Samsung Galaxy Note 8 : Everything you need to know

So the Galaxy Note 8 has launched, with Samsung’s big announcement taking place on August 23. The rumours were pretty much spot on, so all the specs and features Samsung unwrapped were things we already knew – there were no real surprises. The phablet is already up for pre-order, while the official release date is September 15.

Samsung Galaxy Note 8 : Design & Display

We’re all familiar with the fact that Samsung can make some pretty stunning looking, premium-quality smartphones fashioned from metal and glass. And then there’s the fact that Samsung pioneered the whole curved-edge Super AMOLED thing.

Whether you love or hate Samsung’s aesthetic if you’ve handled or seen first hand any of its phones since the Galaxy S6 this is going to be familiar with the Galaxy Note 8 as well, as it’s much the same deal.

There are one or two distinguishing features though. It’s slightly more squared off on the corners, but crucially, like the Galaxy S8 series, the Galaxy Note 8 has a 6.4in, 18.5:9 aspect ratio “Infinity Display”, meaning the entire front fascia is dominated by edge-to-edge glass, with no Home key or other controls cluttering things up. This is a first for the Note series and gives you maximum screen real estate for doodling and scribbling with the S-Pen stylus. Samsung has mastered Super AMOLED and this huge expanse of screen is stunning to gaze upon with a QHD+ resolution; it’s insanely sharp and overflowing with rich colors, deep blacks, vibrant contrast, and punchy brightness levels.

Samsung has added some interesting new features for the S-Pen as well; the last few generations of flagships have feature Always-On display functionality and the Note 8 is no different, only this time as well as displaying the date, time, and notifications, it also allows you to take handy notes or create quick sketches while the phone is asleep. It’s a great idea whether you use the phone for meetings or if it’s your shopping list in the supermarket.

Other S-Pen functionality sees it being used to translate text from other languages, convert currency, capture and modify screenshots (this isn’t new, but it is cool), and a really interesting new one (though not so productive!) is you can make your own gifs and emojis.

Oh and one more thing, both the Note 8 itself and the S-Pen are IP68 water and dust resistant.

Samsung Galaxy Note 8 : Software & Performance

Samsung’s new powerhouse Note 8 dawns experience UI which is pretty snappy and responsive. But none of this is too surprising, again, this is pretty much exactly the same deal as the Samsung Galaxy S8, and the UI and performance on that was fantastic. It’s more of the same here…just on a bigger scale.

The Note 8 has a sizeable 3,300mAh battery inside and, if the Galaxy S8+ battery performance is any measure, this should offer some astounding run-time on a single charge. The chipsets are nice and battery friendly 10nm, although the QHD+ display resolution on a screen this size could be greedy. That said, again, as per the Galaxy S8 series, Samsung knows what it’s doing when it comes to optimizing the battery with the software, OLED’s clever battery saving trickery, and the power-saving properties of these CPUs.

Samsung Galaxy Note 8 : Camera

Samsung’s first two-camera setup places a 12-megapixel telephoto lens alongside a 12-megapixel wide-angle lens (there’s also an 8-megapixel camera up front). Both cameras use optical image stabilization (OIS) to help keep images and video looking smooth.

Portrait mode is the major use case here. This applies a softly blurred background around the subject (which itself is in focus), like an aura of mystique that makes the person or thing pop out.

Samsung calls it Live Focus, and it lets you do more than you can on other phones with similar modes, including the iPhone 7 Plus, which popularized the feature.

• You can adjust the amount of blur on a sliding scale of 0-10 before you take the shot
• It lets you use both lenses to take and save two pictures in the gallery. One photo is the blurry portrait (this is also called bokeh effect), and one that’s a wider-angle image that keeps the background in focus, and more of it in the frame. The iPhone 7 Plus does something similar, except its second non-bokeh image saves at the same aspect ratio as the bokeh one.
• It’s called Dual Capture, and although it’s automatic, you can turn it off in the settings.
• You can also remove or alter the blur effect from the gallery after you take a picture.
• You can pop between the portrait and full photo.

Other camera details for shutterbugs: 2x optical zoom, up to 10x digital zoom, F2.4 telephoto lens, F1.7 wide-angle lens with dual-pixel auto-focus.

Samsung Galaxy Note 8 : Stylus

• One neat new feature is called Live Memo. In a message, you can draw a reply, which will be turned into an animated GIF for your friend to watch. It can be seen just as a bit of fun, but it’s also handy to take a screenshot of a map and draw a route on it to send — when they watch the GIF, they’ll be able to see the exact route they need to take.
• Note users have already been able to make quick notes when the screen is off, but the Note 8 expands that by allowing you to create up to 100 pages of ‘Screen Off Memos’. It’s great for jotting down your shopping list, for example.
• The translate tool is new for the Note 8 and it’s really cool. With this mode enabled, you can hover the S Pen over a word in a sentence and, using Google’s translation skills, it’ll show you the word in the language of your choice as a pop-up. You can also select entire sentences to translate.
• The stylus itself has seen some upgrades. The nib is finer than before and it has 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity. Samsung says that makes it feel much more like writing with a real pen. While it is very comfortable to make quick notes, however the small size of the pen still means you will probably wouldn’t want to hand-write entire emails.

Is the Note 8 battery safe?

If you were burned by the Galaxy Note 7 flame-out, you might be a little gunshy about the Note 8.

Here’s what Samsung’s done to help cool your fears:

• Instituted an 8-point battery safety check
• Reduced battery size and capacity from 3,500mAh to 3,300mAh to leave more room in the phone’s cavity
• Partnered with UL, a certification company, to endorse the Note 8

Of course, we won’t know for certain if any phone battery is faulty until users’ reports come in. For the record, there have not been similar widespread reports of problems with the Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus batteries. However, if you’re wary, it doesn’t hurt to watch and wait.

Samsung Galaxy Note 8 Specs & Hardware

• Dimensions: 162.5 x 74.6 x 8.5mm
• Display: 6.3in Quad HD+ Super AMOLED, 2960×1440 Infinity Display (18.5:9 Aspect Ratio)
• Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 (10nm) octa-core CPU OR Samsung Exynos 8995 (10nm) octa-core CPU – region dependent
• GPU: Adreno 540 (Qualcomm Snapdragon) OR ARM Mali-G71 (Samsung Exynos) – region dependent
• RAM:6GB
• Software: Android Nougat
• Connectivity: 4G LTE, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Type-C USB, NFC, GPS, Fingerprint scanner, Iris Scanner, Face Scanner
• Storage: 64GB, 128GB or 256GB – region dependent
• MicroSD: Yes
• Primary Camera: Dual-12MP, f/1.7 and f/2.4 apertures, 1/2.3″ sensor size, 1.55µm pixel size, Dual-Pixel Phase Detection Autofocus, OIS, 2x optical zoom, touch focus, face/smile detection, Auto HDR, panorama, 2160p video @30fps, 1080p video @60fps
• Secondary Camera: 8MP with autofocus, f/1.7 aperture, Auto HDR, 1440p video @30fps
• Battery: 3,300mAh
• Other: IP68 Certified (Water & Dust Resistant), S-Pen Stylus

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