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Android Tablet Recommendations?

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11-02-2022 02:42 PM
eSpatiallyNewYork
New Contributor

Do any Survey123 users have any recommendations on specific Android tablets to use?

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2 Replies
DougBrowning
MVP Esteemed Contributor

Samsung is really the only major tablet maker now.  Also they almost always have a GPS chip where many off brands do not. Still trying to get one to test but I think the new Active Tab 4 Pro could be a winner.  It has dual band GPS, swappable batteries, can run on no battery at all when plugged in, fully rugged,  SD card, 5G, and I think they are saying 4 years of updates but cant find it.

Really want to test the dual band but still waiting to get one.

Looking to be around $650 so not bad.  We used to get them like a year old and then they are cheap.  Pretty much anything out there will be fast enough now.  If it is for a government then we tend to but good ones since they have to last.  Private companies we buy cheaper ones and then they are basically disposable.

hope that helps

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AndyMcClary
Regular Contributor

TLDR - I agree with Doug- just use a Samsung. If you're interested in other options besides a Samsung though, we've also used Mesa 3s from Juniper Systems and TDC 600s from Trimble. We've been using both these devices for about a year doing field work in remote locations and in and around water so we've definitely tested the impact and water resistance.

The Mesa 3s have worked well for us but are very pricy (~2,400$). They are bulkier but so far seem sturdier than the Samsung tablets we've used. Only worth it if you're expecting them to get wet and knocked around frequently or are remote enough that a tablet going  down is a major issue.

The TDC 600s (~800$) are more like sturdy big smartphones or small tablets but the size works well for our surveys. However, they're not all that robust and more importantly we've had major technical difficulties - periodic crashing when switching between Field Maps and Survey123 and a Survey123 update that completely broke the GPS functionality in S123: 

https://community.esri.com/t5/arcgis-survey123-questions/survey123-not-connecting-to-trimble-gps/m-p...

I wish I could recommend them because our field crews loved them right up until they started crashing and not connecting to GPS but there have just been too many issues. The new 3.16 update seems to have fixed the problems but I'm still wary.