The ever-interesting Samsung Galaxy Note has finally been officially confirmed for release on the AT&T network. AT&T announced the Note in a press release yesterday, alongside several other devices. According to the release, the Galaxy Note is “planned for availability in AT&T stores and online in the coming weeks”. Hopefully, those “weeks” won’t slip into months! Pricing information has not been released, but based on the MSRP of the phone, $299-$399 is a safe bet. It’s unclear at this point if Verizon will eventually offer the Galaxy Note or if this is an exclusive for AT&T.

The Galaxy Note, which is the first modern Android phone to incorporate an active digitizer and stylus, was announced what seems like ages ago at IFA in September.  Since then, the Note has gone gone on sale in Europe and elsewhere, but US folks have been unable to get their hands on the phone except through pricey importers.

The Galaxy Note’s active digitizer allows the user to input highly accurate hand-written text. Such functionality has long before been seen on tablet PCs and a few Android tablets, but the Note is the first to include the technology in an Android phone. Chippy has a mini-review of the Galaxy Note alone with photos and videos if you’re interested in the device.

When the Note was first launched, I was a bit annoyed at the massive 5.3″ screen. I still feel like screens beyond 3.75″ or 4″ negatively affect the ergonomics of a phone, but I will admit that in the case of the Galaxy Note, I’m singing to a different tune. The stylus means that you’ll be using the phone with two-hands regardless (one to hold the phone, one to write with), so the argument against a huge screen is somewhat averted. The compromise to enable a large writing area is also one that I might be willing to make (and I know plenty of others who would be happy to make).

Interestingly, in a video accompanied by the AT&T press release, the stylus and active digitizer almost went unmentioned, save for a few seconds at the end. In most of the European advertising material, the stylus was front and center as the most important part of the phone. It seems that AT&T knows that most US consumers (that doesn’t include tech nerds like myself and you!) are looking for an iPhone experience, otherwise they’d be pushing this unique feature much harder.

The ever-interesting Samsung Galaxy Note has finally been officially confirmed for release on the AT&T network. AT&T announced the Note in a press release yesterday, alongside several other devices. According to the release, the Galaxy Note is “planned for availability in AT&T stores and online in the coming weeks”. Hopefully, those “weeks” won’t slip into months! Pricing information has not been released, but based on the MSRP of the phone, $299-$399 is a safe bet. It’s unclear at this point if Verizon will eventually offer the Galaxy Note or if this is an exclusive for AT&T.

The Galaxy Note, which is the first modern Android phone to incorporate an active digitizer and stylus, was announced what seems like ages ago at IFA in September.  Since then, the Note has gone gone on sale in Europe and elsewhere, but US folks have been unable to get their hands on the phone except through pricey importers.

The Galaxy Note’s active digitizer allows the user to input highly accurate hand-written text. Such functionality has long before been seen on tablet PCs and a few Android tablets, but the Note is the first to include the technology in an Android phone. Chippy has a mini-review of the Galaxy Note alone with photos and videos if you’re interested in the device.

When the Note was first launched, I was a bit annoyed at the massive 5.3″ screen. I still feel like screens beyond 3.75″ or 4″ negatively affect the ergonomics of a phone, but I will admit that in the case of the Galaxy Note, I’m singing to a different tune. The stylus means that you’ll be using the phone with two-hands regardless (one to hold the phone, one to write with), so the argument against a huge screen is somewhat averted. The compromise to enable a large writing area is also one that I might be willing to make (and I know plenty of others who would be happy to make).

Interestingly, in a video accompanied by the AT&T press release, the stylus and active digitizer almost went unmentioned, save for a few seconds at the end. In most of the European advertising material, the stylus was front and center as the most important part of the phone. It seems that AT&T knows that most US consumers (that doesn’t include tech nerds like myself and you!) are looking for an iPhone experience, otherwise they’d be pushing this unique feature much harder.

The Samsung Galaxy Note finally has official confirmation of an eventual US release. I don’t think many of us doubted that it would happen at some point, but Samsung had been outwardly indecisive about a US release of the Galaxy Note ever since some initial confusion over a statement made during IFA in October when the Note was announced. Since then, we’ve seen the Galaxy Note pass through the FCC, which bolstered our confidence that the stylus-touting Note would reach the US. Now Samsung has cleared things up once and for all, we’ll see the Galaxy Note in the US in 2012.

According to CNET, who cites a pseudo-press release that was posted as a photo description on flickr, “Samsung has confirmed that a U.S. launch is in the works for next year but hasn’t yet revealed a specific date”. Given the excitement surrounding the Galaxy Note, and the proximity of CES, there’s approximately a 99.9% chance that we’ll see the Note touted by Samsung at the event. We hope to hear more specific news about the Galaxy Note US release date then, stay tuned!

