Samsung Instinct: The latest iPhone clone from Samsung

Apple has announced its latest iPhone model, Apple AAPL iPhone 3G. Now, it’s Samsung’s turn to strike. Earlier, LG tried to take over iPhone with its Voyager and Vu. Samsung released an array of models including F480, F700, SGH-i900 and so on. Unfortunately, none of the models could take over iPhone. Once again, the South Korean mobile giant has announced its latest iPhone look alike; Samsung Instinct. This time every body is saying that it is going to be a major competitor for iPhone though it’s software functions are not as good as that of iPhone. The phone was announced in April. In the recently held CTIA Wireless 2008, Samsung Instinct took the Emerging Technology Award. The phone set also became the Most Innovative and Best Cell Phone in CNET’s Cream of the Crop. It will go on sale on June 20^th.New York Times.com says:

In other words, a certain population still awaits something that offers the touch-screen joy of an iPhone without those limitations. Oh, there have been efforts, but just slapping a touch screen onto a phone does not make it an iPhone. It’s all about the software, kids.
Here comes one more. On June 20, Sprint will offer the new Samsung Instinct. It, too, is a blatant iPhone wannabe, but its software structure is simple and it has its own personality. It does not succeed in surpassing the iPhone, especially the new one — but it does succeed as a smartphone.
The Instinct is tentatively priced at $200 with a two-year contract and a $100 rebate. It’s a wee bit taller and thicker than the iPhone, but noticeably narrower (2.2 x 4.6 x 0.5 inches).

Dimension:
Length: 4.6"
Breadth: 2.2"
Width: 0.5"
Weight: 4.4 ounces.
The phone is taller, narrower and lighter than iPhone.

Features:

• The Samsung Instinct comes with 3G EV-DO data services.
• The Samsung Instinct comes with a 3.25 inch color touch screen with haptic feedback. While browsing the web, the screen makes feel cramped. It is protected by plastic coating.Tech.yahoo.com reports:
  

  The Instinct's main touch interface has four tabs: Favorites, Main, Fun, and Web. Tapping the Main tab brings you to the phone's core applications (e-mail, navigation, settings, etc.), while Fun calls up multimedia (music, videos, camera), and Web includes ... well, the Web browser, plus widgets for news, weather, sports, and the like.

  As you touch the various tabs, little icon-based boxes slide back and forth, gathering smoothly into a grid—it's one of the little touches that makes browsing the Instinct's menus an iPhone-esque experience.

• The Samsung Instinct comes with a 2.0 megapixel camera.
• The Samsung Instinct can record video clips, a feature not available on the iPhone.
• The Samsung Instinct comes with a GPSand turn-by-turn directions which is powered by TeleNav.
• The Samsung Instinct has FM radio. The Sprint Radio offers more than 150 channels.
• The Samsung Instinct has microSD memory card slot (expandable upto 8GB).
  

• The Samsung Instinct has voice dialing system. Quoting AP, CNET, and Wall Street Journal, Gizmodo says:

CNET
The Instinct's touch screen dominates its real estate. With support for 262,000 colors and a 432,240-pixel resolution, the display is positively gorgeous. Colors popped, graphics were vibrant, and text was crisp. Indeed, it's one of the better displays we've seen in a while...but [it] can look rather cramped...

AP
The result is a lucid, logical interface. It's not as pretty as the iPhone's, but it allows the user to quickly use e-mail, Web browsing, GPS navigation and text messaging; watch videos, live TV and photos; and listen to music and online radio.

Wall Street Journal
The touch system on the Instinct is more like that on an ancient ATM than a cutting-edge gadget, even though it has a gimmicky feedback mechanism that gives you a tiny vibration-jolt when you press an icon.

• The Samsung Instinct has speech recognition system which enables the user to make phone calls, send text and picture, go to search, go to news, go to weather, go to movies, go to sports, and go to search.
• The Samsung Instinct comes with 3.5mm headphone jack. Gizmodo says:
• 
  

  Snappy Interface: Other touchscreen phones we've seen have annoying split-second lags. The Instinct, for the most part, does not. Some of its visuals were obviously borrowed from Apple, such as pop-up option screens, lists of settings, etc., but at the same time it has features that are original, albeit inspired by Cupertino: When a call comes in, you tap the center then slide up to accept or slide down to ignore. Hanging up is a slide from left to right. (The phone interface has other cool features, too, like "personal" call history for each of your contacts—so don't go cheatin'—and the ballyhooed visual voicemail, which unfortunately wasn't available to test at this time.) The UI only got stuck a couple of times, and never permanently. As with any other "natural" interface, it takes a few minutes to figure out the physics of the system, but once you do, it's intuitive.

