Samsung Galaxy S4

Samsung Galaxy S4

"Black Mist" Galaxy S4
Manufacturer	Samsung Electronics
Slogan	Life companion Live in a world of infinite possibilities
Series	Galaxy S
Model	GT-I9500 (Chipset - Exynos 5 Octa 5410 CPU - Quad-core 1.6 GHz Cortex-A15 & quad-core 1.2 GHz Cortex-A7 GPU - PowerVR SGX 544MP3) GT-I9505 (quad core Snapdragon 600, LTE) SHV-E300K/S/L (Korean; Exynos 5 Octa core, LTE)
Compatible networks	2.5G GSM/GPRS/EDGE – 850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz 2.5G CDMA 1xRTT/1x-Advanced - 800, 1900 MHz 3G UMTS/HSPA+ – 850, 900, 1900, 2100 MHz 3G CDMA Ev-DO Rev. A - 800, 1900 MHz (select carrier models also support the AWS 1700/2100 MHz band) 4G LTE Rel. 8 (UE Cat 3) – 700, 800, 1700, 1800, 1900, 2600 MHz or up to 6 different band sets (dependent on market) FDD, TDD (dual mode version)
First released	26 April 2013 (2013-04-26)
Predecessor	Samsung Galaxy S III
Related	Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini, Samsung Galaxy Note 3
Type	Touchscreen smartphone
Form factor	Slate
Dimensions	136.6 mm (5.38 in) H 69.8 mm (2.75 in) W 7.9 mm (0.31 in) D
Mass	130 g (4.6 oz)
Operating system	Android 4.2.2 "Jelly Bean"
System-on-chip	Samsung Exynos 5 Octa (GT-I9500 and SHV-E300S version) Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 (GT-I9505 version)
CPU	1.6 GHz quad-core Cortex-A15 and 1.2 GHz quad-core Cortex-A7 (GT-I9500 version) 1.9 GHz quad-core Krait 300 (GT-I9505 version)
GPU	IT tri-core PowerVR SGX 544 GPU (GT-I9500 version) Adreno 320 (GT-I9505 version)
Memory	2 GB LPDDR3 RAM
Storage	16, 32 or 64 GB
Removable storage	Up to 64 GB microSDXC
Battery	2600 mAh Li-ion User replaceable Qi wireless charging (optional)
Display	5 in (130 mm) Pentile RGBG Full HD Super AMOLED 441 ppi (1920×1080) Corning Gorilla Glass 3.0
Sound	Mono speaker with Qualcomm DAC or Wolfson Micro WM5102 audio chip depending on version.
Rear camera	13 megapixels 1080p Full HD Video Recording @ 30fps Back-illuminated sensor, Auto focus, Touch to focus, Digital image stabilization, Face detection, Smile detection, Exposure compensation, White balance presets, Digital zoom, Geo tagging, High Dynamic Range mode (HDR), Panorama, Scenes, Effects, Self-timer, Voice activation
Front camera	2 megapixels 1080p HD Video Recording @ 30fps Back-illuminated sensor
Connectivity	List Wi-Fi :802.11 a/b/g/n/ac (2.4/5 GHz) Wi-Fi Direct Wi-Fi hotspot DLNA Miracast GPS/GLONASS NFC Bluetooth 4.0 Infrared VLC USB 2.0 (Micro-B port, USB charging) USB OTG 1.3 MHL 2.0 HDMI (TV-out, via MHL A\V link) 3.5 millimetres (0.14 in) headphone jack
Other	Accelerometer, Barometer, Gesture sensor, Gyroscope, Hall effect sensor, Hygrometer, Magnetometer, Proximity sensor, RGB light sensor, Thermometer
SAR	GT-I9500 version: US 0.85 W/kg (head) 1.55 W/kg (body) EU 0.42 W/kg (head) 0.54 W/kg (body) GT-I9505 version: US 0.77 W/kg (head) 1.17 W/kg (body) EU 0.28 W/kg (head) 0.40 W/kg (body)
Website	Samsung.com/global/microsite/galaxys4/
References

The Samsung Galaxy S4 is a high-end, Android smartphone produced by Samsung Electronics. First unveiled on March 13, 2013 at Samsung Mobile Unpacked in New York City, it is a successor to the Galaxy S III which maintains a similar design, but with upgraded hardware and an increased focus on software features that take advantage of its hardware capabilities—such as the ability to detect when a finger is hovered over the screen, and expanded eye tracking functionality (which includes scrolling). A hardware variant of the Galaxy S4 also became the first ever smartphone to support the emerging LTE Advanced mobile network standard.

