Asus Zenpad 8.0 Review: A Perfect Performer

After dominating with its prolific ZenFone series, Asus, the famous tech-giant is set to mark its sway in the world of tablets as well. The company has already unleashed some mind-boggling beauties under its ZenPad branding, and is now planning to take on leading players with the all new ZenPad 8.0 affordable yet premium tablet!

In terms of look and feel, the new ZenPad 8.0 continues exactly from where its predecessors left off. The device incorporates a brilliant form-factor, and unifies some stupendous hardware-software elements with a brilliant battery life. On whole, it aims on creating a ZenFone like experience but with a larger footprint. So, how far Asus has been able to lure tablet buyers with the new ZenPad 8.0? We gave an in-depth review on this tablet, and here’s what we have to say about it:

Design and Build Quality

There’s no pointing asking! Asus has always been good with the design of its devices, and even this time, the company has created a perfect masterpiece with an ideal form-factor. The new ZenPad 8.0 looks stunning from every angle and flaunts a nice look with narrow bezels and a thin metallic strip running around the screen. It makes a great first impression and looks like a metal built tablet, but when you’ll get close enough, you’ll find out that the frame and removable back panel are made meticulously from plastic. The ports on the top, and power and volume buttons on the right are easy to reach out as well. On whole, the sleek profile and leather like back of this handset makes up a nice package, and is fairly comfortable to hold and carry!

Display and Visual Experience

Asus ZenPad 8.0 gives a good display experience, but on paper, it’s not a treat for gamers and movie-buffs. The tablet incorporates a screen-resolution of 1280 x 800-pixels, which lacks detail and fails to a strong impression outdoors. At this price, a full-HD display with an aspect ratio of 16:9 would have made more sense, but since, the pixel count is quite less here, users will have to make do with reduced pixel density watching movies or playing games! Colours, brightness and viewing angles are not at par with players like MiPad and others.

Performance and Hardware specs

Under the hood, Asus ZenPad 8.0 packs enormous power with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 615 Octa-core SoC clocked at 1.4Ghz, paired with 2GB RAM. The top-specd tablet stands out in the category, and gives slick performance with 16 gigs of inbuilt memory for keeping a humongous selection of apps, files, and music.

In our testing, the ZenPad 8.0 was at par with several Snapdragon 615 equipped smartphones. The battery-efficient ZenUI handled games and apps with perfection, and catered normal and heavy usage requirements without any lags or thermal issues. Occasionally, the tablet did heat up while running on Asphalt 8, but it is not a major concern as the overall performance of the device is exactly similar to what similarly specs devices have on offer.

Software and OS

On the software side, ZenPad 8.0 runs Android 5.0 Lollipop based ZenUI with a bunch of new features and tweaks. The interface of this tablet is exactly what ZenFone’s have on offer, but along with the good stuff comes the “bad” as well. From “bad” we mean, the amount of bloatware on this device is incredibly high. Though the apps are classified and sorted into groups, uninstalling them at the first place will be quite a task to deal with. In a nutshell, the ZenUI is quite good, but it still needs several improvements from Asus!

Camera Output

Though not very impressive, the camera setup of ZenPad 8.0 is nearly at par with several budget players rolling in the market. The main camera of the device is an 8-megapixel snapper, while the front-facing camera is a 2-megapixel shooter. They both give decent images in daylight conditions, but under lowlight, they fail quite badly.

The rear camera is a decent performer with plenty of modes and 1080p video recording, but the front cam is barely acceptable as selfie camera. It produces dull images with excessive noise, and is just a backup for small video chats.

Battery Backup

Housing a humongous 4,000 mAh battery, Asus ZenPad 8.0 will give you at least 12 hours of juice for an entire day of work and play. Whether you’re surfing on the web or playing a high-definition video, the battery of this device will run comfortably throughout the day. Though after inserting a SIM card, it’ll a little quicker, the overall performance will get you through the day without any snag or performance issue.

Added Accessories

The additional Audio Cover which we didn’t get to review due to product wasn’t working which is a protective cover and add-on speaker bundled with this tablet should connect seamlessly via connector pins that take charge of the DTS speaker. It adds some weight into the device and gives the feel of a thin laptop, instead of a plastic built tablet. Overall, the Audio cover brings a premium look and feel to ZenPad 8.0, and gives an amazing music experience with 5.1-channel surround sound audio!

Pricing and Availability

Asus ZenPad 8.0 is sold exclusively via Flipkart.com at a price tag of Rs. 14,999. It’s an enticing deal for a nicely specd budget tablet, but if you’re a movie-buff and want more in the entire package, you can go for the Audio Cover, which is sold separately for an additional Rs. 3,000 over the original price tag of the Tablet.

Verdict

With new players coming in, Asus ZenPad 8.0 makes a perfect package for budget buyers in India. The power-packed beauty from Asus performs really well and takes a dig straight against renowned budget players rolling in the market. It has downsides as well, but overall, it’s a fairly impressive package when you add the Audio Cover for an outstanding sound experience, which is barely seen in the highly competitive budget market. The display is quite a disappointment but other features are right on the money!

Asus ZenPad 8.0 Performance Test Pictures:

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