Driver Usb Samsung Galaxy Note 4

(Pocket-lint) - The Galaxy Notation two is the successor to the, erm, Galaxy Note, which is anticipated. What wasn't predictable was how nosotros would experience about this new handset. The Annotation, you see, is a bit of an enigma. A massive phone, or really small 3G tablet. It sits in a space that doesn't be, with an unknown audience.

People who haven't used a Galaxy Annotation - the original, or this new model - won't get it. This is a phone yous have to alive with to truly understand. Almost people volition take one look at the size - information technology dwarfs the already massive Galaxy S III - and rule it out equally being impractical. In our view, that's a mistake, considering this phone has a lot to offer too its size. And the size isn't much of an outcome, equally we discovered.

Our quick take

When you go the Note two out of its box, your first reaction will be to its enormous size. Some will find it absurd, only those who want a big screen with loads of beautiful item, a much better bombardment and some absurd pen features will "go" it within ten minutes of holding it for the first time.

The Notation is a device that shouldn't work. A device that the Koreans dreamt up after too petty sleep, and as well many energy drinks. Simply somehow, it's the nearly captivating phone we've used for a long time. It manages to invalidate the tablet to some extent, because it's big enough to exist a powerful media device, but small enough to acquit everywhere.

Information technology isn't a phone for everyone, only those who dear gadgets will have to it, and it will change their lives.

Samsung Galaxy Note two

5 stars - Pocket-lint editors choice

For

Fantastic screen
Pen is great
Loads and loads of power
Neat battery life

Against

Handwriting recognition needs some piece of work
It's expensive

Not as well big

Nosotros've travelled around a fair bit with the Note. Nosotros've been asked a lot almost the size, and honestly, it's not a problem. It will fit in your jeans pocket, assuming your jeans aren't too tight, and you won't actually notice its actress weight.

Strangely, it's not really any harder to use with one mitt than a phone such as the Samsung Milky way S 3. As Apple points out, there is a ratio that allows for unmarried-handed use, and most modern Android phones ignore information technology. And then while the Note is hard to apply unmarried-handed, it's not any more hard than any other Android phone.

READ: Samsung Milky way S III review

It'south a bit heavier though, which might carp some, merely it has a squeamish weight, and a great overall balance.

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In terms of style, in that location'south a power push on the correct-mitt side, with volume controls on the left. The top has the headphone jack, while the bottom holds the USB socket for charging and data transfer.

Nether the battery encompass yous'll detect the, erm, battery, forth with the micro-SIM bill of fare slot, and the microSD card. Here you tin add capacities of upward to 64GB - which is quite a lot of storage for a phone.

At that place is a camera on the back, with an LED flash, and on the front is another, video-conference-type camera.

The pen is mightier than your sausage fingers

The pen on the notation is interesting. We have mixed feelings about information technology, to be honest. The about exciting idea is to use it for handwriting recognition, simply in that location are a few trivial bugs that prevent it being entirely practical. Nosotros've done a lot of tweeting and text messaging using the system, and while it can piece of work brilliantly, there are times when it simply gets things wrong.

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We noticed that getting the software to detect spaces was hard at times. The problem was that in that location was a lack of consistency. If it never got spacing right, you lot could work around it, simply information technology did get it correct about 50 per cent of the time, significant yous'd assume it had done its job, then await over your bulletin and find it hadn't.

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Capital letters were also a trouble. The phone doesn't seem to apply any logic to this, so sometimes words would have a random initial cap. This is plain considering of how nosotros wrote the messages on the screen, simply it'due south fairly easy to remove caps through autocorrect, then we're amazed the Samsung doesn't seem to.

Other than that, the recognition itself is pretty vivid. Its accuracy is very good, as long as you don't write like an idiot and the screen/pen combination works really well. It's arguably a fiddling too small for much writing, but it works for brusque notes.

Of course, the pen does other things. You can apply it every bit a finger, if you wish, meaning you don't need to get grease all over your phone screen. It tin be used to draw too, as you'd expect, and there are some note-taking apps that permit you to tape your writing as either

Nosotros'll be candid about the camera

The 8-megapixel shooter is a bit weak in reduced calorie-free. And then indoor snaps are piddling more than average. Outdoors, in strong light, and things get a lot meliorate. In that location is enough particular in the images for well-nigh use. They won't disgrace themselves when printed out on sensibly sized paper and they'll be fine for sharing via Facebook and the similar.

