Who's excited for the forthcoming Samsung Galaxy S4 announcement? Anyone? As a lover of technology and innovation, I can't say that I'm excited. The smartphone to be announced today is splashing in the pools of rumor with specs, images and features. I will reserve my excitement for my current Samsung Galaxy Nexus smartphone instead. Sure it's an old phone, but rumored phones just haven't tripped my trigger of excitement. Here's why.
Heavily popular smartphones released recently such as the HTC One, HTC Droid DNA and the Apple iPhone 5 have touted great hardware specifications. Quad core processors, beautiful larger high definition displays and massive gigs of storage. Been there done that. I feel like we're at a point of a "hardware slow down", if you will. By this, I mean we really cant get better on items such as CPU's, screens or storage at this time.
Jumping on the next announced smartphone may not be wise if you currently own a smartphone from the last year or even 30 months in some cases. It is my opinion that some smartphones have the hardware to sustain great day-to-day performance when it comes to handling web browsing, social media apps or even casual YouTube viewing. Typically, that's all most average consumers are doing with their smartphone.
What is it that makes consumers rush for the latest phone on the market? I doubt it's hardware. Innovation is the key spec I look for when deciding on smartphones. I ask myself "what can this phone do that my current phone is not able to do?" Fortunately, today's smartphones are (almost) created equal regarding capabilities. Most have mid to high megapixel cameras as well as front facing cameras. Most have radios capable of 4G speeds on mobile networks. Most have brilliant displays.
The smartphone manufacturers have to work hard to be innovative and lure the consumers in. Remember the craze Siri and Google Now caused upon their release? These were eye-catching features to differentiate from other smartphones. The devices offering Siri and Google Now also offered beautiful high definition screens. What most consumers fail to realize is even with stats touting high pixels per inch (ppi), the human eye can only see so many ppi. This is usually less that what's being specified and offered by today's smartphone manufaturers. It's just a small component used in pricing of the device.
What can smartphone OEMs offer consumers today? What's the next innovation? At one time it was rumored that the Samsung Galaxy S4 will have eye-tracking capabilities. This was supposed to allow you to scroll screen on the up and down based on tracking your eyes' movements. I called "baloney" on this feature. It may be available in future smartphones, but probably not on the S4. Even if this feature was available? Would that be enough to get you off of your current device?
What are you expecting from the Samsung announcement? If you're currently happy with your smartphone, what features would incite you into grabbing the next hot phone on the market? Leave me a comment with your thoughts.
Thanks for reading, everyone!