Galaxy Tab 8.9: 9.1″ x 6.2″ x 0.34″ – 15.8 oz
Google Nexus 9: 8.98″ x 6.05″ x 0.31″ – 14.9 oz
Interesting.
I once fondled the 8.9-inch Samsung Galaxy Tab:
I wrote then:
On video, it doesn’t look that much smaller than an iPad 2, but I thought it was in person. It seemed to be a better size to drop in a bag and carry around.
I also wrote:
My thing is, I want to read PDFs on a tablet. A whole lot of Google Books and from the Internet Archive issues of Processed World magazine. I think an 8.9 screen would work…
And:
I’ll have to revisit the 8.9 and do some PDF tests on it. I wasn’t able to this time.
Hmph. I never got the chance.
The main difference between the Samsung 8.9 and the Nexus 9 is this: 8.9″ IPS LCD at 2048 x 1536 — 4:3 aspect ratio for the Nexus.
BOOM!
How many people want the Xiaomi MiPad now?
On the other hand, congratulations to Xiaomi for pushing 4:3 with the MiPad. Now Google will push developers to support it. So it’s a win in the end for Xiaomi on that front, even it might be Pyrrhic.
As for me … the 32GBs at US$479 is a lot to swallow. Especially without a microSD card slot.
I’ll have to see what AnTuTu scores are, reviewers say, and what a Google Books PDF test is like when Best Buy has it in stock.
A final note: I wonder if ACCESS will bring Graffiti out of retirement for this and the Nexus 6 phone?
Previously here:
Alleged Nexus 9 AnTuTu Score
The Nexus 9 Leak Whirligig
New Nexus Tablet Is 4:3?
Rumored Nexus 8
Mike Cane’s xBlog 
I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I’m a little disappointed with the Nexus 9. $399 is a 100% price increase over the Nexus 7 2013. Sure, you get a considerable spec upgrade but that’s to be expected with a 1year+ newer device. Personally, I can’t justify spending over $500 (German price) for a 16GB wifi tablet. I will be going with one of the 9.7 inch chinese tablets for around $200 knowing I won’t get the same performance or user experience. Just my 2 cents.
Also, you’d be more likely to pop another $200 in a year for a more powerful Chinatab than be stuck with the N9 for another year. Hm.
Love the specs. Love the aspect ratio. HATE that it doesn’t have microSD. For that price, it should have 32GB RAM. Fantastic that this form factor has been picked up by Google. I’ll wait for the price to drop a little and perhaps get the 2nd tier wireless with more space. 16GB just isn’t enough, even with heavy use of cloud storage.
You can expect China clones in about six months — or less.
Maybe other manufacturers will focus on the 4:3 more, now that Google itself broke this taboo.
For the Nexus 9, it better has to have some real advantages on its most obvious competitors: Mini and Air. It lacks memory expansions, only 2gb ram, same screen resolution, and most importantly its expensive than other tablets. While it has a clearly more powerful CPU than the iPads, the iPads succeed in squeezing every last bit of juice out their hardware, and honestly the Apple apps ecosystem for tablets is really tough to beat.
Ridiculous price tag…
Teclast X98 Air 3G offers the same resolution and aspect ratio, is Windows capable, offers 3G and has a Micro-SD card slot for not even half the money.
Yeah, I know. Thing is, easier to return, likely to have better support from the XDA specialists, probably better manufacturing quality too. All that said, would have liked it to be at least US$100 lower in price.
In reviewing the Nexus 9 video I could have sworn that I saw a Micro SD card slot on the left hand side of the tablet in portrait mode. If you review the video on youtube at around .24 sec I think you can see it. I definitely want to purchase one as well and I agree with you Mike….it would make it a more desirable purchase.
There’s no microSD card slot listed in the specs at the website. Google has not put such a slot in their devices and is doing their best to dissuade its use by others.
Re Graffiti, it can be installed on new devices but it looks very bare bones for a keyboard alternative: no delete, etc.
Could be useful for smart watches though but it seems that Microsoft has gotten there first… (See, for example, http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/11/6961447/microsoft-android-wear-keyboard-download-features)