The S4 was made available in late April 2013 on 327 carriers in 155 countries. Upon its release, it became the fastest selling smartphone in Samsung's history; the company sold 20 million Galaxy S4 units worldwide in the two months following the device's launch.

Specifications

Hardware

The screen features a 5-inch (130 mm) (sometimes stated as 4.99-inch) PenTile RGBG Full HD Super AMOLED screen with 441 pixels per inch and Corning Gorilla Glass 3.

The S4 comes with either 16 GB, 32 GB or 64 GB of internal storage, which can be supplemented with up to an additional 64 GB with a microSD card slot.

The S4 GT-I9505 includes a multiband LTE transceiver and both models feature an infrared LED that can serve as a universal remote control. In June 2013, a version of the S4 was released in South Korea with support for LTE Advanced networks. It is the first smartphone ever produced with support for LTE Advanced. This model includes a quad-core 2.3GHz Krait Snapdragon 800 processor.

Built into the 2600 mAh battery is near field communication (NFC) connectivity, which allows users to perform non-touch payments at shops that employ specially equipped NFC cash registers. The SC-04E model has a FeliCa secure element, unlike other models which contain an NFC-A secure element. The NFC-A secure element on the SC-04E is provided on the SIM card. The battery also supports wireless charging through the Qi standard.

The Galaxy S4 supports the High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) video format.

In addition to the touchscreen, the S4 has several physical user inputs including a home button located near the bottom of the screen, at the bottom of the S4 is the primary microphone and the microUSB port for both data connections and charging; it also supports USB host and MHL 2.0. There are volume keys on the left side and a power/lock key on the right. At the top there is a 0.14-inch (3.6 mm) headphone jack, the secondary microphone, and infrared blaster. The backside of the S4 has the 13-megapixel camera lens and LED flash, and at the bottom left edge has the loudspeaker.

Samsung's official accessory for the S4, the S-View Cover, utilizes a hall effect sensor in the phone which detects when the cover is closed and displays battery status, time, and other phone statuses in an area of the screen visible through a window on the cover.

Notably, the S4 does not include an FM radio receiver, as previous models did.

Samsung Galaxy S4 Retail Box with the S View Cover

The S4 comes in two variants that differ primarily in the internal hardware:

Quad-core variant

This S4 version for North America, most of Europe, parts of Asia, and other countries has Qualcomm's Snapdragon 600 SoC containing a quad-core 1.9 GHz Krait 300 CPU and an Adreno 320 GPU.

Octa-core variant

Further information: Exynos and Big.little

This S4 version has Samsung's Exynos 5 Octa (octa-core) system on a chip (SoC) chip containing the first ARM Big.little heterogeneous architecture central processing unit (CPU). The eight core CPU comprises a 1.6 GHz quad-core Cortex-A15 cluster and 1.2 GHz quad-core Cortex-A7 cluster. The cluster of four faster "big" A15 cores is paired with the cluster of four slower, more power-efficient "LITTLE" A7 cores. At any given time, only four cores will be active, either the quad Cortex A15, quad Cortex A7 or a mix between them. The switching of the active cluster is performed on demand by the chip firmware, with the migration of the running software from outgoing to incoming cores taking 20 µs. The CPU emulates a single quad-core processor to the operating system and applications. The SoC also contains an IT tri-core PowerVR SGX 544 graphics processing unit (GPU). The GT-I9500 version of the S4 does not support LTE. The E300K/L/S versions support LTE, with the Cortex-A15 also clocked at 1.6 GHz.

Software

Further information: Android (operating system), TouchWiz, and S Voice

The Galaxy S4 ships with Android 4.2.2 and Samsung's TouchWiz Nature user experience. Eye tracking features have been extended on the S4; the new "Smart Scroll" feature can be used to scroll while looking at the screen by slightly tilting the phone, and "Smart Pause" allows the video player to pause videos if the user is not looking at the screen. "Air View" implements gestures and other functionality (such as previewing images or messages) by holding or swiping a hand or finger slightly above the screen. The "Group Play" feature allows ad hoc sharing of files between Galaxy phones, along with multiplayer games and music streaming between Galaxy S4 phones. The S4 also introduces Knox, a suite of features which implements a sandbox for enterprise environments that can co-exist with a user's "personal" data. Knox also incorporates use of the ARM TrustZone extensions and security enhancements to the Android platform.

