At this time of the year, a number of awaited smartphones have already been announced. However for rivals Samsung andd Apple, the war is just brewing. While the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 release date is expected during the IFA event in Berlin, Apple may debut its iPhone 6 a week earlier. 

Interestingly, both devices should be in the market by the same time - the third week of September. 

The Samsung Galaxy Note 4 is expected to be a beast in terms of specs, just like what the Note 3 was last year. 

However, a new report tells us that at least one feature may be downgraded instead of upgraded. 

According to a report by GSM Arena, rumors have it that the Galaxy Note 4's rear camera would only have 12 megapixels, contrary to earlier rumors of it getting a 20MP camera. 

The rumor comes from Korea news website ET News which speculates that Samsung could be getting the camera modules from its Tianjin factory which can produce 1 to 3 million units every month. 

On the upside, the Galaxy Note 4 is rumored to get optical image stabilization instead, which significantly improves shots even those which are in motion. In addition, the Korean manufacturer is also favoring a thinner frame rather than a higher megapixel camera. 

Remember that th higher the resolution the camera has, the thicker it would be. And Samsung may not want a bulge at the back of its newest Android phablet. 

As far as rumors go, the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 packs some serious specs which include a 5.7-inch or larger display with QHD or 2K (2560 x 1440) resolution, a Snapdragon 805 chipset, a quad-core CPU running at 2.5GHz, and 3GB of RAM. 

Other features which are present in the company's Galaxy S5 such as the fingerprint sensor, heartrate monitor and water and dust resistance are also expected to make their way to the Note 4's spec sheet.