Samsung Galaxy S3 Review

Introduction

Samsung has been producing phones for customers since the 1970s. From there they have only worked to keep producing top of the line cell phones for their customers. One of the top of the line cell phones that was distributed was the Samsung Galaxy S3 in May of 2012. The third in the long line of Samsung Galaxy S phones it offers updated software, a new appearance, better user interface and much more. Although some aspects could be improved on this phone is definitely one to look at if your in the market for an inexpensive and slightly out of date smartphone.

Specifications

Dimensions
136.6 x 70.6 x 8.6mm
133g
Display
4.8 inch HD super AMOLED
(1280x720) display
Memory
16/32GB User Memory
MicroSD slot (64GB memory)
Color
Pebble Blue
Marble White
OS
Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich
Battery 
2100 mAh
Camera 
main(rear) 8.0 megapixel auto focus camera with flash and zero shutter lag BSI
sub(front) 1.9 megapixel camera with HD recording

Design

The Samsung Galaxy S3 is a phone that will fit right in your hand. At 5 inches tall and 2 inches across this phone is definitely on of the biggest in its weight class, which is around 133g. But that doesn't stop it from fitting comfortably in the hands of most people. The big size of this phone also provides people with the stunning 1280 HD 4.8 inch display that everyone is enjoying. Although, the huge screen is slightly diminished by the use of plastic as the phone's main casing.

This does tend to make the phone seem a little cheaper and potentially not worth your money. However, the plastic makes the phone feel lighter despite its weight and provides people with the beautiful marble white color or the relaxing pebble blue. According to Samsung the Galaxy S3 it's supposed to be inspired by nature. Given its sleek design and rounded flowing edges I would say that Samsung succeeded.

Overall the casing on the phone is good for hiding scratches. After 2 years and almost never having a case on my phone the back cover is pretty scratch free. I'm not the easiest going person on my phone's and this one has managed to resist too many bumps and bruises. Recently it fell off a 3 foot high shelf onto my tile floor and the screen cracked slightly in the corner that it fell on. This surprised me considering the number of times I've dropped it and it hasn't broken before but the screen is still very usable and the crack is minimal. It's probably time for a new case anyway.

On that note though I would say the phone is a bit slippery whether that is due to my butterfingers or the plastic casing I would highly recommend a case for your phone.

User Interface

As far as smartphones go this one is pretty similar in usability to the HTC phones. There are some obvious differences but jumping from one product to the next will not be hard at all for most people.

The 'home' button is the main navigational tool for the phone. This or the lock button on the side of the phone can be pressed in order to wake the phone up and also answer and end calls. Then per standard smart phone security the user can either simply swipe the screen, enter a passcode, or draw a pattern to unlock your phone.

The S3 comes programmed with Samsung's background and locking mechanism. This allows the user to simply swipe the screen to unlock it and going with their new nature theme there is a ripple that follows the users finger when swiping and a water drop sound when the phone unlocks. However, if security is what you are looking for then there are patterns that can be drawn and pass codes that can be entered.

Once inside the phone first time users will find a colorful built in clock and weather widget that changes based on what the weather is like outside. Although a cool idea, I had trouble with the widget not updating properly and often had to restart my device before the weather would actually display the correct temperature. After a few weeks of this I decided to ditch the weather update and placed a simple clock on my screen.

A cool feature that I did add was the sMemo feature which is basically a notepad that can be drawn or typed on that you can place on your phone screen. I found this useful for jotting down quick notes during the day and having people draw me fun pictures.

I had fun on this phone rearranging my apps and widgets, the phone allows for users to have multiple home screen pages that you swype through. Some of my other screens contain calendars, alarms, and my music playlists. This is very useful for avoiding the navigational hazard that is the app section. Instead of piling through hoards of apps I can easily find the select few that I always use.

Messaging

This is one area where I am really going to be hard on this particular phone. The messaging keyboard for texting is definitely my least favorite feature and I feel like it could be vastly improved. When I got my Samsung Galaxy S3 I made the switch from the HTC Incredible 2. The latter smartphone had a built in auto correct keyboard that was very efficient at turning my jumbled texting skills into actual words. The Galaxy S3 has no capability to do this because of some lawsuit with apple and instead just uses predictive texting.

