was gushing over an android tablet a few years ago and bought one at Costco too.. Then, I thought I was getting one over on the man by swiftly buying a high capacity SD card and shoving that thing into it.. I was quickly brought to reality though.. Your games will not be loaded onto or moved over to the SD card. Some of a games data ( a tiny bit in comparison to the full size) will, optionally, be moved over to the card. But the bulk of a games data will be on your tablets hard drive, just like ios. There are no short cuts when it comes to saving game data, that I ever came up with (mine was non-rooted).. Of course you can load songs, images, movies, etc, onto your sd card till your hearts content. But, the card will have little effect on your gaming needs.. I can relate, last month I had to dump my mini first gen.. That thing was a dog for gaming.. I went with the mini2 new for under $200. I felt it was cheap enough that I could get 24 months or so of service out of it without much regret. I am loving the mini2, btw.. TONS, more stable for gaming then the 1st gen was.. More recently, with the 1st gen, most new game release would either crash my device, or had to go straight to a wishlist.. But this new mini2 is a very solid gaming machine at under half the price of a mini4. Good luck with the Android.. Report back and let us know if it is meeting your needs. Like you said, it will be a step up from your old mini-1, that is for sure..
I've a 128gb Micro SD in my Note Pro 12.2 on top of that I've the basic 32gb internal and I find myself using a 64gb OTG keyring drive quite a bit as well (just very convenient to load files onto), sometimes I stick on my bluetooth headphones and just watch entire seasons of TV shows in bed. Don't know about Samsungs other tablets but the best thing mine has really is the batterylife I really can watch shows for an entire day if I want to, and I've Kodi set up basically exactly like my desktop same experience really except I get to use all my Bluetooth toys.
Well, that is the other reason. I needed space for my business stuff. Most of what I use on my mini is available on the Tab 4.
Nexus tablets and the Nvidia shield are my goto group. There are some apps they have that just aren't on iOS. Plus the form factor is nicer for a few things. Also switched to an Android phone a few years back. OTOH, iOS still leads in apps (barely). And the Apple build quality is nice. Although I'm not sure it justifies the price. I'm invested in iOS though so an iPAD Air 2 keeps me up to date on IOS games. But iOS and Android gaming has taken a massive downswing with FTP gaming over the last few years. I find myself moving away from it back to PCs, consoles and handhelds. My kids get Android devices. iPADs are just too expensive to replace.
Heh, my daughter's getting a $50 Kindle Fire for Christmas, I can't afford to properly replace her dead iPad2, and 90% of the time she's just watching YouTube anyway...
I worry about the speed of the storage volume, GPU and CPU vs. an iPad running Metal. And of course not all the games and productivity apps I want exist on Android. But the price is right! There's a place for low-end tablets on the market. In the end it may not be worth it due to lost resale value (Apple products hold their value) but it's an option to save money in the short term. (As long as storage space is the main thing you need.) It may, however, start to feel slow and crashy just like the Mini 1 did, as time passes. It might even age out more quickly than the iPad. Meanwhile, don't throw out that Mini! Wipe-and-restore should fix the OS if it's crashing. (But if it's specific apps that are crashing, you're at the mercy of the developer--true for Android as well. Developers won't support less-used models as well as they do popular ones.)
Oh, no way would I throw it away or give it away. It seems to mostly have issues with new games... HOWEVER, Touch Arcade app crashes a lot with ios 9.x for me. Luckily, all of my "MUST HAVE" apps are on Android. I don't really plan to game on the Tab 4.
So, it is indeed a huge step up from a 1st gen mini. Everything runs fast. Subjectively, the screen seems just as nice, but there is one thing for the negative.... it feels "cheap". It is too light. Maybe when the case for it comes in, I won't think that anymore, but for now, it feels cheap. Ironically, it crashed right out of the box while setting up, but has been perfect since then. I'm not sure I like the way it keeps all the open windows on the screen. I need a program to make sure all unneeded programs fully close. The only game I play on it is Dungeon Boss, and that is a huge battery hog. Some kind of message came up and said that it drains more power than most apps, or something to that effect. Makes sense, though, as you can tell there is a lot going on. I only have 2GB left for apps. I think the OS takes up about 4.5GB of the 16 it starts with. And once it synced with my phone, well, there went most of the rest of the storage.
Always a mistake buying anything under about 32gb as Android insists on storing apps there which is a pain and Google keeps trying to do sneaky changes to try and kill off SD cards and force people onto their cloud. Although I have heard they are going to bring in Unified storage which will combine Micro SD cards with the Internal which might just solve all the issues I'll believe it when I see it though. To be honest I don't really game much on Android apart from the odd emulator or something which will usually let you keep roms on the SD card.
Well, I posted on Amazon, asking if apps can run on the SD card. I got three answers that said they can, and no answers that said they cant.... I guess I will see, if I need more app space. I shouldn't need more app space, though, since I don't plan to game on it, other than Dungeon Boss.
You can "move the app" but you will find it isn't actually moving over the majority of the data it only moves a tiny bit and I personally don't think it's worth doing, it just leads to problems if most of the app is on internal and part is on the SD card. My advice try it if you want to but I wouldn't expect you to save much space if any it's a bit of a useless function.
