SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE THROWDOWN: A BIG PHONE OR SMALL TABLET?
Swollen shade sizes pull smartphones serve in to tablet territory. Two CNET editors rivet in written crusade over what the heck kind of device the Samsung Galaxy Note unequivocally is.
Chances are you’ve a slightest listened of the Samsung Galaxy Note, the vast 5.3-inch mobile tool that can presumably be used similar to a tablet or similar to a normal dungeon phone. So pronounced Samsung in the splashy Super Bowl ad that blatantly took a appropriate at Apple fanboys.
In the meantime, tech reporters are still arguing over where the Note, with the S-Pen stylus and extra-large screen, fits in the margin of mobile technology products. Judging from an intensely unscientific sample of New Yorkers, the selling open seems confused as well. Here at CNET, editors Jessica Dolcourt and Brian Bennett have intent in more than a singular exhilarated discuss over the Galaxy Note’s standing as a joining device.
Jessica’s on all sides is clear–the Galaxy Note is a phone with a little additional features, yet it isn’t a tablet. Brian on the other hand, strongly sees it more as a hybrid that can hit out the need for a separate, incomparable device. We mangle down our relations positions here.
Portability
Jessica Dolcourt: The Note is a vast phone, roughly as well vast to absolutely hold, yet I can trip it in to my behind slot when it isn’t in my purse. The measure alone make it vast for a phone, yet not all irrational deliberation the proliferation of 4.5-inchers (and more) out there. The 5.3-inch shade here is distant closer to phone domain than it is to the smallest “standard” inscription distance you see–7 inches. (I do not equate the 5-inch Dell Streak tablet, unless it’s as the disproportion that proves the order that nobody wants a 5-inch tablet.)
CNET editor Brian Bennett finds that the Samsung Galaxy Note is a simpler to hoop on NYC transport trains than a vast 10-inch slate.
(Credit: Sarah Kiino)
Brian Bennett: In my view, portability depends on which indicate of perspective you proceed the Note. I consider of it as a mini-tablet given it squeezes all the necessary abilities of a bigger 10-inch Honeycomb line-up in to a 5.3-inch machine. That may not receptive to advice similar to a lot, yet it makes a outrageous disproportion on my each day commute. I see people on the transport grappling with unmanageable iPads all the time and it’s not pretty. There’s a reason strap-hangers give old-school journal readers unwashed looks. As a normal phone, the Galaxy Note’s distance is laughable given the indicate of a handset is to put it bluntly, fit in your hand. I’ve come unequivocally tighten to dropping the Note onto oppressive city sidewalks when retaining it one-handed. As for jeans pockets, fuhgeddaboutit.
Operating system
JD: It runs off Android 2.3 Gingerbread, not Android 3.0 Honeycomb, so Samsung dictated it to essentially be a smartphone. There’s usually a singular app that nods to inscription behavior, and that’s to uncover a celebration of the mass mirror in the central e-mail module when you spin the phone to landscape mode.
BB: That’s true, Gingerbread in place of Ice Cream Sandwich is a letdown, yet it won’t be prolonged until we see ICS on tablets and phones. Still, as I pronounced before, so distant I’ve been able to use the Galaxy Note to plunge in to my sunrise inscription ritual. This consists of celebration of the mass journal apps, and flipping through a garland of news articles gathered by Pulse and Google Currents. Then I switch over to audio podcasts supposing by Google Listen for the travel to the office.
Video playback
JD: Watching videos is glorious on the Note’s vast screen–relative to a phone. Not bad if you’re perplexing to keep your film preferences to yourself, yet a thumbnail compared to a 10-inch inscription similar to the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 or iPad.
BB: OK, you got me there. It’s tough to make the box that the Galaxy Note’s 5.3-inch arrangement can contest with the iPad or even Samsung’s Galaxy Tab inclination with outrageous 10.1-inch screens. However, the Note’s Super AMOLED arrangement looks strong fine, with good observation angles and eye-popping color, and you do not have to be concerned about Peeping Toms eying your screen.