The camera app implements numerous new features (some of which were first seen on the Galaxy Camera), including an updated interface, and new modes such as "Drama" (which composes a moving element from multiple shots into a single photo), "Eraser" (which takes multiple shots and allows the user to remove unnecessary elements from a picture), "Dual Shot" (which uses the front-facing camera for a picture-in-picture effect), "Sound and Shot" (which allows the user to record a voice clip alongside a photo), "Animated Photo", and "Story Album" among others. Other new pre-loaded apps include WatchOn (an electronic program guide that can utilize an infrared transmitter on the top of the phone as a TV remote), S Translator, the workout tracker S Health, S Voice Drive, S Memo, TripAdvisor, and an optical character recognition app.

Updates

Between June–July 2013, Samsung began rolling out an update to the firmware; the update allows apps to be moved to the SD card, freed 80 megabytes of space, adds stability to the camera, and adds a new feature that increases legibility on the display. For the S4 variants on AT&T and Verizon, this update removed the ability to apply the previous bootloader exploit known as "Loki".

In early August 2013, the Google Play Edition variant of the S4 began to receive an update to Android 4.3. By the end of 2013, Samsung plans to release updates to Android 4.3 to all of the carrier S4 variants.

Model variants

Model	GT-I9500	SHV-E300K/L/S	GT-I9505	GT-I9505G	SGH-I337	SGH-M919	SCH-I545	SPH-L720	SCH-R970	GT-I9508	SCH-I959	GT-I9502	SGH-N045 (SC-04E)	GT-I9506
Countries	International	South Korea	International	United States						China			Japan	International
Carriers	International	KT, LG U+, SK Telecom	International (LTE)	Carrier-Free	AT&T	T-Mobile, MetroPCS	Verizon	Sprint	U.S. Cellular	China Mobile	China Telecom	China Unicom	NTT docomo	International (LTE)
2G	850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz GSM / GPRS / EDGE	900, 1800, 1900 MHz GSM / GPRS / EDGE	850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz GSM / GPRS / EDGE				CDMA 850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz GSM / GPRS / EDGE		CDMA	900, 1800, 1900 MHz GSM / GPRS / EDGE		850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz GSM / GPRS / EDGE
3G	850, 900 MHz, PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	850, 900 MHz, PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	850, AWS, PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	850 MHz, PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	850 MHz, AWS, PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	800, 1900 MHz EVDO Rev. A 850, 900 MHz, PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+		800, AWS, 1900 MHz EVDO Rev. A	1880, 2010 MHz TD-SCDMA 900 MHz, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	800, 1900 MHz EVDO Rev. A	850, 900 MHz, PCS, IMT UMTS / HSPA+	800 MHz, IMT UMTS / HSPA+
4G LTE	No	K: GSM, DCS L: CLR, IMT S: CLR, DCS	800, 850, GSM, 1800 MHz, IMT, IMT-E	700 MHz (Band 17), CLR, AWS, PCS	700 MHz (Band 17), AWS, IMT, IMT-E	700 MHz (Band 17), CLR, AWS, PCS, IMT, IMT-E	750 MHz (Band 13), AWS	Extended PCS	700 MHz (Band 12), CLR, AWS, PCS	No			800 MHz, PDC, IMT
Max network speed	DC-HSPA+: 42 Mbit/s	LTE: 100 Mbit/s										DC-HSPA+: 42 Mbit/s	LTE: 100 Mbit/s
Broadcast receiver		T-DMB											1seg ISDB-Tmm
Dimensions	Template:Convert/3
Weight	130 g (4.6 oz)	133 g (4.7 oz)	130 g (4.6 oz)								132 g (4.7 oz)		134 g (4.7 oz)
Operating system	Android 4.2.2 with TouchWiz "Nature UX 2.0" graphical user interface			Android 4.2.2 with Nexus graphical user interface	Android 4.2.2 with TouchWiz "Nature UX 2.0" graphical user interface
Wi-Fi	Broadcom BCM4335 a/b/g/n/ac + Bluetooth + FM
GPS	Broadcom BCM47521		Qualcomm										Qualcomm
NFC	Broadcom BCM2079x				Broadcom BCM2079x
SoC	Samsung Exynos 5 Octa Exynos 5410		Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 APQ8064T								Samsung Exynos 5 Octa Exynos 5410		Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 APQ8064T
CPU	1.6 GHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A15 & 1.2 GHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A7		1.9 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Krait 300								1.6 GHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A15 & 1.2 GHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A7		1.9 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Krait 300
GPU	IT SGX544MP3		Qualcomm Adreno 320								IT SGX544MP3		Qualcomm Adreno 320
RAM	2 GB
Storage	16/32/64 GB												32 GB
SAR US	Head: 0.85 W/Kg Body: 1.55 W/Kg		Head: 0.77 W/Kg Body: 1.17 W/Kg	Head: 0.84 W/Kg Body: 1.18 W/Kg	Head: 0.84 W/Kg Body: 1.18 W/Kg	Head: 1.03 W/Kg Body: 1.31 W/Kg	Head: 0.75 W/Kg Body: 1.43 W/Kg	Head: 0.98 W/Kg Body: 1.58 W/Kg	Head: 0.96 W/Kg Body: 1.23 W/Kg

