Samsung Galaxy S III Review: Style and Grace
Camera Performance and Battery Life
The cameras that are integrated into smartphones have come a long way in just a few years. Now, the Galaxy S III has some of the same features you'll find on mid-to-high end point-and-shoot digital cameras. For example, there's Best Photo which will select the best shot out of a continuous burst of eight photos. In addition, the 8 megapixel rear camera has a zero-lag shutter and the ability to capture up to 20 continuous shots.
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
Click to enlarge
During our tests with the Galaxy S III, the phone's camera did a better than average job at capturing images. Outside shots in well-lit environments were sharp and crisp. Indoor shots were occasionally washed out due to the flash or a tad noisy, but still much improved compared to the indoor shots we typically capture with a smartphone camera. To give you a feel for the capabilities of the Galaxy S III's camera, here are a few shots taken in various lighting conditions.
 |
|
Battery life is a key feature of any phone. After all, what good is a smartphone if it dies mid-way through the day or if you're left without power when you need to make a call or check email? Battery life claims for the Galaxy S III vary depending on which carrier you choose, but generally speaking most carriers agree that you should get up to eight hours of usage time from the phone's 2100 mAh battery.
To verify Samsumg's claims, we put the Galaxy S III through our standard HotHardware battery test. In this test, we set up a webpage with a mix of graphics and text. The page automatically refreshed itself every three minutes. We set the Galaxy S III’s display to 50% brightness and turned off Wi-Fi for the duration.
When we ran this test, the Galaxy S III lasted for 430 minutes while connected to AT&T’s wireless network before shutting down. That's a pretty impressive number, especially if you compare the longevity of the Galaxy S III's battery to other smartphones we've seen.
In our real world testing of the phone, the Galaxy S III’s battery had no trouble making it through a whole work day (8-10 hours) with moderate to heavy use, while checking email, surfing the web, making calls, etc. without needing a charge. Of course, your mileage will vary depending on how much you use your phone.
