Samsung Galaxy S i9001 Plus preview: First look

Introduction

It’s a Galaxy S facelift with just enough of a speed boost to make it 2011 ready. It has a 1.4 GHz Snapdragon processor and the latest version of Android: 2.3.3 Gingerbread. The Samsung I9001 Galaxy S Plus is heading to Russia under the name of Galaxy S 2011 Edition but will probably reach other markets too.

Samsung I9000 Galaxy S Plus official shots

It makes sense to play this card once again, with probably enough people willing to go for a flagship without busting the piggy bank. And the Galaxy S Plus is a flagship through and through, make no mistake. It’s just not this year’s flagship.

This one met a couple of dual core predators and lived to tell the story. It may’ve been a near death experience alright but the Samsung I9001 Galaxy S Plus has nothing to be ashamed of.

Samsung I9001 Galaxy S Plus at a glance:

• General: GSM 850/900/1800/1900 MHz, UMTS 900/1900/2100 MHz, HSDPA 14.4 Mbps, HSUPA 5.76 Mbps
• Form factor: Touchscreen bar phone
• Dimensions: 122.4 x 64.2 x 9.9 mm, 119 g
• Display: 4.0" 16M-color WVGA (480 x 800 pixels) SuperAMOLED capacitive touchscreen, Gorilla Glass
• CPU: 1.4 GHz Scorpion processor, Qualcomm MSM8255T Snapdragon
• GPU: Adreno 205 GPU
• RAM: 512 MB
• OS: Android 2.3.3 (Gingerbread)
• Memory: 8 GB storage, microSD card slot (up to 32 GB)
• Camera: 5 megapixel auto-focus camera with face and smile detection, touch focus; HD (720p) video recording at 30fps, front-facing VGA camera, video calls
• Connectivity: Wi-Fi b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth 3.0+HS, standard microUSB port,
• GPS receiver with A-GPS, 3.5mm audio jack, FM radio, TV out
• Misc: TouchWiz 3.0 UI, DivX/XviD codec support, built-in accelerometer, multi-touch input, proximity sensor, Swype text input

Samsung I9000 Galaxy S Plus live shots

An overclocked single-core chipset doesn’t hold a candle to dual core CPUs but the Galaxy S Plus will be held to a different standard. It was out of its depth in our latest shootout but – as far as we’re concerned – it did well where it matters.

By the way, we should note that we have on our hands a pre-release unit clocked at 1.2 GHz – the market-ready units will have 1.4 GHz clock rates enabled. Even at the lower speed though, the new Galaxy S Plus outperformed the year-old original in most tasks we tested. The speed boost is there – now, let’s see how much of an upgrade we can expect elsewhere.