Samsung Galaxy S III raises the game for all smartphones

When it comes to smartphones and hype, Apple's iPhone has usually had a monopoly, but Samsung's Galaxy S III wasn't only highly anticipated, it has also launched with a great deal of spectacle and acclaim before it even fell into the hands of consumers. What makes this phone so appealing? Part of it is the recent legacy that it comes from, which is as a direct descendant of the Galaxy S II, arguably the first Android smartphone to stand out from the crowd and challenge the iPhone on fairly equal terms. The Galaxy S III is a bit bigger and a bit sleeker, but you can tell that this is a Samsung handset. The design hasn't veered too far off the previous model, including the use of plastics, as opposed to the metal and glass of the iPhone. Even so, it doesn't feel cheap at all. The 4.8-inch screen is the centrepiece of the device, as well as the quad-core processor, Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and even a microSD slot for expanded storage capacity. The phone is also LTE-enabled, has a Near Field Communications (NFC) chip, Bluetooth 4.0 and the other usual connectivity options, like Wi-Fi, GPS and DLNA. Battery life should also be better, since it uses one that's only a little smaller than the one in the oversized Galaxy Note that came out in February. Smart Stay recognizes that your eyes are looking at the phone and keeps the screen awake until you avert your eyes. Motion Recognition lets you call someone back by just raising the phone to your ear after a missed call. S Beam lets you share content with another user by simply tapping the phones together. Face Recognition identifies faces in your photos and then provides direct links to their contact page, Facebook or Google+ profile. Buddy Photo Share extends that further by letting you send a photo simultaneously to all the contacts that happen to be in the shot, provided that their email addresses are part of their contact info. S Voice is the most intriguing of the Galaxy S III's feature set because it's a direct rival to Siri, Apple's voice recognition system in the iPhone 4S. Here, you can ask S Voice for information on places to go, the weather, but even more that that, you can tell it to open apps and do Facebook and Twitter updates. You can ask for a music playlist, set an alarm and searching for a contact. While a great feature, S Voice is going to be prone to make mistakes, just like Siri does. How it interprets voices, accents and intonation are factors in how well it works, despite Samsung's claim that it will eventually get accustomed to your style of speech. The Galaxy S III launches on June 20 with Telus, Bell, Rogers, SaskTel, Virgin Mobile, Wind and Mobilicity. wholesale accessories,ipad accessories,ipod accessories,iphone accessories