E-reading
JD: It’s the same story with e-reading. I non-stop up a book in the “Game of Thrones” array to exam it out. I sure didn’t have to reason the phone as tighten to my face as other smartphones, yet for longer celebration of the mass sessions, it can’t review to a incomparable shade that’s simpler to review and requires you to spin fewer pages.
BB: I’m sorry, yet I remonstrate entirely. Where I do many of my reading, on transport cars or in coffee shops, the Galaxy Note’s not as large distance is reduction of a con to handle. It’s also reduction celebrated than defeat out a big, bad, 10-inch line-up for all to see. Of march I concur that celebration of the mass content on a incomparable device is simpler on the eyes and makes more sense for unresolved at home on the cot or in bed.
A $50 coop appendage makes the S-Pen simpler to use for reception notes.
(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)
Browsing
JD: There’s no default browser environment to serve the desktop chronicle of a Web site rsther than than the mobile-optimized chronicle of the site. Compare this to tried-and-true Honeycomb tablets (or even the Gingerbread-based Kindle Fire), which give you the Settings option to set desktop mode.
BB:True; this is irritating and, similar to many Android smartphones, forces you to find the option to toggle on the desktop chronicle of a site from inside of the Web page itself. Once you do get things full-size on the Note’s screen, it’s a flattering good view.
Corporate wingman
JD: I confess I’m slipping over to Brian’s pro-tablet position on this one. I see distant more tablets and laptops being used for work in the discussion room than I do mobile phones. While typing may not be utterly as gentle on the Note than on a full-size tablet, Google Docs apps, and scratch on the stylus, and the incomparable shade do suggest a improved pick than a customary phone alone, and you do not have to be concerned about undocking that laptop or remembering to squeeze that tablet. It could work.
BB: Samsung makes a vast understanding over the Galaxy Note’s capability to take discerning handwritten notes. I confess this is an area that sorely needs the electronic series to locate fire. So far, though, perplexing to baloney on the Note similar to I would with a normal coop and paper isn’t unequivocally workable. Honestly I’m removing Windows Tablet Personal Computer flashbacks all over again, finish with my frightful scratch done worse by a sleazy shade surface.
The correctness and utility of the Galaxy Note’s scratch approval program is still up in the air, yet works improved the neater you are.
(Credit: Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)
Battery life
JD: Tablets are well known for prolonged battery life, which is necessary for e-reading and for personification cinema and games. Even many Android tablets can get in between 8-9 hours. If you’re continuous to the 4G LTE network each day, you substantially won’t get there.
BB: Even so, you can regularly flip the Galaxy Note over to transport mode when extract runs low. Even smarter, assign it when not in use. Be kind to the Note’s battery; it’s rebellious especially inscription tasks, and it serves as a phone when you need one.
Cellular connection
JD: It has a mobile radio. For promulgation and reception calls. That makes it a phone. ‘Nuff said.
BB: I see where you’re entrance from, JD, given the actuality that shopping the Galaxy Note requires a pricey AT&T 4G LTE interpretation subscription on tip of a voice plan. But riddle me this; what’s a device that looks similar to a little tablet, feels similar to little tablet, and is most appropriate used as a little tablet? Guess what, that’s a little tablet.
ConclusionThe two of us may never stop contention about where the device stands. And we are stability to see if the Galaxy Note’s stretched facilities cling to together on a day-to-day basis. What we do determine on is this: whilst a little people are unequivocally starting to find the Note’s extra-large distance appealing, there will be many more who find it as well unmanageable and only plain-old big. Despite your distance preferences, the 4G LTE speeds, call quality, cameras, shade quality, and inner components are gratifying and high-end, even if you never whip out the stylus to take a singular note or doodle.
The ultimate is that Samsung is starting to be betting vast on the Note, presumably unveiling a 10.1-inch version this month at Mobile World Congress, which would completely play the S-Pen stylus in to undoubted inscription territory.
