MWC 2011: Samsung overview

Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II camera and video samples

We were able to get a Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II unit and take it outside to do some proper shooting. We’ve got some nice camera samples and, most exciting of all, two FullHD videos captured with the new Samsung flagship.

Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II camera samples

The photos are have about as good per-pixel quality as the first Galaxy S, which is a pretty good achievement considering the 3 added megapixels. This means that when you downsize your images or print them out you achieve better results as there’s more resolution available.

Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II camera samples

But the really impressive part is the Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II video recording. Buttery smooth and with excellent colors, those high-res videos look really impressive. Plus we are only using a pre-release unit here so they might be even better when the smartphone hits the shelves.

If only there wasn't for that zoom-in effect it would have been perfect. Well you can't have it all, we guess.

Just don’t forget to click that 1080p button as YouTube doesn’t support embedding of FullHD videos. Also have in mind that the compression added by YouTube leads to slight degradation of the video quality.

The second video was captured with the handset held in hand, but is equally impressive.

Live photos

We also used to occassion to do another batch of live photos of the impressively slim Gingerbread smartphone. The device really is a joy to handle as long as you don't mind the screen size.

Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II live photos

The new display makes way more of a difference with its size than its new technology. Sharpness is indeed slightly improved, but that's barely noticeable. However an AMOLED stretching over 4.3 inches is a joy to behold.

Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II live photos

Of course the reduced thickness of the Super AMOLED Plus has certainly helped Samsung make the Galaxy S II so slim and the even better power efficiency is great news to all power users.

Before we parted ways with the Samsung Galaxy S II we decided to do another UI demo video for you. You can check out some of the new widgets and the generally very good responsiveness of the smartphone even at those early stages of its development.

Also, towards the end of the video you can easily notice how the viewfinder zooms in when you switch to 1080p video mode. There're no such issues with 720p video recording, though.