Being one of the most anticipated phones of 2012, if not all time, the Samsung Galaxy S III has a lot of hype to live up to as it finally made its way over to the US. In a world of emerging quad core tablets and phones, the dual core system stays strong while manufacturers and consumers believe that Android is not yet optimized to fully utilize the larger number of cores. With the recent release of Jelly Bean we’re starting to see just how smooth Android has become while being able to use all of the hardware for an enhanced experience. Being the successor to the hugely popular Galaxy S II is no easy job, and we’re here to tell you if it lives up to the hype of causing all of our news feeds to be filled with BS rumors for months.
Hardware
If you look closely you can see a faint resemblance to the previous models of the Galaxy series; some of these traits include the home button from the international editions, placement of buttons and ports, and that’s about it. Samsung went all out on making this device look nothing like its predecessor, or various other smartphones on the market. While we can argue this is a good thing for lawsuits and patents, it also affected the way the design of the phone ended up. We’re left with the popular white color choice, and the not-so-great-looking-but-it’s-not-white-so-I’ll-buy-it-anyway, blue. While the design of the phone is supposed to mimic that of nature, I cannot find a natural rock on earth that attracts the amount of fingerprints that this baby does.
Although off to a bad first start because some despise the blue and others hate the physical home button (which I personally think is a huge blessing), the phone is one great looking phone. Despite the color choice that Samsung left us, the Galaxy S III offers one of the best overall hardware designs that I have seen come out lately. A mix between the luxurious Galaxy Note, and the more conservative Galaxy S II, the device offers a beautiful 4.8″ 1280×720 resolution SAMOLED screen which leaves you in awe thanks to the bright colors and high DPI. Below the screen we have the typical international-style button layout with a center home button, menu button on the left, and a back button on the right (compared to the Galaxy Nexus’s button on the left. Much better for right-handed people in my opinion). While some hated the physical buttons on the device, I believe that it was the correct decision to make. If you look at the Galaxy Nexus’s bottom-bevel, there’s a lot of space there occupied by a simple LED instead of physical buttons; while I’m aware this is because ICS uses on screen buttons natively, I think that the Galaxy S III’s hardware buttons make better use of the empty area. While only a tad longer, the bevel includes the three buttons and allows more area on the screen to be used by the consumer. Yes, I’m aware, you can disable them on the Nexus, I’m not talking about rooted and ROMed here people, just stock.
Dual Core Does Not Mean Half The Power of Quad Core
While the international version shipped with the new quad core Exynos processor, the US variants came with a dual core Snapdragon and increased amount of RAM. The difference in the processor is not noticeable for the average user, and even benchmarks (when usually mean nothing) the Galaxy S III only slightly outperformed our US models. But what about the increased memory? Well, multitasking is a pleasure. Really. Having nearly 300% of the available RAM of the average Android phone (system usually takes up around 300-500mb approx) really opens new doors. Having all of our applications open from the benchmarks, we were able to switch between nearly every application on our phone that we found useful (that’s not even a joke). Multitasking on this device is very hardcore and we personally can’t wait to see more devices in the future (especially tablets) equipped with 2GB of RAM.
If you’ve owned a Samsung device before you know the feel of the device appears to be “cheap.” The case is ultimately designed with loads of plastic. Although some complain about the construction of the phone, ever since my original Galaxy S, I have to disagree. The plastic leaves the phone to be lighter, and more flexible when it boils down to the device coming in impact with something. Having accidently dropped previous models from waist height to chest height, I’ve never had more damage than a chipped corner or two. The phone is by no means cheap, so don’t let that turn you away. I do, however, have to give some major props to HTC for making their newer devices feel very secure. Even though there are reports of chipping and whatnot. Although the case is made of plastic, and the super fingerprint collecting kind, it does offer a large amount of grip. You can literally just lay the device in your hand and hold it at a 80 degree angle without it sliding down at all.
Is TouchWiz Still Awful?
While we’re on the topic of manufacturer skins, we might as well cover it. TouchWiz, like Sense, has improved vastly over the years. The styling for the new skin leaves a fresh sense of Ice Cream Sandwich in your mind while using it. Gradients have been toned down, the built in toggles have increased in number, and the launcher almost looks like ICS’s default one. I will go ahead and say that I believe that the new version of the skin has a lot going for it. Quick access to a large number of toggles now (wifi, bluetooth, GPS, data, all up top) allow for even the average user to have complete access over their phone without having to get a friend to flash and upgrade for them. The settings menu is customizations galore, giving users the ability to display battery percentage, tweak motion settings (which are awesome), and enable power saving techniques just to name a few.
While I think that the version has improved overall, there are still a few things that bug the crap out of me. First off being the toggles up top have this animation which slides every time you open it up: even after sliding one way or the other. That makes it difficult to quickly open and hit a toggle where you’ve memorized the place. Next up is this stupid nature design: The design is just straight up annoying. Touching anywhere on the phone gives you this nice “Water droplet” sound which makes you cringe, to unlock you must drag your finger across the screen through “water,” and all the default notification sounds are just bad. While this is obviously a minor annoyance, and can mostly be disabled through the sound settings and whatnot, I’d just figure to mention it.
The phone comes with quite a few software tweaks and optimizations, and also a pretty large bit of bloatware: although thanks to ICS we no longer really have to worry about that anymore. All the bundled applications that you don’t want can be disabled through the App Info screen so they won’t run in the background and worry you any more. Some of the cool tweaks I’m sure you’ve heard of: we have Smart Stay, which keeps the device awake as long as you’re looking at the screen; NFC, which allows you to use Google Wallet instead of reaching into your wallet to use the same money; and of course the long awaited notification light, which notifies you of any notification, charged battery, or low battery in case you don’t want to just check your phone.
Was it worth hearing the rumors for so long?
For me, the Galaxy S III has more than lived up to its hype. Allowing users to experience a larger screen without going too big, and all the new features that are coming out in modern phones. If you’re on the edge about getting this phone, dive right in. It’s worth every penny. Prices start at $200 through carriers for the 16GB model (it has an SD card, so why go bigger?), which is less than the Note when it came out on AT&T. You can also grab the phone off Amazon for $10 cheaper, or grab the device off contract for a low $550. For those prices, why wouldn’t you upgrade? Also, check out the gallery below for some larger photos:
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