Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Version) review: A premium Android tablet for a premium price

Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Version) review- With the buzz surrounding the Galaxy Note 3 and the Galaxy Gear smartwatch, it's easy to forget that Samsung is also releasing a fresh tablet.
This time around, Samsung is taking a closer clue from its more successful Galaxy Note smartphone line. here I got from Android site news which review Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Version).

The new Galaxy Note 10.1 is super fast, relatively lightweight and has features galore. S Pen support is preferable to ever; joined with the software improvements, the Galaxy Note 10.1 is a multitasker's dream. In addition, it works with Samsung's Galaxy Gear smartwatch. It's one of a small number of Android tablets that exhibits clear advantages over Apple's almighty iPad.

And yet, I can't quite recommend that anybody should purchase the Galaxy Note 10.1. Starting at $549.99 for the 16GB version, the Note is priced even higher than the iPad, which already establishes a relative threshold for highend tablets. Unless you really believe the S Pen is worth the premium, you're probably better off buying a lowerpriced tablet along with a separate stylus and saving yourself well over $100

 

 

Layout: The Galaxy Note 3's larger sibling

 

Physically, the Galaxy Note 10.1 takes the look of the Galaxy Note 3 and enlarges it across a tablet form factor. You're far less inclined to encounter forearm fatigue after prolonged use, which is pleasant.

The pill comes in either black or white, with a fauxchrome rim around the perimeter. But given the Galaxy Note 10.1's extravagant pricing, Samsung is still ostensibly unable to craft a device that feels high end. Samsung claims the faux leather back panel of the tablet will inspire "analogue nostalgia." While I liked the appearance of the material in pictures, in person it is certainly just textured matte plastic. And the "thorough stitch" around the edges of the panel isn't much more than an embossment. It almost makes me homesick for the chintzy plastic backing on most of Samsung's other products.

Held horizontally, there's a Samsung logo on the peak of the tablet, next to a front facing 2-megapixel camera. There are two haptic feedback enabled capacitive touch buttons to the bottom, on each side of the physical home key. The top border is home to volume and power buttons, together with an IR blaster. Stereo speakers flank the tablet on either side, with a 3.5mm headphone jack to the left, along with a microSD card slot and S Pen on the right.

 

The display has received a large update from the original. This time around the 10.1 inch panel features 2560-by-1600-pixel resolution, which works out to 299 pixels per inch. That places it on par with the Nexus 10, and actually makes it denser than the 2048-by-1536pixel iPad, which has 264 pixels per inch. The screen gets incredibly bright, and colours appear super saturated. My only complaint it that it uses a PenTile pixel matrix, which can cause pictures and text in case you look carefully to appear blurry. A lot of people won't even see it, but when you do, it could drive you a little loony.

 

I didn't have to charge the tablet after utilizing it heavily for just two days in a row, usually using the display brightness set to max.

 

Operation: As fast as tablets get

 

The Galaxy Note 10.1 comes in two flavors. The Wi-Fi models uses Samsung's 1.9GHz octa-core Exynos chip, whilst the LTE variation uses a 2.3GHz quad core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800.

I tested the Wi-Fi version with Samsung's octa-core chip. I put it up from the LG G2, which uses a 2.26GHz quadcore Snapdragon 800; roughly precisely the same processor you'll find while in the LTE Note 10.1. It's also among the fastest Android phones available right now.

Standard scores were extremely similar. AnTuTu tests general system performance, including CPU, GPU and RAM. And whilst the Galaxy Note shows a little edge, both scores are high enough to land them in the top of the rankings chart.

Geekbench 3 simulates real-world, cpu - intensive tasks, and scores multicore and singlecore performance separately. The Galaxy Note showed a small edge again, scoring 957 for single core performance and 2603 for multi-core, as the LG G2 turned in scores of 2229 and 888, respectively.

The Galaxy Note dropped slightly behind in Sunspider, which tests JavaScript performance. It scored 1063.7, compared to 910.6 for the LG G2 9 (In Sunspider, a reduced score is better).
 

I discovered some light stuttering on home screen transitions. This became more pronounced while using Samsung's built-in My Magazine software. As soon as you get an app up and running it's smooth sailing, and so I think that it's sensible to blame the bulk of the slow down I encountered on Samsung's UI, which could occasionally feel somewhat distended (I'll touch on this more in somewhat). It's additionally a little buggy. I encountered moments where my touches wouldn't register in any way until I pressed the button power to refresh the screen. Hopefully these problems will undoubtedly be repaired in a future upgrade.

 

While performance is strong overall, while in the grand tradition of tablet PC cameras, the Galaxy Note's 8-megapixel rear camera feels like an afterthought, despite the ostensibly high megapixel count. Pictures appear waxy and soft, and colors are somewhat washed out. The 2-megapixel frontfacing camera is similarly unimpressive, but works good for video chat.

S Pen 2.0

 

Physically, it's much like previous iterations included with last year's Galaxy Note 10.1 as well whilst the Galaxy Note 2. I'd still prefer it to become a bit more, but previous Galaxy Note owners are going to be very happy to learn that the Note 10.1's S Pen finally works on capacitive touch buttons, which was a curious, frustrating omission before.

