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I was with Caroline at the T3 Awards last night and I was
just as shocked/angered/surprised (I can never read female emotions very well,
I’m sure I’ll learn one day) as her when the iPhone 4S was announced as the
Work Gadget of the Year. 

Like the Galaxy S III before it, Samsung has just announced that the new Galaxy Note II will indeed hit all five major U.S. carriers — AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, U.S. Cellular, and Verizon Wireless — by the middle of this November.

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Fine, I admit it, the company’s still being pretty vague here. As usual, Samsung has left it up to the carriers to announce exactly when the new-fangled phablet will hit their respective store shelves, but rest easy — those announcements are bound to start trickling out any minute now.

There’s also no official word on pricing (on-contract or otherwise), but if the original is any indicator the Note II should launch with a price tag between $249 and $299.

Before we get too wrapped up in the details, let’s consider the hardware for just a moment — the Note II’s 5.5-inch Super AMOLED display and redesigned S-Pen may count among the device’s biggest draws, but its internals are worthy of some extra scrutiny here. While plenty of international handsets tend to get neutered once they make their way stateside, that thankfully doesn’t seem to be the case with the Note II. Samsung’s 1.6GHz quad-core Exynos chipset still runs the show here, while 2GB of RAM and an LTE radio help keep things moving at a snappy pace.

What’s more, the device is Samsung’s first to ship pre-loaded with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, though the Korean company’s liberal application of TouchWiz may make that fact a tough one to discern at first glance. Of course, Samsung’s additions don’t end there: the full slew of S-Pen applications is present too, as are plenty of modifications and updates seen in the recently-launched Galaxy Note 10.1 (think increased S-Pen sensitivity, greater hover distance, and more).

It’s also worth noting that Samsung’s timing really couldn’t be any better — LG opened the doors to its latest press conference/domestic phone unveiling just an hour ago, and now its rival has announced availability for its newest top-tier Android handset. To top it all off, LG also just recently launched its own hulking handset — the LG Intuition — which was largely panned by critics. The poor guys just can’t catch a break.

The original Samsung Note was huge — in both physical size and popularity. Samsung sold over 10 million units of the huge phone, or rather, if you prefer, mini tablet. The Note II is more of the same, really. It sports a much more capable mobile SoC, which should make the Jelly Bean Android build run as smooth as, well, butter. Strangely, the new model features a lower resolution screen than the original, but that likely won’t hurt sales.

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In all, the new Note is like the old Note. Engadget likes what they see so far. That’s a good thing. It’s still a massive thing, likely too big for some users. But that’s fine with Samsung. The Note II shows Samsung’s swagger. It might not be the best selling phone in Samsung’s lineup, but it’s the most important.

Samsung is fresh off a huge court lose that could have sweeping effects. Early reports from phone resellers indicate that users are actually dumping their Samsung phones twice as much as normal. Gazelle.com, a site that buys old phones from owners, reports a 50% increase in Samsung smartphones buybacks over the past three days. That’s just nuts. But Samsung is plowing forward even though some devices could face a ban in the US.

The Galaxy Note II is the successor to the widely popular Galaxy Note. The original Note wasn’t the first 5-inch touchscreen phone, but it was the model to make it big. The 5-inch Dell Streak busted into the market in the summer of 2010 but failed to make much of an impact. The Streak shipped with outdated Android software and Dell failed to provide updates in a timely fashion. Plus, unlike the Note, the Streak wasn’t marketed to the general conumser; the Streak was intended for the business crowd.

Samsung announced the Galaxy Note one year ago at IFA 2011. The phone hit the European market in late October and went on to sell one million units prior to launching in the US the following February. Samsung went big with the Note’s marketing and went as far as showcasing it CES in a huge booth by having artists draw caricatures of show goers. It was a widely popular stunt, and the booth often had a massive line.

Samsung is likely to go even bigger with the Note II’s advertising. The original’s success shows that there is a large market for large screen phones. With the new iPhone using a larger screen, Samsung’s argument for huge screens could be made easier this time around. If nothing else, the Galaxy Note II is a fine halo device, designed to draw consumers’ attention to the Samsung brand — and to the Galaxy S III.

