It would seem that Samsung has a hit on its hands in the Galaxy Note 8. Pre-order numbers all around the world were very encouraging, and today, Samsung revealed that the Galaxy Note 8 broke sales records when it went on sale in the UK and Ireland last weekend. Though we don't have specific sales numbers, Samsung does claim that the Note 8 has been the "most successful" launch to date.
There seems to be a new trend in smartphone screens these days. And, no, we’re not referring to the shrinking bezels on smartphones. It’s the trend, or rather the consumer realization, of phones with “shatter-proof” screens make a huge sacrifice in another department, trading scratches for durability. That was true with the Moto Z2 Force and seems to be the case with the Samsung Galaxy S8 Active as well. The difference, however, is how the two companies seem to be handling the matter.
Way back in 2014, Samsung announced a somewhat unexpected tablet. While rugged tablets weren’t exactly rare even back then, a rugged tablet in 8-inch size and a “ C Pen” stylus definitely was. That was the Galaxy Tab Active, pictured above, which was pretty much a mid-range affair. Despite the tablet market regarded to be in a slump, Samsung is surprising us again with a successor to the 2014 slab, which keeps the size and the screen but bumps up what’s inside. Meet the soon to be Galaxy Tab Active 2.
Virtual reality is fun and entertaining but hardly useful when it comes to getting real-world things done, it isn’t of much help. At least with the current state of technology. In the meantime, however, users can have an approximation of productivity in virtual reality by having their non-gaming software brought before their eyes. That is exactly what the Samsung PhoneCast VR app is trying to do by making some “2D”, a.k.a. flat, regular, and boring apps, available on the Gear VR headset.
If a report from South Korea proves true, the next smartphone spec race is not on quality, but on speed. The report suggests that Samsung is set to create its own 3-layer image sensor that's able to utilize DRAM to snap and process photos faster than ever before. Faster than any smartphone camera's ever allowed in the past, that is to say.
Speaking as a Galaxy S8 owner, I have to say that the phone is great, save for one rather annoying feature: the Bixby button. Not only is its usefulness wasted on me - someone who doesn't have much interest in Bixby - but it's also located in one of the most frustrating places. If you find yourself in the same boat, then take heart, because a new update is letting you fix those problems.
Both Samsung and Apple have new smartphones out for sale today, and I've got some opinions about which one I'd choose. If I wanted to pay the smallest amount of money for a top-notch 2017 smartphone (not considering the Google Pixel), I'd have to go with the iPhone 8, which is around $700, on pre-order starting today. If I wanted the most impressive hero phone this year and I needed to order right this minute, I'd choose the Galaxy Note 8.
Samsung has opened up a $300m fund for autonomous vehicle tech, aiming to splash some cash at projects aiming to help cut human drivers out of the equation. Dubbed the Samsung Automotive Innovation Fund, it'll focus not only on fully driverless systems but advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) too. Samsung says potential beneficiaries are teams working on machine vision, AI, and smart sensors.
2016, 2017, and now 2018. Those are the years when Samsung has been expected to finally bring out its dream foldable phone. But those expectations have mostly been based on speculation, rumors, and, admittedly, wishful thinking. But this time it’s different. The foldable phone that Samsung has always been talking about might finally debut next year. And that’s because DJ Koh, Samsung’s own head of mobile business, said so.
It would seem that the Galaxy Note 8 is on its way to being a success. Last week, pre-order numbers began surfacing from South Korea and showed us that interest was outpacing that of the Galaxy Note 7. Today, we're getting a more complete picture of Note 8 pre-orders, and they paint a rather pleasant picture for Samsung, which had a lot riding on this release.
As of the publication of this article, Samsung's Galaxy Note 8 has out-sold every Galaxy Note smartphone before it. Over this same period of time (since announcement), more people have pre-ordered the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 than any other smartphone in the Galaxy Note lineup. This is a relief, I'm sure, to those at Samsung worried that last year's Galaxy Note 7 fiasco would dent the line's future sales.
Samsung fans should probably be thankful the company is even making Android tablets at all, but tablets it does put out seem to be a shadow of its former self. The Galaxy Tab S3’s specs seemed to be a mismatch to its gorgeous looks, not to mention its price. It seems that Samsung will be repeating that dichotomy with the Galaxy Tab A2 S, a.k.a. the Galaxy Tab A 8.0 (2017), which will look somewhat decent but be burdened by half-decent hardware.
