Samsung debuted at MWC 2016 its two new flagships, the Samsung Galaxy S7 and the Galaxy S7 Edge, during the Unpacked event that took place yesterday. They also unveiled the Gear 360 camera, able to generate VR content and 360 degree videos. Now let’s see what these devices are all about.
Samsung Galaxy S7 is the core model, with a 5.1 inch Quad HD Super AMOLED screen, with 3D glass and a metal chassis. It has a curved edge back, made of glass as well. Both this model and the Galaxy s7 Edge have been certified within the IP68 standard, being water and dust resilient. A novelty here is the Always On Display feature, that lights up the device’s screen just a bit to see notifications and calls without using too much power.
There’s a new generation of camera on board, called Dual Pixel, that brings F/1.7 aperture and bigger pixels than before. Samsung also include a new Panorama mode called Motion Panorama, that lets users take a panoramic photo with mobile elements. Both handsets do fast charging, both wired and wireless and they bring microSD card slots, with support for up to 200 GB of extra storage.
Samsung Pay and Samsung Knox are also included and these models will start selling from March 11th, for 700 euros in the case of the Galaxy S7 and 800 euros for the S7 Edge. Preorders bring users a Gear VR bundled for free. I should also mention that the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge adopts a 5.5 inch Quad HD screen with curved edges and an expanded view of apps and functions on those edges.
Handsets also get 4 GB of RAM, a Snapdragon 820 or Exynos 8890 processor, 32 or 64 GB of storage, Dual Pixel 12 MP cameras at the back and a front 5 MP shooter. S7 has a 3000 mAh battery and the S7 Edge a 3600 mAh unit. There’s a fingerprint and pulse sensor still included and Android 6.0 Marshmallow with the latest TouchWiz is in the mix.
Samsung also launched the Gear 360 camera, a device with 15 megapixel imaging sensors, able to record 360 degree videos with a resolution of 3840 x 1920 pixels. It can also take 30 MP photos and the lenses included here offer F/2.0 aperture. This camera comes with a 0.5 inch PMOLED screen, IP53 certification for dust and water resilience, WiFi, Bluetooth 4.1, NFC and USB, as well as an accelerometer and gyroscope.
It weighs 153 and has a 1350 mAh battery. The content created with this camera can be enjoyed via Gear VR and even uploaded into Google Street View. Gear 360 is compatible with modern Samsung phones, like the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge, Galaxy Note 5, Galaxy S6, S6 Edge and S6 Edge+. It’ll be available in the second half of the year, on certain markets.
