Best Samsung Mobile Phone Deals

With a long history in the mobile industry, Samsung is one of the world’s leading phone manufacturers and has consistently been at the forefront of technological innovation. Samsung produces diverse ranges of mobile phones and smartphones to appeal to all users and budgets. Perhaps Samsung’s most popular current devices are their range of ‘Galaxy’ branded Android smartphones, which are generally considered to be among the best Android phones currently available.

As well as producing wide ranges of their own mobile products, Samsung is a leading supplier of parts to other companies around the world. For example, it was recently reported that around 25% of the components of Apple’s market-leading iPhone 4 smartphone were manufactured by Samsung.

Samsung has a close relationship with Google’s smartphone operating system, Google Android, and its ‘Galaxy’ range of smartphones are considered market-leading Android devices. Samsung’s first Android phone, the Galaxy I7500, was released in June 2009 to a generally positive reception, but the company’s first big success came with its extremely popular Samsung Galaxy S smartphone. Samsung is now considered one of the key Android manufacturers and it has produced two of the three Google-branded ‘Nexus’ phones.

Samsung’s Galaxy S was released in June 2010. Featuring a 4” Super-AMOLED touchscreen, a 1 GHz ARM Cortex CPU and 512 MB of RAM, the Samsung Galaxy S was one of the most powerful Android smartphones available at the time and became an instant success. The Samsung Galaxy S was hailed as one of the top phones of 2010 and at the time of writing has sold over 10 million units worldwide.

Samsung announced a follow up to the Galaxy S to be called the Samsung Galaxy S II on February 13th 2011, and this phone was launched in May. The Galaxy S II featured a wide range of upgrades to its predecessor, including an improved and expanded 4.3” Super-AMOLED Plus touchscreen, a 1.2 GHz dual-core Exynos processor and 1 GB of RAM. The Galaxy S II was advertised as the slimmest smartphone in the world at the time of its release, being just 8.49 mm thick at its thinnest point. Within 2 months of its release, the Galaxy S II had sold 5 million units worldwide and current sales figures stand at over 20 million.

Google periodically develops own-branded ‘Google Nexus’ smartphones. Designed to be flagship phones, these are high-specification handsets that are intended to showcase the best capabilities of the latest Android operating system versions. At the time of writing, three Nexus phones have been launched and the most recent two were manufactured by Samsung.

Samsung’s first Nexus phone was the Samsung Nexus S. This was the first smartphone to feature Google’s Android 2.3 Gingerbread operating system and the first Android smartphone to feature Near Field Communications (NFC) technology. The Nexus S was also praised for its innovative curved glass touchscreen.

In late 2011, Samsung followed up the Nexus S with the Samsung Galaxy Nexus smartphone. This handset marked the launch of Google’s new Android 4.0 ‘Ice Cream Sandwich’ operating system, which represented a major overhaul of the OS. With its 4.65” HD Super-AMOLED display and high-spec hardware, the Galaxy Nexus was extremely well received by critics and is considered a landmark Android phone.

In late 2010, Microsoft re-launched its flagging mobile phone OS, Windows Mobile, with the much improved and re-imagined Windows Phone 7 operating system. Windows Phone 7 was well received by critics for its speed, ease of use and aesthetic appeal, with the unique and innovative user interface receiving particular praise.

Samsung was one of four manufacturers named as launch partners for Windows Phone 7and released the Samsung Omnia 7 featuring the new OS in October 2010. As a result of Microsoft’s strict specifications requirements, the Omnia 7 featured similar internal hardware to that of competing Windows Phone 7 handsets. However, Samsung distinguished its handset with a very high quality Super AMOLED touchscreen, making the Omnia 7 one of the most popular WP7 phones available at launch.

Samsung has developed its own proprietary smartphone operating system called ‘Bada OS’. This operating system was launched along with the first Bada-based phone, the Samsung Wave S8500, in June 2010. Though the operating system lacks the wide distribution of competitors like Android or Windows Phone, Bada was well received in some regions and the original Samsung Wave sold 1 million units within 4 weeks of its release.

Since the initial launch of Bada, Samsung has continued to develop both hardware and software for the OS. Numerous iterations of the operating system software have been released, each addressing various issues and limitations. Samsung released the Wave II smartphone pre-loaded with their 1.2 Bada update in November 2010, and the Wave III was released along with the Bada 2.0 update in August 2011. At the time of writing, the Samsung Wave III is the latest high end Bada model available and features a 4” Super AMOLED touchscreen, 5 megapixel camera and 1.4 GHz processor.