Samsung's trail-blazing Galaxy Note series was once hailed a monstrosity, but now seems comfortably set in the mainstream. The Note 4 is the latest addition in the series, and launched only a couple of months ago. It brings raw power and high performance to the table, but it still keeps us wanting more.

Pros

Superb Display
Powerful Camera

Cons

Phablet may not appeal to many
Build quality
Not waterproof
S-Pen seems redundant

Design

The Note 4, with its aluminium sides is an improvement for Samsung , which has otherwise relied heavily on a faux-leather plastic design. Most of the phone is made of polycarbonate, include the large back panel. While this means the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 is not as attractive as the HTC M8 or even the Xperia Z3 (not to mention Apple's iPhone 6/6 Plus), it is quite a durable device. This design change has a had a marginal impact on the dimensions and weight of the Note 4 compared to the Note 3. With its current dimensions - 153.5 x 78.6 x 8.5 mm - the Note 4 happens to be 2.3mm taller, 0.6 mm narrower and 0.2 mm thicker. Yet, it has only gained 8g (total 176g). My greatest gripe with this device is the fact that it is not waterproof or dustproof. It would only seem natural that such a device, which is comparable to the S5 in many ways, should get the best design feature to appear in the premium Galaxy line. But another part of me is not surprised at all; Samsung's seems to have an incoherent strategy smartphone strategy.

Display

The display is probably the best part of the Note 4. Compared to my relatively modest Galaxy Core LTE, the different is immediately clear. Compared to the S4, I find it somewhat difficult to spot any serious differences. The 5.7inch Super AMOLED screen, sports a 1440 x 2560 resolution (~515 ppi Pixel density), beautifully encased in Gorilla Glass 3.

While I felt a little overwhelmed with the screen size at first, I quickly realised that reading an email or document is a pleasant affair; there is no squinting or pinching involved. At first this could seem a little disconcerting, especially if you are used to a mobile device with a smaller screen, but after a few days with the Note 4, it is difficult to walk back to a smaller screen. Bigger does seem better and the Nexus 6 reiterates that point.

Performance

The Note 4's blistering performance is courtesy of its Exynos 5433 Quad-core 1.3 GHz processor, backed by 3GB of RAM. There is hardly any lag even with a full load of apps running in the background. There is a microSD option so that users can bump the memory capacity up to 128GB. This will serve as additional to the 32GB internal memory. The Note 4 also features the plethora of standard sensors and a few additional sensors, which are cool but most probably used a few times throughout the life of the device.

Camera

The Note 4 features a 16MP primary camera and a 3.7MP secondary camera. Clearly, Samsung is catering to the selfie trend. The picture amazing, especially the low-light shots. Of course the raw power in terms of MPs doesn't necessary mean the shooter is the finest out there and you are probably not going to replace your DSLR with this.

Battery

To its credit, Samsung has included a 3220 mAh replaceable battery.  Even with heavy use (4G, sync, messaging, etc.) it still has enough juice to get through the entire day. The intelligent battery saving features (i.e. Ultra power saving mode) and quick charge features really enhance the flexibility of this device.

Apps and S Pen

The Samsung Note 3 features Android KitKat and users will be able to upgrade this to Lollipop. Yet, there is no escaping the crushing variety of Samsung bloat ware. Moreover, the S-Pen seems more redundant than ever.  While the S Pen does feature some great functionalities it is hard to imagine using this regularly. So it seems sensible that Google ignored the use of a stylus in its much larger Nexus 6.

Conclusion

Despite its short comings, the Note 4 is a robust device with a fantastic display and amazing battery. It may not be waterproof and it may have the usual boatload of bloat ware, but the use of aluminium and the seamless performance compensate these shortcomings. Ultimately, if you are in the market for a large-screen phablet like device, then the Note 4 is an excellent choice. It goes right up there with the iPhone 6 Plus and the Google Nexus 6. My heart's on the Nexus 6 but that's not going to be available in Sri Lanka for a while.

By Navam Niles