In addition to confirmation of an eventual US release date for the Galaxy Note, Samsung noted in the press release that over 1 million Notes have been shipped. CNET points out that “shipped” in this case means how many have been sent out to resellers; fewer than 1 million may actually be in the hands of customers.

The Galaxy Note has been holding firm in the top 10 popular devices in our mobile device database since it’s initial announcement back in November. I would call the massive 5.3″ screen way too big except that the Galaxy Note comes with an active digitizer stylus which allows the user to write naturally and accurately on the Note’s ‘Super’ AMOLED display. You can see it in action here from our very own Chippy:

The only option for obtaining a Galaxy Note in the US currently is to go through an importer, but you’d better not be expecting to pay under $600! Once the device reaches US carriers, customers will be able to get their hands on it much more easily, thanks to subsidies that will bring down the $850 MSRP reported by a number of importers.

Hat tip to Chuong over at GottaBeMobile for pointing out this story.

The Notion Ink Adam was launched just about a year ago, and while it didn’t quite live up to the hype, the company is working on getting the one year old unit up and running with the latest version of Android, 4.0 AKA Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS). Notion Ink has been posting regular updates to their blog about progress in porting ICS to the Adam tablet. Their latest update included a video which shows the Adam quite easily navigating through ICS:

If you’ve got an Adam and the stomach for installing pre-alpha software, see here for more details about ICS on the Notion Ink Adam.

So far, Notion Ink says they’ve got accelerated graphics, GPS, Wi-Fi, accelerometer, SD Card and ADB working, while the camera, sound, 3G, bluetooth, remaining sensors, and a sleep bug remain to be fixed.

This progress is surely a slap in the face of Samsung who have recently announced that the original Galaxy S phones and original Galaxy Tab will not receive upgrades to Android 4.0 / ICS. The reason for this, according to Samsung, is that the TouchWiz interface, applied by the company to all of their devices (less the Nexus S), takes up too much memory that an ICS upgrade would not be feasible for these devices. Instead of ICS, Samsung is apparently considering offering a ‘value-pack’ wherein the company would update these forgotten devices and shoe-horn in some of the ICS features, without actually upgrading to ICS itself.

The obvious outrage here is that, if TouchWiz is really the only thing holding them back from updating to ICS, Samsung should offer a vanilla update to ICS if the customer chooses.

Notion Ink is working on that very thing right now. The tablet originally launched with a completely skinned (far more than TouchWiz) version of Android 2.2, but the company will apparently still be offering an ICS upgrade to their customers, even if it means they have to let go of their proprietary interface.

Samsung obviously believes that TouchWiz is important to their customers and that’s why they won’t simply cast it aside and offer a vanilla ICS install. For some customers this may be true. For me, and most of the people reading this site, I’d say that they’d be willing to drop TouchWiz to get the latest performance, feature, and security updates out of ICS, and I think it’s Samsung’s duty to offer them at least that, especially when a company as tiny as Notion Ink is managing to do so.

The Notion Ink Adam was launched just about a year ago, and while it didn’t quite live up to the hype, the company is working on getting the one year old unit up and running with the latest version of Android, 4.0 AKA Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS). Notion Ink has been posting regular updates to their blog about progress in porting ICS to the Adam tablet. Their latest update included a video which shows the Adam quite easily navigating through ICS:

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If you’ve got an Adam and the stomach for installing pre-alpha software, see here for more details about ICS on the Notion Ink Adam.

So far, Notion Ink says they’ve got accelerated graphics, GPS, Wi-Fi, accelerometer, SD Card and ADB working, while the camera, sound, 3G, bluetooth, remaining sensors, and a sleep bug remain to be fixed.

This progress is surely a slap in the face of Samsung who have recently announced that the original Galaxy S phones and original Galaxy Tab will not receive upgrades to Android 4.0 / ICS. The reason for this, according to Samsung, is that the TouchWiz interface, applied by the company to all of their devices (less the Nexus S), takes up too much memory that an ICS upgrade would not be feasible for these devices. Instead of ICS, Samsung is apparently considering offering a ‘value-pack’ wherein the company would update these forgotten devices and shoe-horn in some of the ICS features, without actually upgrading to ICS itself.

The obvious outrage here is that, if TouchWiz is really the only thing holding them back from updating to ICS, Samsung should offer a vanilla update to ICS if the customer chooses.

Notion Ink is working on that very thing right now. The tablet originally launched with a completely skinned (far more than TouchWiz) version of Android 2.2, but the company will apparently still be offering an ICS upgrade to their customers, even if it means they have to let go of their proprietary interface.

Samsung obviously believes that TouchWiz is important to their customers and that’s why they won’t simply cast it aside and offer a vanilla ICS install. For some customers this may be true. For me, and most of the people reading this site, I’d say that they’d be willing to drop TouchWiz to get the latest performance, feature, and security updates out of ICS, and I think it’s Samsung’s duty to offer them at least that, especially when a company as tiny as Notion Ink is managing to do so.

