Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LTE

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Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LTE

Post by Apoptosis »

Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LTE

The Samsung Galaxy S III is easily the most hyped Android device of the year, and possibly of all-time. With a new Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 dual-core 1.5GHz processor, 2GB of RAM, a huge Super AMOLED 4.8-inch screen (720x1280 pixels), 4G LTE, NFC and an impressive 8MP camera it is no wonder that this smartphone has received so much attention. Read on to find out more about it in our review!

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The Samsung Galaxy S III looked good on paper and once we got our hands on it in the real world we were by no means disappointed by the smartphone. The Galaxy S III is hands down one of the fastest phones that we have ever used in terms of both the processor performance and the 4G LTE network speeds. We've used dozens of Android based smartphones over the past year and none of them gave us the 'wow' feeling we got when we started using the Galaxy S III...
Article Title: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review
Article URL: http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1976/1/
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by pwcmed »

Did you give up on the Atrix? I coming home soon and ready for an upgrade. I have my choice narrowed to this, HTC one X, Nexus S or the Lumina 900. I can't decided :rolleyes:
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Apoptosis »

I will be making the move from the Atrix to the Galaxy S III for sure. I would have moved entirely over by now, but the change to the microSIM card means I got to switch SIMS.

The original Atrix has nothing over the Galaxy S III besides being smaller. Everything else on the GSIII is superior.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Thunder350 »

I went into the store on Friday to check out the GS3 and the HTC One X and ended up buying the One X over the GS3. While both phones are GREAT, and you can't really go wrong with either, I personally felt the One X was superior. While the GS3 has more features built into the phone (detect if your looking at screen to keep it on, watching a small video on top of whatever your doing, S-Voice, etc, etc), feels better in the hands and has the brand awareness of a Apple product with multiple companies producing multiple accessories for the device. The One X without no doubt has a much better build quality, and while the HTC screen is 0.1" smaller, the new LCD 2 screen is noticeably better when next to the pentile AMOLED screen on the GS3. Everything is just more clearer and sharper, the viewing angle is larger and the color representation is great.

Both HTC and Samsung have changed how Android 4.0 looks and acts on their respected devices, either improving or adding more features. HTC's Sense 4 is a huge improvement over Sense 3, removing a lot of bloat and making it much lighter from before and doesn't really take away the look or feel of ICS. While Samsung has improved Touchwiz, they seem to of missed the memo that GB is long gone and outdated. It is extremely difficult to know by looking at the phone that its actually running ICS due to the fact their Touchwiz interface looks exactly the same as the ones on their GB phones (GS2). Also the fact that they still have a dedicated menu button on the phone while ICS apps all have a built in on screen menu button points towards the GS3 being developed for GB and not ICS.

Performance wise they are about the same as they both run on the same CPU in the states, tho the GS3 does have a extra 1GB of RAM for a total of 2GB's!. HTC also spent A LOT of time incorporating a great camera into their phone. The dedicated image sense chip produces stunning life like photos each time with zero shutter lag. While the GS3 also has zero shutter lag, the multiple photo and video comparisons around the web all have the One X coming out on top of both the GS3 and even sometimes the iPhone 4S. Now the biggest downside to the One X is the lack of a expandable memory slot, sadly right now only the 16GB version of both the One X and the GS3 are available in the states while everyone else around the world has the bigger variants to choose from. This is one area where the GS3 trumps the One X due to its micro SD card slot. The GS3 has the ability to hold quadrupedal the amount of photos, video, apps, etc then the One X could ever dream of doing. HTC has partnered up with dropbox to provide a extra free 25GB of cloud storage to everyone who owns a One device. But this only means you'll have to deal with the insanely expensive and/or limited data caps/throttling on the carriers to have access to your data over their networks if you don't use WiFi. This alone could cause A LOT of people to turn away from the One X and choose the GS3 instead.

Again both are great devices and you can't go wrong with either. They both have their pros and cons, it's just up to the user to decide what he/she can live with.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Apoptosis »

great feedback and thank you for sharing!