This requires the texter to type out the word they think they want and then select the word they actually want from the top of the menu. This results in a lot of stop and go texting and really slows down the overall process. That just didn't work for me, but I was excited that this phone had the swype texting ability which I figured would work a lot better. It didn't. The swyping hardly worked and never really got the right word. So I gave up and bought a keyboard from the app store, which I was none to happy about. Especially coming from a phone that had great texting abilities.

Although I use my smart phone for other things beside texting I think that this is a key feature of any phone and still one of the only things that I regularly do on my phone. Sure I use the internet sometimes and use apps like Facebook and Snapchat but the fact that I had to spend an additional four dollars on a keyboard on top of 200 dollars for a phone is upsetting to me. So, if your looking for a phone that has great built in keyboards I definitely wouldn't go with the Galaxy S3.

Battery

Overall I haven't had too much to complain about with the battery on this phone. Given the screen size and the HD quality of the screen itself the battery definitely holds its own. I have come across a few days where my phone just hasn't quite made it until I'm ready to go to sleep but I can also blame that on the fact that I almost constantly check my phone, don't close out my apps, and sometimes browse the web for a while.

Given what I have put this phone through on multiple occasions such as listening to music for a few hours straight while connected to a bluetooth speaker, the battery is pretty impressive. At 2100 mAh the battery is a real powerhouse and has survived many battery draining tests. Seeing as most phones on the market at the same time as the S3 dropped much lower on battery tests it can be said that this is a pretty impressive battery. I would say that now close to my two year mark with the phone the battery is draining a little faster but that is to be expected with anything that ages.

Camera

The camera on my Samsung Galaxy S3 has probably been one of my favorites. It's very simple to use, with just a few options for editing, adding effects, and sharing. The latter being my favorite feature. The S3 gives the user an entire menu of social media, email, and photo editor apps to share your images on. This makes it easy to upload images to Facebook because it even has a menu where you can select multiple images at once to upload an entire album, or just one selfie.

Main Camera Flash 

The phone has two cameras, on in the back and one in the front. The main camera(back) has a bright flash that can be used in even the darkest of places to get a great shot. Unfortunately there is no flash that can be used in the front facing camera mode, which makes taking selfies at parties almost impossible.

Other handy features for the main camera and options such as 'scene mode' this allows the user to change settings on the phone based on the pictures they are taking. There are options for night time, fireworks, a back light, landscapes, and sunsets. These have always been pretty helpful for me when I remember to use them.

Night Mode 

Fortunately, although the front facing camera lacks the ability to use a flash it still takes pretty good pictures in the dark. I've had relatively few problems with my front facing camera. Besides on SnapChat the screen lights up when you need to take a picture so that's all that really matters right?








Beside flash the camera is pretty fantastic. Taking pictures of landscapes and other scenery has never given me trouble. The camera is easy to use and allows me to do almost anything I want with my pictures. The editor that the phone uses is pretty lame but it is easy to download another more useful editor for those of you who have Instagram. Overall I like this camera, the only real improvement I would suggest is that pesky front facing flash.

Speakers 

I must admit that I've been pretty impressed with the speakers on my GS3. Although there is only one on the back of the phone that plays audio (unless your in a phone call) the speakers are actually very loud. The quality of the music that I listen to is always really good too. The sound doesn't get crackly at the loudest setting and its always very clear. I never have any trouble hearing my phone play music when its in one room and I may be all the way across my apartment. Music is an important aspect in my life so having a phone that is capable of playing my music good and loud is a definite plus for me.

Conclusion 

The Galaxy S3 is definitely a top of the market phone for its class. It has a high resolution screen that captures the eye, a design and interface that takes your breath away and all the usability of any other smart phone on the market. Although some aspects such as the messaging mechanism of the phone could use some work this phone is definitely something that people should think about purchasing.