Hands on with the Samsung Galaxy Note 8
I instantly fell in love with the Note 7 when it came out. Then the news started to come out and all of a sudden my open love letters to the phone on social media began to get responses like “blown up any planes with it yet?”
Samsung eventually figured out that the fault was just a battery one, and not the phone itself, but the damage had been done and a full recall was made. My heart was broken.
But now Samsung is back, and you can bet they made sure that there was going to be no repeat of last time. The Note 8 is absolutely massive with its 6.3-inch quad-HD+ AMOLED HDR display that sticks out the top of my pocket. It’s softkeys only enhance the size more as it almost goes edge to edge. The left and right sides have the iconic curve going on that give it that infinite feel.
Since it’s last iteration the Note has picked up a new button on the left hand side underneath the volume. This is the Bixby key, and is Samsung’s desperate attempt at making you use its AI. I did end up using it more often than usual, and its voice recognition of my slurred kiwi accent was great! It did require my to put on an American drawl like OK Google has.
A major factor for my love of the Note 7 was it’s pressure sensitivity and S Pen. Yes, a stylus these days might seem quaint, but having the option is great for artists and people like my dad who have massive sausage fingers. All this is available in the Note 8, and I spent plenty of time drawing on it. It may be nostalgia speaking but I don’t recall the button on the S Pen having software attached to it. When you click it a quick menu appears along the side of the screen, giving you a quick way to jump between apps. This is fine for most people, but as an artist I was hoping to be able to customise what the button did some more. Artflow, the app I used for most of my drawing, used the clicker to colour drop which means it’d be perfect for mixing and blending colours as you go. My only problem was that every time I’d click it I’d get the colour dropper AND the samsung software jumping up all at once. As far as I can see there’s no way to disable the feature.
Photography on it’s duel cameras is beautiful taking brilliantly wide photos.
It got wet a number of times and was able to withstand it just fine. Also its Snapdragon 835 and 6GB RAM was able to process everything I did quickly and efficiently.
The Note 8 is my favourite phone I’ve reviewed in a while. If you’re an artist, or appreciate a massive screen and a flawless experience, then you really need to consider the Note 8.
