Samsung has officially confirmed the Galaxy Note 4's U.S. release date, with pre-orders for the smartphone kicking off the same day its competition, the iPhone 6 Plus, hits stores.
The new Android phablet willl be available starting Oct. 17, with AT&T and Verizon opening up pre-orders Friday (Sept. 19). T-Mobile and Sprint plan to begin taking pre-orders on Sept. 24 and Sept. 26, respectively, but customers can pre-register with both carriers now.
The smartphone will also be available through U.S. Cellular and major retailers including Amazon, Best Buy, Costco, RadioShack, Sam's Club, Target, and Walmart, PCWorld reports.
"Samsung created the large screen smartphone category with the Galaxy Note and are on our fourth generation, a category others are just entering," Samsung Telecommunications America President and CEO Gregory Lee said in a statement, making an obvious dig at Apple. "The Galaxy Note 4 delivers a refined Note experience, and the latest technology that consumers want in their smartphone."
The Galaxy Note 4, which packs the "best display in a smartphone" ever tested by DisplayMate, features a 5.7-inch AMOLED display with Quad HD (2,560 x 1,440) resolution (518 ppi), next-generation S Pen, runs on Android 4.4 KitKat and packs a 16-megapixel main camera with Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), eight-times digital zoom and what Samsung says is its own version of HDR image compositing. The device also packs a 3.7-megapixel front-facing camera and a F1.9 aperture for improved shooting in low-light conditions.
The device comes with a 3,220mAh battery aided by a "Rapid Charging" feature that can jack up the battery 50 percent in 30 minutes and the same "Ultra Power Saving" mode offered in the Galaxy S5 and Galaxy Tab S. A microSD card slot offers for an additional 64GB of storage.
Samsung also announced that it will be available with a 2.7GHz quad-core CPU, although they did not specify, and dual quad-core CPUs. Design-wise, Samsung has equipped the Note 4 with a metal frame and faux-leather back.
The Galaxy Note 4 can also be paired with the virtual reality headset, the Gear VR.
