[Review] Samsung Galaxy Note7 – The phablet with the write stuff

Absolutely Pentastic
The key feature on the Note7 is the one that gives the phone it’s name – the S Pen stylus. The stylus lies securely recessed in a well in the lower right corner of the phone for transport. Clicking it lets the stylus slide out for use. In terms of improvements, it’s water resistant to the same level as the Note7 to the tune of an IP68 rating.

If you’re the sort to read the fine print, that means it’s able to work in up to a meter of freshwater for up to 30 minutes tops so it’ll work just fine in a pool, your bathtub or in the shower though doing it in saltwater would not be a particularly good idea as it’s rather corrosive on electronics. In case you were wondering, yes – it’s able to write underwater.

The nib of the S Pen has been subtly refined as well to be finer and thinner than its predecessor on the Note5 with  tactility akin to a real pen. It’s good enough that Samsung got two professional artists to actually do surprisingly good portraits with the Note7 at a recent press conference. Alas, our artistic skills were not able to evolve past sketching stick men with Viking helmets but the results from both artists were sufficiently detailed enough to print onto coffee mugs and posters.

The Note7’s S Pen stylus has a few additional tricks as well. Highlight a bit of foreign text and it’ll translate it for you thanks to the magic of Google Translate.

[perfectpullquote align=”left” cite=”” link=”” color=”#FF0000″ class=”” size=”15″]The nib of the S Pen has been subtly refined as well to be finer and thinner than its predecessor on the Note5 with  tactility akin to a real pen. [/perfectpullquote]

If you pop it out when the screen is on, you’re able to scrawl a note to act as a handy reminder. This is as close as we’ve seen a phone mimic the functionality of a physical paper notepad and even take it up a notch. During the duration of our field testing, we ended up using it way more than the conventional sheaf of dead trees that journalists usually relied on. That’s quite a feat.