Samsung Galaxy S III - The World's Best-Selling Smartphone Model

A superb screen, lots of power, innovative software and a reasonable price on contract mean that the Galaxy S III retains its smartphone

Only Samsung has been able to match Apple for smartphone supremacy in recent times, and its Galaxy S III ascended last year by improving on the stellar work done by the S II and now it’s been updated to the latest version of Android, too.

Samsung Galaxy S III

The 4.8in screen out-muscles the 4m panel of the iPhone 5, and its 720 x 1280 resolution serves up more pixels, too, albeit at reduced pixel density: 3O6ppi on the S III compared to 326ppi on the ¡Phone 5. Despite the minor discrepancy, you’ll still struggle to make out individual pixels, and quality is excellent, with colors that are bright and vivid without being oversaturated.

It’s a beautiful display, but we were surprised to find that in some respects the Galaxy S Ill falls behind its predecessor. The S Ill’s brightness is good at 240cd/m2, but not as searing as the 300cdIm2 of the S II. The AMOLED panel guarantees perfect contrast, however.

Samsung has loaded its latest flagship with a seriously powerful processor - a 14GHz quad-core Exynos 4412 Quad processor with 1GB of RAM, and a Mali-400 MP graphics core. As expected, the benchmark results are fantastic. The Samsung’s Quadrant score of 5371 is top-notch, and it’s near the top of the table in the SunSpider stakes with a time of 1344ms. The iPhone 5 ran through this in 932ms, and Nokia’s Lumia 920 heads the field with 920ms.

A superb screen, lots of power, innovative software and a reasonable price on contract mean that the Galaxy S III retains its smartphone

More important than the numbers is that the S Ill is extremely slick when scrolling, panning and zooming in the browser and in and around the Android UI. An update to Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean) has eradicated the occasional sluggishness we discovered during games in our initial review. This time Shadowgun, Dead Trigger and Reckless Racing 2 ran flawlessly. Battery life is reasonable, too, although a 60% lifespan after our 24-hour test doesn’t lift the S III above average.

Samsung’s Touch Wiz UI overlay doesn’t look as classy as HTC Sense, but it’s packed with innovative touches. Smart Stay uses the front-facing camera to keep the screen on when you’re reading; S Voice provides voice recognition; and we like the auto-dial feature, which automatically makes a call when you lift the phone to your ear on a contact or messaging page.

The S Ill’s camera is on 8-megapixel unit and quality is excellent. Clarity is simply superb and the macro mode captures remarkable detail. There’s a mind-boggling range of features: image stabilization, manual ISO selection and white balance options, a fake HDR option plus a burst mode.

The S Ill’s camera is on 8-megapixel unit and quality is excellent

We’re less keen on the S III’s build quality, however. It feels plastic KY and poorer quality than its rivals, especially the back panel. The battery can be swapped out from behind this panel and storage can be expanded, but the iPhone 5, HTC One X and Nokia Lumia 920 all feel much nicer in hand.

The lack of finesse on the outside, though, is more than made up for by class-leading performance everywhere else. No other smartphone currently offers this combination of power, software innovation and screen quality and it’s more sensibly sized than the latest Galaxy Note. It is simply the best smartphone on the market.

Samsung GALAXY S III Product Specifications

General ·         2G Network : GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 ·         3G Network : HSDPA 850 / 900 / 1900 / 2100 ·         4G Network : LTE (regional) ·         SIM: Micro-SIM Body ·         Dimensions : 136.6 x 70.6 x 8.6 mm (5.38 x 2.78 x 0.34 in) ·         Weight: 133 g (4.69 oz) Display ·         Type: Super AMOLED capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors ·         Size: 720 x 1280 pixels, 4.8 inches (~306 ppi pixel density) ·         Multitouch :Yes ·         Protection : Corning Gorilla Glass 2, TouchWiz UI Sound ·         Alert types: Vibration; MP3, WAV ringtones ·         Loudspeaker: Yes ·         3.5mm jack: Yes Memory ·         Card slot: microSD, up to 64 GB ·         Internal: 16/32/64 GB storage, 1 GB RAM Data ·         GPRS: Class 12 (4+1/3+2/2+3/1+4 slots), 32 - 48 kbps ·         EDGE: Class 12 ·         Speed:       HSDPA, 21 Mbps; HSUPA, 5.76 Mbps ·         WLAN: Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, dual-band, DLNA, Wi-Fi Direct, Wi-Fi hotspot ·         Bluetooth: Yes, v4.0 with A2DP, EDR ·         NFC: Yes ·         USB: Yes, microUSB v2.0 (MHL), USB On-the-go Camera ·         Primary: 8 MP, 3264x2448 pixels, autofocus, LED flash, check quality ·         Features: Simultaneous HD video and image recording, geo-tagging, touch focus, face and smile detection, image stabilization ·         Video: Yes, 1080p@30fps, check quality ·         Secondary: Yes, 1.9 MP, 720p@30fps Features ·         OS: Android OS, v4.0.4 (Ice Cream Sandwich), upgradeable to 4.1.2 (Jelly Bean) ·         Chipset: Exynos 4412 Quad ·         CPU: Quad-core 1.4 GHz Cortex-A9 ·         GPU: Mali-400MP ·         Sensors: Accelerometer, gyro, proximity, compass, barometer ·         Messaging: SMS(threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Mail, IM, RSS ·         Browser: HTML, Adobe Flash ·         Radio: Stereo FM radio with RDS ·         GPS: Yes, with A-GPS support and GLONASS ·         Java: Yes, via Java MIDP emulator ·         Colors: Pebble blue, Marble white, Amber brown, Garnet red, Sapphire black, Titanium grey, La Fleur Battery ·         Li-Ion 2100 mAh battery ·         Stand-by: Up to 590 h (2G) / Up to 790 h (3G) ·         Talk time: Up to 21 h 40 min (2G) / Up to 11 h 40 min (3G)