Google Play Edition

At the Google I/O 2013 keynote, Samsung and Google revealed that an edition of the U.S. Galaxy S4 would be released on June 26, 2013 through Google Play, featuring stock Android 4.2.2 with Samsung provided updates; it has an unlockable bootloader (similar to Nexus devices) and supports LTE on AT&T and T-Mobile's networks. The model number is GT-I9505G.

Verizon Developer Edition

A Developer Edition of the 16 GB mist black S4 was released for users on Verizon, exclusively from Samsung's website on June 25, 2013. This variant ships with an unlocked bootloader, which can be used for the development and installation of custom ROMs.

Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom

In July 2013, Samsung released a smartphone Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom with Optical Zoom 10x (24–240 mm eq. 35 mm in film camera) with f/3.1-6.3 plus optical image stabilizer and a standard xenon flash. The device looks more camera than a smartphone, but it's still pocketable. The drawbacks of the phone features suggest the device can be categorized as Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini. Uses 1/2.33-inch 16 MP BSI-CMOS sensor and Auto and Manual setting, and also capable to take stereo video in Full HD 1080p30, 720p60 and so on, the device can be categorized as a low/mid end point-and-shoot camera or maybe bridge camera.

Samsung Galaxy S4 Active

On 21 June 2013, Samsung exclusively released the "Active" variant on AT&T that has a water-resistant IP 67 case, shock resistance, LCD screen, three hardware buttons, and an 8-megapixel camera. It has the same software as the SGH-I337 on AT&T. The model number is GT-I9295.

Reception

Critical reception

The Galaxy S4 received mostly positive reviews. GigaOM's Tofel says he would recommend the S4 "without hesitation" and says that it's "Samsung's defining phone". ReadWrite's Rowinski described the phone as a "solid smartphone," but criticised Samsung's use of "bloatware, pre-loaded apps and features that you will likely never use," but called the S4 "a first-rate smartphone." Time's McCraken says the S4 is a smartphone with everything, it has the biggest screen and the most built-in features. He wishes the S4 marks the end of Samsung's plan to just add too many new features with its flagship smartphones.

Technology journalist Walt Mossberg described the S4 as "a good phone, just not a great one". Mossberg wrote "while I admire some of its features, overall, it isn’t a game-changer." Mossberg criticized the software as "especially weak" and "often gimmicky, duplicative of standard Android apps, or, in some cases, only intermittently functional." He urged readers to "consider the more polished-looking, and quite capable, HTC One, rather than defaulting to the latest Samsung."

Consumer Reports named the Galaxy S4 as the top smartphone due to its screen quality, multitasking support, and built-in IR blaster.

Despite only using about 1 GB more than the S III, critics noted that about half of the internal storage on the S4's 16 GB model was taken up by its system software; leaving only 8 to 9.15 GB for the storage of downloaded apps (some of which cannot be moved to the SD card) and other data. Samsung initially stated that the space was required for the S4's new features, but following a report regarding the issue on the BBC series Watchdog, Samsung stated that it would review the possibility of optimising the S4's operating system to use less local drive space in a future update. Storage optimizations were brought in an update first released in June 2013, which frees 80 MB of internal storage, and restores the ability to move apps to the device's SD card.

Commercial reception

The S4 reached 10 million pre-orders from retailers in the first two weeks after its announcement. In the United States, this prompted Samsung to announce that due to larger than expected demand, the roll out of devices on U.S. carriers Sprint and T-Mobile would be slower than expected.

The S4 sold 4 million in 4 days and 10 million in 27 days making it the fastest selling smartphone in Samsung's history and the fastest selling Android device in history. The Samsung Galaxy S III sold 4 million units in 21 days, the Samsung Galaxy S II took 55 days, and the Samsung Galaxy S took 85 days.

Samsung shipped more than 20 million Galaxy S4 smartphones by June 30, which is around 1.7 times faster than the Galaxy S III.

See also

• Samsung Galaxy S series
• HTC One
• Sony Xperia Z
• LG G2

External links

• Official website