I’ll get to the Galaxy Note II in a minute, I promise. However, I have to focus on what is, for me, the biggest story about Samsung at IFA: Samsung announced a Windows Phone 8 device one week before Microsoft was expected to. Wow, the folks at Nokia have to be more than a little miffed right now.
Dubbed the ATIV S, Samsung’s new smartphone has some impressive specs: dual core 1.5 chip, a 4.8″ HD SuperAMOLED display coated in Corning’s Gorilla Glass 2, an impressive 2,300mAh battery, and also a slightly less impressive 8 MP rear camera. One can’t have everything. You can bet Apple already has a legal team looking at every pixel of the photos released of the ATIV S so far.
Samsung is also showing Windows RT some love with the ATIV Tab. In case you were wondering, it looks like ATIV is to Windows 8 RT and Windows Phone what Galaxy is to Android and Focus was to Windows Phone 7. There aren’t too many surprises with what few specs have been revealed: 32 or 64 GB of storage, front and rear facing cameras, some sort of 1.5 dual core processor (hey, is it just me, or are those popular today?) , and a 10″ screen.
Surface-y, ain’t it?
Samsung also showed off some new Windows 8 devices: the Series 5, Series 7, and the Series 5 Ultra. At least, that’s what the devices will be called in the United States. Internationally, all three devices will have the a variation of the ATIV branding. The series 5 Ultra, as the name might imply, is an Ultrabook, albeit with a touchscreen. Sony is adapting its Android Hubs for this and other Windows 8 devices, but the sad fact is that the Series 5 Ultra is not as enticing to me as the regular Series 5 (and the series 7), which are convertible laptops with S pen support. Touchscreens on Ultrabooks are neat, but I’d rather simply full-on use a tablet. Especially as the entry level Series 5 will sell for $649, and you can get the keyboard in a bundle at $749. The entry level Series 5 Ultra starts at $799. Sorry, but the hybrid tablets seem like a better value. As for the series 7, one configuration will be $1,119, but no news on if that is the low end or the high end of the divide.
Enough about Windows 8 though. We know what you came here for — Android cameras! Wait, what? Yup, in what is turning out to be an odd trend, Samsung has stuffed Android onto a camera, the EK-CG100 Galaxy. I’m not a camera person per se, but I do get a kick out of the fact that this camera ships with Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean), something some handset manufacturers can’t get seem to get on the ball with themselves. What is the world coming to when your camera has a more recent version of your smartphone OS than your smartphone does? There’s even Google Play access for adding sharing apps. I can’t wait to see how our resident camera guru reacts to this.
But will it run my IMPORTANT apps?
Finally, in what must have been one of the least guarded secrets in tech PR, Samsung unveiled the follow-up to last year’s hit: the Galaxy Note II. Samsung’s big phone has gone from 5.3 inches to 5.5, and its bringing a bunch of other changes. Fortunately, the folks at Engadget already did the hard work of documenting what they are. The most important things to note are that the phone will have a larger capacity battery and will run Android Jelly Bean. That last bit excites me because maybe then we’ll see Jelly Bean trickle down to the original Note. The Note II will ship in multiple capacities, as opposed to the original Note’s 16 GB.
Warning: Not for use by people with small hands.
However, it’s unknown when the new Note will hit the U.S. other than “before the end of 2012.” That’s an awful long time to wait. While the specs on the Note II may be cutting edge now, who’s to say what else might be out there in the next few months? It seems like a possibly unwise move to delay the U.S. release of a device people are actually techcited about. Particularly if you just lost a billion dollar lawsuit.
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