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I wandered into my local 3 store this lunchtime and wandered out holding what was apparently the first Note 3 sold in the UK on their network. I'll be updating this blog post with my impressions.
First Couple Of Hours
Jesus it's big. Makes my old Galaxy Nexus look modest, and the iPhones we have around the office positively undersized. Feels very light though, the way a huge empty cardboard box feels unnaturally light when you pick it up.
Very quick to boot - much faster than old phone.
Screen is lovely. Bright, colourful, spacious. Pretty much exactly what I expected.
Don't like the supplied software keyboard. Hold-for-more on the period takes far too long, and there's no semicolon when you get there! Plus you have to tap to select, rather than drag'n'release. And there's no swype functionality. Downloaded Google keyboard and all is well. May explore other options later.
LOVE AIR GESTURE. Wafting to scroll through pictures makes me feel like I'm living in the future. Shame there's no Spotify integration.
Camera seems decent indoors and out; better than the Nexus for sure. If anyone with a new iphone wants to get in there and do a pixel-peep comparison, I'd be more than happy to take your shiny toy and smash it to bits with the butt end of my D700.
Interface is very smooth and has a couple of nice new touches (new to me, anyway). Repositioning or placing apps brings up little ghost pages showing you where you've got space, and you can drag straight to them.
Played very briefly with the stylus. Fun stuff; guess time will tell how much I end up using it.
First Evening
Daughter loved all the ways you can play with it. The lock screen interacts with in-air swipes and swirls, you can doodle with the stylus in the various note apps, you can wave your hand around above it to flip through pictures - it's a really engaging device.
Holy shit, multi-window is awesome (not new apparently, but new to me)! You can record pairs of apps to open together, and when browsing open apps it remembers which were sharing a screen and brings them both back. And you can change how the screen is divided. And still open a calculator in a floating window if you feel the need.
The interface as a whole is an interesting beast. The emphasis is firmly on exposing functionality rather than simplicity. Personally, I'm enjoying discovering all the different ways I can prod and poke it into doing things. I like all the bells and whistles that descend when I swipe down from the top of the screen. It's not elegant, but then neither is a massive box of assorted Lego. Sometimes things don't need to be elegant to make you want to play with them.
Speaker sound is decently loud, and nice and clear for voice/commentary, but with no bass to speak of whatsoever. Since the only reason I ever inflict sound from my phone on others is to use speakerphone, this is a non-issue for me.
Loving the fact all my old micro-usb cables plug into the USB3 port and just work. I haven't even taken the USB3 lead out of the box yet.
The 3GB of ram just quietly gets on with making things awesome. I can tit about for hours and still find the game I opened on the train home running in the background.
Just installed the ZappIR universal remote app, which is probably as close as we'll get in my lifetime to the rooftop scene in the matrix:
"Can you fly one of those things?"
"Not yet. Tank? I need..."
Pure techno-joy to wander around the house finding things to control, including the TV and set-top-box in the bedroom for which we've long since lost the supplied remotes.
Day Two
Just stumbled across "Sketchbook for Galaxy" - wow! Really nice sketch app with customisable, pressure-sensitive brushes via the S-Pen, two-finger scroll/zoom, layers(!) and other goodies. And I can watch Day9 while I doodle!
It's a really cool device to show other people, again because it just bristles with functionality. Quote from workmate: "Sod waiting for a 5S, I'm having one of those."
Looking at the battery usage thus far, it looks like the same story as with the Nexus: you get a day out of it and charge it overnight. This may change - I've had phones before where battery life got better after a few charges - but I doubt it'll ever make it to two days of use. Roll on graphene batteries!
Phone calls are clear and the signal is at least as good as I'm used to.
Over the Weekend
Not the biggest fan of the physical 'home' button. Reason being, it brings up the lock screen, and a couple of times now the device has unlocked itself in my pocket (not when walking, but when crouching down or playing with the kids. Solution has been to pocket the phone screen-outwards.
The supplied headphones are good - better than the ones I had - but don't fit my ear terribly well, robbing the sound of bass. I switched the earbuds with those from my old set and it made a big difference.
Watched a fair bit of SC2, and the screen makes it a delight - especially since I can bring up a browser window and follow the LR thread at the same time!
Air gesture is brilliant for greasy-fingered lunchtimes.
The camera noise is VERY loud and harsh and can't be lowered or muted. Covering the speaker with a finger helps a bit. I didn't want to mess about rooting this phone, but I might have to just to avoid being 'that asshole with the unbelievably loud camera phone' in every social context.
In the Office
Just found a whole bunch of other air gesture and interface options that weren't turned on! Now I can hover a finger over a webpage to bring up a magnifier, and tilt the phone to scroll up and down. All this will help keep the screen in good condition longer.
