BW Communities

Surprise After Surprise

BW Online Bureau Nov 08, 2014

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><root available-locales="en_US," default-locale="en_US"><static-content language-id="en_US"><![CDATA[For weeks everyone has been trying to guess at the unknown quantity that Samsung's Galaxy S III has remained. Samsung did a beautiful job of keeping it under wraps. Just like Apple, not a word. All sorts of rumours and leaked photos did the rounds but nothing came anywhere near the real thing when it was unveiled at a big event in London, where Samsung is also an Olympics sponsor.  All anyone could come up with is that it had a quad core processor – Samsung's own – and the latest Ice Cream Sandwich version of Android. They even got the colours wrong. When it came around to unveiling time, the watching world was in for a series of surprises. The phone looked fine enough – a big bright 4.8 inch HD AMOLED screen, a gorgeous white model and a dark blue one, curved edges, and a 8.6mm thin body; just about the thickness of the S II, but with more under the hood. The size of the screen is 22 per cent larger than the S II but this is without making the phone wider as the bezel has been minimized. The primary camera wasn't 12 megapixels, as some had guessed, but 8 and with other special features. Phone makers are beginning to think beyond megapixels a lot these days. The surprise however was not in the looks of the phone or the hardware per se, but in what Samsung has done with the software and capabilities. These have been all developed around two ideas – making the device more human, and being close to nature. The tech anthropologists have truly been at work here. Getting away from the idea of technology for technology's sake, Samsung has gone all out to make the S III natural to use. In this, they've gone as far as anyone has up until now. There are so many features emerging that they're difficult to list. But a few are jaw-droppers for certain. Using the camera and face recognition, they've got the phone sensing just about everything you do. Say you're texting someone and suddenly decide you want to call instead. The moment you lift the phone to your ear, the phone will go ahead and call your contact. When you take pictures of your friends or family, the S III will send them to those people. If you find that frightening, you can change settings of course. The S III also uses eye recognition. So, if you're looking at the phone, it will "know" that you are and the screen won't dim. That's a relief! It also has voice recognition and listens to what you say like a "good friend". When you wake up in the morning, for example, you lift the phone and say "Hi Galaxy" and the phone will light up with information about the day, the weather, etc. Commands to use functionalities are also just built naturally into the usage. You can just ask it to play music, for instance. The camera takes a quick burst of 20 pictures and then choose the best photo for you to use, if you like. The 2 megapixel front facing camera will take a self shot on command.  From shot to share is under a minute. The nature element shows up in sounds and visualizations, making the device more likely to be more soothing to use. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the sound of a babbling brook or gentle rain, calms the users mood subconsciously. The intelligence built into the phone could very well do exactly what Samsung wants to – make it a natural extension of the user. Of course, the sheer smartness of the features will mean users will have to be as intelligent, figuring out capabilities and settings and using them to make actual differences rather than just flaunting the latest premium smartphone. The Galaxy S III launches in Europe first – on May 29th – and then heads for ten cities, among which Delhi is said to also be.  It's to be available in 16, 32 and 64GB models, but pricing is not known at the time of writing this. It is thought that the price will be in line with Samsung's current equivalent reemium phones. What will happen to the Samsung Galaxy Note, the popular 5.3 inch phone-tablet now that there will be a super-smartphone to compete, remains to be seen. Samsung has sold over 44 million smartphones in the first quarter of this year and plans to double its annual sales in this space over the year. Mala Bhargava is a personal technology writer and media professional Contact her at mala at pobox dot com and @malabhargava on Twitter