Jørgen Sundgot glares at Samsung's new gaming phone, the SPH-G1000, featuring a QVGA display, hardware 3D acceleration and more.
Games are popular. Phones are popular. Ergo, 1 plus 1 should equal 2, right? Wrong. A number of manufacturers have applied themselves at this rather simple piece of math, but to date none have performed particularly well (sorry, Nokia, but the N-Gage II still isn't quite there yet). So what happens when Korean superstar Samsung has a go at merging the two popular, yet apparently incompatible areas of interest? Let's find out.
Quite possibly an attempt to upstage
LG's SV360 gaming phone, shown at this year's 3GSM World Congress, Samsung's bid for gaming fame is the SPH-G1000, a Korea-only model which boasts a slider design and medium-to-large display and hardware 3D acceleration. Unlike the SV360, however, the SPH-G1000 appears to be equally balanced between being a mobile phone and gaming device, whereas the SV360 is first and foremost the latter.
 | | Samsung SPH-G1000 |
This is the first sign that those looking for a hardcore gaming experience should look elsewhere - if the handset is ever released in outside Korea, that is. Also, in the name of fairness, Samsung likely did not develop the SPH-G1000 in a bid to replace the Nintendo DS or PlayStation Portable. LG can rest easy as well; the SV360 is
Comparisons aside, however, gaming on the SPH-G1000 proved a surprisingly comfortable experience thanks to the superb QVGA screen and surprisingly good ergonomics - although buttons were a bit too small. Graphics performance was quite good thanks to hardware 3D acceleration, and audio through the dual stereo speakers was loud and clear. Apparently, the SPH-G1000 also supports TV out, but this particular feature was not being demonstrated at CeBIT, which was where I managed to sneak in a few minutes of playtime.
 | | Samsung SPH-G1000 |
A CDMA2000 1xRTT handset, the SPH-G1000 also offers more common features such as a 1.3 Megapixel camera with flash, and the ability to both shoot stills and record video in MPEG4 format. It also doubles as an MP3 player, and has the 64-chord polyphonic ringtones commonly found in recent Samsung models.
For those seeking memory expansion, RS-MMC is the format of choice, and according to Samsung the SPH-G1000 also supports wireless gaming over WAN - again, a feature that couldn't be tested at CeBIT due to the lack of a working CDMA network.
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