Samsung is undoubtedly on a Galaxy Note launch blitz. With Galaxy Note starting to appear in some European countries, Samsung today announced the launch of the smartphone / tablet combo device for India. We also managed to get some time with the huge device and this is what we think.
This goes without saying that the first and foremost thing you’ll notice is the size. Galaxy Note is big. Its dimensions are 146.85×82.95×9.65mm making it huge by smartphone standards and small for a tablet. Nevertheless, Galaxy Note is a beautifully designed phone (or tablet, whatever you wanna call it) and more importantly, pocketable.
Galaxy Note has a 5.3-inch HD display that sports a resolution of 1280×800 pixels. Unlike Galaxy S II that has a Super AMOLED Plus display, Galaxy Note is equipped with Super AMOLED. But despite Samsung using the ‘last generation’ AMOLED displays, Galaxy Note impresses with the HD resolution. The colors are vibrant and text is crisp, just as they should be.
In addition to the big size, another thing that is peculiar to Galaxy Note is the inclusion of S Pen. S Pen is nothing but the stylus that comes bundled with the device. Samsung is pitching S Pen as a way for users to take handwritten notes, draw, write messages etc and good thing is S Pen delivers on that front. Apps have been nicely integrated to take advantage of the S Pen. Handwriting recognition works well. So does the drawing and sketching. However, the success of the S Pen depends on the availability of apps, which is why Samsung will release the SDK for developers to take advantage of the S Pen input.
Rounding up the specs are Android 2.3.5 OS, 1.4GHz dual-core processor, Wi-Fi, 8MP camera, 2MP front-facing camera, Bluetooth, GPS, variety of multimedia codec support, 16GB internal memory and microSD card slot.
To wrap this up, I would say the first impression was quite good. Galaxy Note is a good device with some meaty hardware. However, its uptake will depend on users comfort level with the size.
Love it..