Did I get a dud?

Received one from Amazon today and not one page transition was smooth. Every action I performed felt stuttered. I'm used to 120hz but I only recently sold my iPad mini 6 which obviously had a 60hz screen and operation was definitely smoother than this.

Don't get me wrong, the iPlay 60 MP is a budget option, it cost me 149.99, I knew not to expect perfection, but I tried everything to improve performance - changed animation settings in developer options, used Niagara launcher instead of the in-built one, performed the one update I was offered after turning the device on, restricted the max number of background processes to 1 in developer options, uninstalled and/or disabled anything I didn't need or want - no difference at all. I even used a game booster at one point too.

Am I missing something? Was I just unlucky, or are my reduced expectations still too high?