Back in the day when Samsung unveiled its first generation phablet in the form of the Samsung Galaxy Note, doubters had a lot of reservations in terms of the handset’s making it big in the smartphone market. After all, the Samsung Galaxy Note was a massive niche device and was category-setting, to say the least. The tables were turned though when the phablet finally made it to the shelves. By that time, the smartphone-buying population got their chance to be up close and personal with the device. Having realized the potential and advantage that its massive screen real estate brought to the table, people became enamored with the massive Samsung Galaxy Note and the phablet instantly became a hit afterwards.
Its successor, the Samsung Galaxy Note II, on the other hand did not have to contend with this kind of reservation from our smartphone-crazed brethren. After all, the first generation Samsung phablet already proved its mettle and it was only expected that its successor will definitely be better than it is in every aspect. And in this, the Samsung Galaxy Note II did not disappoint.
In less than a year of its predecessor in the shelves, Samsung engineers and designers already came up with the Samsung Galaxy Note II which was a whole lot better than the original Galaxy Note. As expected, the hardware of the second generation Samsung phablet got a massive upgrade and even its display got beefed up as well. In short, the Samsung Galaxy Note II is much better, more capable, and more importantly, more powerful not only than its predecessor but than most high-end devices in the market today.
The Samsung Galaxy Note II packs Android 4.1 Jelly Bean for its operating system which is in turn overlaid with Samsung’s custom TouchWIZ UX user interface. For some, this is fine but for power users who want full control of personalization and customization options on their handsets, this just wouldn’t cut it. It is a good thing then that Samsung has already released the kernel source code for the Samsung Galaxy Note II and the pertinent files are now available for download from the Samsung Open Source Release Center. With this in play, we can certainly expect the hardworking boys of the developer communities to get their hands on the kernel source and turn it into better and faster custom ROMs for the second generation Samsung phablet.
As for the Samsung Galaxy Note II, its operation is powered by its Exynos 4412 Quad chipset with its quad-core 1.6 GHz ARM Cortex-A9 processor and whopping 2GB of RAM (which I dare say is even more capable than the internals of the Samsung flagship Galaxy S III). In terms of built-in memory, the phablet will be available with internal storage ranging from 16GB to as much as 64GB with memory expansion via its microSD card slot. The main draw of the phablet remains its massive 5.5-inch SuperAMOLED HD panel with stylus support and has a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. Its dual-shooter configuration mimics that of the Samsung Galaxy S III though with the same rear 8MP shooter and front 1.9MP snapper.
