Seven by tradition is supposed to be a lucky number. Well at least by western traditions and sense. However, for Samsung, the number seven wasn’t exactly made out to be the luckiest of numbers. After the disaster that was the Samsung Galaxy Note7, hopefully, this time their new Samsung Galaxy Note8 won’t literally blow up in their face.
So what exactly will Samsung’s new flagship offer? First off, unlike the Samsung Galaxy S8, the Samsung Galaxy Note8 is a lot more squared off making it look a little like a leaflet, which we’re not altogether opposed to.
It looks especially gorgeous though as it blends metal and glass together almost seamlessly onto its body. And with that beauty comes some impressive protection as the smartphone is IP68 rated for dust and water resistance.
Then there’s the display. It’s gorgeous 6.3-inch Quad HD+ Infinity Display is the largest screen to be fitted on a Samsung Galaxy Note smartphone and it comes with an impressive 2960×1440 pixel resolution with a crisp pixel density of 521 ppi.
You can, of course, expect some speedy and efficient operation on the Samsung Galaxy Note8 as well thanks to the Snapdragon 835/Exynos 8895 10nm octa-core processor (depending on market). This will be supported with a whopping 6GB of LPDDR4 RAM.
For storage hogs, you’ll be glad to know that the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 tops up 256GB and also levels down at 128GB and 64GB. And if you’re the type that keeps multiple phone lines, you’ll be glad to know, it will also support Dual SIM. Don’t really need the second line? Then you can use the second SIM tray for additional storage (up to 256GB) via microSD card.
If you’re a bit paranoid, you’ll be glad to know that the Samsung Galaxy Note8 will feature three different forms of biometric security. There’s the rear-mounted fingerprint scanner, an Iris Scanner, as well as facial recognition so don’t worry about people peeking into your private life.
For power users, you might be a bit disappointed with tiny 3,300 mAh battery capacity. Considering what happened to its predecessor though, it’s no surprise that Samsung preferred to be safe rather than sorry as they’re pretty confident on how safe it’s going to be.
As an assurance, the battery has undergone the company’s 8-point battery safety check, considered the most rigorous in the industry. Don’t worry about slow charging times though, as, despite all that safety checks, The Samsung Galaxy Note8 will support Fast Charging and Wireless Charging too.
Of course when it comes to a Samsung flagship, one of the highlights would be the camera and the Samsung Galaxy Note8 is no exception as now it comes with cameras. And no we don’t mean one camera in front and another at the back. We mean two main cameras at the back (well that technically means it has three cameras).
The first back camera is the standard 12-megapixel Dual Pixel f/1.7 aperture camera, that was already available on the Samsung Galaxy S8. It’s now complemented by a secondary 12-megapixel sensor with a f/2.4 aperture short telephoto lens which can give users 2X optical zoom and up to 10X digital zoom.
This second sensor has allowed the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 to gain access to its Live Focus feature. This feature is Samsung’s take on Bokeh. Also, with the second back camera, the Note8 has a Dual Capture feature which captures two photos with both the cameras simultaneously so you can have both a normal wide shot and a telephoto shot of the same scene.
With all that packed in the main back camera, you’d of course still want to take selfies right? So the Note8 still has a decent front 8-megapixel f/1.7 aperture camera that comes with autofocus.
And then of course, there is the S Pen, the one thing that has allowed the Galaxy Note line to stand out from the rest of its Android competitors and Galaxy S siblings.
It still looks the same from the one that came with the Note7, including the clicky button but now it also has a finer tip and IP68 dust and water resistance.
You’ll also be happy to know that Samsung has improved its functionality in the Note8’s software. They’ve made improvements to note-taking by allowing you to pin and edit notes right on the Always-on Display itself and you can now take up to 100 pages of notes with the screen-off memo function.
Translation is also further improved as users can now translate entire sentences instead of single words with the S Pen into 71 different languages. You’ll also be able to convert units and foreign currencies and send GIFs across platforms that support animated GIFs (AGIF) with the S Pen as well.
On the operating system side, the Samsung Galaxy Note8 will come out of the box running Android 7.1.1 Nougat with TouchWiz built on top. Samsung has improved their Apps Edge function by adding something called App Pair. This is designed to make multitasking more effortless by allowing users to pair two apps and launch them simultaneously in multi-window mode at a tap.
Want to make the Samsung’s Galaxy Note8 more than a phone?It’ll also have DeX support so with Samsung’s DeX Station you’ll be able to get a desktop experience. There’s also Samsung’s Bixby built-in with Bixby Voice.
Other hardware specs include Cat 16 LTE connectivity with 802.11ac WiFi and Bluetooth 5.0. NFC is also present and so is MST for Samsung Pay operations.
If you’re wondering just what colour flavours the Samsung Galaxy Note8 will come in, there’s four of them — Midnight Black, Orchid Grey, Maple Gold, and Deepsea Blue.
So when can you get your hands on Samsung’s new flagship? Pre-orders will be starting for most South East Asian (SEA) countries around mid-September, though prices for each country have yet to be announced. And if you’re wondering when here are some of the confirmed dates:
Malaysia
Pre-order: September 5 to 10
Unit arrival: Unannounced
Philippines
Pre-order: September 8 to September 17
Unit arrival: September 29 onwards
Pre-order bonus: AKG speakers worth Philippines P7,990
Source: Rappler
Dates for Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam and other SEA countries pre-orders have yet to be announced and we’ll be updating this post as soon as they come in.
So are you hyped on the launch of the Samsung Galaxy Note8? Check out the entire Samsung Galayx Unpacked 2017 event stream below!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rD37VVMda88
