Samsung Galaxy S Advance hands-on pictures

Samsung’s Galaxy S Advance is on display at MWC, and we got to take a look at the Android-powered handset.

by David Pierce

Feb 27, 2012, 10:59 AM UTC

Samsung Galaxy S Advance

David Pierce is editor-at-large and Vergecast co-host with over a decade of experience covering consumer tech. Previously, at Protocol, The Wall Street Journal, and Wired.

Samsung's Galaxy S Advance is on display here at Mobile World Congress, and we got to take a look at the device first-hand. The phone was originally announced back in January, and while it doesn't seem likely that we'll ever see the Advance stateside, it's a pretty solid mid-range handset. Its curved body feels a bit like the Galaxy Nexus, and its overall aesthetic reminded me a lot of the Fascinate, one of the original Galaxy S devices. I liked the Fascinate a lot, and this one is nice as well, though its plasticky back does lead to it feeling ever so slightly cheap; that's a problem common to Samsung's phones.

The Advance a physical home button flanked by two capacitive Android keys, similar to many of Samsung’s international handset, underneath a 4-inch, 800 x 480 Super AMOLED display. Though the 1GHz dual-core processor isn’t exactly impressive anymore, the phone runs well, though the fact that it’s running Gingerbread even as Samsung starts to release Android 4.0 devices is a little disheartening. Samsung’s filling out the middle of its phone lineup nicely, and the Advance seems to be a solid option — if it’s available where you are.