Very much liking the note-taking apps. My handwriting actually looks better than usual 
Aw, snap, just found the handwriting / formula recognition! Was looking for something to press and instead it comes up as an option when you lasso a section of screen. LOVE!
Regarding one-handed usage: I have pretty average hands for a Brit, I reckon. I can *just* reach everywhere on the screen with my thumb. I've never been much of a one-handed smartphone user, though, so I'm a bad judge of how much the size of the device will bother people who are.
Other Bits and Bobs
4K video at 30fps?? o.O Not exactly practical as I don't have any 4K screens to watch it on, but remarkable nonetheless. 1080p at 60fps looks amazing though.
Nice feature in the browser: if you finger-tap somewhere where there are a lot of links clustered together (eg the sidebar of TL), a magnifier opens up showing the area you tapped so you can choose more accurately.
First Week
Battery life is, as I expected, improving. Absolutely hammered it the last couple of days with WCS Europe and playing with remote desktop apps, and it never got close to running out of charge. Probably could get two average days out of it.
Conclusions
As a piece of hardware, the Note 3 is genuinely amazing. I was really looking forward to upgrading and it's been a rare case of reality exceeding expectations. Samsung has taken some flak for trying to rig benchmark tests, but putting that aside, it's the best-balanced device out there right now. It has a screen to die for, with a GPU to match. It has the CPU grunt to handle multi-tasking, with an OS that actually lets you multi-task, and enough screen real-estate and RAM to do it with aplomb.
How far up it goes from there is entirely down to how apps exploit its features. I really wish the latest iPhone had been a bit more adventurous in the feature department, because the app ecology is currently iTunes-led.
Thanks for reading, and congratulations to those of you lucky enough to get hold of one of these beauties.
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On September 27 2013 01:07 Pulselol wrote:
How's battery life?
Too soon to tell. Only had it a few hours
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Note 2 battery life was amazing. Note 3 can only be better
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for keyboard, you should totally try swiftkey, best in market imo
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First Evening
Daughter loved all the ways you can play with it. The lock screen interacts with in-air swipes and swirls, you can doodle with the stylus in the various note apps, you can wave your hand around above it to flip through pictures - it's a really engaging device.
Holy shit, multi-window is awesome (not new apparently, but new to me)! You can record pairs of apps to open together, and when browsing open apps it remembers which were sharing a screen and brings them both back. And you can change how the screen is divided. And still open a calculator in a floating window if you feel the need.
The interface as a whole is an interesting beast. The emphasis is firmly on exposing functionality rather than simplicity. Personally, I'm enjoying discovering all the different ways I can prod and poke it into doing things. I like all the bells and whistles that descend when I swipe down from the top of the screen. It's not elegant, but then neither is a massive box of assorted Lego. Sometimes things don't need to be elegant to make you want to play with them.
Speaker sound is decently loud, and nice and clear for voice/commentary, but with no bass to speak of whatsoever. Since the only reason I ever inflict sound from my phone on others is to use speakerphone, this is a non-issue for me.
Loving the fact all my old micro-usb cables plug into the USB3 port and just work. I haven't even taken the USB3 lead out of the box yet.
The 3GB of ram just quietly gets on with making things awesome. I can tit about for hours and still find the game I opened on the train home running in the background.
Just installed the ZappIR universal remote app, which is probably as close as we'll get in my lifetime to the rooftop scene in the matrix:
"Can you fly one of those things?"
"Not yet. Tank? I need..."
Pure techno-joy to wander around the house finding things to control, including the TV and set-top-box in the bedroom for which we've long since lost the supplied remotes.
Tomorrow: first proper battery-life test and more...
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Day Two
Just stumbled across "Sketchbook for Galaxy" - wow! Really nice sketch app with customisable, pressure-sensitive brushes via the S-Pen, two-finger scroll/zoom, layers(!) and other goodies. And I can watch Day9 while I doodle!
It's a really cool device to show other people, again because it just bristles with functionality. Quote from workmate: "Sod waiting for a 5S, I'm having one of those."
Looking at the battery usage thus far, it looks like the same story as with the Nexus: you get a day out of it and charge it overnight. This may change - I've had phones before where battery life got better after a few charges - but I doubt it'll ever make it to two days of use. Roll on graphene batteries!
Phone calls are clear and the signal is at least as good as I'm used to.
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Lalalaland34500 Posts
Question that is crucial to me - is there a sticker or any other indication on it which says it is region locked to the EU?
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Hmm. I don't have the box with me; I'll take a look when I get home tonight.