Where do you mount on the Galaxy Note–too big, as well small, or only right?
Swollen shade sizes pull smartphones serve in to tablet territory. Two CNET editors rivet in written crusade over what the heck kind of device the Samsung Galaxy Note unequivocally is.
Chances are you’ve a slightest listened of the Samsung Galaxy Note, the vast 5.3-inch mobile tool that can presumably be used similar to a tablet or similar to a normal dungeon phone. So pronounced Samsung in the splashy Super Bowl ad that blatantly took a appropriate at Apple fanboys.
In the meantime, tech reporters are still arguing over where the Note, with the S-Pen stylus and extra-large screen, fits in the margin of mobile technology products. Judging from an intensely unscientific sample of New Yorkers, the selling open seems confused as well. Here at CNET, editors Jessica Dolcourt and Brian Bennett have intent in more than a singular exhilarated discuss over the Galaxy Note’s standing as a joining device.
Jessica’s on all sides is clear–the Galaxy Note is a phone with a little additional features, yet it isn’t a tablet. Brian on the other hand, strongly sees it more as a hybrid that can hit out the need for a separate, incomparable device. We mangle down our relations positions here.
Portability
Jessica Dolcourt: The Note is a vast phone, roughly as well vast to absolutely hold, yet I can trip it in to my behind slot when it isn’t in my purse. The measure alone make it vast for a phone, yet not all irrational deliberation the proliferation of 4.5-inchers (and more) out there. The 5.3-inch shade here is distant closer to phone domain than it is to the smallest “standard” inscription distance you see–7 inches. (I do not equate the 5-inch Dell Streak tablet, unless it’s as the disproportion that proves the order that nobody wants a 5-inch tablet.)
CNET editor Brian Bennett finds that the Samsung Galaxy Note is a simpler to hoop on NYC transport trains than a vast 10-inch slate.
(Credit: Sarah Kiino)
Brian Bennett: In my view, portability depends on which indicate of perspective you proceed the Note. I consider of it as a mini-tablet given it squeezes all the necessary abilities of a bigger 10-inch Honeycomb line-up in to a 5.3-inch machine. That may not receptive to advice similar to a lot, yet it makes a outrageous disproportion on my each day commute. I see people on the transport grappling with unmanageable iPads all the time and it’s not pretty. There’s a reason strap-hangers give old-school journal readers unwashed looks. As a normal phone, the Galaxy Note’s distance is laughable given the indicate of a handset is to put it bluntly, fit in your hand. I’ve come unequivocally tighten to dropping the Note onto oppressive city sidewalks when retaining it one-handed. As for jeans pockets, fuhgeddaboutit.
Operating system
JD: It runs off Android 2.3 Gingerbread, not Android 3.0 Honeycomb, so Samsung dictated it to essentially be a smartphone. There’s usually a singular app that nods to inscription behavior, and that’s to uncover a celebration of the mass mirror in the central e-mail module when you spin the phone to landscape mode.
BB: That’s true, Gingerbread in place of Ice Cream Sandwich is a letdown, yet it won’t be prolonged until we see ICS on tablets and phones. Still, as I pronounced before, so distant I’ve been able to use the Galaxy Note to plunge in to my sunrise inscription ritual. This consists of celebration of the mass journal apps, and flipping through a garland of news articles gathered by Pulse and Google Currents. Then I switch over to audio podcasts supposing by Google Listen for the travel to the office.
Video playback
JD: Watching videos is glorious on the Note’s vast screen–relative to a phone. Not bad if you’re perplexing to keep your film preferences to yourself, yet a thumbnail compared to a 10-inch inscription similar to the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 or iPad.
BB: OK, you got me there. It’s tough to make the box that the Galaxy Note’s 5.3-inch arrangement can contest with the iPad or even Samsung’s Galaxy Tab inclination with outrageous 10.1-inch screens. However, the Note’s Super AMOLED arrangement looks strong fine, with good observation angles and eye-popping color, and you do not have to be concerned about Peeping Toms eying your screen.
