Wednesday 20 March 2013
The Samsung Galaxy S3 makes the final test with the HTC-invasion at the forefront of mobile leaderboard. Captured with impressive results in most test categories it totally deserves the top position. Only Samsung's innovation department should once again to report.
In the shell of the Samsung Galaxy S3 is based on polycarbonate. It should be particularly stable and scratch resistant, but feels like plastic. However, the S3 has clearly quality than its predecessor. On an iPhone 4S or HTC One S with metallic components, it comes in this category but not approach. We liked how Samsung uses almost the entire surface of the device for the display. Therefore, the cell phone is despite the XXL touchscreens no greater than about the Galaxy Nexus. Admittedly, to operate the touch screen with one hand is not easy.
Under the thin battery cover conceals a removable battery and one slot for a microSIM card and a microSD card with - according to Samsung - up to 64 GB capacity. Intern will assist you in Germany available in 16-gigabyte version over 11 GB free disk space. Samsung puts on it but still 50 GB Dropbox storage for two years. The announced S3 versions with 32 and 64 GB are not initially distributed in Germany.
In the shell of the Samsung Galaxy S3 is based on polycarbonate. It should be particularly stable and scratch resistant, but feels like plastic. However, the S3 has clearly quality than its predecessor. On an iPhone 4S or HTC One S with metallic components, it comes in this category but not approach. We liked how Samsung uses almost the entire surface of the device for the display. Therefore, the cell phone is despite the XXL touchscreens no greater than about the Galaxy Nexus. Admittedly, to operate the touch screen with one hand is not easy.
Under the thin battery cover conceals a removable battery and one slot for a microSIM card and a microSD card with - according to Samsung - up to 64 GB capacity. Intern will assist you in Germany available in 16-gigabyte version over 11 GB free disk space. Samsung puts on it but still 50 GB Dropbox storage for two years. The announced S3 versions with 32 and 64 GB are not initially distributed in Germany.
The power of four cores
The Galaxy S3 is. The HTC One X, the second in this country available smartphone with quad-core CPU As our tests show that the One X built Tegra 3 platform running at 4 +1 architecture is not quite round. Samsung's Exynos processor in the S3-4412-makes it better. The cores can be individually controlled and reduced to a minimum of 200 MHz. In less complex programs, the CPU automatically restricted accordingly to use less power. This works perfectly on S3, with very few exceptions. Even quick exchange between rigid apps and videos or playing games succeed. The opening applications happens quickly, almost running Android without any lag. Only when calling the widget index the S3 shrugs minimal. If you want to return via home button to the starting screen, the Samsung phone approved but mostly a small pause. In a majority of benchmark tests, we examined more closely in our photo gallery, reached the quad new records.
When Web Surfing the Galaxy S3 also proposes excellent. Via HSPA + with up to 21.1 megabits per second in the downlink opens the S3 our 600 Kbyte large test site in unprecedented 2.6 seconds. Over the WLAN manages this in 3.1 seconds - too quick, but not a new optimum. Prima: The S3 is always booked automatically into the best available Wi-Fi network. The operation of the browser goes smoothly by hand. A small drawback is, however, we also noticed: the zoom function by double-column width is not correct - a typical disease of the Android-4-browser.
When Web Surfing the Galaxy S3 also proposes excellent. Via HSPA + with up to 21.1 megabits per second in the downlink opens the S3 our 600 Kbyte large test site in unprecedented 2.6 seconds. Over the WLAN manages this in 3.1 seconds - too quick, but not a new optimum. Prima: The S3 is always booked automatically into the best available Wi-Fi network. The operation of the browser goes smoothly by hand. A small drawback is, however, we also noticed: the zoom function by double-column width is not correct - a typical disease of the Android-4-browser.
The new innovation hope?
Let's talk about having always known as special features of the S3. The new voice control S-Voice in the German variant was found in our testing as completely immature. With numerous translation errors, many problems with the voice recognition and some strange German-English gibberish they fit into a cabinet of curiosities rather than in a smartphone flagship. Too bad, because in principle, S-voice functions such as WLAN and Bluetooth on and off, opening apps and navigating in Germany, so it would be theoretically superior to Apple's Siri against.
For this work the direct call. When you call a contact and the phone to his ear, keeping the phone automatically dials the number. S3 which uses either the top number in the contact window, or defined as a default. By the way: This also works from a text message out - you can therefore save the detour through the phone book. Something strange how the "smart sleep" mode (also known as Smart Stay). Once you are no longer looking at the screen, it should go out of the Samsung advertising According. In truth, the function is enabled then only the set screen timeout. The intelligent sleep mode is more a smarter alert mode that had the test but also works well as long as we had turned our faces to the screen, he did not go out too.
The picture-in-picture feature is impressive, but also comes up against certain limits. You can use it like this: When watching a video, press the button at the bottom right of the video and moves in a smaller window. The S3 will continue to run smoothly, and they can now, for example, surf the web while keeping the clip in the small picture in mind. This only works with stored video, so do not, for example, in video streaming via YouTube. The new social features of the camera are not as comfortable as advertised. The Galaxy was supposed to synchronize contacts stored images with people on geknipsten photos. This works in the test, however, particularly since the phone only on images with a bright environment at all perceive faces. A comparison with images stored contact creates the S3 is not.
