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Galaxy K Zoom review: Samsung's best cameraphone yet
Samsung is on a mission to build the perfect cameraphone. Low-quality fixed lenses and tiny smartphone sensors are clearly insufficient for photography enthusiasts, but while you always bring your phone to parties, sporting events and trips to the zoo, it's often impractical to haul along a dedicated camera as well. The Galaxy K Zoom is Samsung's response to this dilemma, marrying a 10x optical zoom lens with an otherwise ordinary Android handset. It's hardly the best camera, or the best smartphone, but if you're willing to make some compromises, this may just be the most compelling option yet.
Samsung's latest smartphone-camera hybrid launches in the UK tomorrow
Samsung appears intent on single-handedly bringing back the word "cameraphone," if the Galaxy S4 Zoom and recently announced Galaxy K Zoom are anything to go by. The newer of the two does a much better job of hiding its hybrid bloodline, and tomorrow (May 31st) it arrives in the UK at various online and bricks-and-mortar outlets, including at Carphone Warehouse and Samsung's own Experience stores. If the official K Zoom product page is any indication, you'll be looking at around £400 all-in, and we doubt they'll be a wealth of carrier-subsidised deals on offer for the niche device. The K Zoom doesn't quite rival the Galaxy S5 in terms of raw power, but it's the 20.7-megapixel camera with 10x optical zoom you'll be buying it for; and, how can you resist something with a Selfie Alarm mode?
Samsung blurs the line between phone and camera (again) with the Galaxy K zoom
Last year, Samsung tried something a little kooky: it made a mash-up of a middling smartphone and a solid point-and-shoot camera (you know, the kind smartphones have nearly driven to extinction). The resulting chimaera was called the Galaxy S4 Zoom, and it was... not great. To absolutely no one's surprise, though, Samsung's fixation on fusion is still going strong and the company's trying to crack the code again with a new camera/phone combo called the Galaxy K zoom. Mildly silly name aside (the "K" stands for "kamera," seriously), the international K zoom packs 2GB of RAM and one of Samsung's hexa-core Exynos chipsets into its chubby, dimpled frame. In this case, the chip combines quad-core 1.3GHz and a dual-core 1.7GHz processors -- the pairing isn't as snappy as a Galaxy S5, but it's still beefy enough to handle most people's daily routines. Toss in 2GB of RAM, 3G and LTE radios, 8GB of internal storage and a spacious 4.8-inch 720p screen and you've got yourself a package that's a bit more robust than most. If the name wasn't a dead giveaway though, the K zoom's 20.7-megapixel BSI CMOS camera sensor is the star of the show here. Samsung's rear shooter is kitted out with optical image stabilization, the ability to shoot 1080p video at 60 frames per second and a slew of software features that aim to make your on-the-go photos less terrible. That all sounds fine enough on paper, but here's the bigger question: what's it like to actually use? Long story short, better than you might expect.
