Amid more and more rumors and fake renders of the new Galaxy S III (yeesh, it’s beginning to look like an Apple launch around here) there’s some actual news straight from the horse’s mouth. Maeli Business News reports that Kim Young-Ha, the president of Samsung’s greater China operations, told conference call listeners that the company was considering an expedited April launch for the new flagship phone. The date has yet to be agrees upon by Samsung’s top brass. This is going against the tide of most of the rumors pointing to a May announcement or release.
When Samsung announced that the Galaxy S III wouldn’t be making its way to Mobile World Congress and was instead being saved for a Samsung event, many speculated that either A) it was being pushed back to better compete with the iPhone 5 or B) Samsung was waiting for a more seamless global release. The US, Canada and some of the more remote regions of the world tend to follow Europe and Asia by a factor of months for major phone releases, and it’s possible that Samsung wanted a simultaneous (or nearly so) worldwide release. Leaks and rumors have indicated May 22nd for the event date, but nothing’s been confirmed.
It isn’t clear if or why Samsung would move the date up, other than to satisfy a growing demand for the as-yet unseen device. It’s worth noting that an executive in China would be unlikely to have any sort of final say in the matter, since Samsung’s head offices and most of its senior executives are in South Korea. We wait in breathless anticipation for any sort of real news on the Galaxy S III, which has so far eluded the tech press worldwide. About all we can say with certainty is that it’s coming, and that somebody out there has got entirely too much time to fiddle around in Photoshop.
If you’re like most heavy Google Voice users, you keep your GV voicemail and standard carrier voicemail separate. This is great for managing different numbers, but it’s a bit of a pain to wrangle all on the same phone. Android and Google Voice get a little closer today, as GV’s voicemail service is available from the native Android phone/dialer app. The update treats voicemails like calls, so you’ll see them in the same place that you usually see Google Voice incoming and outgoing calls in the dialer. Download the updated Google Voice app to apply the changes.
Unfortunately, this feature is limited to Android 4.0 at the moment. Google may back-port the voicemail integration into an earlier version, but that seems unlikely – if I had to guess, I’d say that this is something Google’s been planning for a while and had to code for specifically in Ice Cream Sandwich. On top of that, early reports indicate that phones without a mostly stock Android system can’t use the feature; skins like Samsung’s TouchWiz and HTC’s Sense UI usually completely replace the dialer and contact system. HTC Vivid users with their brand new Android 4.0 update are reporting that the feature doesn’t work for them. Another new feature that’s exclusive to ICS (but probably works for all Android 4.0 builds) is access to Google Voice folders from the app itself.
The addition is a handy one for the admittedly small intersection of Google Voice users and stock Ice Cream Sandwich (or a suitably close ROM) users. While this isn’t the VOIP addition to Google Voice that many have been hoping for, it’s one more way that your Google Voice number and identity can easily move between Android devices. There’s just no way to match this kind of integration on another platform – something that Google’s surely proud of.
Gameloft is one of few companies that qualifies as a top-tier game publisher in the Android realm, and it looks like they’ve got big plans for all of their upcoming games. Plans of a very specific nature: PocketGamer reports that Gameloft will be placing in-app purchases in every game it releases for the remainder of the year, on every platform, for both smartphones and tablets. The company made the announcement during its financial report, adding that all its upcoming games will also have social elements.
In-app purchases are basically the downloadable content (DLC) of the mobile world, and they’re a polarizing subject to be sure. Essentially operating on a “freemium” model, most games with in-app purchases are free, but require small payments to add new levels or get otherwise unobtainable items. Many games allow you to advance at an accelerated pace with purchases, such as exchanging small amounts of real money for in-game currency. Some of the most popular games on Android, iOS and Facebook operate in this manner and are extremely profitable. A good example from Gameloft’s stable is The Oregon Trail: Settler, now #36 in the list of the most popular free games on the Google Play Store.
