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About a month ago, my sister queuing for a Samsug Galaxy S II in their first Grand Launching in Pacific Place, Jakarta. The price was shockingly attractive by giving a BCA Credit Card holder’s to buy at Rp 4.2 mio with a 6 or 12 months 0%, while the other cash payment will be given a Rp 4.5 mio. With this attractive price, there are so many people queuing for this cell phone to buy. There were only 1.200 units to sell in one day. Now, The Samsung Galaxy S II has been sold in a regular price at Rp 5.5 mio.

I already know that this cell phone, The Samsung Galaxy S II, has a high performance in android today’s handsets. You can compare it to its class like HTC Sensation and LG Optimus 2x where they have the same hardware with a dual core processor and a powerful graphic cards implemented inside. The Samsung Galaxy S II has left all their competitors far away by performance test.

SGS2cSGS2a

    • General
      2G Network
      GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900
    • 3G Network
      HSDPA 850 / 900 / 1900 / 2100
    • Announced
      2011, February
    • Status
      Available. Released 2011, April
    • Size
      Dimensions
      125.3 x 66.1 x 8.5 mm
    • Weight
      116 g
    • Display
      Type
      Super AMOLED Plus capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors
    • Size
      480 x 800 pixels, 4.3 inches
    • - Gorilla Glass display
      - TouchWiz UI v4.0
      - Multi-touch input method
      - Accelerometer sensor for UI auto-rotate
      - Touch-sensitive controls
      - Proximity sensor for auto turn-off
      - Gyroscope sensor
    • Sound
      Alert types
      Vibration; MP3, WAV ringtones
    • Loudspeaker
      Yes
    • 3.5mm jack
      Yes
    • Memory
      Phonebook
      Practically unlimited entries and fields, Photocall
    • Call records
      Practically unlimited
    • Internal
      16GB/32GB storage, 1 GB RAM
    • Card slot
      microSD, up to 32GB, 8 GB included, buy memory
    • Data
      GPRS
      Class 12 (4+1/3+2/2+3/1+4 slots), 32 – 48 kbps
    • EDGE
      Class 12
    • 3G
      HSDPA, 21 Mbps; HSUPA, 5.76 Mbps
    • WLAN
      Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, DLNA, Wi-Fi Direct, Wi-Fi hotspot
    • Bluetooth
      Yes, v3.0+HS
    • Infrared port
      No
    • USB
      Yes, v2.0 microUSB (MHL), USB On-the-go
    • Camera
      Primary
      8 MP, 3264×2448 pixels, autofocus, LED flash, check quality
    • Features
      Geo-tagging, touch focus, face and smile detection, image stabilization
    • Video
      Yes, 1080p@30fps, check quality
    • Secondary
      Yes, 2 MP
    • Features
      OS
      Android OS, v2.3 (Gingerbread)
    • CPU
      Dual-core 1.2GHz ARM Cortex-A9 proccessor, Mali-400MP GPU, Exynos chipset
    • Messaging
      SMS(threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Mail, IM, RSS
    • Browser
      HTML
    • Radio
      Stereo FM radio with RDS
    • Games
      Yes
    • Colors
      Black
    • GPS
      Yes, with A-GPS support
    • Java
      Yes, via Java MIDP emulator
    • - Active noise cancellation with dedicated mic
      - NFC support (optional)
      - TV-out (via MHL A/V link)
      - SNS integration
      - Digital compass
      - MP4/DivX/XviD/WMV/H.264/H.263 player
      - MP3/WAV/eAAC+/AC3/FLAC player
      - Organizer
      - Image/video editor
      - Document editor (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF)
      - Google Search, Maps, Gmail,
      YouTube, Calendar, Google Talk, Picasa integration
      - Adobe Flash 10.1 support
      - Voice memo/dial/commands
      - Predictive text input (Swype)
    • Battery
      Standard battery, Li-Ion 1650 mAh
    • Stand-by
      Up to 710 h (2G) / Up to 610 h (3G)
    • Talk time
      Up to 18 h 20 min (2G) / Up to 8 h 40 min (3G)
Key features
  • Quad-band GSM and quad-band 3G support
  • 21 Mbps HSDPA and 5.76 Mbps HSUPA support
  • 4.3" 16M-color Super AMOLED Plus capacitive touchscreen of WVGA (480 x 800 pixel) resolution
  • Android OS v2.3.3 with TouchWiz 4 launcher
  • 1.2 GHz dual-core Cortex-A9 CPU, Mali-400MP GPU, Exynos chipset, 1GB of RAM
  • 8 MP wide-angle lens autofocus camera with LED flash, face, smile and blink detection
  • 1080p HD video recording at 30fps
  • Dual-band Wi-Fi 802.11 b, g and n support
  • GPS with A-GPS connectivity; Digital compass
  • 16/32GB internal storage, microSD slot
  • Accelerometer, gyroscope and proximity sensor
  • Standard 3.5 mm audio jack
  • Charging MHL microUSB port with USB host and TV-out (1080p) support
  • Stereo Bluetooth v3.0
  • FM radio with RDS
  • Great audio quality
  • Extremely slim waistline at only 8.5mm and low weight (116g)
  • 2MP secondary video-call camera
  • Full Flash support and GPU-acceleration for the web browser permit 1080p flash video playback
  • NFC support (optional, not without a software update)
  • Document editor
  • File manager comes preinstalled
  • The richest video format support we have seen
Main disadvantages
  • All-plastic body
  • No dedicated camera key
  • Super slim body has poor grip when taking pictures
  • Non-hot-swappable microSD card

