Review: 8849 Tank Pad Projector Tablet

Review unit provided by 8849 Tech

The 8849 Tank Pad is a rugged Android tablet that has almost everything, including a built in projector and a fan to cool it.

It's a rugged tablet so the target market is kinda specific or niche. This tablet is probably for those who use their tablets outdoors and don't want to baby the tablet or worry about battery life. Most obvious downside is of course the weight, which is not listed on the company's website.

Price at the time of review is USD 499 during the pre-order period which will end on 2 Dec 2024.

Specifications

Things included

• Tablet
• User guide
• USB-C to USB-C charging cable
• 66W charger

Design

When you look at the back, you'll know that this was designed to be tough and durable. It has IP68 and IP69K to be drop-proof (1.5m) and waterproof (1.5m, 30 min). Just don't drop it face down on a rock because there's no glass screen protector applied.

That huge LED camping light is blinding.

Camera on the back is a 50MP Sony IMX766, and self camera is a 32MP Sony IMX616.

Build quality is metal, and there are extra bumpers at the corners.

On the other side, there are two volume control buttons, and two customisable button.

The top has a focus wheel for the projector lens, a SIM tray that can hold a microSD card and two nano SIMs, and a power button with fingerprint scanner.

Design of this tablet actually looks quite good for a rugged tablet. The display has resolution of 2000 x 1200 pixels and refresh rate of 120Hz. Colours look good. Brightness looks high enough. Visuals look sharp enough. This a pretty good display.

There's 16GB RAM and 512GB storage. Processor is MediaTek Dimensity 8200 and overall performance is pretty smooth and responsive, certainly more responsive than the Helio G99 processor found in many budget tablets.

The tablet runs on Android 14 and the UI is easy to navigate. There's Google Play Store and no bloatware installed.

So yes this tablet is capable of some gaming too.

Download speed is fast enough for me.

The tablet is heavy. I don't know the weight, but it's not something I would want to hold for long periods of time with one or even two hands. It's best to have the tablet on the table or some form of support when playing games, watching videos, or reading.

The built-in projector only has 100 Lumens which isn't that bright. The LUMOS Auro V2 home projector I reviewed recently has 6000 Lumens.

So this projector is best used in a totally dark environment. I don't know the resolution of the projection but it looks pretty sharp to me, after focusing with the focus wheel.

So is this projector a gimmick? I don't think so. It's certainly usable but you have to make sure your room is totally dark, and this definitely won't work well outdoors.

Pair with with some good speakers (with the 3.5mm audio jack) and movie watching experience can be decent.

If your room is dark enough, you have the projector go further back and the brightness is still sufficient. Shown in the photo about is a projection that's almost 80-inches.

Oh, battery life is great obviously with the 21,000 mAh battery capacity. I don't a number for you because that will vary wildly depending on usage. And you can use reverse charging to charge other devices.

Downsides

Auto-brightness does not work well.

There are two back-facing speakers and audio quality is not ideal. Speakers are loud but they sound hollow. You only get stereo audio when tablet is in portrait orientation and not landscape.

Widevine L3 can't get you 1080P streaming from video streaming platforms that use DRM.

Conclusion

The specs of this tablet is actually quite good. Performance is good. Display quality is good. And there many features such as camping light, projector, NFC, 5G, Google Play Store, durable, long battery life, reverse charging.

If you're interested to get this, you can buy it from 8849 Tech online store or AliExpress.