Tablet camera tests: iPad 2 vs. Motorola Xoom vs. Samsung Galaxy Tab
Odds are, if you ask anyone waiting in line for an iPad 2, they'll list plenty of reasons why they're lusting after Apple's latest camera-equipped tablet. — According to our lab tests, image quality isn't going to be one of them.
Context & Ripple Effects
Motorola positioned its Xoom as the first credible iPad challenger when it launched in February, and by early March the field had a four-way spec sheet with HP's TouchPad and BlackBerry's PlayBook also on it (the tale-of-the-tape comparison). Macworld's new lab tests cut through that paper war: on the cameras Apple added to the iPad 2, the measured winner is not the market leader — the Xoom and Galaxy Tab both produce better images.
The timing sharpens the point. Piper Jaffray reports the iPad 2 is completely sold out days after launch, so Apple is losing no sales to the camera gap — evidence that in this category, lab-tested component quality and purchase decisions are running on separate tracks.
First-order effects
- iPad 2 buyers get rear- and front-facing cameras that test below what Motorola and Samsung ship, giving both rivals a concrete, measurable talking point against the market leader.
- Apple faces no immediate commercial cost: the sell-out reported by Piper Jaffray means demand is absorbing the hardware criticism without friction.
Second-order effects
- Camera image quality joins display and thickness as the axes Motorola and Samsung can differentiate on, pushing their next tablets toward spec-first positioning rather than price cuts.
- Review-driven comparisons gain weight as the tiebreaker: when the leader's components test worse, outlets' bench tests become the main neutral ground where challengers can claim wins.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, tablet competition splits into two games: Android vendors competing on measurable hardware superiority while Apple competes on integrated software — consistent with lab results showing iMovie on the iPad 2 editing and encoding video faster than MacBook Pros.
- Lab-test culture around tablets hardens into an industry institution, with camera and display benchmarks becoming standard procurement-style evaluations that every subsequent generation must clear.
The trend: Tablet competition is bifurcating between Android vendors racing on measured component quality and Apple winning on ecosystem integration despite trailing hardware specs.