Live: Will Samsung’s pricey phablet, Galaxy Note II take India by storm?

3.11 pm: Samsung Galaxy smart camera also launched

The Galaxy Smart Camera has also been brought out to show consumers as part of a ‘surprise segment’ in the launch. Warzi reveals that it will be made available in India during the course of the month, before diwali.

Warzi is calling the camera “a charged up Android 4.0 device”, and is talking up the features of the device. The camera is 21 MP, comes with Android Ice Cream Sandwich, is wi-fi enabled and has SIM capability.

3.02pm: Galaxy Note II will cost Rs 39,900

It’s official. Warsi says that the Note II will cost Rs 39,990. There is an interest free EMI option spread out over nine months, but there are no to ways about this. The price is very very steep – it will be interesting to see how it fares, given the competitive nature of the smartphone market in India.

Even more interesting now, will be to see at what price point Apple will position the iPhone 5. This is a great opportunity for them to outgun Samsung ahead of the Diwali shopping season. Will they take it?

2.51pm: S Pen sounding cooler and cooler

Asim Warsi is demonstrating some of the key features of the Galaxy Note 2, showcasing the intuitiveness of the device. After praising the S pen as the most advanced mobile gadget yet, Warsi dwells on length on ‘photo note’ which allows users to edit pictures, tag and make little notes on the photographs taken. An in-built scrapbook option if you will.

And now we’re back to the S Pen. Warsi talks about its capability to sense pressure. “The S Pen is tuned to sense 1024 different levels of pressure sensing. This can draw lines of depth, width, intensity”, he says.

Warsi promises that this means that using the S Pen is exactly the same as using a normal pen and paper. If it does everything it says, this could be a huge boost for Samsung, especially since it will appeal to users who are not too comfortable with touch screens.

2.45 pm BGR says Note will cost Rs 39,000

BGR is reporting that the Note II will cost Rs 39,900. We will confirm the price once we get more updates.

Warsi is now talking about the Air View feature of the S pen aka the Stylus of the Samsung Galaxy Note II.

AirView is pretty a cool feature. What it does is that users can just hover the S Pen approximately 10mm over the surface of the device and then just preview emails, S Planner, image gallery, or video to preview without having to open it.

For those find touch-screens tough to handle, the AirView feature should be pretty helpful.

2.40 pm: ‘Not just bigger but thinner’

Samsung Vice-President India, Asim Warsi talking about how the smartphone is not just bigger but thinner. He’s talking about how the screen is much better thanks to AMOLED tech and that this is one of the best smartphones around.

Best is yet to be seen but it does have a really big screen.

2.30 pm Samsung Galaxy Note 2 is officially here

Director Imtiaz Ali is at the launch and the phone has been officially unveiled.

Ok currently Samsung has gone for some theatrics at the launch. While the song and dance sequence looks nice, what we’re really waiting for is the price of the Galaxy Note II in India. Will it be priced more than Rs 40,000 or less?

2.27 pm: 

India is one of the first few markets where the Note II is being launched. Yay for that. B D Park, the President and CEO of Samsung South West Asia Operations and Managing Director, Samsung India Electronics Ltd is present at the launch.

Right now he’s talking about the S pen, the bigger screen and why Samsung went for it.

Samsung’s official event for the India launch of the Galaxy Note II will begin today at 2.30 pm in Hyderabad. The South-Korean firm had first revealed the oversized smartphone/phablet at the consumer electronics show IFA in Berlin in August.

We’ll be giving you live updates of the launch. It is being telecast live on the web. To check out the live webcast click here.

Image: From Samsung Mobile India’s Twitter page.

The smartphone is available for pre-order on Samsung’s Indie e-store. You can click here to order. The cost for pre-ordering the device is Rs 5000. Note, that a pre-order is once placed, it cannot be cancelled.

While the actual price of the smartphone has not been revealed, according to reports it is expected to cost a maximum of Rs 38,000.