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Samsung Producing 5 Megapixel Camera Phone
Shippy writes "Straight from Yahoo News on the other side of the pond comes a story about Samsung's latest creation: a five-megapixel camera phone. This is pretty cool considering it's a pretty big jump from the camera phones that are currently available (many max out around 1.5 megapixels). It's expected to be available by the end of the year, but only in South Korea. I doubt it'll take long for a domestic carrier to pick up on this hot new toy." Other readers submitted a closeup picture and the company press release.
...has a charge-coupled device camera and high-sensitivity flash which allow users to take high-quality pictures. It can also function as a camcorder.
One of the biggest problems of camera phones is poor flash (if the phone has one AT ALL).
Until phone manufacturers make phones with a good quality Xenon strobe flash, 5 MP still doesn't mean anything if the lighting conditions stink. (See this month's issue of PC World for a little blurb on possible developments of Xenon strobe flashes in camera phones.)
Did anyone notice that the phone uses cdma2000. Carriers such as Verizon, Sprint and US Cellular use CDMA so this phone will work in the US. But the last time I tried to hookup a privately owned CDMA phone with Sprint and US Cellular they refused stating that if it didn't have their company name on the phone then they would activate it. I would hat to spend probably a grand (couldn't find the price) on the phone and not be able to use it. Then again, I don't know which is worse, I would hate going with a mobile phone carrier that wouldn't allow me to activate it.
The definition of megapixel is slippery. Sometimes these companies allow for interpolation for some reason (they are liars!). Some camera, such as the Foveon, only have 3.1 megapixels but behave like a much higher megapixel camera. This one I can't tell about what is the reality.
You can get the pictures off the damn thing.
I recently got myself a Motorola v220. Got a cute little 640x480 camera on it. Only problem is the only way to get the photos from the phone to my computer [or any other storage] is to either buy the 70$ software from motorola [that should have come with the phone] and run windows [something else I don't do] or pay 5 cents per kilobyte to email myself the picture.
So 5M pixel camera is likely to make "slightly larger" files. If I want to pay a couple of bucks to get each photo off the camera this might be a good idea.
Best thing they can do is make the thing act like a usb-disk to get maximum portability.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
...I doubt it'll take long for a domestic carrier to pick up on this hot new toy
Uhhh....where have you been for say, the entire history of the wireless world? Japan and South Korea have consistantly been about two years ahead of the US in this technology. The blame almost surely rests on the shoulders of the carriers, with about 25% of that being the consumers fault. Why would Motorola spend big dollars licensing that tech when consumers are still perfectly happy shelling out $300 for phones with 0.3MP camera's in them? The same argument applies to the rest of the market.
We, the consumers are locked into a rut where we don't quite have the money to start pushing the 6 month product cycle. Until we start upgrading our phone everytime a new model comes out, the carriers are still going to maintain high prices with slow product upgrades. Right now the mentality is that the average cell user signs a year contract and then never upgrades the phone during that year. With no drive to upgrade, there is no drive to innovate. With no innovation, there is no competition. With no competition, prices will stay rediculously high. And we, the consumer, will keep paying $300 for 2 year old technology.
I've dirtied my hands writing poetry, for the sake of seduction; that is, for the sake of a useful cause. --Dostoevsky