Almost a year ago when Microsoft "Google phone” was a rage, Google launched the HTC Nexus One which lasted around six months in the market.
After a year, Google is trying this concept again with Samsung Nexus S, an Android phone with direct access to the full set of Google features.
The Nexus S’ candy-bar design is typically Samsung with lots of similarities with the Galaxy series. It is larger being 4.88 inches tall but lighter than its ancestor. The chassis is all-black plastic with a self- designed backplate. The phone looks alluring with its shiny polished exterior but does not feel very sturdy. The skin and the display are also fingerprint magnet. The four Android touch controls (menu, search, back, and home) are present right below the display. The camera lens sits on the rear face next to the flash. The second camera lens is on the front side just above the bright 4 inch display. The Super AMOLED capacitive touch screen display is sharper, with richer colours, deeper and better graphics, and a wider view angle. All the ports and connections are found on the edges. The highlight of the phone is its contour design which means the front of the device is slightly curved so that it feels comfortable to hold the phone against the side of your head.
The feature set of this standard looking phone is pretty interesting. First and foremost, the Nexus S is the first handset with Gingerbread (Android 2.3), and it offers a few upgrades like a second camera, an NFC chip, and a gyroscope.
Nexus S contains the same 1Ghz Hummingbird processor on the Galaxy S devices. The user interface is pretty responsive like any other Android device. It offers five home screens for customization with widgets, app shortcuts, and folders. Gingerbread, has added lots of shortcuts for managing apps. It has also added a new copy paste feature for you. The virtual keyboard is quite impressive and offers good typing feedback.
Pros:
It supports standard text and multimedia messaging, e-mail syncing, calendar syncing and a news and weather widget. When talking about connectivity, you get Bluetooth 2.1 (with A2DP), Wi-Fi, PC syncing, USB mass storage, and an accelerometer. The Nexus S is also optimized for 3G network, GPRS and EDGE. All the Google apps are onboard like Google Voice, YouTube, Google Search (with voice), Google Latitude, Google Maps with Navigation, Google Places, Car Home, and Google Talk. The web browser is nice and includes features like pinch-to-zoom multitouch, multiple windows, bookmarks, copy paste and the ability to find text on a page.
Cons:
The 5-megapixel camera has nice inbuilt features. Unfortunately it lacks HD video and shoots video clips only in a 720x480-pixel resolution. The Nexus S offers 512MB of RAM and 16GB of internal memory but there is no memory card expansion slot.
Verdict:
The Samsung Nexus S has a sleek design complemented by a crisp OS and faster performance. As a new model it does not offer bundles of innovative features. But, if you are a Google lover and Android loyalist, it can be a great phone for you.
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