Best Tablet?

Hey guys,

I really want to get a tablet and have about 400 dollars to spend. I'm leaning towards the samsung galaxy tab s 8.4 but I wanted some different opinions. I also weighed in the Nvidia shield tablet greatly because of the gaming performance but it's rather bulky and geared towards serious gaming whereas I just want to run games off the android app store (which I heard the tegra k1 isn't really meant for). I also considered the nexus 9 with the tegra k1 but due to the lack of microSD card slot I quickly ruled that out. Likewise, I ruled out the iPad line for the price tag and no card slot although it would go well with my mac. I don't have a smartphone so continuity would not matter although I do have a macbook pro. If any of you have a samsung galaxy tab s 8.4, please let me know with your experience and if there are other tablets, please let me know. Thanks in advance!!

P.S. I heard the galaxy tab s has a beautiful screen but lags sometimes so I would like to know about the performance of the galaxy tab s 8.4 especially while gaming

You can pick up a 32gb iPad Mini 2 for $350, which is the same price as the 16GB Galaxy Tab S 8.4. I don't really see anything outside of the iPad line worth buying besides the Nexus line or the Shield Tablet.

Wait... so is the samsung tab s 8.4 not good? I thought the reviews and features were really good and I love apple products but I feel they are more overpriced and don't include microSD. Also, I guess I kinda want to try the android platform. In addition, is the shield tablet good? I would prob only use it for games from the play store but I heard that most apps can't take advantage of the tegra k1. Thanks a lot for the response!

can apps from the store run well? also, is the screen good enough, and is the build quality good?

Depends on what you plan on doing with it.

I normally recommend a Nexus tablet because of hackability.

The x86 especially the i3s and above are wonderfully hackable and can run real software. And you could put Android x86 on it or full Linux.

Since you already have some Apple stuff an used/refurbished iPad may not be a bad idea. Apple stuff does play very nicely together.

 If it was out, I would say the Jolla Tablet. It has an x86 processor 1440 screen SD card support. It runs full Linux and can run Android apps.

I bought myself a Nvidia Shield Tablet for Christmas (my 2012 Nexus 7 was completely unusable after the Lollipop uodate). 

I like it a lot. I only games I play are Stick Cricket and Pinball from the android store though. 

I like the stylus, it works very well. Everything is extremely smooth. But that K1 seems to really like draining the battery. 

Honestly after dealing with anything Samsung id rather deal with an Apple product.  Touchwiz is garbage and so is their love of hardware buttons.  They are over priced and mediocre.  A good semi cheap tablet I would go for is either a Nexus 9/Nexus 7.  Since you want expandable storage though your SOL for the nexus line.  You dont do much gaming on it other than facebook like games.  So on all of that i would suggest either what Taco Bell said with the Jolla tablet or What i think is a semi decent tablet for the money and what you would do with it an LG G Pad 8.3 Google Play Edition.  Just my two cents :)

I have the 2013 Nexus 7 from ASUS and I love it. You can grab it for $250 or less on Amazon

I have the 2013 Nexus 7 from ASUS and I love it. You can grab it for $250 or less on Amazon

How about a Chinese Windows tablet? This has full fledged Windows 8.1, not RT. The CPU is comparable to a Snapdragon 800/801, the screen is IPS and highres, it has enough storage and USB OTG. Plus, it's cheap. It can even run Rise of Nations. Battery life isn't great, but for this price you should just buy a Xiaomi Powerbank 16000MAh with it. 

Not to be snide but I could throw around 'first-party' tablets all day within the price range. All completely and some even more capable, and above all, proven.

Asus Transformer

Toshiba Encore 2

HP Stream 8

Dell Venue 8 Pro

Unfortunately the concept of full windows on a tablet just hasn't been perfected yet. It's not the tablets, it's windows, for what it is, almost anything now a day can be done on an android tablet in a much friendlier experience.

I would absolutely recommend the the Dell Venue 8 7840, that thing is actually pretty damn cool. First tablet in a long while to impress me. However gimmicky, it is the 'worlds thinnest tablet' which makes it very easy to handle. The 2560x1600 OLED screen looks stupidly good as well as the bonus of front facing speakers and 3D camera on the rear. To wrap it all up is that it's running nearly stock android, which means really quick updates and smooth experience.