Buffed-up Megapixel Celly is Also Good for Calling
Korea’s Samsung Electronics has raised the bar on high-resolution camera phones so far that other handset makers are going to need a ladder to scramble over. The company’s new SCH-S250 handset boasts five (Count ’em: 5!) megapixels. To date, three megapixels has been the industry top — and available in only a very few Korean and Japanese handsets (which hit retail shelves just several short months ago).
The TFT LCD screen can display 16-million colors; shutter speeds hit 1/1000th of a second, and the zoom function guarantees clarity up to 10 centimeters. The company boasts its colors are up to 60 times clearer than previous, wimpy, 1- and 2-megapixel models.
Samsung developed the proprietary technology for their high-pixel-count micro-lens together with Japan’s Asahi Pentax. What about the phone’s calling and audio features? Who cares? Talking is a secondary feature here, folks.
But the phone does also boast an MP3 player, a TV tuner, 92 MB of memory (for up to 100 minutes of video) plus an auxiliary 32-megabyte memory card slot, so the overall package looks pretty solid. Retail price is TBA but you can bet it won’t be cheap; the phones hits store shelves the last week of October.
Will everyone rush out to buy buffed-up, megapixel cellys? No, of course not. But the synergy between cameras and cell phones is so natural that the market just can’t stop innovating. Pressure will be on manufacturers in Japan to get their megapixel ducks lined up especially since Samsung is reportedly working on a ten-megapixel model that should debut in the coming months.