Would You Buy a Curved Smartphone? Samsung Experiments With New 'Galaxy Round' Phone With a curved display, the phone touts motion-activated features and customizability.
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If the form factor on your slab-style smartphone simply isn't cutting it anymore, Samsung is betting that it has exactly what you need. The tech giant has announced the Galaxy Round -- what the company says is the first smartphone with a curved display.
Why would anyone want or need a phone with a curved display? Samsung says the 5.7-inch screen -- which gently bends inward from left to right -- "offers a comfortable hand grip feeling to [the] user."
So, it's about ergonomics. A phone with a slight curve could presumably fit more easily in a person's hand and therefore reduce the likelihood of it being dropped.
Beyond that, we're not sure what the benefits could be. When asked about it, a Samsung representative simply said this in an email: "We don't have further details."
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The Round is initially being sold only in Korea for about $1,000 without a contract. The phone might not land in the U.S. for some time.
More about the phone: It runs on Samsung's version of the Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean) operating system. The software that runs on the Galaxy Round makes use of its unique shape with features like the "roll effect" that briefly pops up information such as time and date, messages or missed calls when a user tilts his or her phone to one side or the other. When music is playing, a user can switch between tracks in the same way: left for the last track or right for the next one.
With the Multi Window feature, a user can have multiple apps open on the home screen, making it easier to multitask and share information between apps. The Galaxy Round can also be customized with Samsung's "one-hand operation" feature that let users position the controls they use most frequently on their preferred side of the screen.
Like other Galaxy Devices, the Round is Wi-Fi, LTE and NFC capable with BlueTooth and USB 3.0. It features the same 13-megapixel main camera and a front-facing 2-megapixel camera.
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