By We’re just three days away from Samsung unveiling its latest flagship smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S4, and you can bet we couldn’t be any more excited to see what it turns out to be. You had to guess that we might start seeing more and more leaks ahead of schedule, and one Chinese forum may have come through with some early looks at the device.
Right away, you might notice that this doesn’t look much different from frames of the Galaxy S3 and the Galaxy Note 2. That’s alright, because this might not be the final design we see unveiled on Thursday. Samsung could be testing prototypes of the device with a different chassis as the company did with the Samsung Galaxy S3 for situations just like these. The leaked cases we saw earlier this month wouldn’t fit these designs, either, but then again we’re not sure if those cases were accurate themselves.
This particular device was thrown into the Antutu arena, and that revealed it had a full HD display, about 2GB of RAM, a 1.8GHz quad-core “5410” processor (Exynos 5410 is the Octa-Core chipset Samsung unveiled earlier this year), and a 13 megapixel camera. The person who leaked the pictures claims this will be a dual-SIM variant headed for China Telecom, and that bit of info could also lend credence to the fact that we might not see this exact device come Thursday.
Take a long hard look above and make your own mind up about whether or not this device (or something like it) is the one we’ll be seeing March 14th in New York City. Don’t forget Phandroid will be in the neighborhood that day to check it out for ourselves so be sure to come back and see if Samsung can continue its stellar reputation for innovation in 2013.
It’s going to be tough – get an S4 or patiently wait for the X phone from Google Mobility….hmmm
I’m approaching that decision as well. I figure it will be a couple more months until we can put in our orders for the S4 and news of the X will start leaking out by then. If I hear nothing more, I’ll stick with what I know works and get the S4. I took a chance on the GNEX and got bit.
I took a chance with the Nexus 4 and Google just sent me a goddamn lemon with a washed out faded looking screem. On top of that, LG just sucks. I will patiently wait for MOTOs X-phone. I am so sick of my G S3 already.
That Damn bezel
There is like no bezel at all dude lol
There’s a button and a bezel there. I pictured them stretching the screen by eliminating it and giving us software buttons.
the S3 has a smaller bezel on the bottom than both Nexus phones with those screen-burning buttons.
Okay.. I just said what I was hoping it would look like. Thanks.
I was hoping for software keys as well, but at least it has a really small bezel
there is a button and a bezel where that button is… Yes true but it doesn’t really count as bezel because it serves a purpose for being there. Bezel altogether isn’t bad if done minimally and strategically. For example strategically they have a minimal amount of bezel on the sides this is to prevent unwarranted touches… Now I have grown accustom to capacitive buttons and their use before google changed the game and did full time software buttons. Now as far as I know the Galaxy series doesn’t use fulltime software buttons like stock does so its warranted in the use of capacitive. Google has already went the full touchscreen route by means of N4 and look what that has now… Thick bottom and top bezels that are non functional… I would rather have the case of hardware/capacitive buttons that get use rather than just empty space because if that button wasn’t there that would still be with that bottom bezel.
There already was a leak of this device and both were the same so yea I believe this is what we’ll
looks like it took most of its features from the note2. I just hope they make the bezel out of something else this time. The pastic they used in the note2 is way too soft and easily shows dents from even slight drops.
there is a outer aluminum ring around the phone, sort of what we saw with the droid RAZR HD, or like the iPhone
Talk about beautiful
I don’t really see a problem with this form factor or a need to change drastically from something that apparently works for them and makes their products recognizable. yeah you may not at a glance be able to tell from a picture this is a gs3/note/gs4, but so what? you know it’s a high quality Samsung phone and that’s what they are banking on.
yeah but that was before htc one and the sony xperia z came out, so they better up their game because this wouldn’t cut it at least not for me. this year is all new game for smartphones it seem like everyone brought their best to the table.
The front face of their device is made of glass the side is made of aluminum, the only thing made of plastic is the battery cover, something the HTC one and the Xperia Z don’t have.