Consider the Chevy Corvette — it’s too expensive and not practical for every buyer, but it brings people into car showrooms and that’s the Note II’s job too. The Note II is physically huge. It’s not for everyone. But Samsung would argue that the Galaxy S III, the Note’s smaller and cheaper counterpart, is for everyone. Where the Note II is Samsung’s Corvette, the Galaxy S III is the Chevy Camaro, an everyday driver.

At $199 with carrier subsidies, the Galaxy S III is Samsung’s mainstay. The phone still features a large screen, but it’s rather small compared to the Note II. The GSIII lacks a stylus, tablet-ish flappy cover and, most important, the negative connotation that it’s too big.

Samsung clearly knows what it’s doing. It’s the largest phone manufacturer in the world and the Galaxy S III will rival the new iPhone in sales; the Note series will not. But it doesn’t have to in order to accomplish its mission. The Note II gives Samsung’s lineup a bit of variety while still keeping the manufacturing simply by using parts similar to that found in the Galaxy S III. This way Samsung can offer more models while keeping manufacturing costs down.

Expect to hear a lot about the Note II in the coming months. It’s scheduled to hit the Europe in October, with a wider release to follow shortly.

Click to view slideshow.

It was only a fortnight ago that T-Mobile announced it would be carrying Samsung’s Galaxy Note. Pink subscribers everywhere rejoiced in the confirmation — we’d suspected the Note’s arrival for quite a while, and a tweet from T-Mobile sealed the deal.

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Now, however, it appears that T-Mobile is discontinuing the device, just a few weeks after it put the phablet on store shelves. Android Police reports that a trusted source has confirmed the EOL status of the Galaxy Note, which has been removed from T-Mobile’s website.

As uncomely as it looks for Tmo to flip flop at this rate, it actually makes much more sense to dump the old and bring in the new. Remember, word of an even bigger Galaxy Note II is spreading around the web.

Rather than sell a device released nearly a year ago internationally, and more than half a year ago in the States, T-Mobile (and its subscribers) are much better off waiting for the new new thing.

[via UberGizmo]

These past few weeks have been quite the ride for Samsung’s Galaxy Note devotees — a variant of the original model is finally (and officially) on its way to T-Mobile’s airwaves, and a report out of South Korea pointed to some nifty upgrades in place for the phablet’s successor.

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Now there’s a new, even juicier tidbit for those phablet fans to mull over. A Samsung spokesperson confirmed to Reuters last night that the company would indeed show off “the next Galaxy Note” at an event in Berlin on August 29 — just two days before the city’s massive IFA trade show is slated to kick off.

Sadly, said spokesperson wasn’t feeling very gabby when it came to specifics about the device — even just the name would’ve been nice — but early reports hinted at the inclusion of a quad-core processor and an even larger 5.5-inch display. Should those details hold true, it seems like a natural (if conservative) step for a device that pushed plenty of limits the first time around. More than a few people (myself included) weren’t initially sold on the concept of pairing an awfully wide phone with something as seemingly passe as a stylus, but the original went on to sell 7 million units as of this past June. Not too shabby, Samsung.

This turn of events also casts some doubt on the big August 15 unveiling that Samsung’s U.S. arm announced earlier this month. Many expected the company to pull back the curtains on the new Galaxy Note at that domestic event, but that seems awfully unlikely now — the original Galaxy Note made its debut at the IFA show last year, so to trot it out on U.S. soil as opposed to one of the world’s largest consumer electronics events seems a little lacking in the grandeur department. Looks like it may be full speed ahead for the long-awaited 10.1-inch Galaxy Note tablet, especially considering that some online retailers will soon be pushing them out the door.

T-Mobile’s Galaxy Note has been one of the worst-kept handset secrets in recent memory but the one thing the carrier managed to keep close to its proverbial chest is when its customers could actually go and get their hands on one. According to CNET, T-Mobile will begin selling its version of Samsung’s 5.3-inch phablet on August 8, for a cool $249 with a two-year contract.