In that location are also some nice features such equally a burst shooting way, that fires off lots of shots in rapid succession. These are stored in the phone memory, which might lead to some confusion nigh where to find them afterward.

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Yous likewise get a lot of control, and in that location are plenty of modes which allow you to grab the "best photograph" from eight shots, which the phone snaps - as with the burst mode - in rapid succession. In addition to all this, in that location are the usual settings to tweak, to get the best possible photo. And, to give the Instagram lovers a treat, at that place are some basic photo filters too.

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The camera app is pretty like shooting fish in a barrel to apply. The usual touch-to-focus is here, and nosotros didn't accept whatever problems with it failing to focus properly - something that seems to plague cheaper phones. It'south besides nice and quick to go a lock. We too found face detection worked well, and although we've never made much employ of it, it'due south skillful to run across it included.

Motion and gesture control

Things get very cool when y'all look at what Samsung has added, both in terms of motion detection and gestures. Like many phones, you can turn the Note over to silence it when it's ringing. Also, rather brilliantly, if you accept a contact on-screen, and then but lifting the phone to your ear will call that contact. There's a niggling buzz of vibration to confirm this is happening.

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Our favourite feature though, has to be the gesture to selection up the telephone. When you do this, past reaching toward the handset, the screen illuminates telling you if you have missed calls, new text messages and the level of your bombardment. It's fab, although it uses the camera to pull this play a trick on off, and then expect it to destroy the battery life of your Note.

All of these features tin can be enabled or disabled individually too, so yous can pick and choose the ones that suit your needs. We found most of them to be slightly pointless, and nosotros never in one case managed to get the screen grab gesture to work.

Powerful and fast

With LTE in the Uk being a bit of a mess, the whole situation has the potential to confuse. The Annotation 2 will be available on EE in a 4G diverseness. At that place are also other versions of the phone that support 4G on 700MHz and 1200MHz for regions where those frequencies are existence used. If y'all desire the Note 2 in a 4G flavour, you should seek aid from your mobile network.

READ: Milky way S 3 vs. Note ii

Based on the theoretical maximum, the Note 2 can download at 100mbps and upload at 50mbps. That's some serious speed, and while we dubiousness nearly people will encounter anywhere near that, it'due south a cool thought that your telephone could download faster than your habitation broadband.

The residuum of the phone is super-fast though. A quad-cadre processor ways that there's almost no lag at whatever time. In that location's 2GB of RAM too, which should aid to keep the phone feeling lite, powerful and responsive. There are 16 32 and 64GB capacities too, although the one you're likely to exist buying is the 16GB.

Entertainment goliath

Perchance the best thing near the Note is that screen. At over five-inches, it's a formidable size for all things video, and the Note has some pretty cool tricks up its sleeve for this. Simply best of all, its 720p (720 10 1280) resolution is platonic for lots of media, and you'll become a lot out of video that uses this format, as it's brilliantly matched to one of the most common HD formats. Being an AMOLED console, in that location's no shortage of colour here, with vivid tones bursting out of the screen. Samsung, perhaps aware of the criticism OLED gets for being quite unrealistic, has likewise provided modes to tone down the color, should you lot want more than natural tones.

As usual for Samsung's high-terminate handsets, at that place is enough of video playback support. MKV files - which have MP4 video within them - playback perfectly, and with sound too, which isn't the case on a lot of other phones.

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If you employ the stock video player, you lot besides go the pick to watch video in a pop-up window. This means you lot can browse the web, send text messages or practice any other phone task, while watching your video in a pocket-sized window. It's a nice characteristic, that makes use of the Note's impressive processing ability.

And then, of form, you've got Netflix, YouTube and endless other video players that volition requite you lot admission to stacks of content, all on that large, bright, cute screen. Video is a real treat on the Note, so if you lot're looking for a media device with a bigger screen than a telephone, this is quite likely to be the device of your dreams.

