Samsung Galaxy Note Review: Is it a Tablet or Smartphone? Discussion

[Dragan Petric]

Somewhere between 5 and 7-inches is a fine line that separates tablets from smartphones. Because so few devices have display sizes that fall into that range, it?s impossible to tell exactly where in that range smartphones end and tablets begin.

Entering this no-man's land is the Samsung Galaxy Note, a device Samsung dubbed "neither a smartphone, nor a tablet" at its unveiling at IFA in Berlin. With a 5.3-inch screen, it?s bigger than the biggest smartphone and smaller than the smallest tablet.

Apart from its atypical size, Galaxy Note differs from a smartphone as it comes with S Pen, an active stylus that provides an entirely new user experience (new to those who never owned a PDA, anyway) for smaller screen devices. Furthermore, the Galaxy Note sports some impressive particularities, including an exceptionally fast 1.4-gigahertz dual core processor, a Super AMOLED screen with a resolution characteristic for larger tablets and a 2500 mAh interchangeable battery, which is substantially more than most smartphones have to offer.

This review covers the international version of the Samsung Galaxy Note, released several months ago in Europe. The device is nearly identical to the Galaxy Note launching for AT&T.

Read the full content of this Article: Samsung Galaxy Note Review: Is it a Tablet or Smartphone?

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[watchdog]

I bought this device almost as soon as I first read about it, and I'm really glad that I did. I originally purchased the HTC Flyer because it had the pen, but it has recieved zero support for It's pen, there is only one app that really uses the pen and that is the notes app that comes with it.
The Galaxy Note's S-pen can be used with all apps, that means that I am able to use it in Sketchbook mobile although it does not have pressure sensitivity in that app. That is not actually a problem though, and the S-pen will work with all art apps.
To answer the question most out there are wondering, its a Wacom pen, probably the smallest ever made. How do I know it's Wacom? Because the Wacom pen from my (no longer working) OQO model 2 works on it, that means that a standard tablet PC Wacom pen will also work. In the S memo app on the device, the pen works great.....and the eraser on the pen also will work (the tablet PC pen, the included S-pen does not have an eraser), the S memo app will also slow you to pinch zoom which is lacking on the Flyers notes app. This device is now doing everything I wanted my Flyer to do and it's way more portable.
I write and I draw pretty small to begin with so I don't have any trouble with the small size, nor am I put off by its larger than usual phone size. Unfortunately I am with ATT and in the area I'm in, ATT has never been very reliable. I attempted to get on Verizon, but the Galaxy note works off of sim cards and Verizon and Sprint do not use sim cards.
Battery life on my device is not too impressive to me, I can get a whole day out of it before it needs recharging. I do however use the device for a lot of internet, reading ebooks and various doodling in one or more art apps I have, as such I am still tweaking the power levels.
I think this is a great all around device, and if you are interested in an art tablet, this is one of the best choices. The stylus pen might be to small for some people to use, but I am a big guy with long fingers, I love this device.

[Steve B]

I've been curious about this since I heard about it. What sort of drawing apps can you use pressure sensitivity in? Since they're Android apps do they use the full 256 levels or are they built around N-Trig specs? What can you use for notes? Will it convert text? Or do you save it as an image file like on the Asus eee Note? Can you save notes in something like Evernote? Can you run a calendar with the pen? Or import a small PDF to fill out?

There's just not much info on how the pen feature can be used. It would be nice to know more about how you can apply its "defining feature." There aren't even any pics of the phone in someone's hand so I can't tell how big it really is anyways. Can someone post one?

As for the device being too big for calls -- I use my earpiece almost exclusively anyways. I'm more interested in varied functionality s a small package.

[watchdog]

I've been curious about this since I heard about it. What sort of drawing apps can you use pressure sensitivity in? Since they're Android apps do they use the full 256 levels or are they built around N-Trig specs? What can you use for notes? Will it convert text? Or do you save it as an image file like on the Asus eee Note? Can you save notes in something like Evernote? Can you run a calendar with the pen? Or import a small PDF to fill out?

There's just not much info on how the pen feature can be used. It would be nice to know more about how you can apply its "defining feature." There aren't even any pics of the phone in someone's hand so I can't tell how big it really is anyways. Can someone post one?

As for the device being too big for calls -- I use my earpiece almost exclusively anyways. I'm more interested in varied functionality s a small package.

The only app that currently has pressure sensitivity is the included S memo app. But you can use the pen with any drawing app with a high level of accuracy. The device does have the ability to convert written text although it's done with a version of the old windows mobile text converter (a much improved interface). I don't know about the PDF part, that's not something I ever needed to do. I looked this thing up at as many sites as I could before I bought it (a bit pricy on Amazon where I bought it from), I'll look up a good review with video that shows what this phone can do.

[watchdog]

Engadget has a pretty good review;
Samsung Galaxy Note review -- Engadget

[doobiedoobiedum]

The Galaxy Note has been available here for a while now, Samsung even hired some illustrators on to illustrate people's tweets for the month of November.

Article and video here: video may not be available in your country.

I'm interested in what this new step represents i.e. the first of hopefully a whole batch of smart phones with Wacom Digitisers which will force the larger 10 inch tablet manufacturers to think about upspeccing their machines to compete.. Certainly from a business viewpoint I hope Wacom would be interested in getting into the 10 inch tablet market.

[Ed Hardy]

There's some evidence that the Galaxy Note may be released by AT&T. You can read more in this news article:

Samsung Galaxy Note Tabletphone Could Be Headed for AT&T -- Brighthand

[Steve B]

Well, as I have an AT&T Iphone that's good news for me. What kills me though is that they don't have pressure sensitive apps available. Or do they? That would make it a dream.

[watchdog]

Samsung has their own apps store, it has gotten quite a few apps since I bought my Galaxy note. There is even a dedicated drawing app or two for the note. We may see some really good support soon.

[watchdog]

Another really superb review with a fantastic 28 min video. they really show what this device can do, I did not know about much of this info myself;
MobileTechReview Forum and News: Samsung Galaxy Note Video Review, Seriously Lovely and Large Android Smartphone