We apologize for the delay in getting some sexy CTIA news coming your way but technical difficulties — ie, relying on an AT&T USB modem for connectivity — have been a bit of a road block. No matter… Welcome to AMOLED world, aka Samsung’s CTIA booth this year. As you can see from the giant AMOLED sculpture-thingamajig welcoming visitors to the Samsung booth, Sammy is making it a point to let us know that it means business when it comes to handset displays. And it does, by the way, mean business. Samsung has a handful of handsets on display and the common theme among more current models is a big, bright, gorgeous AMOLED touchscreens. Hit the jump to see some highlights plucked from Samsung’s line up.
First up is the newly announced Samsung A877 aka Impression. This puppy was scooped quite a while ago and then last month we exclusively dropped the price and release date, as the Impression will be part of an upcoming BOGO offer from AT&T. What more do you need to know? You can read the spec sheet all you want but you can’t get a feel for how bright and vibrant the 3.2″ AMOLED display is until you hold it in your hand. No, the Impression isn’t a smartphone but the QWERTY has a great feel, the TouchWiz UI with haptic feedback is as spry as it gets and the 3 megapixel camera will definitely get the job done. For $200 and a BOGO deal no less, the Impression could be a killer for messaging fiends.
The Instinct S30 is another handset we scooped to no end, but many questioned whether or not it would be a worthy sequel to its predecessor. The answer — maybe. Sprint’s upcoming S30 is rock solid and packs plenty of zip but current Instinct owners may be a bit disappointed if they were expecting a big upgrade.
The Beat DJ is definitely a niche handset from our Korean friends and we’ve wondered aloud on several occasions just who would be interested in this little guy. After playing with it a bit, we’re left with the same questions we had going in. The build is phenomenal, the UI is spry, the AMOLED screen is perfection and the speakers are pretty impressive (even in a crowd) but there are at least half a dozen Sammy handsets we would opt for long before the Beat DJ.
Last up for now, we have a little taste of what Samsung has in store for the not-so-distant future. Seen above under lock and key is a hardware sample of an upcoming LTE handset. As you can see, Sammy looks to be maintaining the same styling and form factor found in abundance within its current lineup. Toss in some blazing 4G however, and you’ve got some tasty devices on the horizon. The nice folks at the booth really couldn’t answer any questions about this puppy but it looks like Samsung should be ready to launch this (and other) LTE devices pretty soon — basically, as soon as there is a network to launch them on. Breath = bated.