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Of course, whether or not you should buy one is another story entirely. Sure, there’s nothing wrong with the T-Mobile version per se — it’s nearly identical to the AT&T model, save for its lack of an LTE radio and the fact that it ships loaded with Ice Cream Sandwich. What really makes things dicey is the launch window that T-Mobile and Samsung have come up with.

You see, Samsung is expected to pull back the curtains on its “newest Galaxy device” just one week after T-Mo’s Galaxy Note goes on sale, and there are significant rumblings that said device is none other than the Galaxy Note 2.

If early reports hold true, the update should be a substantial one. South Korea’s MK Business News reported earlier this month that the new phablet will sort a quad-core chipset, a surprisingly beefy 12 or 13-megapixel camera, and an ever larger display — as if the Note didn’t already skew toward the unwieldy side of things. Samsung being Samsung, there’s no official word on what the company plans to unveil come the 15th — it may well be the oft-delayed Galaxy Note tablet — but it’s still a strong argument for staying at home and waiting to see what the Korean electronics giant has up its voluminous sleeves.

Samsung has just reported its Q2 2012 earnings, and it would seem that the Korean electronics giant is still the king of mobile, with an operating profit of $5.9 billion for the period, up 79 percent year over year.

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Of course, the Galaxy S III and the Galaxy Note have plenty to do with that, considering the fact that Samsung predicted it would sell 10 million Galaxy S III units by July. And that’s just what it did.

The company reported $41.5 billion in revenues, which is up about $1.5 billion from last quarter, and up 21 percent year over year.

Samsung is killing it in the TV department, though the company does report that demand stays relatively the same year over year. Even still, the company has increased shipments and profitability, and demand for LED TVs in emerging markets helped “Samsung increase its portion of LED TV sales from the mid 60-percent range to a mid 80-percent share, quarter-on-quarter,” according to the release.

Memory chips and processors were down a bit from last year, but the real shining star was the phone business, which brought in $3.64 billion in profit.

We’ve seen the evidence pile up in front of us over the past couple months, but T-Mobile has just made the Galaxy Note‘s destiny official by the law of social media. After user @epicrivas asked “What’s up with the Galaxy Note for T-Mobile?” the carrier responded with the following:

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@epicrivas We are excited to confirm the Samsung Galaxy Note will be coming to T-Mobile! More info to come.^JM

— T-Mobile USA (@TMobileHelp) July 16, 2012

There’s good and bad news. The good news is that we can all take a breather now that the company has finally confirmed what we’ve been expecting for quite some time. The bad news is that we aren’t really learning anything new. We’ll have to wait for a release from T-Mo before we can get into pricing and availability, but you can expect the same $249 on-contract price tag as we’re seeing over at AT&T.

Unfortunately, it would seem the one thing that didn’t leak out over the past few months is an availability date. Stay tuned though, and we’ll keep you abreast of any changes.

Well, if you needed any more proof that the Galaxy Note will soon make an appearance on T-Mobile’s store shelves, take a gander at this.

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TmoNews has discovered that a slew of Galaxy Note related documents can be found by searching for — what else? — “Galaxy Note” on T-Mobile’s website. Sadly, there’s no word yet on whether or not that rumored July 11 release date is still in the cards.

The documents run the gamut from explanations of the device’s specs and features to a software overview to a how-to guide for using enormous handset. All in all there are 12 such documents detailing various aspects of Samsung’s fabulous phablet, though there’s little telling what specifically is inside of them at this point.

You see, when trying to open up the documents proper, users are prompted to login to their T-Mobile Support Community accounts, and all they get for bounding over that hurdle is an error message saying they aren’t authorized to see the document. It’s certainly a bummer that we can’t pore over those documents to see how (if at all) the T-Mobile version differs from its international and AT&T-bound relatives, but things aren’t all bad.

Some people are surely heartened to see that T-Mobile will soon be getting some big screen love (even though a brand new Galaxy Note may be just around the corner), and with any luck it’ll come bearing the same Ice Cream Sandwich update that the AT&T model just received. And for those of you who just can’t wait to surf on T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network with Samsung’s hefty handheld, well, let’s say just a little elbow grease can go a long way.