Samsung Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 review: By the dozen

Introduction

Samsung's pole position in smartphones doesn't necessarily mean a win in tablets but it sure is an advantage and the Koreans won't give up on it easily. The Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 is standing at the very top of a lineup, whose fourth generation has hit the fast lane again after a less than impressive showing last season. This here Note Pro has unique size and all the S Features the company has developed so far.

Samsung Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 official images

The tablet's business aspirations are made clear by the KNOX enterprise security feature and rich app package that includes a full-blown office document editor, collaboration tools and even subscriptions to business publications.

There's an artistic side to it too, enabled by the S Pen and an advanced drawing app, while the Multi-window split-screen multitasking has grown to support up to four apps at a time (made possible by the larger screen). And that's before the floating apps come in.

Key features

• 12.2" 16M-color Super Clear PLS capacitive touchscreen of 2560 x 1600 px resolution
• Wi-Fi only model: quad-core 1.9 GHz Cortex-A15 & quad-core 1.3 GHz Cortex-A7, Mali-T628MP6 GPU; Exynos 5420 chipset
• LTE model: quad-core Krait 400 processor at 2.3GHz, Adreno 330 GPU; Snapdragon 800 chipset
• 3GB of RAM
• Android OS v4.4 KitKat with TouchWiz UI
• S Pen input and great software backend
• One of a kind split-screen multitasking and pop-up mini apps
• Quad-band GPRS/EDGE/HSPA and hexa-band LTE connectivity Cat.4
• 32/64 GB of built-in memory
• 8 MP autofocus camera, 3264x2448 pixels, geo-tagging
• 1080p video recording @30fps
• 2MP front-facing camera; 1080p videos
• Side-mounted stereo speakers
• Wi-Fi 802.11 ac/a/b/g/n Wi-Fi Direct, dual-band, Wi-Fi hotspot
• Stereo Bluetooth v4.0
• HDMI TV-out (adapter required), USB host (adapter required), Ethernet (adapter required)
• microSD card slot
• Standard 3.5 mm audio jack
• Infrared port
• GPS with A-GPS support; GLONASS, digital compass
• 1080p XviD/MKV video support with subtitles
• Accelerometer, three-axis Gyroscope sensor
• Office document editor preinstalled
• 9,500mAh Li-Po battery

Main disadvantages

• Sky-high starting price
• Size will put some people off
• Relatively poor audio and video codec support
• Air view works with S-Pen only, no thumb support

The size of the Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 is controversial, but Samsung already has the Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014). It's also the feature that sets it apart in a good way - some people prefer larger laptops to tiny ultrabooks and that carries over to tablets as well. The work you did on the office PC just looks different when shown on a small 10" screen.

Update 10 Mar: we received a retail unit for retesting and updated this review with new images and information.

Samsung Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 in our office

We've seen Android tablets try to wedge into the ultrabook market by adding a detachable QWERTY keyboard. Those efforts brought mixed results, but will a bigger screen do better?

This is a gamble for Samsung, but the company can afford it - the Galaxy Tab Pro 8.4 and the Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014) are there to catch the users the Note Pro 12.2 will miss. The Galaxy Note phablet was a gamble too and look how that turned out.