Samsung Galaxy S III Mini to Launch in UK November 8

News
By Jane McEntegart
published

Retailers say the device will ship the second week of November.

It's been over a week since Samsung officially unveiled the Galaxy S III mini at an event in Germany. The smaller brother to the hugely successful Galaxy S III, the mini is already up for pre-order at several UK retailers, though Samsung itself didn't give an official launch date at the unveiling.

Despite initial reports pointing to an earlier release, it seems retailers are settling on a November 8 ship date for the phone. Carphone Warehouse and Phones 4u both list the 8th as the ship date for pre-orders. Meanwhile, Clove offers a little more information, revealing that the white model will ship on November 8 but the blue model won't be available for almost three weeks after, on November 26. Still no word on a U.S. release but we'll keep you posted.

The Galaxy S III Mini packs a 1GHz dual-core processor, 1GB RAM, a 4-inch, WVGA AMOLED screen, 8 or 16GB (up to 32GB of external via microSD), a 5-megapixel camera, a front-facing camera for video chat, 802.11a/b/g/n WiFi, GPS, and NFC. At its launch, Samsung said that it was inspired to create a smaller Galaxy S III after research indicated a strong desire for the 4-inch form factor.

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Jane McEntegart
10 Comments Comment from the forums
  • "Even people on social support seem to afford our flagship phone, and it is out-selling pretty much every phone in history. How can we possibly screw up bad enough to let the competition catch up?"

    "I know! Instead of continuing to improve our flagship product so that it can possibly even dominate the iPhone5, once we make a couple software improvements, let's waste our money and create a hampered, inferior version of the same product.

    This version will be completely clobbered when it is compared to.. well.. virtually any other model out there, and all that wasted money will take valuable focus away from pushing our flagship, currently dominating model!".

    "Great Idea!"
    Reply
  • hate machine
    Choice.
    Reply
  • thefizzle656
    Deceptive marketing as this phone doesn't share much in common with the real SGIII except for the design. People wanting a smaller phone will probably pick this up thinking it is the same thing just with a smaller screen. It would be like Apple re-releasing the 4S as the 5 Mini.
    Reply
  • house70
    Since when is a smaller version the equivalent of a "dumbed"-down version?
    Samsung needs to focus on Nexus 10, not this stuff. Hell, they could even come up with their own version of a Nexus Phone. You know, to replace the aging Galaxy Nexus.
    Reply
  • falchard
    I think Samsung is going to take a daring new naming convention for its Galaxy lines of phone. After several victories against Apple, I think they are going to call this phone the Samsung gPhone 3S Mini
    Reply
  • invlem
    I'm confused, they really need to fix their naming on this phone. Its slower than the both the S3 AND the S2...

    I'd be alright with the naming convention if it fell somewhere in between the S2 and S3 phones on a performance level, but the hardware slower than a phone they launched over a year and a half ago...
    Reply
  • And there you go, everyone who spoke out against their decision to focus on the mini was shot down in the votes. Guess there are some Samsung employees in the crowd: Sorry fellas, burying your head in the sand won't work, you need to own up to your missteps.

    Reply
  • Misdissident
    How about an actually GOOD mini phone? I'd *love* an android phone in the 3.0-3.6" screen size range that has a great screen (great DPI) and top-end powerful hardware. For icing on the sandwich, throw in a good hardware keyboard. Why do mini phones always have to be middling? How is 4" "mini"? I'd like the iPhone if it didn't run an OS that I get irritated with when using.

    It's depressing that the HP Veer is the only device of this kind that I'd actually use at the moment. Actually, maybe not so, since the only things that actually aren't very good about it are the screen quality and camera. Otherwise, the OS flies on it, runs surprisingly quick/snappy, multitasks like a champ, and the keyboard is surprisingly usable; I'd like to see something similar on Android that doesn't pull any punches.
    Reply
  • EDVINASM
    falchardI think Samsung is going to take a daring new naming convention for its Galaxy lines of phone. After several victories against Apple, I think they are going to call this phone the Samsung gPhone 3S Mini
    Asians are bold but not stupid (meaning Samsung here). Naming like Mountain Lion, Time Capsule and other "Magic" gizmos that Apple embraces so much would not stick to Samsung. I mean come on guys.. Really?
    Reply
  • "Samsung said that it was inspired to create a smaller Galaxy S III after research indicated a strong desire for the 4-inch form factor". Thats a very similar form factor to the Iphone 5. Really just stick with the S3's size, it is great. Now you will get accused of copying the Iphone. I thought the whole purpose of the S3 was the bigger screen.

    Reply