All in all the most "innovative" features the S3 seem somewhat arbitrary and not thought very end. Voice control is botched, picture-in-picture only works for offline videos, the automatic screen timeout is not quite what Samsung promises in advertising. It seems that the South Koreans just everything is developing so-flown of ideas crammed into S3 to it apart from the competition. This is a shame, because these features were mature, had the new Galaxy S3 positive may differ from Android rest.
For this work the direct call. When you call a contact and the phone to his ear, keeping the phone automatically dials the number. S3 which uses either the top number in the contact window, or defined as a default. By the way: This also works from a text message out - you can therefore save the detour through the phone book. Something strange how the "smart sleep" mode (also known as Smart Stay). Once you are no longer looking at the screen, it should go out of the Samsung advertising According. In truth, the function is enabled then only the set screen timeout. The intelligent sleep mode is more a smarter alert mode that had the test but also works well as long as we had turned our faces to the screen, he did not go out too.
The picture-in-picture feature is impressive, but also comes up against certain limits. You can use it like this: When watching a video, press the button at the bottom right of the video and moves in a smaller window. The S3 will continue to run smoothly, and they can now, for example, surf the web while keeping the clip in the small picture in mind. This only works with stored video, so do not, for example, in video streaming via YouTube. The new social features of the camera are not as comfortable as advertised. The Galaxy was supposed to synchronize contacts stored images with people on geknipsten photos. This works in the test, however, particularly since the phone only on images with a bright environment at all perceive faces. A comparison with images stored contact creates the S3 is not.
All in all the most "innovative" features the S3 seem somewhat arbitrary and not thought very end. Voice control is botched, picture-in-picture only works for offline videos, the automatic screen timeout is not quite what Samsung promises in advertising. It seems that the South Koreans just everything is developing so-flown of ideas crammed into S3 to it apart from the competition. This is a shame, because these features were mature, had the new Galaxy S3 positive may differ from Android rest.
No way too big for a smartphone
4.8-inch, Super AMOLED, 1,280 x 720 pixels. Even the raw numbers sound impressive. The display test turns out though, that the brightness of the screen is not too impressive, but the values ??for contrast, color gamut and white point all lie within the optimum range. In addition, our testers were located: Subjectively, the screen is extremely strong in color, contrast and knackscharf. The quality of the camera footage is unparalleled especially in daylight and total darkness. Vivid colors, great lighting and optimum sharpness are the result. In artificial light but the result is inferior even to that of a S2 significantly. The color temperature is just too hot. In low light conditions without flash turned on the S3 quite noisy, but still passable pictures. Especially the outdoor shots in bright sunlight have loved it. All patterns of S3 can be found in our photo gallery. A recorded with the full HD camcorder test film has also really sharp and true color. Kudos also earned the music player of the S3. He offers thanks to the high quality supplied in-ear headphones for great sound with numerous presets that bring enormous sound changes.
Flashback with TouchWiz
Android 4, you use the S3 does not have virtual buttons, but on the classic Samsung style on home button, menu and back button. The new Recent Apps button is not the S3. The view of most recently used apps open as in S2 with Android-4-update via a long press on the home button. New views are overview of app and widget menu. Of both, you can call via pinch-to-zoom an overview of all screens. Copied from HTC, Samsung has the shortcuts on the lock screen. Otherwise, there is nothing new compared with TouchWiz 4. Folders you create in contrast to pure Android Sense 4 and 4 on the menu button. Draw two app icons one above the other does not work. Samsung also donated the S3 its hubs. At Game Hub and video hub, there are offers for movies and games. The Music Hub is an online storage for music and a song-streaming service. However, the costs 9.99 euros a month. The new TouchWiz makes it quite easy and takes almost all of the previous version. For us, it remains therefore that the current best addition to Android 4 offers with its HTC Sense interface.
Battery power and free speech
The 2,100 mAh battery has caused strong up front for a lot of attention. What ultimately makes the battery is, the one with a considerable good seven hours of talk time. In addition, the battery lasts the S3 on the endurance level of a smartphone with a much smaller screen. Because the online runtime at full screen brightness is six hours. It's not outstanding, but very good, considering the energy of the powerful Screen S3 demands. Let's talk about voice quality on mobile phone side of the caller sounds clean and clear to understand. Only on the landline side of the sound is tinny. A great improvement over the S2 is the free mode. Although still not at a satisfactory level, this is now at least useful, since it guarantees a proper course.
Conclusion: The Return of the Galaxy Knights
Samsung has done it again with his latest top smartphone customers to put on it. The Galaxy S3 does not offer great innovation, because many new features seem a little half-baked. But otherwise it does virtually everything right, what one expects from a smartphone. And a little bit better and more spectacular, especially as the competition. A powerful display, clean performance, cool hubs and good battery life ultimately ensure that the S3 is at the head of the mobile leaderboard. With the number of points it comes to what we see as the perfect smartphone, pretty close. Samsung currently has struggled with supply issues on S3, but no later than the middle of June, you should get the new Galaxy for about 580 euros in all online stores.
Alternative:
The alternative to the S3 comes from Taiwan. If you find the display of the S3 is too large, we recommend the HTC One S. The former leader of the leaderboard with confident handling, great handling, perfect performance and a beautiful display. The smartphone priced at about 420 euros is well below the S3. In the size of the Galaxy S3 currently no Android-4-unit can really keep up with the performance and the battery life.