I’ve had my Note II for 2 months now and I’d say a significant issue with the product design is putting the speaker on the bottom. Perhaps if I didn’t use a case it wouldn’t be as muffled when sitting on the table (since there is a bulge designed to keep the speaker part from being flush), but the case I picked causes quite a lot of muffling. If I want to listen to something, I have to prop up the case a bit, or turn it upside down. That’s OK, but it isn’t the pinnacle of design if you ask me. If it were me, I’d use two microphones and two speakers on the front face, ditch all the buttons (except for side buttons: volume, on/off, and heck add a third that can be a dedicated camera shutter or other uses when camera is not selected) and allow you to hold it in either direction to talk. 5″ diagonal at 130×68-70 mm is my perfect size (68 is 2.9 mm and 70 is 3.9 mm bezel – 2.9 mm is enough to hold a wrap around case – I wouldn’t make the bezel any smaller than that. I doubt that describes the S IV, but hopefully it is close to some phone in the future (preferably a Nexus phone)
Dara
Patiently waiting for November (Next Nexus)
The term Ocracore is misleading for the Exynos 5410 as it technically is not an octa-core chip.
It is a quad-core chip in the “Big Little” design with four A15 based CPUs and four A7 based CPUs. The catch is, that it never runs more than 4 CPUs simultaneously. It runs 4 x A7, 4 x A15, a combination of 4 x A7 and A15 cores or less than 4 cores. This probably is the reason why Antutu labels it as 5410 quad-core.
Big slab of plastic. I want something new like brass or plywood.
Haha Plywood – Galaxy S4 – “Brady bunch” edition with real wood paneling…LOL
Have to have it treated for termites every year. Lol
Talk about having bugs in your phone!
It will have to be light weight. What about balsa?
If this is the final form factor, I wonder how it will play out with all of their Apple-related legal battles.
We will find out on 3/14.
I would be down with this if, despite the larger screen, the physical footprint of the phone were not bigger than the SIII, which is as big as my hand can deal with.
Well that’s obviously not going to happen if this happens to be it. It looks like there hasn’t been any “cutting back” on the bezel. That would be nice though!
I like Sony’s design better, blocky and angular.
S4 still got that pebble thing going on, don’t like the weird roundness.
Anyway feels like Samsung is not dev friend so -1 on getting another Samsung.
how are they not dev friendly? Other than a Nexus (which 50% of them are made by samsung) , they seem to be the easiest to root/hack/mod. no?
Samsung is keeping important code of the Exynos SoC to themselves.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1925709
They can let people root the hardware but without drivers and stuff the devs cannot properly control the hardware.
Without the hardwork of the devs Cyanogenmod with JB wouldn’t happen for SGS2.
Don’t think the devs will code this hard to make CM with KLP on SGS2 next time.
WOW, what a waste of R&D funds! I’ll pass on this one and wait for the S5 next year.
HTC ONE where are youuuu!!!!!!!!!!!! screw this if it aint made of metal i wont buy it. screw that fanboyism bull crap. i want a quality built phone, not one that is going to crack. SOOOOOOOO HTC ONE you got me.
Notice that the Photo shows that the Kernel was built with a “prerelease” version of GCC, also the IMEI number is shown. There are a few things in those Photos that do not seem correct.
The chance of this being the Phone that is released to the Customer is close to zero. Which Manufacturer is going to use a “prerelease” version of a Compiler to build the Kernel, not one who wants their Phone to be released Bug free.
Its my Samsung Galaxy Note 2 thats lost wight and dropped the s pen….i dont like it :(
Is it the picture at the very top we are supposed to be looking at? Because it looks not a single bit different than the current GS3/Note which I like and am bothered by simultaneously. The GS3 is a very sexy phone IMO and I want the GS4 to look like it but not EXACTLY like it (even if it will be a little bigger).