Samsung announce the Galaxy Camera 2

I was a fan of the original Galaxy Camera, it had a decent camera, a huge optical zoom and you could slot a Micro SIM card in it, the few weeks I had with it were pretty good fun. When I heard rumours of a successor last year I was a little bit excited, then I saw the Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom and I instantly lost all interest.

Samsung announce the Galaxy Camera 2

Yesterday Samsung announced the next successor in the range, the Galaxy Camera 2. Upon seeing it I instantly became interested again. So what is different this time round? Well here are the specs for starters:

  • Image Sensor – 16.3 effective megapixel 1/2.3″ BSI CMOS
  • Lens – 21x Optical Zoom Lens, 23 mm Wide Angle, F2.8(W) ~ 5.9(T)
  • Display – 121.2mm (4.8-inch), HD Super Clear Touch LCD Screen
  • ISO – Auto, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200
  • 1.6GHz Quad Core Processor
  • Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean)
  • Memory – 8GB Internal memory + microSD slot (up to 64GB) 2GB RAM 
  • Value-added Features – Smart Mode : 28 modes (Smart mode suggest, Beauty face, Best Photo, Selfie Alarm, Continuous shot, Best face, Color bracket, Kids shot, Landscape, Dawn, Snow, Macro, Food, Party/Indoor, Action freeze, Rich tone (HDR), Panorama, Waterfall, Animated photo, Drama, Eraser, Sound&Shot, Interval, Silhouette, Sunset, Night, Fireworks, Light trace)
  • Built-in Pop-up Xenon Flash
  • Connectivity – WiFi a/b/g/n, WiFi HT40, GPS/GLONASS, Bluetooth® 4.0 , NFC
  • Sensors – Accelerometer, Geo-magnetic, Gyro-sensor, Gyro-sensor(for OIS)
  • Dimensions – (WxHxD) 132.5 x 71.2 x 19.3 mm, 283g
  • Battery – Li-on 2000mAh

So the new Galaxy Camera comes with an improved lense, improved sensor, OIS, an improved Processor and a whole load of software “enhancements”. It could be a really good device, especially now it has OIS and improved optics, there is no mention of it having a SIM card this time though, so we’ll have to see if they release a 3G model.

As of yet there are no prices or mentions of availability, Samsung will be showing the camera off at CES next week so expect some more promotional material from them. In the meantime here are a load of press images.

So a quick question before you move on to something else, would you prefer a camera running a smartphone OS or a smartphone with a killer camera? I have jumped back and forth between these two so much recently and owning a Nokia Lumia 1020 I think I know which camp I’m in.