The anticipation for Samsung’s lastest addition to their premier Galaxy line of mobile phones has been higher than any other Android device we can remember. Was it for good reason? Well, the revealed specs include a massive, 4.8-inch Super AMOLED display at 720p resolution, 16-64GB of internal storage with a microSD slot for expansion, Bluetooth 4.0, a 2,100 mAh battery and a Exynos quad-core processor, all nestled inside a frame that weighs only 1.2oz and measures 8.6mm thick.
There’s also an 8MP rear camera, complete with zero shutter lag, a start up time of less than one second, plenty of image tweaking settings, best shot mode, and a 3.3 shots per second burst mode, as well as a 1.9 MP front-facing companion camera. While that’s all great news for Android fans looking to one-up other Android users with state of the art hardware, it’s the Galaxy SIII’s software that truly separates it from the pack.
We’ve got more images, details, and even the melodramatic first TV commercial after the break.
Samsung states the S III experience was modeled after nature, specifically inspired by water, wind, leaves, and pebbles. In fact, their new UI is literally called Nature UX TouchWiz, and if you can cut through the eastern philosophy jargon, that translates into a variety of unique enhancements such as a Siri-like voice recognition system dubbed S-voice, which enables users to do things like wake up the phone by muttering “Hi Galaxy”, or open the camera app by saying “I want to take a picture”.
There’s also so-called Smart Stay, which utilizes the front-facing camera for eye-tracking to determine when users are actually looking at the phone to optimize screen dimming. Direct-dial is another simple, but clever feature, that will automatically call anyone you’re texting with by just raising the phone to your ear. Those in the SIII club can take advantage of a beefed up version of Android Beam too, which Sammy calls S-Beam, that allows users to transfer files such as videos by simply tapping phones together, as well as AllShare Play, which is a DLNA-based network sharing solution that seems on par with Apple’s AirPlay. Piling on top of it all is 50GB of free storage via dropbox for two years, in addition to early access to Flipboard on Android.
One cool accessory that will up the anti of the “natural” experience is a wireless charging station that operates off of “resonance technology” — whatever that means. Launch dates are set for May 29th in Europe, exclusively on Vodafone at first. Those stateside will have to wait until June, when the 4G version arrives on our shores with a TBD carrier and price.
