Salop Matt Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 So one for the tech guys and girls....... For the last 8ish years we have used a Ipad 2 & HP Laptop (90% + use on the IPad2) We use them for our internet browsing an you-tube watching. But the Laptop has pegged it and the Ipad is slow and the battery life isnt what it once was. We have 100meg broadband but the IPad2 only has 2ghz wifi receiver so cant make use of the 100meg speed available. So we are now looking for a second tablet, the ipad has been excellent and trouble free. But a new Ipad will cost us a fortune so we have almost ruled that out so that leaves androids. What android do folk rate and recommend that`s sub £200 with 5ghz wifi ? We have spotted the Huawei T3 10" with 16gb of storage, does anyone have one and what do they think of it? Also what do you use / recommend for anti-virus protection (never used anything on the ipad) ? TIA Matt Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steve_b_wales Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 I have a Lenovo Tab 10 which is excellent. Not sure of what ghz wifi but I've had no trouble with it, at home and when away on holidays abroad. I expanded the memory on it too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strimmer_13 Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 I've had huawei phones (mate 7) and my dad has a huawei tablet (free on his vodafone contract) about 2-3 years ago. His was a 9" I think and I like it. So does he. I love them but I've no idea what speed they run at, but hand on heart I had a ipad as well at the time and for just going on the net I'd use the ipad. Also the operating system is very different than other androids eg Samsung, Sony, ect and takes a while too get used to. The samsung tablet 10.1 is rapid and has a good screen maybe that's a option as well Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loriusgarrulus Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 I have a Huawei T1 8" tablet/phone on Android. I am very pleased with it. It was £120 from EE on payg. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rewulf Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 2 hours ago, strimmer_13 said: The samsung tablet 10.1 is rapid and has a good screen maybe that's a option as well +1 bought one at Xmas, Tab A 10.1 Fast,great screen, and brilliant battery life, £180 Very happy with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nial Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 If it's mostly for browsing have a look at Chromebooks. Almost instantly on, almost as fast as the iPad but has a keyboard which is really useful a lot of the time, battery life of 10 hours (and this is about right). I bought a cheap one a year or so ago and it's one of those things I have which if it broke I'd immediately go out and replace (or buy a better one). I'm sure the newer ones do 5Ghz wifi, there should be a few options sub £200. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junglebert Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 The 2.4ghz WiFi on your iPad isn’t linked to the 100mb speed of your broadband, a 2.4ghz device can make full use of any internet connection. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
figgy Posted January 25, 2018 Report Share Posted January 25, 2018 Have a look at the new crop of Chromebooks you can fold them 180 degrees and use in tablet mode or use as like a laptop, new android apps interface and very fast browsing and watching of movies videos online. Will be updating the one my wife uses in near future as the I pad does not see the light of day anymore. She uses chrome across all devices and has gmail on her iPhone and can still go google on it to access everything. My daughter is a chrome fan too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevo_m Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 Look for a second hand IPad Air. Had mine since they came out and still works perfectly. Dual band, so you can use the 5ghz Wi-fi for faster speeds. Also worth waiting for the new iOS 11.3 where they will stop throttling the iPad, and get the battery upgraded. You’ll regret moving to Android if you’re used to Apple reliability!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
muncher Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 I'm after one but not very teck savy I want to be able to use word documents but I can't find out if that can be done on these tablets? Anyone know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
martyn2233 Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 How about an Amazon firehd 10 https://m.johnlewis.com/new-amazon-fire-hd-10-tablet-with-alexa-hands-free-quad-core-fire-os-10-1-full-hd-wi-fi-32gb-with-special-offers/p3337450?sku=237166879&s_kwcid=2dx92700024311620642&tmad=c&tmcampid=2&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIovzssqz12AIVQhMbCh11DQZMEAQYAyABEgJaHfD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Salop Matt Posted January 26, 2018 Author Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 12 hours ago, junglebert said: The 2.4ghz WiFi on your iPad isn’t linked to the 100mb speed of your broadband, a 2.4ghz device can make full use of any internet connection. The Virgin engineer came to sort or broad band and both his personal phone a Iphone 8 and his work Samsung Note both on speed tests gave 100 meg. Hard wired via ethanet cable so did the laptop we borrowed. Yet our Ipad 2, My 8 week old Huawei P8 lite and the wife's Samsung J5 2017 all only got 25 meg. The engineers two phones had 5ghz wifi but mine and the wife's phones don`t. From what I've read online this info is correct that 5GHZ will give you better speeds but at closer distances. https://support.stuff-fibre.co.nz/hc/en-us/articles/226438147-What-is-the-difference-between-2-4-GHz-and-5-GHz- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rewulf Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 13 minutes ago, salop sniper said: The Virgin engineer came to sort or broad band and both his personal phone a Iphone 8 and his work Samsung Note both on speed tests gave 100 meg. Hard wired via ethanet cable so did the laptop we borrowed. Yet our Ipad 2, My 8 week old Huawei P8 lite and the wife's Samsung J5 2017 all only got 25 meg. The engineers two phones had 5ghz wifi but mine and the wife's phones don`t. From what I've read online this info is correct that 5GHZ will give you better speeds but at closer distances. https://support.stuff-fibre.co.nz/hc/en-us/articles/226438147-What-is-the-difference-between-2-4-GHz-and-5-GHz- Im not positive, but I dont think thats to do with the wifi frequency. Its more about throttling within the phone or tablet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
