Samsung melds slate, slider with Ultra Touch S8300

If having your cake and eating it too is just how you roll, you're probably the kind of hard-to-please son of a gun that wants a numeric slider keypad to go along with your phone's AMOLED WQVGA touchscreen. Wait, let us guess: you also want an 8 megapixel camera, AGPS with geotagging, integrated FM radio, stereo Bluetooth, and microSD support up to 16GB. And naturally, you want it all somehow magically packed into a shell measuring no more than 12.7mm thick. Well, guess what, sweet pea? Samsung's gone and called your bluff with the rumored Ultra Touch S8300, earning itself an official announcement ahead of MWC -- and as long as a real smartphone OS isn't on your shopping list, this 7.2Mbps HSDPA monster should fit the bill. We don't have launch territories or pricing just yet, but see that little "Barcelona" on the weather widget there? Yeah, we suspect we'll be seeing plenty of this one on the Mobile World Congress show floor.

[The WC @ Feb 9th 2009 3:08AM]

Why thank you, honey bun. ;)

[StephenD @ Feb 9th 2009 3:10AM]

You do know 'meld' isn't actually a word, right? Someone's been watching too much Star Trek.

[letstakeawalk @ Feb 9th 2009 3:18AM]

It's a perfectly cromulent word...

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meld%5B3%5D

Third usage: verb, to merge or blend

[Oli D @ Feb 9th 2009 3:28AM]

i wonder how many people will get that ^

[Derek @ Feb 9th 2009 1:45PM]

Why are we skipping over the biggest problem with this post? One cannot watch too much Star Trek!

[Oli D @ Feb 9th 2009 3:20AM]

That is a bootlicious haul of techno-crammage

if you know what i mean....

[bigpinekey @ Feb 9th 2009 7:50AM]

I totally agree

With the release of all these new Samsung units -- It's clear the trio of HTC/Nokia/Samsung has now
positioned themselves as the world dominant "TRIO" of all phones.

With the "feature set" of these phones now out in the open, it's obviously clear, the new buzz-word will
be "HTC/Nokia/Samsung KILLER".

[teamdrivers2 @ Feb 9th 2009 7:59AM]

@Bigpinekey

I wuz thinking the same thing !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

How quickly Apple's cheap plastic construction materials and lackluster
features has reduced it to nothing more than yesterdays novelty phone.

[bigpinekey @ Feb 9th 2009 8:16AM]

You did bring up a very important point = construction materials

Apple chose to use El Cheapo plastic to further reuduce the price of their iPhone.
Not exactly a smart move, as who dosn't drop their phone from time-to-time.
Now that the Fab Cycle of iPhone ownership has seriously gone way past its
initial surge, it's now found its product placed in the $99 dollar discount rack.

Quality constructed cellphones, with far superior feature/benifit set has raised
the bar for the future of phones. Novelty "Hipster" phones has already played
out and soon to be nothing but last years news.

[Tarnation @ Feb 9th 2009 8:45AM]

You know it is pretty said when a company releases a product who's overall design is nice, but because they didn't give us everything we wanted on the first one they release a second one that has everything we want and then they go and skimp on quality.

Oh yeah and that is one hawt looking phone.

[bigpinekey @ Feb 9th 2009 9:01AM]

Tarnation

You do have to wonder......don't ya ? In a time when most all "TOP TIER" Mfg's are using
top of the line metals and composites, the KOOL-AIDE drinkers get delivered an updated model
utilizing the cheapest of all materials = ABS Plastic. It wuz like Apple knew the sheep would
buy what-ever was given to um......and they did.

[Shinigami @ Feb 9th 2009 3:21AM]

Awesome phone with horrible screen resolution. Even LG Arena has 800x480 instead of 400x240. Nokia 5800 has 640x360.
400x240 just won't do.