The Samsung NP530 is the new 1.4KG Series 5 Ultrabook you saw launched in South Korea a short while back. We’ve now confirmed It’s coming to other countries soon as we’ve just spotted pre-order for it in Germany. The specifications and price are looking very competitive.

Full gallery here.

Samsung NP350 , specifications, link, gallery.

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The Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7 was made official way back at IFA in early September. Since then, the premium tablet has been a hot topic (holding the #2 position in our mobile product database popularity rankings), especially considering the circumstances of its odd removal in the midst of IFA. It’s been months since then, and the Galaxy Tab 7.7 is still not officially available, and it’s unclear exactly what regions it will be available in once a release date is announced. The Galaxy Tab 7.7 has been spotted in the FCC, so a US release is expected, eventually.

Importers have begun to list prices for the Galaxy Tab 7.7, and it looks like the price is settling around $650. Here’s a sample of Galaxy Tab 7.7 16GB WiFi prices that I’ve been able to find:

• Mobile City Online: $699
• Negri Electronics: $668
• Chat and Vision: $622

For a device featuring a 7.7″ AMOLED display, one of the fastest CPUs we’ve seen on such a device, and sizing up at only 7.8mm thick, I think we could call that price justified. Still, at $650, only those gadget lovers with money to spare will be able to pick up the Galaxy Tab 7.7. Anyone without a premium gadget-budget would likely be much more attracted to the Galaxy Tab 7 Plus, which can be had starting at $399.

But, there’s some good news. If we take a little trip down memory lane, we find that the original Galaxy Tab 7 had a suggested retail price of a whopping  â‚¬799 ($1023 USD). However, as Chippy realized, much of that was a buffer for Samsung to give their retail partners room to play. Chippy predicted that the street price would start at â‚¬700 then drop to â‚¬600 over the next three months, and that’s very close to what we actually saw. The Galaxy Tab 7 could afford to have such a big buffer because it was the first 7″ Android tablet on the market. The Galaxy Tab 7.7 doesn’t have the convenience of such exclusivity. Still, the importers are likely setting their Galaxy Tab 7.7 prices in accordance with a retail price suggestion from Samsung, which several sites are listing at $799. As with the original Galaxy Tab 7, I think we’ll see the Galaxy Tab 7.7 get a lower street price once the official release date is made (probably around $600), and drop to around $500 over the next few months. Much of this depends on how well the AMOLED display production scales.

Whatever the case, Samsung better hurry the Galaxy Tab 7.7 out the door before another company releases a substitute device and puts it on the market before the 7.7. They definitely don’t want to wait into February when iPad 3 rumors start cropping up.

CES is coming up in just a few weeks, and it’s likely there that we’ll hear more official info about the Galaxy Tab 7.7. Stay tuned for updates!

To see out latest Galaxy Tab 7.7 stories, click here.

The Samsung Galaxy Nexus was announced almost two months ago (a fairly long time in the tech world) and though almost all of the details of the device had been spilled by Google and Samsung, one bit was kept from us: the Galaxy Nexus release date. Until now that is.

After weeks of speculation the Galaxy Nexus is officially on sale in the US, as of today, from Verizon, Best Buy, Wirefly, and directly through Samsung. All of these outlets are selling the 4G LTE version of the Galaxy Nexus, so those hoping for an AT&T/T-Mobile/Sprint compatible version still have some waiting to do.

Of the four stores currently selling the Galaxy Nexus, Wirefly has the cheapest price by far: $189 — that’s $110 less than Verizon, Best Buy, or Samsung who are all selling it for $299. The WireFly page claims that this is the same 32GB version as sold by the other sites, but if you’re going the WireFly route, definitely double check on this as it seems a little too good to be true (chances are, they are selling a 16GB model of the Galaxy Nexus). These prices are of course for those who qualify for an upgrade or are purchasing new service. If you’re curious, the official MSRP for the Galaxy Nexus is listed at $799.

While the Galaxy Nexus isn’t the most powerful or feature-rich phone on the market, it is the first ever to run the latest version of Google’s Android OS: 4.0 AKA Ice Cream Sandwich. Ice Cream Sandwich is expected to bridge the gap between Android phones and tablets which have been running forked versions of Android ever since the release of Honeycomb. With Ice Cream Sandwich, phones and tablets will share a more consistent interface and feature set.

European folks were able to begin purchasing the Galaxy Nexus nearly a month earlier than in the US. Importers were bringing the phone into the US initially, but now that it is available through the usual channels, those looking for the Galaxy Nexus will probably end up buying it right on US soil.

Now the wait begins for ICS tablets!