Google Nexus 10 vs Apple iPad 4

Introduction:

Just in time for the holidays, two of the hottest tablets on the scene right now, the Google Nexus 10 and Apple iPad 4, are undoubtedly vying for supremacy in the highly competitive tablet market. Of course, as we all know too well, Apple’s game changing iPad has remained a relevant device in this space – even though this latest model is a hairline update over its predecessor. Still, considering it has the backing of a strong ecosystem combined with a premium design, the iPad 4 remains largely in a league of its own. However, Google’s Nexus 10 tablet is seemingly setting things ablaze with its hot-hot pricing. Not only is it a good $100 less than the iPad 4, but it’s also sporting the highest resolution display to grace a tablet ever! Surely, it’s going to be a battle for the ages with these two titans.


Design:

All things considered, there’s one valid reason why the iPad is continually a favored tablet amongst the heap – it’s because of its premium design! Between the two, there’s no arguing there’s a hint of premium love attached to the iPad 4 and its brushed aluminum casing, which at the same time, adds a wholesome level of sturdiness to its construction. On the flip side, there isn’t anything too profound with the appearance of the Google Nexus 10, but we have to say that its modest design is still appreciable for something priced so aggressively. In addition, its matte soft touch body does phenomenal job in maintaining a clean appearance – while still providing us such much needed grip.

Only broken up by the occasional glow of its pulsating notification LED light below its screen, the Nexus 10 sports a clean front surface since the typical set of Android buttons are incorporated into its interface. Meanwhile, the iPad 4 features a physical recessed home button, which has been a hallmark sighting with all of Apple’s touch devices.

	Front cameras
The Google Nexus 10 (left) and the Apple iPad 4 (right)

Feeling out the physical buttons around their trims, the iPad 4’s power button and volume control are jutting out more, which provide for a more distinctive feel. Thankfully though, the buttons of both tablets exhibit wonderful springy responses when pressed. As for some of the commonalties they share around their trims, they include the 3.5mm headset jack and microphones. In terms of power and data connectivity, the Nexus 10 employs a traditional microUSB port – whereas the iPad 4 favors Apple’s proprietary Lightning port. However, we do appreciate the dedicated microHDMI port on the Nexus 10 for quick and easy video-out functionality.

Power keys	Volume rockers	Charging ports	Speakers
The Google Nexus 10 (bottom, left) and the Apple iPad 4 (top, right)

Тhese two titans feature 5-megapixel rear cameras – with both having the ability to shoot videos in 1080p. However, it’s the Nexus 10 that benefits in low lighting situations with its LED flash. When it comes to snapping self-portraits, the two offer front-facing 1.3-megapixel cameras for the occasion, plus the ability to record video in 720p.

Backs	Rear cameras
The Google Nexus 10 (left) and the Apple iPad 4 (right)

Display:

Since the introduction of the third-gen iPad, Apple had the notoriety of offering the highest resolution display on a tablet – dubbed as none other than the Retina Display. With its 9.7-inch 2048 x 1536 IPS LCD Retina Display, it continues to deliver such stunning detail unmatched until, well, now. Enter the Nexus 10 and its even higher resolution 10.05-inch 2560 x 1600 True RGB Real Stripe PLS display, which so happens to feature a crunching pixel density of 300 ppi. And yes, it triumphs over the iPad 4’s 264 ppi tally. Certainly, it’s a clear win for Google when it comes to numerical figures, but when it comes to practical usage, we’re hard pressed to firmly say which is the more detailed, as our eyes take notice of their extreme level of sharpness and clarity from a normal viewing distance. Continuing to show their allure, both displays exhibit the same lovable qualities that make them visible in all conditions – such as their wide viewing angles and luminescent brightness output.

Viewing angles
Color production The Google Nexus 10 (left) and the Apple iPad 4 (right)

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Interface and Functionality:

Apple might’ve had the head start in building its tablet platform from the ground up, but Google has been able to catch up in a relatively short manner. More importantly now, its Nexus 10 tablet is running Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, which easily eclipses the feature set that’s available in the most up-to-date version of iOS for the iPad. Yet again, we’ll give it to the iPad for having the simpler and more straightforward experience, however, it’s lacking the productivity and accessibility substance that the Nexus 10 so happens to offer. On the flip end, the newest flavor of Jelly Bean carries along some exciting new features that help move the experience in a steady manner on the Nexus 10 – like native widgets support in the lock screen. As a whole, we can’t help but to vouch for the extensiveness that Google has been able to produce with its Android experience.

The Google Nexus 10 is sporting the newest flavor of Jelly Bean, Android 4.2

This latest iPad is running iOS 6

Taking a gander at the core organizer apps of both tablets, there isn’t a whole lot separating the two, as they employ tablet-optimized layouts and similar functions to make the experience justified. Likewise, we can say the same thing about their respective email apps, but the Gmail experience of the Nexus 10- is undoubtedly more equip in delivering that desktop like experience that we desperately crave.

Organizer apps of the Google Nexus 10

Core organizer apps of the Apple iPad 4

Although landscape typing is most ideal with these sized tablets, seeing that their keyboard layouts are spacious and they offer responsive actions, it’s the iPad 4 that better accommodates our digits with portrait usage. In fact, with the aid of its split-style keyboard option, our thumbs don’t have to extend much to encompass the entire layout.