[Oli D @ Feb 9th 2009 3:23AM]

but its AMOLED, which has 2 more letters than regular OLED

[Information Central @ Feb 9th 2009 3:57AM]

There's no way for us to evaluate that, since Engadget stupidly uses non-terms like "WQVGA" instead of just saying what the resolution is. That saves what, two characters? Apparently they're serving the site on dial-up.

[Shinigami @ Feb 9th 2009 4:33AM]

WQVGA = Wide Quad-VGA. VGA is 640x480. WVGA is usually 800x480 or 848x480. Its easy to remember.

And ignore my comment about screen resolution. Its 2.8 inches, so consider it a normal screen resolution for a wide screen of this size. But the price is horrible.

[arcticpenguins @ Feb 9th 2009 3:36AM]

Win.

[ed. @ Feb 9th 2009 3:52AM]

what about the "DivX playback and an "anti-scratch / anti-fingerprint coated duraluminium chassis."" and a black with orange trim colour scheme

as show here http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/29/samsungs-s8300-slider-packs-amoled-display-8-megapixel-camera?icid=sphere_blogsmith_inpage_engadget

[ooolezhka @ Feb 9th 2009 4:06AM]

Here much more info:
http://www.mobile-review.com/review/samsung-s8300.shtml

[Shinigami @ Feb 9th 2009 4:37AM]

Nice one, Oleg! Posting a link to Russian-language review on US page!
http://www.mobile-review.com/review/samsung-s8300-en.shtml
Same page in English

[crescentdavid @ Feb 9th 2009 3:56AM]

I think it's more of a "burnt pepper" trim ...

[Information Central @ Feb 9th 2009 3:59AM]

Ah yes, the moronic "slider" design persists, against all common sense. So what, exactly, are we doing with the wasted bulk that resides on the sliding portion behind the screen?

Yep: nothing. Good design!

[Gnormie @ Feb 9th 2009 4:32AM]

You meant the bit of the phone that contains the logic board with the processor, memory, controllers, and various other pieces of hardware that you know... make the phone work, what wasted space!

[Shinigami @ Feb 9th 2009 4:36AM]

It isn't a bad design, sizes are
110x51.5x12.7 (in mm)
So its slim and not too big. Perfect size for a phone with a large screen.

[Information Central @ Feb 9th 2009 8:37PM]

Yes, wasted space. Note how the G1, despite its other failings, manages to use the surface of that enclosure for a LARGE KEYBOARD. Keyboards are relatively thin, and can reside of the surface of the battery/circuitry compartment.

[superhobo @ Feb 9th 2009 4:09AM]

Crappy battery life?

[Stewie @ Feb 9th 2009 10:38AM]

Mobile-Review.com has the battery at 880 mAh...o_o

[darkmax @ Feb 9th 2009 4:41AM]

If Omnia is anything, its battery life was better than many phones'. So I would guess at least 4-5 hours of normal usages. Probably 2-3 on videos

[michael @ Feb 9th 2009 2:21PM]

could this be the 8mp camera that is rumored to be coming to tmobile?

[Mark Anderson @ Feb 9th 2009 5:22AM]

I will never buy another Samsung phone that has that stupid dual purpose connector again. It's unbelievably annoying.

[yG @ Feb 9th 2009 5:30AM]

Perfect timing! I was just looking for a phone.

[gonintendo @ Feb 9th 2009 8:41AM]

Are you sure it's not a Sumsang?

[CJ @ Feb 9th 2009 8:57AM]

How come I get the feeling that if this had a Smartphone UI and 3.5mm Headphone socket, this would be the current generation's N95?

[Zane @ Feb 9th 2009 9:12AM]

Sorry but it has just gotten its ass kicked by the new SE Hikaru that was unveiled today - the same specs but with metallic construction to boot.

[prashanthsharma @ Feb 9th 2009 12:41PM]

Now if only they made it a WinMo/Android smartphone.......

[wolverinejoe80 @ Feb 10th 2009 10:46AM]

wow. that's sexy. i just have a thing for a slider.