So one of the first things I noticed with the Galaxy Note was a lack of ringtones. A quick Internet search yielded a site with instructions on adding an mp3 as a ringtone on a Galaxy S. The instructions worked perfectly for the Galaxy Note.
From Richard S. (http://www.androidpit.com/en/android/forum/thread/427141/How-do-I-set-my-mp3-as-a-ringtone-on-the-Samsung-Galaxy-S):
1. Open any file manager app
2. Look for a folder called Media in the phone’s main directory.
(Most likely it doesn’t exist, so create it by right clicking and choosing New Folder, then rename the folder to be media)
3. Inside the media folder, you need a folder called Audio. Again, if its not there create it as above
4. Inside the Audio folder, create subfolders for the sound categories you want to change:
– Ringtones for sound files you want to use for incoming calls
– Alarms for sound files you want to use for alarms
– Notifications for all other alerts such as incoming SMS, emails or alerts from individual apps, etc
(lower/upper case is irrelevant – the folders can be “Media”, “MEDIA”, “media”, etc)
Copy the MP3 file you want to use to the relevant folder
You should now see your MP3 file listed in the menu for selection in the relevant sound settings menu (to access the ringtone/notification settings, press the hard Menu key from one of your home screens, then press Settings then Sounds and Display, or go to settings from within a relevant app)
Alternatively, most audio player apps allow you to set music files as ringtones when playing them, either with a hard press or from the Menu key. Note, the default Android music player does not have this function, which I consider to be a little odd.
I’m glad someone figured this out because the default ringtones stunk. I’ve never been into adding my own ringtones, but this time it was definitely necessary.