For mobile and Android fans, Samsung’s Galaxy Unpacked events are big news. Next week, Samsung will host their first Unpacked event for 2019, unveiling a new range of hotly anticipated devices.
Thanks to teases from Samsung themselves and a variety of leaks which plague mobile manufacturers these days, expectations for what Samsung will unveil include at least three phones in their Galaxy S lineup, as well as more wearables, and also their foldable phone which was teased at their developer conference last year.
Galaxy S10
Samsung’s 10th generation flagship Galaxy S line-up includes three models, an entry level Galaxy S10E destined for emerging markets, and of course the Galaxy S10 and Galaxy S10+.
The company will finally address the notch display trend in their Galaxy S10 lineup with a new ‘Galaxy O’ infinity display that will utilise a ‘punch-hole’ design allowing them to give users maximum screen real-estate while still allowing the front-facing camera (or dual cameras in the case of the S10+) to poke through.
These, and a procession of other renders of the phones in an array of colours have shown that Samsung will adopt an ‘in-display’ fingerprint sensor for their new phone line-up, moving away from the awkwardly placed rear sensor on previous models.
The vaunted camera ability of the Galaxy S series phones will be bolstered with the Galaxy S10 and Galaxy S10+ offering a triple camera array on the rear.
Samsung will be using their in-house developed Exynos 9820 processor in the Galaxy S10 line, which will include a dedicated Neural Processing Unit which they say will offer faster Artificial Intelligence operations, which will aid their Bixby virtual assistant that will be included on the phones.
A range of hardware specifications will be offered including offering between 6GB to 8GB of RAM and 128GB or 512GB of storage on the S10 and S10+.
A special edition Galaxy S10+ offering 12GB of RAM and 1TB of storage that will come have a limited edition ceramic back is also rumoured, though availability of this special edition model will be limited to selected markets making it quite the sought after item.
The Galaxy S-series line-up has been offering wireless charging for some time, however this year Samsung will be offering a reverse wireless charging option on the phone, a neat trick letting you charge another phone on the go – if it too supports wireless charging.
The phones will also feature Samsung’s new One UI over Android 9.0, featuring a new look for Samsung phones which adopts the new design language of Google’s operating system, while also offering their own improvements including a focus on moving interactive elements to the bottom of the display to aid in one-handed use.
Galaxy F – Foldable phone
Samsung’s foldable phone, expected to go by the Galaxy F brand has been teased many times, but we’re finally expecting to get a good look at the phone next week at Unpacked. Samsung has teased the phones appearance at the event in a teaser released this week.
As shown in November, the Galaxy F will have a 4.58” display in a familiar phone form factor, which will unfold into a 7.3” display, perfect for viewing videos, surfing the web or reading a book.
Though the concept of a foldable phone holds a lot of promise, a potential $2,000 USD price tag may be out of the range of most people.
Galaxy Buds
The Galaxy Buds will be an update on Samsung’s IconX line of truly wireless earbuds. The earbuds will use Bluetooth 5.0 offering greater range and faster data speeds which means better sound quality and possibly include on-board storage for music storage for truly wireless audio entertainment.
According to leaks, the Galaxy Buds will also pair nicely with the Galaxy S10 wireless charging, with the charging case able to be topped up using the reverse wireless charging feature to ensure you’re never short on power.
Galaxy Watch Active
To top off the wearable announcement at Unpacked, Samsung will also be announcing a new fitness focused ‘Galaxy’ branded watch.
The Galaxy Watch Active as it will be known, will come with a 1.1” 360×360 resolution AMOLED display, and be powered by Samsung’s in-house sourced Exynos processor and 4GB of on-board storage.
The watch will include WiFi support, though not LTE. Samsung will be offering users tap and pay support through NFC and a 236 mAh battery.
The design will unfortunately drop the rotating bezel design of previous Samsung watches, instead utilising dual button designs which sit flush with the metallic bezel that will be available in silver, black, blue and rose gold colour options.
Availability
Samsung is expected to make their Galaxy S10 available globally on March 15th, with pre-orders likely to start in early March. Samsung will likely be available across all Australian carriers on a range of plans, with a pre-order bonus, which may include the Samsung Galaxy Buds. The Galaxy Watch Active will likely arrive at some stage in the near future.
For those keen to live on the foldable edge, Samsung’s Foldable phone is likely to be limited in availability, so we’ll have to wait for more details from Samsung
To tune in to the Galaxy Unpacked, you can watch the live stream at samsung.com/au/galaxy/ at 6am AEDT on the 21st of February, and we’ll have all the details launch details for you here on EFTM with Trevor Long live in San Francisco as a guest of Samsung.