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On September 27 2013 21:41 Firebolt145 wrote:
Question that is crucial to me - is there a sticker or any other indication on it which says it is region locked to the EU?
Its locked in some way.
+ Show Spoiler + http://www.sammobile.com/2013/09/26/heres-samsungs-vague-official-statement-regarding-galaxy-note-3s-regional-sim-lockUPDATE: While Samsung’s wordings aren’t very clear, it seems that the Galaxy Note 3 will actually be usable everywhere, but not before it is activated with a SIM from the region it was bought in. Once you activate it/use it with a local SIM, you’ll be able to visit other regions/travel abroad and use it with SIM cards from that particular region without issues. This is likely to reduce grey imports by retailers and those who want to make a quick buck by importing the device and selling it at higher prices, as the retailer would have to open the box to activate it before selling it, which would make it less attractive to a buyer. However, until Samsung makes an even clearer statement, you probably should refrain from importing even a Note 3 that has been activated in its home region. Statement from Samsung:
Some current Samsung products are now provided with a local SIM card lock. This means that devices purchased in the European Union, with SIM cards of mobile operators from Germany and from the European Union and the European Economic Area (the “European region”) work as usual.
Users of these Samsung devices can continue to use these together with their SIM card of a mobile operator from the European region via roaming service to appropriate roaming charges to their wireless service provider around the world. If purchased in the European Union and not yet been put into use to be activated for the first time abroad, users can unlock their device for the region free from local Samsung service partners.
The regional SIM card lock only affects the following Samsung models that are produced from the end of July 2013, and provided with a corresponding sticker:
Samsung GALAXY S III, II, GALAXY Note, GALAXY S4, S4 GALAXY mini and the GALAXY Note 3
Devices that have been delivered by Samsung and are in camps or even at retail are not affected.
Specifically, there is a functionality of the devices with SIM cards of mobile operators from the following countries:
Countries of the European Economic Area (EEA):
Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands , Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, UK, Switzerland, Croatia
- Non-EU/EEA:
Albania, Andorra, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, San Marino, Serbia, Vatican City
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Over the Weekend
Not the biggest fan of the physical 'home' button. Reason being, it brings up the lock screen, and a couple of times now the device has unlocked itself in my pocket (not when walking, but when crouching down or playing with the kids. Solution has been to pocket the phone screen-outwards.
The supplied headphones are good - better than the ones I had - but don't fit my ear terribly well, robbing the sound of bass. I switched the earbuds with those from my old set and it made a big difference.
Watched a fair bit of SC2, and the screen makes it a delight - especially since I can bring up a browser window and follow the LR thread at the same time!
Air gesture is brilliant for greasy-fingered lunchtimes.
The camera noise is VERY loud and harsh and can't be lowered or muted. Covering the speaker with a finger helps a bit. I didn't want to mess about rooting this phone, but I might have to just to avoid being 'that asshole with the unbelievably loud camera phone' in every social context.
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In the Office
Just found a whole bunch of other air gesture and interface options that weren't turned on! Now I can hover a finger over a webpage to bring up a magnifier, and tilt the phone to scroll up and down. All this will help keep the screen in good condition longer.
Very much liking the note-taking apps. My handwriting actually looks better than usual
Aw, snap, just found the handwriting / formula recognition! Was looking for something to press and instead it comes up as an option when you lasso a section of screen. LOVE!
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Lalalaland34500 Posts
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How big are your hands? I'm asian so I have small hands and just orders a 5S thru verizon this weekend to keep unlimited hopefully.
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I have pretty average hands for a Brit, I reckon. I can *just* reach everywhere on the screen with my thumb.
Other Bits and Bobs
4K video at 30fps?? o.O Not exactly practical as I don't have any 4K screens to watch it on, but remarkable nonetheless. 1080p at 60fps looks amazing though.
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First Week
Battery life is, as I expected, improving. Absolutely hammered it the last couple of days with WCS Europe and playing with remote desktop apps, and it never got close to running out of charge. Probably could get two average days out of it.
Conclusions
As a piece of hardware, the Note 3 is genuinely amazing. I was really looking forward to upgrading and it's been a rare case of reality exceeding expectations. Samsung has taken some flak for trying to rig benchmark tests, but putting that aside, it's the best-balanced device out there right now. It has a screen to die for, with a GPU to match. It has the CPU grunt to handle multi-tasking, with an OS that actually lets you multi-task, and enough screen real-estate and RAM to do it with aplomb.
How far up it goes from there is entirely down to how apps exploit its features. I really wish the latest iPhone had been a bit more adventurous in the feature department, because the app ecology is currently iTunes-led.
Thanks for reading, and congratulations to those of you lucky enough to get hold of one of these beauties.
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EPT