Designs and Hardware

Samsung Galaxy S II has a very light, thin and small design for cell phones. Unfortunately, the body made of plastics that I felt not representing the price tags. SGS II has been equipped with the Super AMOLED plus display with a very clear image and low-voltage power consuming. I am amazed to see the pictures and videos played in this Super AMOLED display, bright and clear images.

There are two camera, The main camera is 8 MP with flash light which considerably a high performance camera with their features like smile detection, panorama, touch to focus, etc. The front camera is equipped with 2 MP, this is far better than any other front-facing camera that can be used in skype and other application.

SGS2d

The GUI provided by samsung is a TouchWiz UI 4.0 where I felt like an iPhone clonning in it’s home screen. There’s not much tools provided in the lock screen, only the picture you can slide to open. Compared to HTC Sensation’s lock screen, they (HTC) has made a great move at providing a far better tool in their lock screen and even in the home screen.

Samsung Galaxy S II has a huge 16 Gb internal storage and can be expanded to another 32 Gb with memory card’s slot ready. The application in this handset runs smoothly in Gingerbread (2.3.3), thanks to their 1.2 Ghz dual-core processor and a very big 1 Gb of RAM. I don’t feel any lag in all application even with the live wallpaper used in their home-screen. With the Gingerbread OS (The Latest Android version), I can experience more application inside and with the high resolution (HD), I can also feel the HD Games playable in this handset.

imageimageimageimage

From above benchmark provided by GSMArena, I could say that the Samsung Galaxy S II has a very powerful hardware compared to the same level. It is effective to see the dual-core processor and GPU provided by Exxynos compared to the LG Optimus 2X and  HTC Sensation that use the dual-core processor too but GPU provided by NVidia Tegra. I believe the 1 Gb provided RAM for Samsung Galaxy S II has given the boost to the performances. The Exynos GPU unfortunately doesn’t seem to provide more hardcore games like the NVidia games. This is somewhat the minus for the mobile gamers who wants more games like Need for Speed, The Sims, etc. Samsung need to provide more relationship to game developers like EA, because I have seen some game couldn’t be run in Samsung Galaxy S II but the LG Optimus 2X and HTC Sensation could.

SGS2b

The battery provided also has shown a more capacity. This performance hasn’t meet the required android battery more than 1 day for hardcore gaming, but has given more life compared to other devices. The 8 hours of usage or maybe less in full internet connectivity has made this device a more life not to charge as other smartphones do. But, when it comes to gaming performances, it still can’t give a more than 6.30 hours of life.

 

Conclusion

Samsung Galaxy S II has come as a high-end product with the latest android operating system and a very huge internal storage supported with dual-core processor, great performance of GPU and huge RAM. All test has proven the capability of this smartphone as becoming the first position compared to other same level devices. The Super AMOLED plus display has also defined the best android screen but slightly below the iPhone  Retina display. It is beautiful to see images in this devices. The prices has made a huge impact too for customer to buy a smartphone, but Samsung has shown their eagerness in providing a competitive range of prices compared to HTC and LG with all their performances. The only bad thing for me is the build design all made of plastic in this price range. It’s better to have the metal for this price range, but Samsung has provide and give a good calculation for customer to see things in a better way.