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Picture and sound quality are both vivid though. Nosotros really liked the Notation equally an entertainment device. Music sounds great, and the music player Samsung includes is pretty good. You lot become access to Samsung'due south Hub too, which allows you lot to store music online, merely you will need an account with Sammy to use this - and that won't be for everyone.

Jelly Bean

Subsequently much dilly-dallying nigh getting Jelly Bean on the SGS III - it Nevertheless hasn't arrived, officially - we were very pleased to see the Note 2 ship with Google's flagship OS already installed.

Jelly Edible bean is crucial, because it brings some of the most heady features nonetheless to Android. Google Now, for example, is fantastic, and the "cards" which the system uses to keep you updated on weather, traffic and public transport is utterly brilliant.

Voice control is besides much improved, and Google's system works every bit well or improve than Siri in most of the tests we've tried. It's not got a sense of humour though, and so don't effort making jokes or asking random questions to befuddle it.

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You besides get the new notifications area. This is a huge improvement, with much larger previews. Nosotros've found that this has increased how much time nosotros spend in the notifications tray, because it has suddenly become incredibly useful, both for toggles for the likes of Wi-Fi and GPS, but also for getting to the menus and seeing long previews of our email.

On summit of Android, at that place's Samsung's TouchWiz interface. We aren't crazy well-nigh it, visually speaking, simply in the Note it adds a lot of pretty crucial features. For case, the handwriting recognition, and apps that utilise the pen in full general all make use of the Samsung modifications. So if you hate TouchWiz, this isn't the phone for you, as you lot're stuck with it if you lot want to use the phone's features to the fullest.

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Commonly, we complain about the stock keyboard on phones likewise. Merely here, we constitute ourselves quite liking the system. For one, the actress screen infinite allows for a dedicated row of numbers above the top row of messages. You'd be surprised how much of a difference this makes to using the device. But too, the Samsung keyboard allows you lot to switch hands to handwriting recognition, which is another decent feature.

Samsung also includes its "blocking manner", which is like Apple's "do non disturb" function. Y'all can cake calls, text messages and so on for gear up times with this feature. There'southward too the selection to allow through calls from sure people - say, your child's plant nursery, or your other-half.

Phone call and text

The just trouble with making telephone calls on the Annotation is that it can sometimes be difficult to locate the earpiece properly. This means you will sometimes not hear people on the other end all that well. Move the telephone around, and you'll eventually hit the sweet spot, simply with no distinguishing "feel", it's harder than you might think.

In one case you're sorted, the audio quality of calls is bright. And while the Note is massive, and you look ridiculous using it, it'southward a really comfy phone to employ and fifty-fifty though it's both big, and heavy, nosotros never struggled.

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Text messaging on the Note is terrific. You can mitt-write letters if you want, although it's a scrap backbreaking. But the extra screen size ways that the keys, and the gaps between the keys, are larger than on a normal phone. This means typing is easier, and we discovered that we were able to blazon much more accurately.

Bombardment

A large telephone needs a big battery. The screen lone will drink power in the Note two, so if yous're using it for, say, satellite navigation, where the screen is on constantly, and so it'due south going to run out of juice very quickly indeed. We tested this, and reckon you'll lose ability at more than ten per cent per hour for navigation - and probable video too.

Things wait up when you lot use the telephone more "commonly". In one case you're out of the constant use phase that affects everyone when they first purchase a handset, and then you outset to use information technology less and overall go more than impressive battery life. The Note can easily last the mean solar day under normal utilize, and if you were conservative with it, you lot'd go one-and-a-half to two days' utilize. Switch off a few things like push notifications and you'll accept no worries.

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The battery itself is a 3100mAh prison cell, then in that location'due south a lot of juice in here. To give you an idea, almost phone sit about 2000mAh these days - older, or smaller phones from 1600mAh up - and tablets residual effectually 6000mAh or more (the iPad 3 is nearly 12,000mAh). The life yous encounter though, can be curtailed by some of Samsung'southward own functionality, like motion detection and some of the gesture-based coolness.

To recap

Nosotros're in beloved. This phone may seem wildly casuistic, only those fabulous Koreans have somehow managed to create a device that offers so much more than a smaller phone and almost makes tablets pointless. This telephone won't be for everyone, only for us it'due south one of the best Android devices money tin buy.

Writing by Ian Morris.