Social additions are a mixed bag as well. Many games will connect to users’ Twitter or Facebook account to send out automatic updates on the players; progress and achievements are delivered to friends and followers (often with maddening frequency). Search Twitter for “achievement” and you’ll find millions of nearly identical auto-tweets from whatever games are trending at the moment.
For better or worse, Gameloft seems to be adopting the driving strategy of one of its biggest rivals, Zynga. Plenty of players and pundits don’t appreciate this move towards microtransactions, but there’s no arguing with the money it’s bringing in. Just a few of Gameloft’s upcoming titles are The Dark Knight Rises, Ice Age, The Avengers, The Amazing Spider-Man, My Little Pony, Littlest Pet Shop and Men in Black III.
The last time we showed you the Galaxy Note 10.1, we had time for a few hands-on shots, but not quite enough to get to know the tablet, to warm up to the idea of interacting with one of our favorite 10-inchers using a stylus pen. Now that we’ve had a chance to park ourselves at Samsung’s Mobile World Congress and get acclimated to the various S Pen apps, we wanted to hit back with one more hands-on, this time focusing on what makes the Note 10.1 so special: the writing experience. Meet us past the break and we’ll share some early impressions, along with a walk-through video. Only have a minute to spare? Consider those photos below your Cliff’s Notes.
Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 hands-on
Galaxy Note 10.1 and the Galaxy Tab 10.1, compared
S Pen Experience
Though you might assume the Note 10.1 is just an outsized copy of its little brother, it actually improves on the user experience in at least one critical way: you can always use the Wacom-compatible pen to navigate through the OS. No exceptions. If there’s one irritating thing about using the original Note (and really, there are very few such things), it’s that it’s really not convenient to use the pen to tap those touch-sensitive controls. When you think about how often you tap that menu button, you realize how impossible it is to enjoy an uninterrupted pen experience. Since the Note 10.1 has all soft keys, that’s a non-issue.
Additionally, we came away impressed with the various ways you can use the pen. And we’re not even talking about apps yet: write, if you wish, or use the pen to scroll through lists. Thankfully, the technology is smart enough to know when you’re paging through a memo instead of writing. That way, you don’t end up with random, unwanted markings on the page.
In general, the apps feel intuitive, with obvious paintbrush, text symbols and other shortcuts scattered throughout. Beneath that handful of icons, though, lie some fairly robust controls. You can choose the writing implement, brush thickness and text color, and even save “brushes” you think you’ll use often. In the planner, you can press and hold to create events, as you’d expect, as well as add to different calendars (something you can also do in Google’s native app). In the case of writing apps, there’s an eraser icon, although you can also flip the pen over and use its pen like an eraser. Granted, we’ve seen this before, but it remains a favorite trick nonetheless.
Moving away from specific apps for a moment, you can take screenshots using a shortcut located at the bottom of the screen near where you’d tap for home, or to see which apps are running. Not a feature you’ll use every day, though we can see it coming in handy for marking up webpages and doodling on photos, among others (to say nothing of the pleasure tech reviewers will take in being able to grab screenshots without the help of Android’s SDK).
As for performance, we’ll happily revisit what we’re about to say when we get a Note in to review, but so far as we could tell today the screen seems responsive to pen input. We didn’t have to bear down on the display to make our scribblings register, and we got by lightly tapping shortcuts with both fingers and the pen. Still, even with 1GB of RAM and a dual-core 1.4GHz chip, we noticed that some of the native apps were slow to load, which can be a drag, to the extent that a few-second delay can be irritating to someone used to instant digital gratification.
Hardware
What’s that, you say? You want to talk hardware? Well, that is what we do here, right? In any case, rest assured this doesn’t mark much of a departure from the original 10.1 you know and love. Though the Note is indeed a bit thicker, the difference between the two silhouettes is subtle at best. Besides, the two have the same build quality, which is to say you won’t find any unibody aluminum here, but it feels dependable and well-made just the same.
