Nowadays people are usually on the run and want a discreet and reliable device for work, school or entertainment. Fortunately, hardware companies have found the solution and they are working on improving their tablets to cater to all the customers’ tastes and wallets. Here are five of the best and most popular tablets for you to choose from:

Apple iPad

Features like incredible image quality, thanks to the Retina display, fast 4G speed, improved camera and a wide selection of fun apps place the new Apple iPad in the lead both from the customers’ and the specialized websites’ point of view. The costs may sometimes increase, when you find yourself in the position of having to pay for additional upgrades, like for example special docks for the new Lightning connector, but that does not seem to bother loyal fans too much.

Google Nexus 7

Leading the market of Android tablets, Google Nexus 7 offers you high-quality design, speedy performance and a powerful version of Jelly Bean, all for a great price. It has its own downs, like the lack of a microSD card slot (same situation as iPads) or of a back-facing camera, as well as some lag when using the Magazine app, but its advantages make you forget about them. All in all, it is considered the best 7-inch tablet and it combines fast quad-core performance and a smart operating system with a top-notch design.

Amazon Kindle Fire

Amazon brings you yet another great-priced Android tablet, which was developed from the world’s favorite e-book reader, the Kindle. Its pros are the solid and compact design as well as the friendly and easy-to-use interface. It also gives you access to a lot of apps and also free videos and books for the customers who are Amazon Prime members. Unfortunately, the 8 GB memory is not expandable and the performance may be a bit sluggish now and then, but the very affordable price makes it worth buying.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1

If the 7-inch tablets are too small for you, you can choose the larger Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 for its bright display and powerful speakers, but also for its long-lasting battery life and other features. If you always lose your TV remote around house, you will be happy to know that you can control your TV using the smart app offered by this tablet. On the other hand, the camera is not spectacular and the charging times are a bit high, but the tablet is still a good and affordable choice.

ASUS Transformer Pad Infinity TF700

The last one on this list, the tablet from ASUS has a very bright and sharp display, as well as improved cameras, long-lasting battery life and a high quad-core performance. The sound quality is good, despite the rather awkward speaker placement; the display may show some distortions if you put too much pressure on it when you touch it. It has its ups and downs, but it is a balanced Android tablet and it is the first one with a full HD screen.

If you’re looking for a new tablet, check out these 5 models first, and you are bound to find something that suits you perfectly.

The battle between the tablets from Apple and Microsoft has been lasting for a while and the year 2012 is no exception. Apple announced the launching of their new tablet, iPad 4, just a few days before the official release of the Microsoft Surface Tablet – and they promised a powerful processor and a better Wi-Fi connection. So which one would you choose?

In fact, there are two versions of the Surface tablet – one is the already available model powered by Nvidia Tegra 3 and using Windows RT, and the other one will come out soon and it will be dedicated rather to business people, powered by a friendlier Intel Core i5 processor and using Windows 8 Pro. Note that both Surface tablets are significantly larger and slightly heavier than the iPads.

Surface has a bigger screen with great resolution – 1366×768 for the Windows RT model and 1920×1080 for the Pro one – but iPad does offer a brighter image and better detail, contrast and color, thanks to the Retina display. On the other hand, Surface has some pluses, especially when talking about storage size. The model using Windows RT starts from 32 GB built-in-storage, while the iPad offers you 16 GB. Moreover, Surface gives you the possibility of a microSD card if you want to expand that storage, whereas the iPads do not.

Apple customers were a bit disappointed when they heard that the new iPad has a Lightning connector replacing the traditional 30-pin dock connector used for the previous models. That means that if someone wants to use regular cables, they will have to buy more upgrades, therefore spend more money for Apple. Fortunately, Microsoft Surface has the good old full-size dock, usable with all cables – you can plug in USB devices, cameras and printers.

Both tablets offer you fun and interesting apps and let you connect to millions of songs, books, videos and games. A nice feature available on Surface is the Kickstand, which lets you place your tablet almost vertically so you can use it handsfree- while talking on Skype with your friends, watching movies or maybe checking up some recipes online when you are cooking in the kitchen! If you miss the presence of a keyboard – sometimes necessary at work, school or just more comfortable for you when you have typing to do – the people from Microsoft have come up with a great idea. The Touch Cover can be used as a traditional cover that protects your Surface, but also as a very thin and sensitive keyboard.

In the end, it is a battle of tastes, and the success of iPads or Microsoft tablets will resume based on what customers want. There are differences between all the models, which means that the companies are trying harder and harder to bring something new to the scene and to eventually lead the market. That is a good thing for customers, who will have more powerful and efficient tablets to choose from. But will the fans of a certain company stick with it from now on too, or will they switch to the other one? We’ll have to wait and see.