Samsung Announces $1,000 Galaxy Note 9 Smartphone With Last-Gen Android Software Out-of-the-Box (engadget.com)

The Galaxy Note 9 touts a slightly larger 6.4-inch end-to-end screen, a 4,000mAh battery that promises "all-day" use, and a minimum 128GB of storage -- there's also a 512GB version that, with 512GB microSD cards, can give you a full terabyte of space. It runs Android 8.1 Oreo -- not Android Pie, which Google and Essential rolled out to some of their devices earlier this month. Engadget: Samsung is also bringing over welcome improvements from the Galaxy S9 family, including stereo speakers and the variable aperture f/1.5-2.4 primary camera (there's a second camera on the back, of course). This year, though, the most conspicuous change revolves around the S Pen. This is Samsung's first S Pen to incorporate Bluetooth, and that lets you do a whole lot more than doodle on the screen. You can use it as a remote control for selfies and presentations, and Samsung is providing a toolkit to let app developers use the pen for their own purposes. And no, you don't need to load it with batteries or plug it into a charger -- it'll top up just by staying in your phone. The base model of the Note 9, featuring 128GB of storage and 6GB of RAM, is priced at $999. The other variant will set you back by $1,250. Preorders begin on August 10th, and the phone will be available on August 24th at all major carriers or direct (and unlocked) from Samsung. CNET writes about the camera sensors on the new handset: The Galaxy Note 9 keeps the same hardware setup as the Galaxy S9 Plus. That is, dual 12-megapixel cameras on the back, one of them that automatically changes aperture when it detects the need for a low-light shot. (Samsung calls this dual aperture, and it's also on both S9 phones.) There's also an 8-megapixel front-facing camera for your selfies. What's different is AI software that analyzes the scene and quickly detects if you're shooting a flower, food, a dog, a person. There are 20 options the Note 9's been trained on, including snowflakes, cityscapes, fire, you get it. Then, the camera optimizes white balance, saturation and contrast to make photos pop.

Comments

Brand new phone, but OS isn't up to date

[shilly]

I know this is normal in Android land, but I don't understand why people are OK with it.

Re:Brand new phone, but OS isn't up to date

[MightyYar]

I wish Windows laptops still shipped with 7.

Re:Brand new phone, but OS isn't up to date

[known_coward_69]

because phones have a 2-3 development and testing time frame and by the time the Note 9 began field tests it was too late to have it ship with pie or wait for pie and delay the testing

Re:Brand new phone, but OS isn't up to date

[Powercntrl]

Because the smartphone industry has become the fashion industry, and the masses only care about having the "latest style", not the best technology. Hence we've got phones with distorted edge displays, notches, locked bootloaders, etc... All because the masses only care about bragging on social media how they just dropped a grand on Samsung or Apple's latest polished turd.

Re:..or

[magarity]

or you can buy Kindle Filre 8.9" for $60 that does 90% of things Note does.

The most important thing the Note will do is not have Alexa.

1000

[cascadingstylesheet]

I won't even buy a desktop computer for $1000.

Re:1000

[kiviQr]

$20k rollex shows time the same way $20 timex does. To some people it is disposable income to some it is a choice what to do with it (invest, travel, etc.).