The Samsung Galaxy S3 is to be the successor to the hugely popular Samsung Galaxy S2 and rumours surrounding its release date, features, design and price are rife, here we take a look at what has so far been confirmed and what we can expect from this new high-end smart phone.
First of all, Samsung may have accidentally already revealed the Galaxy S3 in a video launched at the recent CES event this year which shows a larger handset than the S2 with a much bigger touch screen and slimmer bevel surround, the display is likely to be 4.6 inches or more based on the manufacturers last two release.
These include the Samsung Galaxy Nexus which sports a 4.65 inch display and the Samsung Galaxy Note which packs the largest touch screen currently available at a massive 5.3 inches, the Galaxy S3 will most definitely use Super AMOLED Plus technology and offer HD support at 1080p as this is already available on the Samsung Galaxy S2.
The camera will most probably turn out to be a 12 mega pixel lens although Samsung did out a 16 mega pixel unit in October of last year there has been no talk connecting it with the Galaxy S3, the camera will be enhanced with face recognition, smile detection, LED flash, image stabiliser, auto and touch focus and 1080p video capture.
When it comes to a definite release date there is no confirmed knowledge at this time, originally tipped to be launching at the Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona the manufacturer has now confirmed that will not be the case. Reports suggest that it may be a while longer as the company want to avoid the staggered release scenario of the Galaxy S2 which saw a significant delay in launched the product in America after hitting the UK market.
It has also been rumoured that it could coincide with the release of the new Apple iPhone 5, the S2 was launched around the same time as the iPhone 4 and has gone on to outsell Apple’s previous model in the UK, the newer iPhone 4S has also failed to make much of an impact on Galaxy S2 sales figures.
In terms of overall design, the Samsung Galaxy S3 looks to be following a similar stance to the S2 with a lightweight, slim and sleek form which makes the iPhone look a little bulky, the main touch screen dominates the front of the handset and touch sensitive buttons may be removed.
This is mostly due to the new phone shipping with the latest Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich edition operating system which negates the need for both physical and touch buttons, it also introduces lots of new features and updates such as better task management, facial recognition unlock, live effects for video, advanced NFC sharing features and improved email and web browser.
Powering this new flagship phone could well be the first ever quad-core processor as the manufacturer; Qualcomm have now confirmed that these are available, this could increase speeds to between 1.6GHz and 2GHz making the Galaxy S3 one of the fastest smart phones available.
As for price, it is widely expected that the Samsung Galaxy S3 will cost a little more than the S2 did when it was first released, this would mean that a free phone would probably be available with contract deals of between £36 and £41 line rental costs per month.