screamingdead Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 Might be worth changing the channel that the 2.4GHz wireless network uses. You can get interference from neighbouring networks if they're all on the same channel. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junglebert Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 That's nothing to do with the 2.4/5GHZ factor, 2.4ghz can operate at up to 600mb, so your 100mb won't stretch it, the difference between the two frequencies (and don't forget, they're frequencies, not speeds) comes into play when you have congested networks, at home I have about 25 devices using wifi, so I split them between the two frequencies. The distance thing is half(ish) right, 2.4ghz signals propagate over a longer range than 5ghz, but there's not much in it. 1 minute ago, screamingdead said: Might be worth changing the channel that the 2.4GHz wireless network uses. You can get interference from neighbouring networks if they're all on the same channel. Good point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grrclark Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 As above, your problem with wifi speeds will be due to congestion rather than the frequency. Within each frequency range there is a number of channels that can be used. To help understand imagine a sheet of blank A4 paper, that is the frequency range, now draw lines to split the paper into 14 equal sized columns, those are the channels. If everything is being squeezed into 1 column then you run out of space, albeit the frequency range has plenty capacity left overall. Also the more devices using that space there is more wifi chatter and much more risk that messages get lost or collided with in the noise, so devices slow down to a speed where they have the least amount of interruption. Slow, but reliable is better than fast and flakey. you can download apps for your ipad that will show you what channels are being used and how much, then you can then manually set the channel that has the greatest headroom. It is possible that your wifi router will also be able to give you that info, but you will need to logon to that to find out. If you do manually set a channel then choose 1,6 or 11. Lots of dull reasons why due to channel aggregation, but shall spare you. Google will be your friend to help you investigate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junglebert Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 If you can stretch to £299, you can get a refurb iPad Air 2 direct from Apple with a full warranty. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Salop Matt Posted January 26, 2018 Author Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 I hear what you’re saying folks. BUT ……I don’t believe congestion is an issue as when I did my speed tests I was stood next to the virgin engineer, the tests were 30seconds apart. Every time he got 98meg to - 117meg, every time on our above named devices we got 25-35 meg. Even when we did a speed test on his phone at the same time as I did one on my phone he still got 91meg and I got 5meg. Same network, same time two different results. We did this maybe 10-20 times and every time the same result, the only difference was his phones vs ours. Our router is kicking out 100meg, he could receive and use it but we could only get a third of it. He was on 5ghz and our phones IPAD wouldn’t detect / receive 5ghz. Finger crossed we will have a new tablet this Sunday with 5ghz wifi and we can test the theory! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
figgy Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 Muncher you can use Microsoft mobile office or some such similar name on mobile devices or use it online for free. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grrclark Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 5GHz will make a difference as that space will not be congested. Go onto your broadband router and set the 2.4GHz channel to 9 and not auto. Then try your speed tests again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
muncher Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 14 minutes ago, figgy said: Muncher you can use Microsoft mobile office or some such similar name on mobile devices or use it online for free. Does that mean I can get the Lenovo tablet and do some basic documents on words then? Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
screamingdead Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 1 hour ago, salop sniper said: I hear what you’re saying folks. BUT ……I don’t believe congestion is an issue as when I did my speed tests I was stood next to the virgin engineer, the tests were 30seconds apart. Every time he got 98meg to - 117meg, every time on our above named devices we got 25-35 meg. Even when we did a speed test on his phone at the same time as I did one on my phone he still got 91meg and I got 5meg. Same network, same time two different results. We did this maybe 10-20 times and every time the same result, the only difference was his phones vs ours. Our router is kicking out 100meg, he could receive and use it but we could only get a third of it. He was on 5ghz and our phones IPAD wouldn’t detect / receive 5ghz. Finger crossed we will have a new tablet this Sunday with 5ghz wifi and we can test the theory! 5GHz uses different channels from 2.4GHz and its probable that it's not as congested as the 2.4GHz wireless. As a first step I would download a wifi analyzer from Google app store on your P8 and see what networks are using what channels. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevo_m Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 This is a good example to show the speed differences. I’ve always found 5ghz much faster than 2.4 and that’s down to the available bandwidth for that frequency. https://support.stuff-fibre.co.nz/hc/en-us/articles/226438147-What-is-the-difference-between-2-4-GHz-and-5-GHz- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
figgy Posted January 26, 2018 Report Share Posted January 26, 2018 (edited) 6 hours ago, muncher said: Does that mean I can get the Lenovo tablet and do some basic documents on words then? Cheers Yes look online it’s free for home use on mobile devices and tablets and can be downloaded as apps for iOS android and Windows 10 devices. Edited January 26, 2018 by figgy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Salop Matt Posted January 27, 2018 Author Report Share Posted January 27, 2018 Right here I am posting form our new Samsung Tab A with 5gz WiFi....... Speed test was the first thing we did and...... 109meg download threw the WiFi So our engineer was correct, the higher speeds is accessed via 5ghz. Really happy now with both the Tab A & 5ghz 100meg WiFi speed. ATB Matt Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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