Samsung Lifts The Curtain On The Galaxy Note II

 

When does a phone stop becoming a phone and wander into tablet PC territory? It's a question likely to be at the forefront of the collective tech worlds' mind tonight, as Samsung unveiled the successor to the massive Galaxy Note.

Announced at the IFA tech conference in Berlin, the Galaxy Note II packs a whopping 5.5-inch Super AMOLED display (0.2 inches up on the 5.3-inch Note display, and a considerable upgrade from the Galaxy S3's 4.8-inch display) with 16:9 aspect ratio; runs Android 4.1 “Jelly Bean”; features 2GB RAM, 4G LTE, a 1.6 GHz Exynos processor, a rear-facing 8-Megapixel camera and will also take advantage of a much larger battery. The Note's most defining attachment/feature/stylus plaything the, the Samsung S Pen, also gets a notable few improvements. Longer, thicker and with a more ergonomic design, the Note II takes advantage of the S Pen in more discernible ways than its predecessor ever did.

Users can now add 'Quick Commands' to stylus gestures, while a new feature called 'Air View' allows you to preview certain content by merely hovering the stylus above the screen. For example, you will be able to view snippets of an email without diving straight into the message. Putting the pen to the screen during a call, meanwhile, will bring up an on-screen notepad to allow you to jot down a phone number or address mid-conversation.

Notably (pun intended, of course), the Galaxy Note II will be the first Samsung smartphone release since the Korean company was ordered to pay Apple $1 billion in damages. (And no, it hasn't gone about paying it all in 5 cent coins, as today's rumour mill suggested.) The Note II will be available to UK customers in either 'Marble White' or 'Titan Grey' this October. No news on UK pricing or mobile networks as of yet.

Richard Birkett