We've heard a lot about it and we already assumed it was part of the family from the mass of leaked images, but here it is in it's full glory, the officially announced Samsung Galaxy S4 Active. As we expected this is a ruggedised version of Galaxy S4, but there's some interesting trade offs in this variant of the phone.
For example, much remains the same there's still a 1.9GHz quad-core processor, which we assume is the same Snapdragon 600 as in the original Galaxy S4, but there's also a few changes. The screen for example isn't the same 1080p amoled display, instead the Active is rocking a 1080p TFT LCD display, which could possibly be down to supply issues of the amoled variant.
One other thing which has been switched out is the 13MP camera from the S4, replaced in this case by an 8MP sensor which you can use to take pictures under water too! Samsung have chosen to offer an 'Aqua Mode' for the camera, which allows you to 'increase visual quality and clarity for enhanced underwater images and video' and it also lets you use the volume down key as a shutter button for the camera too!
Because this is a rugged smartphone it has had to receive certification for the durability and this device has returned with an IP67 rating. This means that it's both dust and water resistant and it can tolerate being in up to 1 meter of water for up to 30 minutes!
The device will be rocking Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean on launch and there will be 4G LTE, Bluetooth 4.0, NFC and a 2600 mAh battery crammed into those rather good looking frames!
All in all this is a nice device and if you want one then in the future they will pop up in 'urban grey', 'dive blue' and 'orange flare', the latter of which are to the right and the former is above. The S4 Active will go on sale in the US and Sweden initially and it will probably branch out after that. Keep your eyes on Samsung's June 20th event for some hands on action!
The full press release is available here and check out the full spec sheet in the image below!
Click to enlarge. |