Much to everyone’s expectations judging by the recent stream of leaks and rumors, the brand new Samsung Gear S3 smartwatch was officially introduced yesterday – August 31st – at IFA 2016 in Berlin. The new model comes with various upgrades compared to the Samsung Gear S2, and Samsung was keen to discuss the various features that should make the Gear S3 an exciting wearable. However, Samsung has also been keeping quiet in regards to the exact system-on-chip powering the new model, but thankfully this bit of detail has now been uncovered by tech blog AnandTech.
According to the new data, the Samsung Gear S3 is powered by an in-house Exynos 7270 system-on-chip, featuring a dual-core processor clocked at a frequency of up to 1.0 GHz. The Exynos 7270 is a new contender and as yet, there’s not a lot of official information to go by regarding its specs and capabilities. However, it’s interesting to note that according to the source, the Exynos 7270 was built using a 28-nm manufacturing process, not unlike the Exynos 3250 powering the Samsung Gear S2. As such, there is a possibility that the main difference between the Exynos 3250 and Exynos 7270 lies in the type of cores used by the chipsets. The Exynos 3250 relies on Cortex-A7 architecture, so there is a possibility that the Exynos 7270 may have been updated to utilize Cortex-A35 or Cortex-A53 architecture instead. Whatever the case may be, the Samsung Gear S3 is equipped with a 380 mAh battery said to offer enough battery life for 3-4 days with the always-on display feature enabled, so at least at first glance it appears that these changes may have contributed to better autonomy, which is something that’s highly desired on a wearable smart device.
Otherwise and in case you’ve missed yesterday’s hands-on impressions with the Samsung Gear S3, the smartwatch’s design appears to have evolved and now aspires for an even more premium feel than before. The circular 1.3-inch Super AMOLED display is covered in scratch-resistant Corning Gorilla Glass SR+, and features a rotating dial as an additional input method along with touchscreen controls. Additionally, the smartwatch takes advantage of optional LTE and A-GPS connectivity, GPS + GLONASS, Bluetooth 4.2, NFC, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, and is even equipped with MST (Magnetic Secure Transmission) technology for Samsung Pay support.
