Ordered one of these from Radioshack today for $150. Will let you know how it is in a few days. I tried one in the AT&T store first and it has the most impressive screen I've ever seen on a phone. It was also extremely fast. In fact, it was by far the fastest phone I've ever used, including the iPhone 4S. Browsing the web in chrome felt exactly like doing so on a laptop or desktop because of the speed combined with the high screen resolution. There's no need to zoom or even view mobile versions of web pages when the screen is 720p. Also, the metallic blue is much nicer looking than the white. I'm sure the iPhone 5 will follow suit with its own high resolution screen and crazy specs. The Galaxy S3 is pretty good preview of what's to come in the world of high-end smartphones I guess.
$150? That's on a contract right? Here they cost $750-850 outright, on a plan they are currently $5/mo on top of your cap price (usually $59, but most $70+/mo caps will bundle the phone free). I guess $150 outright is only $30 more than $5/mo over 24 months so that sounds comparable.
The best part of chrome for android for me was the automatic scaling of text on non-mobile websites. It automatically scales the text to a readable level so you don't have to zoom in. Regular browser: Chrome:
I can't get over the screen resolution and how fast this thing is. It's like a having a little laptop in your pocket. This is the first time in a long time that a smartphone has really impressed me. Apple is going to have their work cut out for them with the iPhone 5 if they want to beat this thing. Samsung actually grew some balls and released something that's better than the current iPhone in every way.
I got the phone rooted. I recommend using this method. It can be done in about 5 minutes. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1743780 Some of the other methods are much more complicated and time consuming. Unfortunately most of the roms, even CM are in a rather primitive state given that the phone just came out a couple of weeks ago, so I'm just going to leave it on stock for now. From what I understand, the SGS3 will be getting updated to Jelly Bean within the next couple of weeks, which is faster than any decent Jelly Bean ROMs would be able to come out, so it probably makes more sense to leave it on stock anyway.
Yeah I wouldn't mess with the ROMs. Seems like there is always something that doesn't work right with them.
It depends on the custom rom and how mature it is. The US variants of the galaxy s III are literally only a few weeks old. The dev community for it is brand new so you really can't expect much in form of custom roms. Really just some hacked tethering and theming involved.. which is really no different than stock. For the galaxy nexus, there's a very robust dev community and stuff like aokp has really matured for it and work really well.
I'm pretty sure most android phones are like this right after they launch. My original Galaxy S took about two months before it started seeing really good ROMs. Eventually it got CM which is really just as good as stock Android. There's massive interest in the SGS3. It's probably the most anticipated android phone ever, so I'm sure the ROMs will come. I had a hard time getting one because they were sold out at AT&T and ended up at Radioshack. On top of that, the US version is the most powerful cell phone in the world right now with its 2GB RAM and super fast processor, so I'm sure the devs are dying to get their hands on it.
Unfortunately, the Korean version gets that crown. It keeps the exynos 4412 soc, gets 2GB of ram, and also includes LTE. 8(
Just had a Galaxy SIII mini delivered for someone at work. It was either this or the Xperia T but either will be a massive step up from her personal phone which is a Galaxy Ace. thought the smaller phone would be nicer for a girl. Free phone Unlimited calls Unlimited texts 1GB data £21/month ($33/month) Not bad for the price I reckon. She has gone part time (baby) and was spending £60+/month on her personal package because she was spending a lot of time on work calls on her days off and using more than her allotted minutes. Edit: Just noticed they don't make different labels for different regions as it says 'Color: Pebble Blue' on the box.
I never understood Samsung and their stance on branding. I really have no idea why they called that thing a Galaxy S III mini as the internals definitely aren't on par with the Galaxy S III. They should've just called it the Galaxy Mini or something.
It does, but so does the Galaxy Note series. The hardware in the Galaxy S II is better than the Galaxy S III mini's.
I agree with khaid, they somehow managed to create a name with the Galaxy branding and now they're proceeding to spread it too thin. I have no problem with the Galaxy S III Mini's existence, just that it should have included a bit higher tier hardware. As it is, it's like buying a PC in 2001 with a P4 celeron, geforce 2mx, 128mb of ram and winxp. And thinking "it has Intel inside and nvidia graphics, it HAS to be good". I'm sure this actually works on consumers, but it's almost unethical to me.