I spent some time with the HTC One X in the store also, but didn't try the camera out there. I'll have to see if I can get the HTC One X to review as well.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Major_A »

Due for a phone upgrade in Oct. and this is probably what I'll be getting. Without getting too deep, why in the hell are there international and US versions of phones? On paper the international version of the S III and One X are superior to the US versions.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

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Major_A wrote:Due for a phone upgrade in Oct. and this is probably what I'll be getting. Without getting too deep, why in the hell are there international and US versions of phones? On paper the international version of the S III and One X are superior to the US versions.
The US carriers want their new phones to be able to run on the new LTE networks. Unfortunately both Nvidia's Tegra 3 processor and Samsung's Exynos processor (both quad cores) are unable to support LTE. So they had to go with Qualcomm's new Snapdragon S4 (dual core) processor. While you would think this would lead to a performance drop. Most test show them going head to head with the S4 even pulling ahead in some test. Mostly depends how good the apps are coded and if they can take advantage of all cores. Most of these apps don't even take advantage of dual core let alone quad core. And in every day real life performance of just using the device (None of these silly benchmarks) you don't see much if any difference in the responsiveness of the devices. The only "real" advantage the quad cores seem to have at the moment is that it kinda future proofs your phone for when developers really start coding their apps to take advantage of all the cores available.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Major_A »

Thanks for the information.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Digital Puppy »

...and because of you, I now own my one! :)

Searching for some memory and a case now!
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Apoptosis »

I'm still liking the Seidio because of the kickstand.

Also remember Incipio, Otterbox, Golla, Spigen and Case Mate make cases for the Samsung Galaxy S III!
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by pwcmed »

Nooooo! my dumbass thought I was due for an upgrade. Just got back from a deployment and should've known that putting my account on hold also put my contract on hold which means I have to wait 6 more months. I might just get a Lumia 900 of craigslist.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

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pwcmed wrote:Nooooo! my dumbass thought I was due for an upgrade. Just got back from a deployment and should've known that putting my account on hold also put my contract on hold which means I have to wait 6 more months. I might just get a Lumia 900 of craigslist.

Well, welcome back from deployment, but that sucks on the phone upgrade! Looks like the Lumia 900 is selling for $250 on CL here in St. Louis.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by Waterbeds »

I have had the Galaxy S III for about two weeks now and its is hands down the best smart phone on the planet. I have used iphones, and androids of all different shapes and sizes. The best part however, for any iphone user contemplating the switch is the amazingly cool white samsung earbuds that come with it. Make any ios user feel at home! lol.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by forsaken »

I am now able to get what I want and Im simply torn between the S3 and the HTC one X. I have a desire S right now, and am both happy and familiar with the Sense UI, so feel comfortable with the One X, but what steers me away from it is the lack of SD card and even more important is reading about the HTC One X's abysmal battery life. I can be sometimes hard on the battery with gaming, and currently im not so happy with the battery life of my desire S, so I don't know. Most people seem to like the display on the One-X better, as well as the camera. So anyway, really torn :-(
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

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Apoptosis wrote: Well, welcome back from deployment, but that sucks on the phone upgrade! Looks like the Lumia 900 is selling for $250 on CL here in St. Louis.

Thanks,

So I got a Lumia for $185 and my mind is blown, this thing rocks! I might do a review in a couple weeks.
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

Post by forsaken »

The international version I'm getting in Norway has a quad-core Samsung Exynos 4412 1.4GHz CPU - vs. the dual-core snapdragon. If anyone is interested, I can run the same tests in the review and we can see how the numbers vary?
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Re: Samsung Galaxy S III 16GB Smartphone Review - AT&T 4G LT

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forsaken wrote:The international version I'm getting in Norway has a quad-core Samsung Exynos 4412 1.4GHz CPU - vs. the dual-core snapdragon. If anyone is interested, I can run the same tests in the review and we can see how the numbers vary?
That would be awesome
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