Samsung Galaxy S III Indepth Review

The Samsung Galaxy S III has been my daily device for the last month and after the initial hype I still remain very impressed by what is easily the android smartphone on the market.

The 133g mass does not feel heavy at all and the shell fits extremely well into the palm of the hand. It could be said that its design doesn’t look that impressive and I can relate to the statement. It certainly isn’t the most beautiful phone available but there is no reason to avoid the Galaxy S III based solely based on the appearance.

The 4.8 inch Super AMOLED HD display is a class leading product. The infinite contrast works wonders for image quality and I certainly welcome the the saturated colours. Overall, the display is amazing and it will be down to personal preference if you prefer the AMOLED of the Galaxy S III or the Super LCD 2 of the HTC One X.

We were thoroughly impressed by the TouchWiz Nature UX, it is very smooth and not feature impaired. That said, it is not the prettiest looking user interface, and some stock applications appear to be a bit ‘mix ’n’ match'.

In regards to performance, the Exynos 4412 chipset with the quad-core processor (running at 1.4 GHz) takes the crown in all eleven of our benchmarks. If you want pure raw performance then that’s another reason to purchase the Galaxy S III.

It is also worth pointing out that the camera is very impressive and is perhaps the best implementation we have seen to date on a mobile device.

Other Phones to Consider

Right now the Galaxy only has one true competitor in the form of the HTC One X, which happens to be slightly cheaper. The One X has an arguably better design and has access to perks in some games, thanks to its Tegra 3 chipset.

Software Information

Our review unit was running Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich with build number I9300XXALE8 however it just received an update to ALF2 as we were writing up the conclusion. This update apparently increases the amount of idle RAM by about 100 MB which should make the multitasking experience even better.

You can buy the Samsung Galaxy S III including a wealth of accessories direct from Amazon. The 16GB SIM free Marble White version is £437.99 inc vat, and the SIM free Pebble Blue version is £454.95 inc vat.

Pros

• Feels great in hand.
• Is the most future proof phone available today.
• Super AMOLED HD display is very impressive.
• Exynos 4412 processor is the fastest we’ve experienced.
• 16 or 32 GB internal storage plus MicroSD slot.
• Superior browsing experience.
• TouchWiz Nature UX runs very smooth and is much improved over previous versions.
• Only a couple of minor bugs and glitches noticed over a month of use.
• Impressive battery life.

Cons

• Loudspeaker is muffled very easily.
• No dedicated multitasking key.
• Stock keyboard is a pain to use.
• HTC Sense and AOSP could be considered better than TouchWiz.
• S Voice is largely a gimmick.

KitGuru says: If you are currently in the market for a high-end smartphone right now then there is only one phone I can recommend; the Galaxy S III. It is the most complete smartphone package available today – a title it will likely retain until later this year. At the end of the day Samsung reaffirms its dominance of the high-end Android market with the Galaxy S III.

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