 

To the flip side, you can even buy a $20 Wacom Bamboo stylus to be used with just about some other tablet, so what makes the S Pen special? It's mostly inside the applications.

As well as returning like pressure sensitivity, features, palm rejection and the S Note app, Samsung has created a quantity of built - in new features called Air Commands.

 

Air Command is initiated automatically once you remove the S Pen in the holster within the tablet. Still, you can activate it by hovering the S Pen right above the tablet's display and clicking the button on the face of the pen. This feels a little difficult at first, but you get used to it.
 

Air Command is actually a series of five quick actions it is possible to perform with the S Pen. The simplest of the actions is Pen Window. This enables you to draw a window all over your tablet PC screen to open a compatible app inside of it. Still, it's helpful for multitasking, allowing you to truly perform two actions at once without needing to switch windows.

 

S Finder is just another relatively simple feature, just like Spotlight on Apple's OS X. It allows you to really search for content in your apparatus or on the web.

Screen Write takes a photo of the current screen, enables you to annotate or draw on it together with the S Pen, then save or share it with another person.

 

Scrap Booker lets you pull a band around anything you find intriguing - like a video clip or an image while searching the Web - and place it in a digital scrapbook. You can then access this content in Scrapbook app or on other devices with the Samsung viewer app.

At Length, Action Memo looks a good deal such as an update to the S Note widget from previous Note devices. It's essentially a tiny yellow sticky pad that enables you to truly jot down quick notes. The essential difference from S Note is that you are able to now pick a similar action for your notes you take. For instance, you can write down someone's contact information, and Action Memo will read your handwriting and make a real listing for you inside your pill's Contacts page. It works astonishingly well.

The problem is, aside from authentic note taking through S Note, and possibly some experimentation with Action Memo, I'm not sure how much I'd actually use one of these characteristics. If you ask me, nearly all of Samsung's additions feel as though they're in search of an audience, rather than the other way around. This feeling carries over into Samsung's new Magazine UI.

Software

The Galaxy Note 10.1 runs Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean), plus a wholesome dose of customizations from Samsung. Samsung's TouchWiz UI seems similar to that which we've seen in recent iterations. The largest change is available in the shape of the My Magazine feature.
My Magazine is essentially a Flipboard-powered app/UI that transforms your graphics tablet screen into an interactive feed for news and social network updates. To get to My Magazine, all you have to do is swipe up in the bottom of the screen, or press the house key once you're about the home screen. (That last feature really caused me to open the app on a number of occasions I wasn't trying to. Luckily you'll be able to disable it.)

 

My Magazine begins having a setup screen that allows you choose what sort of news you need to get. Still, you can choose which social networks you need to access, but a lack of Facebook confounds me. There's also a Personal channel, that may pull together your recent photographs, notes, emails and calendar entries.

It is possible to change between feeds by swiping horizontally across the screen. Swiping vertically will bring you extra stories from within the feed you really are in. The info is presented in roughly two to six tiles per display, each of which will typically link you to a website, social network, or perhaps the original file on your own tablet in the event you tap on them. It's an attractive interface that makes utilizing the tablet more satisfying, but it doesn't offer any significant improvements on the standard Flipboard app - which, by the way, does let you hook into your Facebook account.
Needless to say, the Galaxy Note 10.1 also supports Multi Window multitasking, which allows you use two apps in a split-screen mode. Some improvements have been seen by this feature since a year ago. You may also now run precisely the same app in both windows (though this only works for the net and a few messaging apps). And should you generally run the exact same two apps together, you can create a "paired window" so you don't need to select each app individually each time. The Galaxy Note 3 can do all of this also, but it's much simpler to use on the larger tablet display.

Perhaps my favourite feature is the fact the Galaxy Note 10.1 remains a killer universal remote control. Through Samsung's WatchON app, I was able to link the tablet to my Sony HDTV and Time Warner cable box within seconds, and Samsung's applications interface is clean and easy to make use of. I'd take the Galaxy Note 10.1 over a normal remote control any day.

Conslusion

Since I spent time together with the Galaxy Note 10. 1, I kept asking myself, what makes this specific? And actually, plenty does. It's super fast. It has a comfortable, lightweight design. The S Pen can be used in lots of different ways, and Samsung has packed in tons of attributes you simply can't get with an iPad
In the other hand, there's still nothing clear about what makes this tablet $150 more special than, say, the Nexus 10. Sure, Samsung is offering some free bundled content, like trial subscriptions to Dropbox, Hulu Plus and the New York Times, amongst others. It's never as strong as the Galaxy Note, but I'd expect that to change with rumors of a second variation of the tablet on the way. If you actually like Samsung's My Magazine feature you'll be able to download Flipboard for free. Along with a Wacom stylus will set you back $20. That means you'll be saving well over $100 compared to the Galaxy Note 10.1.
The 2014 Edition of the Galaxy Note 10.1 is an improvement on the original in just about every way. But if Samsung actually desires to capture exactly the same way to the Android tablet market it has with smartphones, it takes to work out a way to offer more features in relation to the competition without such a substantial upsurge in price.