The Samsung Galaxy Player is the latest Android-based PMP from Samsung. It was showcased at the CES 2011, Las Vegas. This device resembles the Galaxy S smart phone in design but has no call features and instead it focuses on gaming, music and video experience only.
Good?
The Galaxy Player runs on Android 2.2 Froyo powered by a 1GHz CPU. It has access to Samsung Apps and the Android Market so there is a huge number of apps and features, which is cool. This also makes it the first time Google has certified a device without a cellular radio to access the Android Market using just Wi-fi. Users can buy and download movies, music and TV shows etc., by easily accessing the Samsung Media Hub. So, you can browse the web using the Wi-fi, use Google’s available mobile services (like YouTube) and also take shots with the integrated 2 MP camera.
The device has a Super AMOLED 3.2 inch touch screen display with a resolution of 640 x 800 pixels. Therefore, the display quality is excellent and the 3.2 size is wide enough for watching videos. The Galaxy Player can play HD videos with the WMV, H.263, H.264, MPEG 4, DivX and XviD formats. Being AMOLED, the screen display is bright and video viewing is generally pleasant.
For music, the device’s media player supports and plays the MP3, AAC, WAV, WMA and OGG audio formats. This is a big cool factor that users should appreciate. If they haven’t seen why? It supports more formats unlike iPod Touch (limited to iTunes). This player delivers a good sound quality too.
The 2 mega pixel camera captures both still images and record videos. The videos are captured at 320 x 240 pixels resolution and a frame rate of 15 fps. In addition, a Bluetooth 3.0, GPS receiver, Digital Compass, Accelerometer Sensor, micro USB 2.0 port etc are featured in the Galaxy Player.
This device requires no software installation before you can be able to connect it to a computer. So, you can just plug it in, copy and paste or drag and drop music and video files. This feature combined with the multiple codecs available expands the versatility and convenience limits.
Bad?
To start with, the design looks good until you start comparing it around (with say, iPod Touch). One major factor that contributes to this is the plastic built of the Galaxy Player. It just don’t give the sight to behold or the feel of firmness when held. The device’s music player functions rather slowly and lacks anything new to offer. Since music is a basic and major feature in any multimedia player, an upgrade or two would have made it more functional and interesting.
For a multimedia player device today, 8 GB or 16 GB is not the ideal built in storage space you would look for when there are devices offering 32 GB and 64 GB space. The 2 MP camera is low to be incorporated in a device like this for capturing images and recording videos. To make it worse, the camera has few options to impress. The 5 MP camera of the Samsung smart phones could have been added to give the world one more reason to buy it. Hope they do.
The current price tags of Rs. 12,500 (£180) for the 16 GB and Rs. 10,400 (£150) for the 8GB versions are cheaper in comparison to iPod Touch. However, if viewed as a media player (minus other features, for those who are not interested), you can find many other devices who does the same job for a lot lower price tag.
Ugly?
Although good looking and light, if you compare the plastic look and feel of the Galaxy Player’s built to that of other devices that has a metallic one, you might not find the appearance of the Galaxy Player so appealing. The lightweight could be also taken, in a way, for cheapness. The same goes with the touchscreen’s display, in comparison to Apple’s solid retina display.
What do we think?
The Samsung Galaxy Player might appear to fall short in some features and functions in comparison to iPod Touch. However, it has its own various functional advantages too. Its multiple format support is is absolutely laudable. The storage space can be expanded up to 32 GB using microSD cards. The battery of this device can be removed for replacement, a feature absent in its Apple rival. Although it fails to score big with its music player, the rest of the features offer interesting and usable functions.
The thousands of apps with music, games, videos that are downloadable and accessible using the Android market, Google and Samsung Media Hub trio ensures no lack of entertainment and functionality. Those who like the smartphone facilities wouldn’t mind owning it.