The Galaxy S was one of the most popular handsets of 2010 and so it is no surprise that Samsung would issue out a sequel. In fact, at the time of the Galaxy S II´s release the original Galaxy S still remains one of the most popular and best selling phones available in the UK. While a slightly modified version of the original was provided with the Samsung Galaxy SL the Galaxy S II is by no means a slightly polished rehash. The Galaxy S II follows on the same award winning design principles while undeniably pushing Samsung to the forefront of the next generation of mobile phones.
The original Galaxy S featured a 4″ screen employing Samsung´s Super AMOLED technology, which at the time was the finest screen technology available on phones. This has since come into competition from the likes of Apple´s Retina Display and the LG Optimus Black´s IPS LCD screen but the developers at Samsung have also been hard at work improving their screen technology and Super AMOLED Plus is what they have come up with. This is even more impressive than the original Super AMOLED which still remains a highly desirable feature.
The screen on the Galaxy S II has been bumped up a notch to 4.3″, which some might consider excessive in light of the fact that the Galaxy S was not exactly petite. This increase in screen size, which is perfectly suited for better web browsing and video entertainment, has been compensated for by a slimmed down body. At 8.5mm the Galaxy S II is one of the slimmest phones on the market and has already chipped away Apple´s smugly held claims of possessing the World´s Thinnest Smartphone.
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The screen comes with Gorilla Glass, high WVGA resolution and colour depth, multitouch input and an accelerometer for interface auto-rotation. There is also a gyro sensor which affords the Galaxy S II fully 3 dimensional controls which are ideal for games and other apps. The Galaxy S II runs on dual core 1.2GHz processors with 1GB RAM, making it one of the speediest phones on the market and certainly worthy of its “S” epithet.
The Galaxy S II runs on Google Android 2.3 Gingerbread with optional Near Field Communications (NFC) which can allow your phone to be used like a credit card, amongst other things. The OS is combined with Samsung´s TouchWiz interface giving it a unique feel to other Android handsets. Due to its Android status the Galaxy S II comes with a large range of Google features supported out of the box, including Gmail, Google Talk, Picasa and YouTube. The latter app, along with Adobe Flash 10.1 allow you to stream videos from online for your own entertainment.
You can enjoy your own music and video content as well with the Galaxy S II come with a fantastic range of support for all the popular file formats, including Flac. The Galaxy S II comes with either 16GB or 32GB of internal storage which can be complemented with up to 32GB of microSD cards, providing a maximum potential of 64GB. This places the phones far ahead of the leading competition in terms of the volume of content it can store. Additionally there is an FM radio with RDS, and the MHL AV link, Wi-Fi DNLA and Wi-Fi Direct all allow you to hook the Galaxy S II up to a home TV to enjoy your videos.
These can be videos that you have copied onto the phone through microUSB, Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, or perhaps videos you are streaming from online. It can also include videos you have captured yourself from the phone´s 8 megapixel camera as this comes with 1080p video recording at an unrivalled 30fps. The camera also includes an LED flash and features such as geo-tagging and face detection.
The Galaxy S II comes with integration for social networks like Facebook and Twitter, allowing you to more easily update your status or send out a tweet. Threaded SMS is available, as is MMS, email and instant messaging.
At the time of its release it really does seem like the Galaxy S II outperforms all of its competition in almost all aspects of its functionality. It has a very high quality screen with Super AMOLED Plus, excellent 1080p video recording, with DLNA and Wi-Fi Direct to perfectly compliment it. It also has more storage available than any other phone for media content and also comes with the latest dual core processing power. In terms of messaging, entertainment, photography and general web browsing the Galaxy S II ticks all the right boxes.
Editor’s Note: You can buy this phone at our UK partner, Best Mobile Contract