PiPO is really full of surprises. This thing just pops-out in the middle of nowhere bring vast hardware and software improvements on the rest of 7" and 8" China MID Tablets in the market. Honestly, what I've felt is like; "$h!+, I should have wait for this instead of buying that". I've always been a fan of 7" Tablets because of their portability and lightness unlike those 9.7" and 10.1" which I understand serves different purpose. Anyway, I'm still in-love with my PiPO U1 with JellyBean 4.1.1 OS installed because of its stability (hardware and software). However, If given chance to get another tablet, I'll definitely buy PiPO Smart-S2 because of several new improvements which we will discuss later on.
You can order PiPO Smart-S2 DualCore 8" IPS Tablet at Pandawill.com for amazingly low price of US$135.99 which includes a world-wide free shipping.
This tablet offers almost exactly the same specification the PiPO Max-M1 has like 1.6GHz DualCore RK3066 processor paired with 250MHz QuadCore Mali400 graphics, a built-in Bluetooth 2.0, a 1GB of DDR3 RAM and 16GB of Storage which is pretty common to PiPO Tablets and most other Tablet brands except it is an 8" Screen instead of 9.7 and has 5000mAh Battery which suppose to last 7 hours of continuous use and is a really-really great unlike what we've seen on PiPO UP-U1's 3250mAh Battery. So now, smaller Tablet enthusiast like me can now enjoy having good time playing intensive 3D games and or doing everyday stuff without worrying too much about the battery life and of-course about stability of the tablet in both hardware and JellyBean 4.1.1 OS (thanks to PiPO's awesome Firmware Support).
PiPO chose the regular screen resolution that other 8" China MID Tablet offers, an 8" 4:3 resolution which makes me a little-bit sad as I really do not understand why 4:3 ratio is still essential when most of things now are in 16:9 or 16:10 wide. Fortunately it isn't just a plain LED-LCD, PiPO also lets their users enjoy the rich-colorful images produced by the IPS screen as-well. A feature that some 8" China MID Tablet brands failed to offer. Just behind the Scratch Resist glass screen, located on the top-left-corner of the Tablet's bezel is the 0.3MP Front Facing Camera. Not as good as others but this is pretty standard to most. Meh, good-enough for Video Calls.
On the right-side we can notice the tablet edge design that PiPO introduced also on their recent tablets like PiPO M2 and M3. I really do not like this kind of design, for me it loses some kind of elegant appearance factor when is compared to smooth-round edges of other tablets. Well, at-least it has all the necessary Interface Ports that a users would need. From the bottom to top; we have the Power Button, mini-HDMI port, Wall Charger port, 3.5mm Audio port, mini-USB port, micro-SDCard slot (32GB microSDCard support), and a standard USB-OTG port. there are two small holes as-well which will probably one for Reset hole and one for Mic hole.
On the right-top-side corner, there is nothing really except again on the design where the Volume Rockers and Menu/Back Buttons are placed. And this is kinda sad, it doesn't just make the tablet to look thicker. The PiPO Smart-S2 thickness measures 13mm, a 1.5mm ~ 2mm thicker than its brothers PiPO Max-M2 and Max-M3. We don't know if this is correct but if it is, its really really sad. This is probably due to quite large RK3066 PCB (Printed Circuit Board) or the huge 5000mAh Battery. At-least it weighs less than half kilogram, 486grams to be exact. Something that won't really make you hurt in long/frequent use.
The back shell uses a Plastic material which is I'd rather choose instead of scratch magnet coated aluminum. There is some kind of amusing simple design made by PiPO here, I don't know how to explain but it made me; "well, that's kinda new" (the white dot in the center I believe is just an photo defect, hopefully. lol). Placed on the middle-top a 2.0MP Rear Facing Camera. Yes, you are right. No LED Flash in there. It'll be useful capturing events in your day-light life but don't expect picture perfect photos. On the right-corner of the back is the Mono-firing Loudspeaker which we hope loud enough and not shy at all in producing good quality sounds, and the PiPO markings.
The Performance of this Tablet would be or should be comparable to PiPO U1's performance or maybe a little bit higher because PiPO Smart-S2 actually uses lower resolution than PiPO UP-U1. If you visit some Android Tablet forums like Slatedroid.com and AndroidTablets.com, most of PiPO devices users are happy to their Tablets because of fewer bugs and a stable JellyBean 4.1.1 OS. Wi-Fi connections are doing good, there are some some reports of dead pixels on screen and washed screen on early batches of PiPO U1 and maybe on PiPO M1 but on recent batches produced they just disappear (kudos to PiPO).
The Cons:
The Cons:
- Tablet Thickness and Edge Design - this is almost out of specs if we talk about latest Tablet thickness and Smooth round-edge design. PiPO should be able to find ways on how to prevent making Tablets with such build designs. Almost everyone on the market is racing on thinnest Tablets, PiPO should participate to that race as-well.
- 4:3 ratio Screen Resolution - Some users might not consider this as a CONS, but probably most of us will do. On everyday we do like watching HD Movies, 16:9 or 16:10 widescreen resolution is a must. I really hope PiPO Smart-S2 had 1280x800px or even 1024x600px wide resolution instead of 1024x768.
Overall, PiPO Smart-S2 DualCore 8" IPS Tablet is still a good buy and absolutely worth to buy. It'll definitely fix the hole that PiPO U1 made on Smaller Screen Size segment (7"/8") because of its Small Battery Capacity. With PiPO Smart-S2's 5000mAh, it'll definitely create a new challenge to other competitor.
