You can't miss the Samsung Galaxy View. As a tablet, it's huge. As a laptop, it's just about right. And, as a TV, it's too small.
Despite its identity crisis, the reviews for the View are in, and once the novelty of this new product type wears off, being a jack of all trades makes the View a master of none.
The Galaxy View's best shot at being a worthwhile product is in its size. The display maxes out at 18.4-inches (almost half a foot larger than Apple's largest tablet, the iPad Pro, with a 12.9-inch screen). Unfortunately, it looks like Samsung just slapped a big screen on the device and expected it to stand on its own, simply by its sheer size alone.
It does, though – stand on its own. Literally. The Galaxy View comes with a non-adjustable, non-removable kickstand at the back so it can be set up on a desk or counter. But its form doesn't assist in how the device would actually function in the hands of a regular consumer.
"The fact that the stand can't be removed means that it's always flapping around, adding bulk and threatening to trap our fingers whenever we wanted to move the device around," observes James Archer of the Inquirer.
Unlike the premium metal builds of Samsung's smartphones, the View is constructed in a style reminiscent of the Korean conglomerate's former cheap-feeling plastic design. Even its screen, though quite large, is also not up to today's standards with a low pixel density of 119ppi on a 1,920x1,080 resolution display.
In fact, "typing on the screen is incredibly awkward" and that one could "buy a 32-inch 1080p smart TV from Vizio for about $250 and have a much better and cheaper experience," says Nathan Ingraham of Engadget.
On a positive note, the Galaxy View may not be the most powerful tablet on the market, but its internals are solid enough to browse the web and watch videos on it. That is what it seems to be perfectly suited for anyway.
Also, Android runs speedily enough on the device with a unique homepage "filled with all your streaming TV viewing options, things like Netflix and the ABC app and Hulu," Ebenezer Samuel of the NY Daily News shares.
In the end, "For better or worse, there's no other tablet like this," Chris Welch puts it best in his review for The Verge with a barely passable score of 6.3 for the Galaxy View.
