To help us provide you with free impartial advice, we may earn a commission if you buy through links on our site. Learn more

Samsung Galaxy S Advance review

Our Rating :

Has a large screen, but the S Advance proved slightly sluggish in use

Specifications

Android 2.3.6, 4.0in 480×800 display

The Samsung Galaxy S Advance is a lesser model than its Samsung Galaxy S3 sibling, but it’s still a desirable and stylish smartphone nonetheless.

Yes, it has the aging Android 2.3 Gingerbread operating system and a 1GHz dual-core STE U8500 CPU instead of the S3’s 1.4GHz quad-core CPU, but it has a 4in Super AMOLED screen, a 5-megapixel rear camera and a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera, along with a range of multimedia and entertainment apps. In short, everything you arguably could need from a smartphone.

Samsung Galaxy S Advance

Certainly, we we’re impressed by its colourful 4in Super AMOLED display. Viewing YouTube videos on the Galaxy S Advance is a truly pleasurable experience. Sadly, its 480×800 resolution is unspectacular by modern standards, but the images are still sharp. Indeed, text and icons are smoothly rendered.

Samsung Galaxy S Advance

Less good is the motion of animations and menu transitions, which judder too often. The juddering isn’t annoying in itself; it’s annoying because it does occasionally provide smooth animation. Similarly, it’s too slow to change orientation and we regularly had to shake it to wake it. When it does change orientation, the transition is immediate and ungraceful, which we feel is unbecoming of the Galaxy S Advance. Even an iPhone 3GS switches orientation smoothly and gracefully. The Galaxy S Advance isn’t a cheap phone, and this jerkiness does let it down somewhat.

Samsung Galaxy S Advance

The phone’s web browser is functional, but reading text on it is disappointing given its screen size. We found ourselves zooming uncomfortably far in to the screen to read text, and then realised that part of the problem is its dimly lit screen. Even with the brightness turned all the way up, the browser was still too dark. It took a brisk 8 seconds to render the BBC News home page, which is fast.

Samsung Galaxy S Advance

It has forward and rear cameras, a range of shooting modes such as Panorama and Smile Shot, an LED flash and a maximum resolution of 2,560×1,920. Settings are easily changed and you can even switch between Auto Focus and Macro Focus, and add GPS tags.

Pages: 1 2

Details

Price£0
Rating*****

Hardware

Main display size4.0in
Native resolution480×800
CCD effective megapixels5-megapixel
FlashLED
GPSyes
Internal memory8192MB
Memory card supportmicro SD
Memory card included0MB
Operating frequenciesGSM 850/900/1900, 3G 2100
Wireless dataGPRS, EDGE, 3G
Size123x63x10
Weight120g

Features

Operating systemAndroid 2.3.6
Microsoft Office compatibilityWord/Excel/PowerPoint/PDF viewers
FM Radioyes
AccessoriesStereo headphones, USB data cable, Wall-charger
Talk time7 hours
Standby time23 days

Buying Information

SIM-free price£260
Price on contract0
Prepay price£260
SIM-free supplierwww.argos.co.uk
Contract/prepay supplierwww.carphonewarehouse.co.uk
Detailswww.samsung.com

Read more

Reviews