Samsung Galaxy Products I'm Using - Short Review

There's a recent study that says consumers nowadays consult up to 21 sources of information before making a purchase of a gadget. Which is I think quite truthful, as I consult several blogs and friends first before buying anything. So, as a way of paying back that digital karma, here are two quick reviews of the gadgets I'm using from the Samsung Galaxy family.

SAMSUNG GALAXY TAB 2 7.0 (P3100)

 

This model delivers as it promised. It's slim, lightweight, works fast, responds quickly. It has phone functionality, so you can send and receive SMS, MMS, and CALLS. More than OK battery life (which by my standards means it can last 24 hours with moderate usage).

What it's not good for: heavy functions like editing documents. I thought getting one would help me write documents more nomadically. I imagined myself hooking it up with a Bluetooth keyboard, and typing away. As a writer, I have very low requirements for a mobile device. As long as it has a decent word processor, I'm good. I downloaded apps that can create and edit documents (Kingsoft and Polaris), and the Photoshop Touch. The interface has a steep learning curve, and the small screen makes me fidget with the zoom and the display, plus I can't navigate through the document as deftly as I'm used too on my laptop. This is a matter of personal preference, though. I believe that this is less of the gadget's shortcoming, and more of an incompatibility between my expectations and its capabilities.

What it's good for: MEDIA CONSUMPTION. Now if you like watching videos, reading e-books, listening to music, surfing the web, this is the device for you. It's very portable, and it can display a wide range of media. Games play great because its display is big enough to be immersive, yet it's handy enough to be portable. It displays websites really well too, so you can totally wallow in your friends' newsfeed and timelines and tumblr posts. It plays videos really great. It's very nearly the size of typical books, so the reading experience has a natural feel to it when you're holding the device. Also, I've installed FLIPBOARD, and I spend literally hours flipping through the digital content that I'm following.

My only beef is that GOOGLE PLAY STORE doesn't have the BLOGGER APP available for the Philippines. Which really, really sucks. It's a Google product in the first place! This device would have been amazing if I can use it to blog on the go. Which is a shortcoming it shares with my other Galaxy device.

SAMSUNG GALAXY S3 MINI (I8190)

I had no plans of buying this phone. Our company offered to get us SAMSUNG GALAXY S3 MINI on installment, so, on impulse, I bought one.

I love it. It's an amazing smartphone, and more so because I'm powering it with my SMART postpaid sim--because, let's face it, I don't want to ruin a great product with a network that has a horrible mobile internet connection, causes my text messages to get delayed, and has a heavily congested system. I'm not wasting all my money on a smartphone that a faulty network would render useless. That's why for my gadgets, I only trust SMART, it's the country'st strongest network, and it has FOUR TIMES more fiber optic infrastructure that allows the fastest transmission of data.

I have nothing to say against it. It's sleek and lightweight enough as a phone to carry around. Battery life is... OK enough.  It feels so natural in my hands. It has a very clear and bright display, and it works really fast. It has all the cool functions of its bigger brother, the S3. For a midrange phone, it's amazing.

Except for the camera. I feel like at that price range, Samsung could have gone all out and equipped the S3 Mini with at least an 8MP main camera at the back. Even if it bumps the cost a little upwards, it would still be worth it, and it would really, really, really make this a killer smartphone. Instead, they stuck a mediocre camera with a phone that has an amazing range of functionality. Media consumption wise, it's great too. It's a compact media player too.