Samsung's Galaxy TabPro S is thin, powerful and ready to work

If you look at Samsung’s new TabPro S and think, “a Surface pro knock-off,” you’re not looking in the right direction. Samsung modeled this tablet/PC hybrid on Apple’s brand new, giant iPad Pro.

Sure the TabPro S runs Windows 10 and has a detachable keyboard/screen cover, but the core chassis has more in common with the iPad Pro than it does Microsoft’s Surface Pro 4. Both have exactly two ports. The Surface Pro has a display Port, USB, a mini display port and a micro SD card slot. And while the Surface Pro 4 uses a built in, fully adjustable kickstand, the iPad Pro and TabPro S both use folding keyboard covers to prop them up.

I am, admittedly a big fan of the Surface Pro 4 and I really like the iPad Pro. Now I realize that I like almost anything that can offer me true laptop-level productivity in an ultralight form factor. The Samsung Galaxy TabPro S fits that bill.

The Intel Core M3-sporting, $899.99 system is not as attractive as the iPad Pro and the included (!) keyboard doesn’t have the same great chicklet keys, as large a trackpad or type feel as the Surface Type cover, but it generally acquits itself nicely in all areas.
Good Looks and lapability

The 12-inch tablet is slightly smaller than the iPad Pro, but roughly equal to the Surface Pro 4. It weighs a pound and a half without the screen cover, which means it has some heft, but is also roughly equivalent to the iPad Pro (1.53 lbs., for the TabPro S and 1.57 lbs. for the iPad Pro). The TabPro S can feel a little heavier because that weight is squeezed into a smaller frame. That feeling becomes more pronounced when you attach the keyboard cover which wraps around both sides of the device. Apple iPad Pro folds the keyboard under one side of the cover.

Screen wise, the Samsung Galaxy TabPro S features the first Super AMOLED on a Windows 10 tablet. At 2160 X 1440, it’s super sharp and impressively bright, though, both the Surface Pro 4 (2736 x 1824) and iPad Pro (2732 x 2048) offer higher resolutions. That screen technology let Samsung make the TabPro S even thinner than the Surface Pro 4, which uses LCD technology, and slightly thinner (less than a millimeter) than the iPad Pro. For better or worse that means there is no standard USB port.

Instead, it has a USB-C port that you’ll use for charging and data. If you’re like virtually everyone I know, you’ll have to buy a USB-C-to-USB adapter. I found one from Satechi and even though the system said it didn't recognize the USB device, it worked just fine.

Article and image source from Mashable.