Regrettably, though, Samsung’s swapped out the not-too-shiny plastic on the 10.1 for a darker, drabber, much more reflective cover. In its latest iteration, the 10.1 is a fingerprint magnet, and as you can see in our comparison pics, the smudges are just a bit more conspicuous than on the 10.1. Other than that, though, these two tablets have way more similarities than they do points of divergence. Take the bright, 1280 x 800 display, for instance, or the proprietary charging connector, or the simple selection of ports that includes a microSD slot, headphone jack and volume rocker. Make no mistake: these two tablets are clearly cousins — first cousins, even.
Outlook
Something tells us we’ll have to live with this thing a while to truly do it justice, but tentatively it seems Samsung’s carefully tailored the software to make it both useful and responsive to that pen-that-isn’t-a-stylus (essentially, what we said about the smaller Note). Of course, a price and performance / battery life benchmarks will help put this all in perspective, but for now we’re just pleased Samsung’s taken an already-solid tablet and found a way to incorporate pen input in such a way that the entire OS is one pen-optimized app. Is it worth it, though? We’ll let you watch our demo and decide for yourselves.
Another day, another fleeting rumor of the ever-elusive Galaxy S III. After skipping out on Mobile World Congress tro throw its own party Apple-style, Samsung still hasn’t mentioned when it intends to bring the Galaxy S III to market. The CHEIL Worldwide Marketing company thinks they know, according to ZD Net Korea: they say that Samsung is planning a huge promotion for April, when they expect the phone to launch in multiple markets worldwide. The 2012 Summer Olympics will reportedly play a large part in the initial promotion.
The reasoning for the Olympic tie-in is a deal between Samsung, credit card company Visa and the IOC, launching a new NFC-based payment system with the Galaxy S III as the flagship device. NFC certainly makes sense – Samsung has been including it with most of the high-end phones it’s announced in the last few months. The April release seems a little dubious, to be honest: there’s already a Samsung event scheduled for later this month in France, so they’d need to get the product finalized, announced and delivered in a span of just a few weeks.
There’s very little information about the Galaxy S III that can be verified. A large screen, fast processor and Samsung’s TouchWiz version of Ice Cream Sandwich seem like a given, but every analyst and insider between here and South Korea seems intent on getting a word in edgewise. At the moment about the only thing we can say for sure is that a successor to the incredibly popular Galaxy S III is on its way – some time, somewhere.
The all new iPad was just announced only a few short hours ago, and while CEO Tim Cook was on stage he was quick to take a few stabs at Android and Samsung regarding tablets and the user experience. Now after the final specs have been confirmed Samsung is already fighting back. They have released their own little “content creation” and comparison chart showing just how much better they think their Galaxy Note 10.1 tablet is over the Apple iPad 3rd Gen.
Now obviously coming from Samsung they’ve dialed up their strong points and put them out first for the world to see, but in terms of content creation they sure do have tons to offer with the Galaxy Note. Content consumption this might looks slightly different as Android is still catching up with tablet apps, but in terms of creation this is a pretty good assessment.
Above you’ll see the chart provided by Samsung. Quickly pointing out that not only is their tablet (and all their recent tablets) actually thinner and lighter than the new iPad, but it specifically covers everything else as well. Apple’s new iPad may have a faster processor and a new iPhoto app to go with it but on the Galaxy Note 10.1 you can use absolute precision while editing and tweaking pictures with the use of the included S-Pen (stylus). Then they are quick to mention the Note 10.1 screen handles 10x the pressure sensitivity and accuracy over the competing iDevice.
Samsung also attacks the multi-tasking aspect of things. Obviously Android is great when it comes to multi-tasking, especially Android 4.0 ICS, but the Galaxy Note being able to have two windows open surely helps users to browse on one side while they create or take notes on the other.
We enjoyed the Galaxy Note 10.1 tablet during our visit to Spain for MWC 2012 and you can see all of our coverage of the 10″ slate from Samsung talked about above from our timeline of links below. Which device would you purchase?
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