			Gesture based input
The stock Android 4.2 keyboard on the Google Nexus 10

The keyboard of the Apple iPad 4

Processor and Memory:

Knowing that these two are carrying super high resolution displays, they require powerful hardware to keep their performance at an optimal rate. Interestingly enough, in an age of quad-cores, these juggernauts are being powered by dual-cores instead. Specifically, it’s a dual-core 1.7GHz ARM Cortex A15 based Exynos chip with 2GB of RAM on the Nexus 10 – while the iPad 4 is sporting a dual-core 1.4GHz Apple A6X processor with 1GB of RAM. Probably due to the simplistic layout of its homescreen interface, the iPad 4 exhibits the snappier response when navigating around – whereas the Nexus 10 displays a tiny bit of choppiness every now and then whenever it comes across graphically intensive widgets and live wallpapers. Nevertheless, they mostly produce the same lovable results with other common tasks.

In terms of storage, the Nexus 10 and iPad 4 are available in 16GB and 32GB capacities, but it’s the iPad 4 that offers another model with 64GB of memory. Unfortunately, there’s no way expanding their storage capacities, which means you’ll need to moderate what you put in them.


Internet and Connectivity:

Surfing the web has never been easier, especially considering that the experience is complemented by the mind boggling resolutions of both displays. In addition to offering peppy page loads and tight navigational controls, the two have that added level of pop with the staggering amount of detail and clarity produced by their displays. However, we find the extensive set of sharing functions and useful gestures employed by the Chrome browser to out muscle what’s available with Safari for iPad.

The Chrome browser of the Google Nexus 10

Safari browser on the Apple iPad 4

As it currently stands, the Nexus 10 is only available in Wi-Fi flavor – whereas the iPad 4 is outfitted with various cellular connections to appease a wide array of users. Rounding things out, they both pack other connectivity features such as aGPS and Bluetooth, but it’s the Nexus 10 getting in with the NFC craze.

Camera:

Scary to say, but we’re increasingly see more tablets being outfitted with good cameras. If the only devices within arm’s reach at the moment were none other than the Nexus 10 and iPad 4, we’d have to stick with the latter – mainly because its quality proves its advantage. Although they’re both sporting 5-megapixel auto-focus rear cameras, the main difference is that the iPad 4 pulls out the sharper looking visuals. In contrast, the Nexus 10 still delivers some exciting shots, but it’s noticeably duller with its details. At the same time, there’s just a tad bit more noise produced with its low lighting shots – albeit, it has an LED flash to counter them, which is something that’s not offered by the iPad 4. Going out of the norm, we appreciate the other cool shooting modes available with the Nexus 10 – particularly the neat 360-degree view of its Photo Sphere shooting mode.

Photo Sphere shooting mode Camera interface of the Google Nexus 10

Camera interface of the Apple iPad 4

Google Nexus 10
Apple iPad 4
Google Nexus 10
Apple iPad 4 Outdoor samples

Strong	Medium	Low light
Google Nexus 10
Apple iPad 4
3ft	5ft	7ft
Google Nexus 10 - darkness with flash Indoor samples

Even though there’s only a marginal difference in still shot quality between the two cameras, it’s the iPad 4 that drastically separates itself in the 1080p video recording quality department. In fact, it’s most evident by the amount of fine details and sharpness it’s able to produce – whereas the Nexus 10’s visuals are downright muddy and soft looking. Making things worse, there are also distracting artifacting elements that pop up with the Nexus 10’s results that make its quality less appealing.

Google Nexus 10 Sample Video:

Apple iPad 4 Sample Video:



Multimedia:

On the surface, there isn’t a whole lot separating the music player interfaces of both tablets, especially when they’re conventional looking with their presentations. Still, we can’t forget to mention the cool 3D carousel feature found with the Nexus 10’s Google Play Music app. Beyond that, the Nexus 10’s stereo speakers emit the slightly stronger volume tones, but in all honesty, they both produce pleasant tones at the loudest volume setting.

The Google Play Music app on the Google Nexus 10

The Apple iPad 4’s music player

Even though they’re capable of playing high definition videos without a single hiccup, the 16:9 aspect ratio of the Nexus 10 display makes it the more ideal candidate – even more when there’s some conversion needed to get 1080p videos onto the iPad 4.

Battery:

Who knows what it’s all attributed to, whether it’s the optimizations found with the dual-core Exynos processor or Android 4.1 Jelly Bean experience, but the Nexus 10 delivers the better battery results. So much so that we’re able to get close to two whole days of normal usage on a single charge – versus the average one-day put out by the iPad 4.


Conclusion:

Frankly people, we can’t help but wonder in awe about the aggressive pricing attached to the Google Nexus 10. Sure, it might not have the premium build of the iPad 4, nor its mightier camera taking capabilities, but when it proves to be the productivity conscious tablet between the two, aided by the new enhancements of Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, it definitely screams more value for the buck. At the moment, we can agree that there are more tablet-optimized third party apps on the iPad, but as always, that gap is lessening as time passes. With a starting price point that $100 less than the iPad 4, the Nexus 10 still manages to enthrall with its magnificent high resolution display, easy video-out functionality, and battery longevity.


Google Nexus 10 vs Apple iPad 4: