We’re two days away from the Galaxy S4 announcement but it seems we already have a full leaked hands-on video of the Galaxy S4 Duos, which is most likely going to be the dual-SIM version of the Galaxy S4.
We know Samsung has been trying to keep the design of its devices almost identical since the Galaxy S3, and I believe this trend will continue with Galaxy S4. From the official and unofficial leaks we’ve seen so far with the Galaxy S4, we can conclude that the Galaxy S4 Duos is Galaxy S4’s twin, and that they will both look exactly the same.
If this leak is real, the design looks like a very slight evolution of the Galaxy S3 design. I understand why Samsung did this. They wanted their devices to look “familiar” and since the Galaxy S3 was very popular, they know people will recognize the Galaxy S4, too.
The downside is, I considered the Galaxy S3 to be very ugly at worst, and dull at best. I never thought the Galaxy S3 had an “iconic” design, the way most of the iPhone models had, the Lumia models, and the HTC One/X models had. In many ways the Galaxy S3 felt like a more polished version of your cheap everyday plastic phone.
And now the Galaxy S4 is poised to look very much alike, just wider. The leaked Galaxy S4 images and the video of the Galaxy S4 Duos, makes them look like they are now using a 16:10 resolution, or perhaps even wider than that. I’m not sure what their thinking was there, considering they’ve just gone 16:9 with the Note 2, when the original Note was 16:10. I’m not even sure 16:10 works so well on phones that are 4.7″ or larger, because it makes them hard to hold in your palm.
I do like the fact that Samsung has been focusing more on dual-SIM smartphones lately, though. I think there’s a huge untapped market there, at least in Europe and Asia, where people can actually use unlocked phones with different SIM’s. In these regions, the Galaxy S4 Duos could take up a large part of Galaxy S4 sales, especially when considering the Galaxy S4 Duos is probably the first high-end smartphone with a dual-SIM. So far dual-SIM smartphones have been mid-range at best. Here’s hoping we’ll see a lot more of them soon, from other companies, too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfzom-RdrwI
[Via SamMobile]