Samsung Galaxy Book (10.6" 64GB) Review

Quick summary and highlights:

When the Samsung Galaxy Book (SGB) arrived, the first impression of the box was a standard Samsung Galaxy series design. Unboxing of the SGB was easy and fun as all items were packaged with great efficiency. Quality of the device was immediately apparent with a near perfect weight balance for its size and awesome design features.

Battery was charged 50% out of the box and charging was fast with the Samsung Adaptive Fast Charger. The setup of Windows 10 with all the latest patches took a couple of hours to complete and presented a very welcoming start up screen.

Windows switches the device to tablet mode when removed from the keyboard and the interface changes to a more tablet friendly Operating System. Using the device with keyboard gives a remarkable resemblance to a laptop. The keyboard is good quality and the keys give you that real keyboard feel. The mouse works well with pressing down for clicks or just touching for clicks.

The S Pen works remarkably well, providing the user with an authentic pen to paper friction sensation. This is ideal to make notes directly on the Edge and decent markup tools compliment the functionality.

NFC on the keyboard is a great feature to help with starting your Samsung Flow and together with Bluetooth you get a good integration between compatible devices. The battery output is good and depending on use, it can give up to 9 hours of video playback on a single charge. Full charge takes less than three hours.

Pros:

• Size – 10.6” Tablet - compact laptop, large tablet
• Battery life
• Quality of Book and keyboard
• NFC and Hot keys on keyboard
• Micro SD for expansion
• S Pen

Cons:

• Lengthy setup process, Multiple patches and reboots
• Storage – 64GB is mostly consumed by the space hungry Windows 10 Operating System

Detailed Review:

Unboxing

Unboxing of the Samsung Galaxy Book was a great experience. The quality of the box is similar to the Samsung Galaxy phone series with an elegant black look. The box was securely sealed with two separate tags. Opening the box presented the SDB wrapped in a protective cover. Taking it out was easy and gave that feeling of being secretive and created some anticipation. The Book and keyboard were separately packaged.

Removing the Keyboard revealed the USB-C adaptive fast charger & cable, S Pen, S Pen holder, S Pen Tips and Booklet.

Usage

The battery was charged ~50% out of the box. Plugging in the USB-C cable was easy and no guessing is needed for the orientation of the plug. Charging the SGB took ~1 hour to reach 100%. The SGB comes with a setting to allow charging the battery to 85% only to extend battery life.

Docking with the keyboard is solid and a decently strong magnet is present. The cover has some preset locations where it snaps to the back to give you multiple angles for use. Another feature is the keyboard can be flipped back and the SGB will go into tablet mode and disable the keys. There are also 4 tiny rubber risers that allow you to put it down on a table without the weight of the book pressing on the keys.

If you are use to Windows 10 you will feel at home using this SGB. Using a Mac, iPhone or iPad predominantly will give you a little feeling of confusion or uncertainty. Nevertheless, it is easy to use and will be a quick adoption. Switching to tablet mode helps with finger navigation and it has sufficient power to play your favourite mobile games.

Samsung Flow works really great and is for Apple users something similar to iMessage. You can see your messages directly on the SGB while working without needing to pick up your phone. The other great feature paired with a compatible phone is the ability to unlock your SGB with your fingerprint on your phone. Connect with NFC, Samsung Flow will start on the phone and allow you to unlock the SGB. Samsung Flow also allows for easy integration with the phone to setup a hotspot on your phone and connect to it automatically.

After about a month’s usage, the SGD has performed great. I installed a home architecture and design app to test speed and use for professionals such as graphic designers, architects and real estate agents. Switching between design, 2D and 3D views had no delay or lag.

Use the SGB to read the news while watching the snow fall, making notes directly on Edge and saving the notes or work on your office document in Office 365.

Easily switch to tablet mode to play some games while waiting at appointments or keep it docked and play your keyboard and mouse games.




     

The dual speaker design allows for you to enjoy your music or games and is not obstructed when holding it. Want more bass, just add a Bluetooth speaker for full spectrum of sound enjoyment.

Conclusion

The Samsung 10.6” 64GB Galaxy Book is another great design and product delivered by Samsung. Usage is easy for existing Windows users and will take minimal effort for Apple / Android users to adapt to. Samsung Flow works effectively and has good features. The S Pen is a valuable addition and makes the Samsung Galaxy Book a 3 in 1 device. Tablet, PC and note/sketchbook.

Performance is good enough for most productivity tools and will play most of your favourite games while giving you the flexibility of being extremely portable.

The only negatives I could find for this device is the lack of available space after Windows is installed and secondly, the lengthy setup process. You can use the expansion SD slot for more memory to offset this and the setup is a once off process.



#InsidersGalaxyBook
#TheInsidersCanada