E-reading
JD: It’s the same story with e-reading. I non-stop up a book in the “Game of Thrones” array to exam it out. I sure didn’t have to reason the phone as tighten to my face as other smartphones, yet for longer celebration of the mass sessions, it can’t review to a incomparable shade that’s simpler to review and requires you to spin fewer pages.
BB: I’m sorry, yet I remonstrate entirely. Where I do many of my reading, on transport cars or in coffee shops, the Galaxy Note’s not as large distance is reduction of a con to handle. It’s also reduction celebrated than defeat out a big, bad, 10-inch line-up for all to see. Of march I concur that celebration of the mass content on a incomparable device is simpler on the eyes and makes more sense for unresolved at home on the cot or in bed.
A $50 coop appendage makes the S-Pen simpler to use for reception notes.
(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)
Browsing
JD: There’s no default browser environment to serve the desktop chronicle of a Web site rsther than than the mobile-optimized chronicle of the site. Compare this to tried-and-true Honeycomb tablets (or even the Gingerbread-based Kindle Fire), which give you the Settings option to set desktop mode.
BB:True; this is irritating and, similar to many Android smartphones, forces you to find the option to toggle on the desktop chronicle of a site from inside of the Web page itself. Once you do get things full-size on the Note’s screen, it’s a flattering good view.
Corporate wingman
JD: I confess I’m slipping over to Brian’s pro-tablet position on this one. I see distant more tablets and laptops being used for work in the discussion room than I do mobile phones. While typing may not be utterly as gentle on the Note than on a full-size tablet, Google Docs apps, and scratch on the stylus, and the incomparable shade do suggest a improved pick than a customary phone alone, and you do not have to be concerned about undocking that laptop or remembering to squeeze that tablet. It could work.
BB: Samsung makes a vast understanding over the Galaxy Note’s capability to take discerning handwritten notes. I confess this is an area that sorely needs the electronic series to locate fire. So far, though, perplexing to baloney on the Note similar to I would with a normal coop and paper isn’t unequivocally workable. Honestly I’m removing Windows Tablet Personal Computer flashbacks all over again, finish with my frightful scratch done worse by a sleazy shade surface.
The correctness and utility of the Galaxy Note’s scratch approval program is still up in the air, yet works improved the neater you are.
(Credit: Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)
Battery life
JD: Tablets are well known for prolonged battery life, which is necessary for e-reading and for personification cinema and games. Even many Android tablets can get in between 8-9 hours. If you’re continuous to the 4G LTE network each day, you substantially won’t get there.
BB: Even so, you can regularly flip the Galaxy Note over to transport mode when extract runs low. Even smarter, assign it when not in use. Be kind to the Note’s battery; it’s rebellious especially inscription tasks, and it serves as a phone when you need one.
Cellular connection
JD: It has a mobile radio. For promulgation and reception calls. That makes it a phone. ‘Nuff said.
BB: I see where you’re entrance from, JD, given the actuality that shopping the Galaxy Note requires a pricey AT&T 4G LTE interpretation subscription on tip of a voice plan. But riddle me this; what’s a device that looks similar to a little tablet, feels similar to little tablet, and is most appropriate used as a little tablet? Guess what, that’s a little tablet.
ConclusionThe two of us may never stop contention about where the device stands. And we are stability to see if the Galaxy Note’s stretched facilities cling to together on a day-to-day basis. What we do determine on is this: whilst a little people are unequivocally starting to find the Note’s extra-large distance appealing, there will be many more who find it as well unmanageable and only plain-old big. Despite your distance preferences, the 4G LTE speeds, call quality, cameras, shade quality, and inner components are gratifying and high-end, even if you never whip out the stylus to take a singular note or doodle.
The ultimate is that Samsung is starting to be betting vast on the Note, presumably unveiling a 10.1-inch version this month at Mobile World Congress, which would completely play the S-Pen stylus in to undoubted inscription territory.
Where do you mount on the Galaxy Note–too big, as well small, or only right?