• Preordering 
  • BestBuy changed their preordering process this year; this was a bummer because I prefer to buy local (economy, returns, etc)
  • Bought through Samsung’s website this year
  • Arrived 2 days ahead of general availability date via preorder so that’s something

• Pricing
  • That’s right, there are two models this time; I can’t tell you much about the little one; I wish that one was just as good as the big one
  • $999 for regular sized Note 10
  • $1099 for large sized Note 10+
  • Also: black on launch this time; no more of that blue on launch-only restrictions
• Display
  • Size
    • 6.8 inches
    • 19:9 ratio; which is just ever-so-slightly better than 18.5:9
  • Gorilla Glass 6; at some point this is not remarkable anymore is it?
  • Special features
    • All of the features from the S10 line are here; fingerprint sensor, ambient display, you name it
  • There’s a new placement for the front camera though; instead of the S10+ 's strange double cutout in the corner, there is a single camera cutout just pixels from the top of the phone
  • There’s no speaker cutout in the top glass, the speaker is literally in the top of the phone and not on the display side
• Physicals
  • Look and feel, build quality
    • Footprint
      • It’s huge! Who could have guessed
      • 162.3 x 77.2 x 7.9 mm (6.39 x 3.04 x 0.31 in)
    • Weight
      • 196g 
      • It’s slightly heavier than the S10+ but feels lighter than the Note 9
    • Comparing the Note 10+ with the Note 9; the Note 9 looks ancient, the chin, forehead, the chunky look and feel - even the curved edges were massive
    • The S10+ fares much better, Note 10 is really an extension
  • Battery
    • 4300 mAH
    • Effectively the same as the S10+ for my usage patterns
  • Charging
    • The new 45w charger might be more note... get it... worthy than the phone’s charging capabilities, but it can charge fast when you need it to
  • Ports
    • No more headphone jack; I haven’t missed this whatsoever
    • TypeC otherwise with Dex Support
  • Speakers
    • They’re fine, but I’ve seen criticism of them since the top speaker is not in the previous position
  • Buttons
    • What an amazing change!
    • The bixby button is gone, well, it’s the bixby button but your first job upon set up is to change its function to the regular wake/sleep power button
    • There’s no more power button on the right side
    • Many people took weeks to adjust, while I was very ok
  • Keyboard (if applicable)
    • There’s no keyboard...
  • Pen
    • But the pen is back!
    • Really, the S10+ could have a further variant S10 Pro that has a pen
    • The pen has all of the same gimmicks as last time
    • I like taking photos with the pen as a remote, it’s not like this couldn’t be done with an add-on accessory on any phone, but it’s great built in
    • “Air Actions” are new and useless since most apps will never support them
      • I would have liked Samsung to figure out how to make “scrolling” a default universal “air action”; if I am on Twitter in a lengthy list, air scrolling would be great - but no
    • The new notes app allows handwriting to be kept as handwriting but internally converted to text for search capabilities, making notes searchable is huge for usability in the long term
• Camera
  • How is it
    • It’s the same as the S10+ but after almost a year with a wide lens, I can’t imagine having a phone without the option; I take so many shots with it
    • 2x mode is kind of mediocre in my opinion; if the camera had regular, 4x and it’s current 1/2x mode, I think it would be a wonderful mix
    • 2 12mp sensors, the wide is 16mp
    • Time of Flight sensor for something
  • Special modes
    • Night Mode is available
    • Due to how Samsung updates their unlocked phones, those get updates last; I was never able to use Night Mode on the S10+
    • I never use Night Mode; why are you taking pictures in the dark?
    • Better slowmo options
    • 4k60 recording
    • S10+ had an issue where taking photos during a video would cause framedrops in video, this doesn’t exhibit the same issue
    • Pro mode lets you tweak whatever you want
  • Notable features
    • QR code scanning is now an automatic thing the camera will do
• Specs
  • CPU
    • Snapdragon 855
  • RAM
    • 12GB because this is the Note 10+
  • Storage
    • 256gb + I added a 64GB SD card
• Software
  • OS
    • TouchWiz is still gone, the Samsung EXperience is gone, now it’s the One UI and I enjoy it
    • I skip the default One UI launcher and use Action Launcher and I have it customized the way I like it (which is really not at all the way Chris Lacy likes it at all - get your Google Pixel nonsense out of here)
    • Running Android 9.0 probably until March (by the time the S11 comes around)
  • Updates
    • Carriers suck
    • Samsung should figure something out for this; but I get the complexity of such a thing
  • Performance
    • It’s as fast as any phone has been and should be
    • Some people like turning the animation speed up
• Final thoughts
  • Note 10+ is great
    • It’s big, fast, has cameras, has a good interface
  • S10+ is cheaper now, almost as good
  • S11 coming in just a few months

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• Free Music Archive: Beat Doctor - Organic (electric edit)

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