On May 9, 2011, Samsung announced that they had received pre-orders for 3 million Galaxy S II units globally.[15]
In some time after the device's release, Samsung also released a Nvidia Tegra 2 powered Samsung Galaxy R (or 'Galaxy Z' in Sweden) variant version. The release of the Galaxy R 'GT-I9103' corroborated with early pre-release reports of an Nvidia powered Galaxy S II smartphone.[16][17] Eldar Murtazin, of Mobile-Review.com, hinted that Samsung might have faced delays in meeting worldwide shipment of both its Exynos chip and Super AMOLED Plus screens. He noted that nobody expected the "huge success" and "sky high" demand for the previous Samsung Galaxy S.[18]
Different regions around the world have received this device to market beginning from the earliest of May 2011.
Asia/Pacific
| Country | Release date |
|---|---|
| Australia | June 1, 2011 |
| Hong Kong | June 14, 2011 |
| Israel | July 3, 2011 |
| India | June 8, 2011[19] |
| Iran | June 1, 2011 |
| Iraq | July 18, 2011[citation needed] |
| Japan | June 23, 2011 |
| Lebanon | June 21, 2011 |
| Malaysia | June 22, 2011 |
| Pakistan | July 23, 2011[20] |
| Philippines | June 27, 2011 |
| Singapore | June 24, 2011 |
| South Korea | April 29, 2011 |
| Taiwan | June 17, 2011 |
| Thailand | July 8, 2011 |
| UAE | June 22, 2011 |
North America
| Country | Carrier | Release date | Variant |
|---|---|---|---|
| Canada | Bell Mobility, Virgin Mobile Canada | July, 2011[21][22] | Samsung Galaxy S II 4G |
| Canada | Telus | October, 2011 | Samsung Galaxy S II X[citation needed] |
| Canada | Rogers Wireless | November, 2011 | Samsung Galaxy S II LTE (i727R) |
| Mexico | Telcel | June, 2011[23] | Samsung Galaxy II LTE |
| United States | Sprint | September 16, 2011 | Samsung 'EPIC 4G Touch'[24] |
| United States | AT&T | November 6, 2011 | Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket i727 |
| United States | T-Mobile | October 12, 2011 | Samsung Galaxy S II T-Mobile |
| Caribbean | Digicel | December 21, 2011 | Samsung Galaxy S II Digicel |
South America
| Country | Release date |
|---|---|
| Chile | May 25, 2011 |
| Brazil | June 28, 2011 |
| Argentina | August 22, 2011 |
Africa
| Country | Release date |
|---|---|
| South Africa | June, 2011[25] |
| Uganda | September, 2011[citation needed] |
Europe
| Country | Release date |
|---|---|
| Austria | May 5, 2011 |
| Denmark | May 19, 2011 |
| Belgium | June 1, 2011 |
| Finland | May 25, 2011 |
| France | June 23, 2011 |
| Germany | May 16, 2011 |
| Hungary | June 1, 2011 |
| Ireland | June 1, 2011 |
| Italy | May 25, 2011 |
| Netherlands | May 11, 2011 |
| Norway | May 26, 2011 |
| Portugal | June 8, 2011 |
| Romania | May 26, 2011 |
| Russia | May 18, 2011 |
| Spain | May 15, 2011 |
| Sweden | May 12, 2011 |
| Turkey | June 9, 2011 |
| UK | May 1, 2011 |
Hardware
Processor
The Galaxy S II has a 1.2 GHz dual core ARM Cortex-A9 processor that uses Samsung's own 'Exynos 4210' System on a chip (SoC) that was previously code-named "Orion".The Exynos branded SoC was the source of much speculation concerning another branded successor to the previous "Hummingbird" single-core SoC of the Samsung Galaxy S. The Exynos 4210 uses ARM's Mali-400 MP GPU.[2][26] This graphics GPU, supplied by ARM, is a move away from the PowerVR GPU of the Samsung Galaxy S.[27]
The Exynos 4210 supports ARM's SIMD engine (also known as Media Processing Engine, or 'NEON' instructions), and may give a significant performance advantage in critical performance situations such as accelerated decoding for many multimedia codecs and formats (e.g., On2's VP6/7/8 or Real formats).[28][29][30]
At the 2011 Game Developers Conference ARM's representatives demonstrated 60 Hz framerate playback in stereoscopic 3D running on the same Mali-400 MP and Exynos SoC. They said that an increased framerate of 70 Hz would be possible through the use of an HDMI 1.4 port.[26]
The Motorola Atrix advertised in June 2011 that it was "the world's most powerful smartphone"; in August 2011 the UK Advertising Standards Authority ruled that the Atrix was not as powerful as Galaxy SII due to its faster processor.[31]
