Terminal Thoughts

With the fourth generation of the Galaxy Note, Samsung has finally got information technology right. The Galaxy Notation 4 is an awesome combination of useful software features and acme-notch, cutting edge hardware. If y'all want a large-screened smartphone that succeeds in nearly all key areas, it's hard to look by Samsung's latest and greatest.

The biggest and most obvious change to the Note line is the refined design. Samsung finally ditched the cheap plastic in favour of a role-metal blueprint, improving the plastic dorsum cover in the process. The Annotation iv is truly the starting time Galaxy production I've used that feels and looks similar information technology'due south worth the asking cost, which is a massive footstep forrad for the company. And this isn't just token praising of improvement and endeavour: the Note 4'south has 1 of the better designs of the year.

The Note 4 camera is merely superb. It takes the stellar Galaxy S5 camera sensor and adds in the last piece of the puzzle, optical image stabilization, allowing it to deliver fantastic photos in nearly all atmospheric condition. Paired with a top-notch HDR mode, an improved selfie camera, and Ultra HD video recording, and you're left with 1 of the best – if not the best – smartphone cameras available.

Samsung hasn't held back when it comes to packing in the latest technology. Both models come with make new SoCs, and each are exciting in their own right. The Exynos variant is one of the merely SoCs on the market place with ARM'due south 64-chip CPU cores inside, while the Snapdragon 805 is Qualcomm's beastly chip designed for Quad HD devices. Alongside up to True cat. vi LTE, Wi-Fi 802.11ac and Bluetooth 4.1, this a potent hardware combination.

It's as well great to encounter the Note 4's Exynos model holding its own against the Snapdragon model for the first time in generations. Benchmarks reveal the Exynos model has a 7% faster CPU, and most importantly a GPU that'southward only marginally slower, which is a significant step forwards for Samsung'due south silicon partitioning. No matter which variant you opt for, you'll be blest with top of the table performance that'll satisfy you throughout a standard 2-year contract.

The jury'due south however out on whether upgrading to 2560 ten 1440 displays is really necessary, though in that location'due south no doubting the Annotation 4 packs an excellent Quad Hd Super AMOLED. Brightness is the only real concern with this display, equally it excels in viewing angles, sharpness, contrast and color quality (later a bit of tweaking). The size is besides great for media consumption and note taking, so long equally you tin handle information technology.

Samsung's software offering is every bit refined as information technology's ever been. The S Pen is very responsive and provides some genuinely useful features throughout the operating system. S Note and South Health are nifty starting time-political party apps, even if the new sensors for the latter are contemporary, while other features like multi-window are much improved.

Despite all the strong points of the Annotation 4's software, Samsung hasn't been able to fully eradicate some of the clunkiness. Although improved, the settings screen is still long and somewhat hard to navigate, with options left, right and center. Some parts of TouchWiz don't meld well with the stock Android experience either, giving the handset a disjointed feel from fourth dimension to time.

As for bombardment, at this stage I've only been able to benchmark the Exynos variant, though it performs quite well. In well-nigh of our tests it produced better battery life than the Snapdragon variant of the Note 3, which is a large achievement for Samsung'due south SoC partition and a bang-up result for anyone looking to option upwards the Note 4.

All things considered the Galaxy Note 4 is a terrific device, by far the all-time Samsung smartphone I've always used, and a contender for the best large-screened handset y'all tin buy.

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Pros: Greatly refined design that finally adds in some metal. Optically stabilized camera takes awesome photos across the board. Superb Quad HD Super AMOLED powered by one of two immensely powerful SoCs. The S Pen is back and ameliorate than ever. Decent battery life.

Cons: Some aspects of TouchWiz are still clunky and demand work.