Galaxy note 2

For our first review, we will be looking at one of the most successful smartphones in the market. It's younger brother, Samsung galaxy S3 took the market by storm and recorded huge sales in the past year, then in September 2012 came a 5.5 inch turbo charged bigger brother, the galaxy note 2. Its predecessor, the galaxy note, was a successful smartphone but lacked lots of features that a phablet must have, after all it was the first of its kind, half phone and half tablet. After the success of the galaxy S3, many people thought that the note 2 will be just a big S3, but it turned out to be very different. Both, the galaxy S3 and the note 2 look alike in terms of designs but under the hood, lots of difference. The galaxy note 2 shipped with android jelly bean out of the box with Samsung's Touchwize, Touchwize has been beefed up to accommodate the big screen, the S pen and MANY other features that this phone holds.one of the main features of this phone is the S pen, which is a huge improvement than its predecessor, it is great for content creation. I did not think that I will be using that much but I ended up using it with most of the phone's features. Samsung had a huge success with the S pen, in terms of its integration with the software and the many features it holds. The galaxy note 2 has a heavy price tag, but comparing to other smartphones in the market with much less features, it is an amazing price. When buying a new smartphone, the galaxy note 2 should definitely be on the top of your list. Below I will discuss hardware, software, features, design, and at the end give you my verdict.

Hardware specs:

The galaxy note 2 packs a huge 1.6 ghz Exynos quad core processor with a whopping 2gb of RAM, that is laptop territory guys. The extra power ensures that it will take on any tasks you through at it.it is packed with a beast of a battery at 3100 mAh. It is only normal to Handel the phone's features. It comes with 16 GB of internal storage and an expandable storage slot at the back, which comes in handy more that you'd think.

Display:

The display is exactly 5.55in of Samsung's super HD AMOLED technology with a resolution of 1280x720 (approximately 267 pixels per inch). Its display is rich in colors and brightness with very good viewing angels, but it is not as good as other Full HD smartphones in the market. The display is protected with Corning gorilla glass 2, which is pretty durable and can withstand most falls, but it will get scratched, so I recommend buying a screen protector. The touch sensitivity is very good and responsive with no issues of ghost clicking or lag in touching icons.

The galaxy note 2 is packed with 1 stereo speaker at the back that produces loud sounds, but will distort when volume is turned up to the max.

Battery life:

The huge battery will easily give 1 day of hard work. Powering it is a 3,100mAh battery, which Samsung claims that it will provide standby time of some 890 hours on 3G.

Camera:

The camera on this phone is 8 mega pixels with LED flash, and packet with tons of really intuitive new feature. The pictures are crisp and sharp and video quality is very good at 1080p, but only under good lighting as the flash is not very effective in low light situations. The best things about the note 2’s camera are the settings and features, lots of settings, features and customizations. The best feature is the shooting mode that is packed with excellent modes like best photo mode, which takes 8 pictures of the target and recommends the best one. Next is the best face mode, which takes 5 pictures and makes you choose the best face for each one in the picture. For example if someone in the picture is closing their eyes, you can take their face from another of the 5 pictures and insert to the picture. This is a very nice feature that is very handy when taking pictures of your friends that insures that everyone looks great in the photo. The panorama mode is very intuitive and gives great quality when shooting, it pastes the pictures into place very nicely. The last of the best modes, is the share shot where the phone connects to other Samsung phones with your friends and automatically shares it when it is taken.

The front camera is 1.9 Megapixel VT Camera that is good for video calls and skipping.

Design:

The designs on the phone is very nice, regardless of its large display it’s very easy to hold with 1 hand, but not easy to type, that’s why Samsung introduced the one handed operation. The back door is flexible plastic, which lots of people may not like compared to other phones with metal materials. It really comes down to preference, the phone’s build quality is excellent though. The physical buttons are placed nicely and are east to reach, on the right side you have the power and sleep button, on the left you have to volume rockers and on the bottom front you have the home screen button. There are 2 touch buttons on the front, one for options and the other is for going back. The note 2 is shipped with 2 beautiful colors, Marble White and Titanium Grey.

Dimensions:

The phonies a bit bulky but is thinner than its predecessor at 9.4ml which is impressive for a phone with all that power under the hood. Its weight is 182.5g. The exact dimensions are 80.5 x 151.1 x 9.4 mm, 182.5g.

Software:

Galaxy note 2 comes with android jelly bean 4.1 with Touchwiz. Samsung where able to make the features stand out from other android phone with the phone’s features. This phone is by far the best android on the market now. The motion and SPEN features come in handy very often, one of the features that really impressed me was smart stay, which keeps the phone’s display on as long as you are looking at it. The software is very nicely integrated with the hardware, its speed is very nice, with very good responsive times, but sometimes third party apps crash. One of the down side of the software is Samsung’s email client. Compared to other phones and email clients, it is by far the worst. Samsung need to work hard to make it stand out. It is very hard to use, lots of times the emails aren’t sent and very hard to change folders. It absolutely needs a makeover to be able to compete.

Multi-Tasking:

Samsung were able to tackle the multi-tasking feature with real care, as if it was developed badly it could have a very negative impact on the battery life. Multitasking is simple, same as in most android phones, very easy to manage and always handy, especially the clear ram feature.

Notification:

The notification panel on the note 2 has been revamped by Samsung and if I may say, it is beautiful. Samsung were able to put lots of quick settings buttons that come very handy in most times. You can adjust the display brightness also from the notification panel

S Pen:

The S pen is truly smart. They added tons of new features to accommodate your every need. For example, Air View, you can quickly browse your photos, videos, documents, etc. Without even touching the screen, all you have to do is just hover on the item. Check the figure below

Another feature is the quick command, all you have to do is drag the pen bottom to up while holding the button and voila. The quick command panel appears and you can write command shortcuts for various apps and feature. You can even create your own quick command.

Multi Window:

Multi Window is a leap forward in the world of Mobile technology and it no surprise that it was introduced on the note 2 because of its power. Multi window enables you to open dual apps at the same time. You can be watching a movie while writing an email or browsing the web. Some people may thing that it might be a bit slow, but not at all very responsive and very easy to handle.

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