LAS VEGAS, CES 2012 – A week or so ago, I quipped that come CES, we’d probably see Samsung continuing its pathological plagiarism of years-old iOS designs by unveiling a new Galaxy smartphone modeled after the Apple Newton PDA.
Looks like I wasn’t that far off. Check out the monstrous beast of a phone that is the Samsung Galaxy Note. It’s a 5.3-inch smartphone with a frickin’ built-in stylus, coming to the States in February.
Here’s what it looks like side-by-side with an iPhone. You seriously can’t make this stuff up. It’s beyond parody.
John Brownlee is a writer for Fast Company, and a contributing writer here at CoM. He has also written for Wired, Playboy, Boing Boing, Popular Mechanics, VentureBeat, and Gizmodo. He lives in Boston with his wife and two parakeets. You can follow him here on Twitter.
38 responses to “Exclusive: Samsung Unveils Galaxy Newton!!! [CES 2012 / Humor]”
I would say that palm treo’s copied Apple with PDA phones but I don’t see this being the Samsung version of the Newton. Samsung and Apple just need to get along. Isn’t like 25% of the iPhone made with Samsung hardware?
Apple pays Samsung for its hardware, Samsung isn’t paying for its rip-offs.
Great, now Samsung is coping 25 year old Apple products
How does one put a 5.3″ phone in your pocket?
forcefully
Samsung will gladly say ‘we will get along with you, Apple, as long as we can continue steal all your designs: past, present, future and you keep paying us millions of dollars for our hardware’
Talk about dictatorship.
1. this is old news
2. the note is selling pretty well internationally, despite it’s awkward size.
3. yes, it has a stylus, but so did every pda. why you decided to pull the newton out of the history books is beyond me.
I agree, Samsung has definitely copied Apple before with stuff, but I hardly doubt they had the newton in mind when they made the note.
I’ve been using one for over a month now and it’s surprisingly handy. It can easily slide in most jeans pockets, unless you’re a fan of skinny-type jeans.
http://www.ravebug.com
Philippine’s social marketplace.
Damn – Samsung appears to be keeping the authors of this site up at night.
You can fall asleep by counting all the iSheep.
And it had NOTHING to do with the Galaxy Note.
I don’t see why you guys think this phone is funny. This is THE ONLY phone I would trade my iPhone for.
easily if you don’t wear girly pants
Are you tards making fun of your own news stories now bashing Samsung?
The Note is a bit oversized for a phone in my opinion.
It`s almost at that sweet spot I`m looking for in a little tablet/e-reader though.
The SG Note is a great one! Gaming on a 5″ device rocks… Not as big as the iPad and not so small like the iPhone … 5″ is a great size for mobile fun!
And BTW: Old Old Old News… And the bashing against Samsung get’s boring ;(
But it is relevant, as Jobs killed it because he believed that a stylus was the absolute least intuitive way to interact with a device. And he was right. Seeing as every smartphone on the market now has a touch screen, Samsung has been so clever as to step backwards by about 5 years. Smooth.
Is it just me, or are you a lazy troll? I mean, at least Prof. Peabody tries. What the fuck is this shit?
It also is a touch screen but comes with a stylus so you can right down notes and stuff. It’s not just a display for only a stylus.
Honestly, I do understand that you could make fun of the Galaxy Note.
But as a user who owns all iPhones and the Galaxy Note, I have to admit, its an awesome phone. Battery life is stunning, more than 20 hours of talk time (!), replaceable battery, screen is huge and beautiful, screen resolution is perfect and it has a decent camera etc. Especially, it fits my palm perfectly fine and it easily (which I wasn’t sure about) fits into a casual jeans pocket without being annoying.
You have to try it first, before mocking it. I do actually recommend the Note.
If this is Newton rip-off then iPhone was LG Prada rip-off.
Seriously, people usually copy successful good products, Newton was neither
i tried it. all feature are awesome as u said. but really ? fits ur plan perfectly? what palm u got there? kingkong palm? the screen too huge dude.
I tried it. Feature are awesome. but really? it fits ur palm “perfectly” fine? what palm u got there? king kong palm?
the screen too huge dude… don’t exaggerate thing too much.
This is innovation and choice. You don’t have to use it, because it is not Samsungs _only_ product, if you prefer smaller phones, you can buy a different, smaller Samsung phone. The same is true with the stylus. If you need it or like it, you can choose to use, if you don’t, then buy a different phone.
I think many people would love to have the option to buy a bigger iPhone with a stylus, Apple should release something like this.
my palms are not King Kong size, but a BB looks tiny in my hands (except for my new BB 9900)
And yes, I can use the device one-handed with no troubles whatsoever.
Einstein Platform is NewtonOS running on other operating system. See:http://code.google.com/p/einst…
Hi,
I’ve sold my iphone 4 for a galaxy Note. Trust me, the Note fits better in my pocket than the iphone. The iphone is not thin and it’s very heavier….The Pen is not only a pen, it detects the pressure you put when your wirte. The Screen is awesome. I don’t regret my iphone… Sorry about that guys, but Apple is now behind.
…screen and stylus are the extent of the similarities between these two products. They look nothing alike.
i hate you Brownlee
A stylus? Haven’t they learned from 10+ years of tech history?
Why do you have so many phones? Seems a bit excessive.
Well besides that I’m half Asian, which accounts for 50% of it ;), I do just love Gadgets. And, I currently own 4 tablets… iPad1, iPad2, Samsung GT 10.1, Playbook. Call me crazy that’s alright ;)
At least I’ve got a very good overview of what’s going on.
Agreed
Got to give it to Samsung on this occasion, they’ve just re-invented the PDA. I believe that this will go down very well with the various service companies that still rely on Windows mobile devices….
I wish I could somehow block all of your articles, John. You’re a disgrace to technology and this site. Your opinionated, shit reviews and articles lack substance and contain very little more than your own, useless opinions. Just thought you should know that should I abandon this site, it’ll be due to your terrible writing.
So they brought back the “graffiti” concept from the Palm OS? Even worse? That was the most broken and useless handwriting recognition to ever exist! Hence why keyboards won.
I love seeing everyone get angry because this was compared to the Newton. It says “Humor” right in the damned title! Besides, even Apple fans know that the Newton sucked.
I don’t think you understand what the stylus is for. Its not for a “graffiti” style handwriting recognition. It’s for just jotting down stuff. That’s it. Other than that, it is a regular multitouch display that is on smartphones. I don’t see how adding support for a stylus is a step backwards when griffin makes stylus for iPad and iPhones.
Or if you’re like Blake, and have nothing else in your pants to get in the way.