Samsung’s 8-Inch Galaxy Note Tablet Is Reportedly Set For Its February MWC Debut

Well, it certainly seems like a good time to be in the market for an Android tablet — Sony has just announced its attractive new Tablet Z, and it seems that Samsung really does have another Note tab up its sleeves.

According to Korean news outlet iNews 24, Samsung Mobile chief JK Shin has confirmed that the company’s rumored 8-inch Galaxy Note tablet will indeed be making an appearance at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

At this point there’s still no official word on what kind of internals we can expect from the 8-inch version, but that hasn’t kept the rumor mill from churning as it always does. Should you believe the reports floating around out there, the new Note tablet could ship with Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, 2GB of RAM, a 5-megapixel rear camera and a 1.3 megapixel front-facer. Curiously, there’s been very little chatter about what sort of processor will drive this package, but it shouldn’t be long before all those details are made available for us to chew on more thoughtfully.

Still, this is a welcome morsel of news from Samsung — it had its share of shortcomings, but I was generally very fond of the Samsung’s 10-inch Galaxy Note — to me, it remains one of the most thoughtful implementations of the Note concept (and its string of recent software updates haven’t hurt either). That said, scaling down that S-Pen-friendly display to a more portable 8 inches is a smart (if not unexpected) move, and could help Samsung fight back not only against Apple’s iPad mini, but popular devices like the Nexus 7 as well.

That report also goes on to say that people shouldn’t expect to see Samsung’s oft-rumored Galaxy S IV on display in Barcelona, which isn’t exactly a shocker considering Samsung’s recent track record. The Korean consumer electronics giant showed off the 10.1-inch Galaxy Note tablet last year in lieu of any flagship smartphones at MWC last year (though the team ultimately went back to the drawing board for a few months before actually releasing the thing), and saved its Galaxy S III for a lavish spectacle in London later in the year. I wouldn’t expect Samsung to buck that trend any time soon, but that’s just fine by me — if some persistent murmurs are any indication, the GSIV will make for a hell of show once the time is right.