Samsung shoots Galaxy S III with shrink ray, unveils 4in Mini
Size flatters
Samsung has officially unveiled the Galaxy S III Mini, the widely predicted compact version of the firm's flagship Android smartphone.
As revealed earlier this week, the Mini boasts a 4in, 800 x 480 display plus a dual-core 1GHz ST-Ericsson Novathor U8420 chipset powering Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.
The blower features a 5Mp rear-facing snapper and a 0.3Mp (VGA) front-facing webcam, 720p video recording capability, and the choice of 8GB or 16GB storage capacities.
Following in the footsteps of the Galaxy S III, the smaller sibling comes with S Voice, Samsung's equivalent to Apple's Siri. It also packs S Beam functionality and various battery saving and call-making features such as Direct Call - the ability to dial a buddy's number by simply lifting the phone to your ear.
There's no word on when the Samsung Galaxy S III Mini will launch, nor are there any pricing details. Some retailers are listing it at just under £300, though with the caveat that this may change when Samsung announces official details. With the device clearly aimed at competing more directly with Apple's latest powerhouse, you can bet your bottom dollar on combative costs. ®
COMMENTS
Not a wide public for that style of marketing
Only truly hardcore Android cultists associate their phones to their penises.
Most people just want their phones to be functional and fit well in their clothes/bags/etc.
This is Samsung showing that for all their claims of engineering "innovation" they cannot squeeze up-to-date performance specs, display technology and networks (LTE) into a decent sized phone, only their phablets and monster phones get anything of the sort.
But still they might fool a few punters with the S3 branding... If only car manufacturers could get away with this, Aston Martin could sell a DB9 "Mini" with a Corsa engine.
Disappointing
For something branded as an SIII I would have expected a quad-core CPU and a pixel density to match the SIII's 720p screen. Dropping to a dual-core and lowering the screen res basically make this a phone that looks like a small SIII but really isn't. Bad form Samsung.
I don't see how El Reg can think it competes with the iPhone 5, the spec puts it more in line with the 4S. Maybe it's got an absolutely belting GPU to make up for the rest of the spec?
"With the device clearly aimed at competing more directly with Apple's latest......"
"4in, 800 x 480 display plus a dual-core 1GHz ST-Ericsson Novathor U8420 chipset powering Android 4.1 Jelly Bean."
Clearly aimed at the iPhone5? The SGIII certainly is - a very fine phone. This however is clearly aimed at the mid-end market which not the case with either the iPhone5 or the SGIII. Just precisely what does the writer mean by that statement? If I have misunderstood something here (which is perfectly possible) I would be grateful if someone would enlighten me.
Battery life
A smaller SIII with otherwise the same specs would have had a pitiful battery life.
