Google's Nexus 7 is the hottest new tablet around. The tablet has a 1.3GHz Nvidia Tegra 3 quad-core processor plus 1GB of RAM. With a quad core processor, the Nexus 7 is now one of the most powerful tablets and it only costs $249 (16GB version).

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The Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 (7-inch version) is the same price as the Google Nexus 7's 16GB model. Even though it only has 8GB of internal memory (there are versions with more), it has a microSD slot which makes all the difference; it is easy to add 32GB more storage. Let's take a closer look at both of these tablets.

Screen

The Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 features a WSVGA display with a resolution of 1024×600, while the Nexus 7 boasts an IPS display with a resolution of 1280×800. Samsung usually makes the best displays, but dropped the ball with this one. The display on the Nexus 7 is excellent, but lacks the color saturation of other tablets, especially from Samsung. Still, the Nexus 7 gives you a great screen for a low price.


At first glance, it appears that Samsung might have dropped the ball with this category too since it only has a 1GHZ dual-core processor. Still, everything runs smoothly and Samsung's integration of its own software with Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) is well done. Even though the Nexus 7 doesn't really feel like it is running on a quad-core processor, it is easily faster than the Galaxy Tab 2.

The Nexus 7 is the first tablet that comes with Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean). Even though the learning curve is more difficult, Jelly Bean is far more tablet friendly than Ice Cream Sandwich. iPad users might be confused with Jelly Bean at first, but they may even prefer Jelly Bean to Apple's iOS after a few hours since it is far more customizable.