If you are on the look out for the latest and sexiest Android smartphone, you can safely give the new Samsung Galaxy Galaxy GC100 a miss.
It is as thick as four or five of the new smartphones available at the same price levels in India, Rs 29,850.
But the Galaxy GC 100 is not about the looks. In fact, though many may call it a smartphone, it’s not primarily a smartphone at all.
Look at it as the revenge of the camera. The digital camera has been pushed to oblivion, at least at the lower end, by the increasing photographic capabilities of the smartphones.
The 16-mega pixel Galaxy GC100 turns the tables on the invading smartphones – it’s a digital camera that has a phone at the back.
The device looks more or less like a normal digital camera, but comes with Android 4,1 Jelly Bean operating system, WiFi and 3G. Unfortunately it does not have the normal GSM voice calling capability. However, as it has a mic, a headphone jack and Android, it may be possible to make voice calls using applications such as Skype, though we are not very sure about it.
Most of the other features and specifications of the GC100 are those of the most high-end smartphones available in the market — including a 1.4-GHz quad core Exynos processor.
However, it’s not worth looking at the device primarily as a smartphone. It must be evaluated for its camera capabilities.
It has 21X optical zoom — a feature no other smartphone can even come near — ISO ranges from 100 to 3200, the f-stop from 2.8 to 8.0, and shutter speeds up to 1/2000th of a second. Most entry level digital cameras come with just 3X optical zoom.
Looked at as a camera, the specifications place the device in the upper half of the camera range — above average and definitely better than entry level point-and-shoots, but perhaps not quite there as a professional camera.
“With an ultra-sharp 308 pixels per inch and the full spectrum of glorious colours, the screen lets you enjoy pictures with utmost sharpness and vibrant colours,” says Tradus in its description of the device. The online retailer is one of the first to offer the Galaxy GC100 in India.
Our verdict – it’s definitely a sign of things to come – when everything will come with a ‘smartphone’ built in, including refrigerators, cars and TVs, but the GC100 will ultimately survive or perish on how good a camera it is.