Samsung Galaxy S8 Will Start Smartphone War With iPhone 8 On April 21
The Samsung Galaxy S8 will be in stores on April 21. Forbes has the news.
“Straight out of Samsung’s home country of South Korea is a report from ETNews which claims Samsung will introduce the Galaxy S8 at an event in New York on March 29. It will then go on sale to the public on April 21. This ties in with previous reports that the U.S. will be the company’s chosen destination after it ruled out a launch at Barcelona’s Mobile World Congress later this month.”
The article adds that the price tag could go as high as $1,000. However, Samsung is clearly building two premium versions of its latest Galaxy smartphone. As BGR notes, the specs have been leaked. The Galaxy S8 Plus will be a 6.1-inch smartphone, and the regular Galaxy S8 will have a 5.8-inch screen. Other than the size, both phones are expected to have the same exact specs.
The phones will have Quad HD displays (not 4K ones as rumors indicated), a 12MP rear camera (8MP front-facing), an Iris scanner, and 64GB internal storage with 4GB of RAM. The phones are expected to either contain the Exynos 8895 or the Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processors. Many of the commenters on BGR‘s article seem to think that Apple will still rule in 2017 no matter what.
“It doesn’t matter what Samsung does. Apple will dominate 2017 with the iPhone 8. This is a year for also-rans,” says Dart.
“Samsung is always trying to copy Apple, but they will always be 2nd rate,” says SheRaHero.
The iPhone 8, which will be released in September, is certainly no slouch. Apple may be forgoing Touch ID technology in favor of 3D facial recognition, according to Mac Rumors.
Apple’s widely expected 5.8-inch iPhone with an edge-to-edge OLED display will feature a front-facing 3D laser scanner for facial recognition, corroborating previous rumors, according to JPMorgan analyst Rod Hall.”
The article adds that Hall claims the scanner will replace Touch ID as Apple plans to remove the Home button to allow for an edge-to-edge display. If Apple employs this type of technology, it will be similar to Windows Hello on Windows 10 devices that allows you to log in by facial recognition. However, Windows Hello hasn’t been without its problems. Some people claim it drains battery life, and at times, doesn’t recognize faces accurately.
However, given that Apple has been able to perfect technology started by other companies, it will be interesting to see if Apple can make facial recognition security features mainstream. Many would argue that Apple’s Touch ID technology perfected what Samsung, Microsoft, and others started.
Besides the facial recognition features and edge-to-edge display, the iPhone 8 is likely to come in two different versions — a 4.7-inch device and a 5.8-inch one as well. The website 9to5 Mac also claims we will see an all-glass design with a variety of colors and a Home button that is actually embedded inside the screen. According to Mac Rumors, inductive wireless charging could also come to Apple’s next smartphone.
“Over the course of the last year, there has been ongoing speculation that wireless charging company Energous has inked a deal with Apple and could potentially provide wireless charging technology for the upcoming iPhone 8,” says Mac Rumors columnist Juli Clover, who adds that a new investor’s note from Copperfield Research outlines why Apple has no plans to use Energous’ WattUp radio frequency-based wireless charging solution.
Based on all the speculation, which smartphone would you rather have — the Galaxy S8 or the iPhone 8? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section.
[Featured Image by David Ramos/Getty Images]