• The Samsung Instinct comes with Bluetooth 2.0.
• The Samsung Instinct has LiIon battery with up to 6 hours of talk time.
• Sprint Music Store offers wireless downloads with $0.99/track.
• The Samsung Instinct also has Microsoft Live search.

Weak points:

• Sprint TV has been reformatted to fit the screen of Samsung Instinct, but the video quality is not so good. You can enjoy Spring TV with live on demand programming.
• The web browser and UI need more development. Tech.yahoo.com

Web browsing on the Instinct isn't quite so impressive, however. The browser works well enough with mobile-optimized pages, but (as I've written before) slows to a crawl with full-HTML pages. You can scroll by tapping and dragging Web pages, but there's no "pinching" on the Instinct's non-multitouch display, so you must tap a virtual button to zoom in or out. In other words, while the Instinct's Web browser is certainly above par, it can't hold a candle to the iPhone's.

• The graphics on Samsung Instinct touch screen are slightly dull.
• The Samsung Instinct does not have Wi-Fi.
  

Price:
Initially, Samsung Instinct was priced $499.99. After iPhone 3G was priced at $299, Samsung brought the price down to $199 with a rebate of $100, which requires a two year contract. The phone set will be sold by renowned wireless telecommunication Network company, SprintS.

If you want to get more information you can visit these two websites:
http://www.nowisgood.com/

http://www.samsunginstinct.com/

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Samsung launched its latest 'iPhone Killer,' Samsung SGH-i900 Omnia

Yesterday, before Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced a new version of iPhone, Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. launched one of its flagship phones of 2008; Samsung SGH-i900, also known as Samsung Omnia.

Omnia is a Latin word which means everything. In Arabic, it means wish. You can also refer it as an ‘iPhone clone’. Samsung is now desperate to break into iPhone’s market. Earlier, the company also released other models such as Samsung F480 TouchWiz saying it will be an ‘iPhone killer.’

If you are a regular reader of Asianbiz, you have already read about the phone. A Chinese website: pconline.com.cn., leaked out pictures of Omnia on the internet.

The current Omnia version will work in Asia’s 3G network but not in the USA 3G. On June 17^th, the phone will be unveiled at te CommunicAsia trade fair in Singapore and would go on sale in South East Asia that week. It will be available in Europe in July.

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Samsung's reorganization and reassignment creates further controversies

First, it was the top level executives; now, Samsung Group is reorganizing its companies in an effort to reinvigorate its image. According to the latest news, Samsung Electronics Co.(SEO: 005930), the major profit earner of Samsung group, will be combined with its home appliance division that makes refrigerators, air-conditioners and washing machines. The home theatre, DVD and Blue-ray player business will be merged with its TV section. Samsung’s notebook computer, digital music player and set top box business will be transferred to its telecommunications network division. Wall Street Journal reports:

The moves are "in line with the latest technology trend" and "we hope to further strengthen our position as a digital convergence leader," the company said.

The moves follow a change at Samsung Group's top management last week, when Samsung Electronics said external relations chief Lee Yoon-Woo would be its new chief executive, succeeding Yun Jong-Yong, who had led the electronics giant since 1997.

But analysts said it is still uncertain if the reorganization would bring about any significant synergies.

"We haven't paid attention to its home appliance business, which hasn't contributed to its profitability much," said Song Myung-Sup, an analyst at CJ Investment & Securities. "It remains to be seen if the combination will actually create synergies."

Unfortunately, what seems to be an effort to revive has created further agitation and controversies. Thirty nine year old, Lee Jae-Yong, Samsung Electronics’ former chief client officer and son of the former chairman of Samsung Group, Lee Kun-Hee has been reassigned to a new post. On Thursday, in a statement, Samsung Electronics said that Lee Jae-Yong, will work in China, India, Russia, and in other commonwealth of Independent states to develop the company’s business. Though he was not charged of any wrong doing, after Lee Kun-Hee was charged with tax evasion and breach of trust, Lee Jae-Yong resigned along with his father. Yong’s reappointment has irked the Samsung employees. They protested against his reassignment.

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Samsung Dominating LCD TV and Memory Chip Market of North America

In my earlier article, I have talked about the Samsung mobile phone and its aim to overtake Nokia by 2010 or 2011. Well, the South Korean company is also leading the global market of LCD television and memory cheap. A market research firm from U.S., DisplaySearch, has recently showed that Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (SEO:005930) has secured its top ranking from Sony in the North American LCD TV market in terms of sales unit in the first three months of the year. Samsung reportedly holds 30.6 percent of global market share of chips.

In the North American LCD TV business, Samsung could hold on its top ranking only because of the edge it has in its pricing. The company is investing aggressively in the market, which makes the life difficult for its competitors like Sony, Vizio etc.

