Samsung's Galaxy S 4: Introduction & Hands On
by Anand Lal Shimpi on March 14, 2013 7:30 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Samsung
- Mobile
- Galaxy S 4
Final Words
With a release scheduled for sometime in Q2 of this year, today’s announcement is more of a preview. We’re sure to have more details on hardware and software in the coming months. For now, the Galaxy S 4 seems like a logical evolution of the Galaxy S lineup. Faster hardware and a larger higher-resolution display were both expected and delivered upon.
Power users will be pleased by the modern SoC integration, and I’m sure there are some that will still be happy with the removable battery and micro SD card slot.
Samsung has continued to increase its focus on delivering enhancements through software, which is very obvious based on the list of launch features for the Galaxy S 4. Although I’m sure power users will still prefer unmodified Android, it’s important to note that many of the features Samsung is introducing with the Galaxy S 4 will be very easy to market to mainstream consumers. The ability to control your smartphone without ever touching it or pause/unpause video with a glance are marketing messages that are very clear and easy to deliver.
The same is true for the enhancements to the camera app. While Samsung continued down the path of the megapixel race, truth be told it will have an easier time selling the Galaxy S 4 to mainstream consumers based on specs and the added features enabled by the new camera app.
Round it all up with S Translate and S Health, two more features that aren’t really new but definitely speak directly to consumers. It’s Apple’s Siri strategy, but coming from many different angles. Samsung’s consumer focused strategy is one that has done very well and I see the Galaxy S 4 continuing that. The real question is how well all of these features will perform/work in final software. Conceptually the Galaxy S 4’s software suite makes a lot of sense, the proof as always will be in the execution and how long it takes Samsung to get to the appropriate level of polish.
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edwpang - Friday, March 15, 2013 - link
Quite some people talked about the usefulness secondary battery. I think it make more sense to have a LARGER battery than to have a spare battery with the same capacity.10101010 - Friday, March 15, 2013 - link
For many people, why would they want to carry around, hold, grip, etc., a phone with a giant battery all day? Maybe they only need extra battery a few times a week. And then they take their second battery. It's a little bit inconvenient to have a second battery, but they their phone is still light, easy to hold, etc. for the majority of the time they use it. Seems like a worthy trade to me.Hanako_Ikezawa - Friday, March 15, 2013 - link
Exactly. I love my note II but it would be unreasonable to assume everyone would want to drag a phone that big around all in order to have the battery life that it offers b/c of its size.Back in the dark ages my instinct would last almost 2 weeks with out plugging in b/c I just replaced the battery when it finally died. I do miss dumb phone battery life though xD
Tams80 - Wednesday, March 20, 2013 - link
There's no reason you can't have both.wrong - Friday, March 15, 2013 - link
Removable batteries have an important underappreciated use: guaranteeing that the phone is powered off all the way.Ever had a phone on switch get triggered in a pocket? Ever thought your phone was off but had an alarm go off? Ever needed to turn your phone off silently but got a jaunty goodbye tune instead? Ever been in a plane, or a courtroom?
magnetik - Friday, March 15, 2013 - link
First picture, I thought you cracked the screen.Silma - Saturday, March 16, 2013 - link
Not impressed by S translator.Compare it to the free Bing translator for wp7/wp8:
- works offline
- with typed text, voice
- with live scan: hover your phone camera over a restaurant menu, a newspaper article or whatever
- has been available for more than a year for free.
Regarding removable battery it's back to the future. It now looks high end but was standard standard of so long ago before manufacturers absolutely had to ape Apple even in its failed design decisions. Same with ultrabooks really.
leomax999 - Saturday, March 16, 2013 - link
Looks like radio design wins for Infineon (intel).It looks like they had used the cost savings in traditional areas to pave way to new features.
cyberguyz - Saturday, March 16, 2013 - link
Anand, in your comparison chart you are comparing the North American SGS3 (Dual Core) to both North American and International flavors for the SGS4. You are doing everyone a disservice by not including International SGS3 with a quad core Exynos 4 SOC and 1GB memorylanderf - Saturday, March 16, 2013 - link
Ao is anyone else visiting Tech Report and thinking they're at ananadtech and then visiting anandtech and zoning out because they don't know wtf they're looking at?