Well just when you thought that there was no phone that could beat the size of the SII, Samsung dropped a phone the size of a tablet into our hands and frankly speaking you can't hold the Note just with one hand(unless they're big ones).
In this review I'll be critically analyzing the Samsung Galaxy Note on the basis of design, build quality, functionality and pricing after which I will give a final verdict.Design- The Samsung Galaxy Note's design almost completely resembles that of the SII, with the only difference that it is the beefed up version of the SII. You have the standard Home button and the soft Menu and Back keys.It sports a large 5.3 inch super AMOLED screen which gives the colours nice saturation. The Note wouldn't be called the note if it weren't for the revolutionary S-pen which allows quick hand note taking. At the back is an 8 MP autofocus camera.
Build Quality- Nothing changes for the Note when it comes to build quality. The screen is protected by tough Gorilla glass and the back panel is made of textured but flimsy plastic, yeah it makes the phone look cheap when you remove the back panel, but we don't think that you would purposely want do it in front of others.
Functionality- The Galaxy Note is basically an SII with bumped up features. No great improvements, it is powered by the 1.4 GHz dual core ARM Cortex A9 chip set which is slightly powerful and doesn't transform the using experience to any major extent(just 200 MHz extra won't take you anywhere). It sports the TouchWiz 4.0 user interface which is the same UI used by the SII. Texting on the Note was a pain; the large screen meant that we couldn't reach the letters at the center. The phone's app list is based on a 5x5 grid rather than the normal 4x3 layout, obviously due to the huge screen. It runs on Android 2.3.5(Gingerbread), no surprises here. However, the Note is by far the best phone to browse the web and view multimedia, thanks to the big screen and super AMOLED display. One striking feature of the Note is that you can take screen shots, i.e., take pictures of whatever you are viewing on the screen. The S-pen does its job of note taking well though very rarely we did observe some lag while using the pen. The Note also allows viewing of Flash content. The 8 megapixel camera with auto focus and LED flash at the back takes good pictures and has a variety of settings.
Pricing- The Galaxy Note, well for obvious reasons comes with a premium price tag. Priced at $660(USD), much more than the SII ($590), we did not question the hefty price as the Note came with such premium features.
The Verdict- Overall, the Note didn't pack a punch as strong as the SII(the SII redefined the capabilities of a smartphone), but it did impress us to quite an extent. With a big screen, slightly more powerful processor and the ability to take hand-written notes, the Samsung Galaxy Note is a good phone. It is also going to receive an Ice Cream Sandwich OS upgrade, which will make the user experience over the top. Don't like the Note's price, then you must definitely go in for the Samsung Galaxy SII(which can be held with one hand).
Hope this review was resourceful and helps you buy your Samsung Galaxy Note. If you would like to purchase the Samsung Galaxy Note right away, you can buy it through our 100% safe Amazon and Flipkart portals.