Korea Times reported:

``While rivals suffered from huge losses and falling profits, we will not change the current strategy to implement aggressive investment plans and the faster migration into advanced chips,’’ a Samsung spokesperson said Friday. The company reaped 4 percent of the operating margin in the chip business in the quarter, which is better than the chaser Hynix Semiconductor’s 30 percent operating losses over the same period.

``We are engaged in a very tight race with Vizio and Sony in the North American LCD TV market, however, what’s impressive is that we still have price edges there, because price-cutting has made other competitors such as Philips and Sharp struggle in their TV business,’’ according to the official.

North American economy is now going through a rough patch at this moment and the producers and manufactures are trying their best to hold on their place in the market by reducing the prices. Sony has faced heavy losses and some other companies are struggling. So, given the situation, it is really a success story for Samsung that the company holds its rank both in LCD TV and memory chip market of North America. Now, let us see if Samsung can hold its market share in the coming months of the year.

Samsung

Samsung : Disagreement with subcontractors resulted into Gumi plant shutdown

World’s largest electronics company, Samsung Electronic Co., Ltd (SEO:005935), had been forced to shut down its plant due to disagreement over material price with its contractors. This incident also provoked lots of negative criticism and marred the company’s image. The company admitted that its mobile phone handset producing plant at Gumi in Seoul had to stop 20% of its operations for eleven hours, starting from 11 p.m. Friday to 10 a.m. Saturday, as the small and medium-sized subcontractors accused the company of passing on the cost-cut burden upon them. Korea Times reports:

Samsung said the plant has been normalized after it agreed with the participants to review prices in upcoming talks. However, worries are high that Samsung’s premium handset image might get hurt in the long term without decisive measures to ease such disputes.

Samsung hopes to narrow the market gap with the industry leader Nokia by sticking with a two-tier strategy _ premium phones such as the Soul and Haptic from its domestic plant and mid-tier phones from those overseas. The company plans to increase the annual production of handsets in Gumi to 80 million this year from 75 million in 2007.

This is the first incident of production halt in Gumi plant since its inception in 1988. There are 630 suppliers in Gumi. According to the report of Strategy Analytics, a market research firm, Samsung and Motorola is currently at the second position controlling 16.4% of the global mobile phone market. A Samsung spokesperson said that the company should strengthen its price competitiveness at Gumi plant as the product is losing its pricing edge. Currently, Samsung has manufacturing facilities in India, China, and Brazil. It will set up another facility in Vietnam to meet its current production target of 200 million.

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Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 Review

Samsung Electronics Company Limited (SEO:005935) is going to release another phone for Verizon Wireless; Samsung Glyde SCH-u940. It is the first touch screen phone produced by Samsung. Here is a brief description of the various features of the phone:

General features:

• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 is a CDMA version of the Samsung F700.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has 8 GB micro storage system.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has a slide open full QWERTY keyboard. It slides out to the left and very easy to open. The square keys are big and easy to press but the key board does not have numeric keys. You can close and open it with one hand.
• The display changes after you open the keyboard but the menu options remain the same.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940’s user interface is based on Croix interface but it has been heavily modified for Verizon.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has a major weakness.It can not handle notepad or document.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 comes with GPS navigation.
• The headset port and headset jack in Samsung Glyde SCH-U940 are separated.
• To connect Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 with memory card, you will have to remove the battery cover.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has text and multimedia messaging.
• It also has a calculator, a calendar, an alarm clock, a stop watch, a world clock, and a notepad.
• The phone also has text-to-speech function.

Dimension:

• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 weighs 4.1 ounces.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940’s is 4.1 by 2 by .7 inches.

Display:

• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has a 262K color screen which works fine as a display but falls short for an ideal touch screen.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940’s home screen contains few options.
• Dial pad: It has a traditional 12-button design and dedicated talk and End controls, clear button, shortcuts for contacts and recent calls lists.
• Contacts: The Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has 500-contact phone book. For each entry, you can enter five phone numbers, two e-mail addresses, and notes. You can group the callers and set photo beside their names.
• Main menu: It shows various functions with icons which is a good thing. As you will operate on the touch screen you will see blue bars on the display that follow your finger as you swipe from one option to another option.

• It also has access to Verizon's extra cost services (including V Cast music, ringtones, games, and VZ Navigator).

• In the center of the display, there is a small blue square. Clicking on it will take you to a shortcut menu containing 12 icons.

• At the bottom, there is another shortcut bar which contains seven functions including the speakerphone, the message in-box, the missed calls list, the calendar, and the alarm clock.

