Samsung
G800

The G800 was an evolution of the G600 which was announced in July 2007. It introduced a number of new features within its stainless steel slider form factor including support for HSDPA 3.6Mbps data speeds (compared to GSM/GPRS/EDGE in the G600), a 262K colour display with QVGA resolution and a 160MB internal memory. However, most significant were the imaging specific additions to the device. The most prominent of these was the inclusion of optical zoom support. The G800 was a landmark device as it is the first camera phone in Western Europe to extend beyond digital to optical zoom. The complexity of integrating optical zoom and the implications in terms of device size and battery life meant that it had been among the last features of dedicated digital cameras to move into mobile phones. The 3x optical zoom operated internally within the device saving space and ensuring a high level of durability. The G800 also matched features included in products from Nokia and Sony Ericsson at the time with the inclusion of a xenon flash and an improvement to the camera user interface which was designed to offer a user experience similar to that of dedicated digital cameras. Samsung also expanded the imaging software capabilities of the device with the addition of features including wide dynamic range (WDR), face detection, mobile blogging / upload support (which was powered by a service called ShoZu) and video editing software. The introduction of Samsung’s second five-megapixel phone exacerbated the competitive intensity of a camera-phone segment which had grown substantially following the launch of Nokia’s N95.