A newer Samsung Galaxy S II (i9100G) uses a 1.2 Ghz dual core TI OMAP 4430 processor with PowerVR SGX540 graphics.[32]
Memory
The Galaxy S II has 1 GB of dedicated RAM (in either LPDDR or possibly DDR2/DDR3 by Samsung) and 16 GB of internal mass storage. Within the battery compartment there is an external microSD card slot.Display
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Audio
The Galaxy S II uses Yamaha audio hardware.[35] The Galaxy S II's predecessor, the original Galaxy S, used Wolfson's WM8994 DAC.[36] User feedback on Internet forums as well as an in-depth review at Clove,[35] have expressed the Yamaha chip's inferior sound quality compared to that of the Wolfson chip featured in the original Galaxy S.Camera
On the back of the device is an 8-megapixel Back-illuminated sensor[37] camera with single-LED flash that can record videos in full high-definition 1080p at 30 frames per second. There is also a fixed focus front-facing 2-megapixel camera for video calling, taking photos as well as general video recording, with a maximum resolution of VGA (640×480).Connectivity
The Galaxy S II is one of the earliest Android devices to natively support near field communication (NFC).[38] This follows on from the Google Nexus S which was the first de-facto NFC smartphone device.[39] It has been reported that the UK version will be supplied without an NFC chip at the beginning of its production run,[40] with an NFC-equipped version released later in 2011.[41]Samsung has also included a new high-definition connection technology called Mobile High-definition Link (MHL). The main specialty of MHL is that it is optimized for mobile devices by allowing the device's battery to be charged while at the same time playing back multimedia content.[42] For the Galaxy S II, the industry standard micro USB port found on the bottom of the device can be used with an MHL connector for a TV out connection to an external display, such as a high definition television.[43]
The micro USB port on this device also supports USB On-The-Go (USB OTG) standard which means the Galaxy S II can act as a 'host' device in the same way as a desktop computer in allowing external USB devices to be plugged in and used.[10] These external USB devices typically include USB flash drives and separately powered external hard drives. A video demonstration on YouTube[44] has shown the OTG function to be readily available with an ordinary micro USB (B-type) OTG adaptor. The same YouTube video goes on to mention a successful test completed on a 2 TB USB external hard drive (requiring own power source) but however reports of failure when trying to connect USB keyboards, tested USB mice and tested USB game pads. Currently the only file-system supported for USB drives within OTG is Fat32.
A 3.5 mm TRRS headset jack is available and is located on the top side of the device. The micro USB connection port is located on the bottom side of the device.
BCM4330 combo chip integrates 802.11n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 3.0 + HS and FM radio. BCM4330 supports Wi-Fi Direct that communicate directly with one another without having to interact with an access point.[45]
Accessories (optional)
- Dock connector for battery charging and audio-visual output[46]
- MHL cable which makes use of the device's micro USB port for HDMI output[46]
- USB OTG adaptor for use with external USB devices such as USB flash drives.[10]
- Stylus pen for use on the device's capacitive screen.[46] Support for a stylus on the Galaxy S II is precursor to the Samsung Galaxy Note.Software
Android operating system
The Galaxy S II ships with Android's 2.3 (Gingerbread) installed.[4]Samsung Galaxy S II US variants begun shipments with the slightly updated Android 2.3.5 (Gingerbread) installed.[47][48] The Android 2.3.6 firmware update from Samsung was made globally available from Dec 12 2011.[49]
In December 2011, Samsung confirmed that it would offer a firmware update to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) within the first quarter of 2012.[50][51]