Touch screen:

• The touch screen of Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 uses capacitive touch technology. It relies on the electromagnetism of one’s fingers. The main problem is the touch screen is not strong enough. Very often the buttons do not function on one touch. Moreover, the small size of the screen makes it difficult to use.
• The measure of Samsung Glyde SCH-u940’s touch screen display is 240 by 440 pixels. The length is 2.75 inches.
• Like Apple iPhone, the front touch screen of Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 does not have too many buttons.
• Another interesting feature of Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 touch screen is that it has a haptic vibrating feedback. Whenever you touch a button on the touch screen, it vibrates.

Internet:

• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 comes with stereo Bluetooth.
• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has Evolution, Data Optimized (EVDO) system, full HTML browser. It supports Verizon's Get It Now and V Cast services.
• Users will have to browse the net by holding the screen horizontally. This is another weakness of Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 because it gives you little space for reading the web content.

Audio/Video/Media/Music/Radio:

• Samsung Glyde SCH-u940has a 2 mega pixel camera with auto focus and flash.
• You will find Samsung Glyde SCH-u940’s camera under the ‘Get it now option.’
• On the right side of Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 there is a volume rocker/camera zoom, a camera shutter, and a power control.
• The camera lens, flash, and self-portrait mirror are situated on the back of Samsung Glyde SCH-u940. For taking pictures, you have to hold the phone horizontally.
• The Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 offers a collection of 72-chord polyphonic ringtones.

Call:

• The Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has clear audio sound with zero background noise.
• The Samsung Glyde SCH-u940 has a high call quality.
• It also contains vibrate alert mode.

Cost:

The Samsung Glyde SCH-u940will cost $250.

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Samsung i200 Review

Famous South Korean electronics company, Samsung Electronics Company Limited (SEO:005935) has declared to launch a new mobile phone Samsung i200. So let’s take a look at the features and specifications of the model:

• Samsung i200 is a slim and compact smart mobile phone. The phone’s thinness is 11.8 mm.
• Samsung i200 is 116.7 mm in length 50.8 mm in width.
• Samsung i200 has compact bar-type design.
• Samsung i200 has all the latest features of a cell phone.
• Samsung i200 is going to be a great mobile phone for business professionals who want smart and stylish cell phones.
• Samsung i200 supports Windows Mobile 6.1.
• Samsung i200 users can use various Microsoft programs such as Excel, Word, Power point, and Outlook.
• Samsung i200 is very user friendly. It has intuitive user interface which will directly connect you to the menus.
• Samsung i200 also has an easy navigation system.
• Samsung i200 has all the latest email features. The email features include HTML format email. You can easily cut, copy and paste, your mail.
• Samsung i200 has unified email and SMS and MMS management system.
• Samsung i200 has automatic pop up system which will let user know about incoming emails.
• Samsung i200 comes with a 2.3” QVGA TFT screen.
• Samsung i200 has a glossy coating.
• Samsung i200 has High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA). The speed is 3.6 Mbps.
• Samsung i200 comes with ‘light sensor’ that will enable users to minimize the power consumption to adjust the lightness of LCD and keypad.
• Samsung i200 has a 2 mega pixel camera.
• Samsung i200 has a picture resolution of 1600x1200 pixels.
• Samsung i200 has built in hands free voice command, and voice memo.
• Samsung i200 also has MP3/WMA/AAC/MPEG4 player.
• Samsung i200 comes with polyphonic ringtones and vibration alert.
• In Samsung i200, you can download songs and listen to them.
• With Samsung i200 phone book, you can save unlimited number of entries.
• Samsung i200 also has unlimited call record system.
• Samsung i200 comes with Bluetooth.
• Other features of Samsung i200 includes video, Java MIDP 2.0, mobile printing, T9 text input, and organizer.
• Samsung i200 comes with standard Lithium Ion battery.
• Games have now become a major feature in any mobile phone and Samsung i200 comes with various games.
• Samsung i200 organizer includes calculator, calendar, reminders, and currency converter.
• With your Samsung i200, you can listen to FM radio.

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Armani/Samsung premium LCD television : A great combination of fashion and technology

Samsung Electronic Company Limited (SEO:005935) and Giorgio Armani Group introduced their newly designed LCD television at Milan Furniture Fair. Specially designed for upper class fashion conscious buyers, the Armani/Samsung premium LCD television has been inspired by Giorgio Armani’s new 2008/9 Armani/Casa home furnishings collections. According to Giorgio Armani, once television was a misfit in a beautifully decorated room but now, with the advent of new technology, flat screen television can become great fashion statements.

The Armani/Samsung premium LCD television comes with two stylish remote controls. One is smaller pebble-shaped used for basic functions.

There is also a special 4-mode lighted power switch, which customizes the display of the logo of the two companies.

The television comes with 46 inch and 52 inch model.

The television includes 100Hz Full HD and HDMI connectors that ensure high quality picture.

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