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The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

arstechnica.com

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Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#71

Post by xnx »

cageface wrote: post #43
Springtime wrote: post #18

I'm a bit puzzled by the tone of the piece in that the author frames it as a critique yet also points out how much easier it is to repair. I was anticipating some literal 2.5" SSD-like empty husk.

No need to actually read any Google articles by Ron Amadeo. They are all cut from the same smug, snarky dismissive cloth. Ars can and should try harder.

I did enjoy his lengthy article on the history and debacle of Google's many chat systems: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/08/a-decade-and-a-half-...

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#72

Post by hnisforfascists »

kyrra wrote: post #20
Springtime wrote: post #18

I'm a bit puzzled by the tone of the piece in that the author frames it as a critique yet also points out how much easier it is to repair. I was anticipating some literal 2.5" SSD-like empty husk.

He tends to write only negative things about Google. So it's par for the course.

[dead]

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#73

Post by ClumsyPilot »

ithkuil wrote: post #69
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what is 'less dense' component, is the battery full of air?

No, my point is that the battery has the density it has. I mean, you have a weigh budget, you have cost budget, you have a width/height budget, you also have a thickness budget chosen for many reason including the material the case is made of (which is determined by your cost budget); you take all those things into account and if it turns out your component have the density they have, it may just happen that you have…

by that logic there is no such thing as bad product, they just took different tradeoffs.

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#74

Post by ithkuil »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #73
ithkuil wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, my point is that the battery has the density it has. I mean, you have a weigh budget, you have cost budget, you have a width/height budget, you also have a thickness budget chosen for many reason including the material the case is made of (which is determined by your cost budget); you take all those things into account and if it turns out your component have the density they have, it may just happen that you have…

by that logic there is no such thing as bad product, they just took different tradeoffs.

there are different ways a product can be bad:

1. it could have had good requirements but badly executed 2. the chosen requirements could be bad and despite flawless execution the product is crap

I just think that the quantity of empty space inside of the encasement, is not a reason to label something a bad product. It makes no difference to the end user except for the "feeling" that something could have been added to it. But as I said, the moment you add something into that empty space you make the device heavier and thus perhaps you turn an otherwise good product into a bad product because it's too heavy.

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#75

Post by brudgers »

Etheryte wrote: post #13
pohl wrote: post #9

Isn’t the reason for the empty space just because it’s a tablet — by which I mean that the dimensions are determined by a large screen? Phones are dense inside because they have to be small.

I mean, if you have space left over you could just pack it with more battery? For example if we look at the iPad [0], there is some empty space inside, but mostly it's all battery. [0] https://youtu.be/uCYUZQGjm8I?si=D-fpaRSSCkbOdReo&t=75

Cooling.

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#76

Post by kibwen »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #68
kibwen wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This question strikes me as bizarre. What is the causal relationship between the goodness of a tablet and what its inside looks like?

imagine someone wrote something this silly abour a car - "what is the casual relatio ship between how the performance of the car and what it looks lile under the whood? So what if the engine is a mess, surely thst does not affect how it drives"?

There's nothing that's a mess about the inside of this tablet, it's just not filled to the brim with stuff that it doesn't need. That's normal, good design.

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#77

Post by kibwen »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #66
itsoktocry wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could, but that adds weight and cost.

And what am I paying for, an empty shell?

You're paying for a tablet based on the utility that it gives you. If we could shrink every component except for the screen down to the size of a pin head, then, yeah, you'd be paying for a mostly empty shell, and that's not a problem in the slightest.

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#78

Post by itsoktocry »

jwells89 wrote: post #62
itsoktocry wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic, but: I bought a Pixel Tablet. It is good. The speaker/charger thing actually pretty useful (I have it on my desk as another screen, sound is decent). I've owned a few Android tablets. This has been the best. They never feel as good as an iPad, but that's normal; hard to beat Apple there. But I have no desire to get back into the Apple ecosystem, I now actively avoid it.

The frustrating thing is that Google has made a tablet that had iPad-level or very close fit and finish, and that was the Pixel C. I had one. It felt nice to use. The problem with that tablet is that the software was awful, causing issues with accidental touch rejection, WiFi flakiness, somewhat frequent hard crashing, etc. They had the hardware, all they had to do was fix the software. Instead they quit making Andro…

>Instead they quit making Android tablets until the subject of this article was released.

Which is why I jumped on the Pixel Tablet when it came out. The Android tablet scene kinda sucks. I guess the Samsungs are good, but I'm not interested in their custom OS bloat and they're also pricey.

Again, the iPad is still the king here, no doubt. But this tablet is the best Android one I've used.

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#79

Post by itsoktocry »

37521804 wrote: post #61
itsoktocry wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could, but that adds weight and cost.

The basic iPad costs $449 and the Pixel Tablet costs $499. The iPad weighs less than the Pixel tablet, 477g to 493g. The iPad battery is 28.6Wh and the Pixel Tablet has a 27Wh battery. I don't particularly care that the insides are 'emptier' in the Pixel Tablet, but to say they didn't do something because of weight or cost doesn't really appear to have any bearing considering it's the heavier, more expensive tablet.

>but to say they didn't do something because of weight or cost doesn't really appear to have any bearing considering it's the heavier, more expensive tablet.

So they should have made it heavier and more expensive? I don't understand your argument.

Re: The Pixel Tablet is just a few spare parts in a half-empty body

#80

Post by Shish2k »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #68
kibwen wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This question strikes me as bizarre. What is the causal relationship between the goodness of a tablet and what its inside looks like?

imagine someone wrote something this silly abour a car - "what is the casual relatio ship between how the performance of the car and what it looks lile under the whood? So what if the engine is a mess, surely thst does not affect how it drives"?

I opened up the hood of a car once and there was loads of empty space inside there. Why are they not filling up every cubic inch of the engine compartment with more pistons, or making the compartment water-tight and then filling it with even more petrol to increase the car’s range? Admittedly I don’t know a single thing about car design, but surely all of that empty space is an indicator of poor design right?
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