Samsung Galaxy S III (Verizon)
Phone Scoop Review
Jul 10, 2012 by Eric M. Zeman
Phone Scoop takes Verizon's version of the Samsung Galaxy S III for a spin. Does anything set it apart from the AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile versions? We find out. read review ›
User Reviews
Average Ratings
Best smartphone availibal!
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Fast, beautiful screen, battery last long when you have your settings correct. Top notch I believe I made the right choice. Great web experience, overall just fun. Love playing with it when not using it for work. GO GET ONE!
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My finest phone until the next one :-)
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This phone is as close to perfect as possible. I had a few hiccups the first few days I had it. I had to do resets but now everything downloads right back to the phone. I love the over intuitiveness of this phone like when I am texting someone and the conversation gets long, I can hold the phone up to my face and the phone will call, Or i can palm swipe the screen to do a screen capture.
Overall its a great phone. Screen isn't as bright as many of the reviews claim (outdoors). You will have to take your glasses off to see it.
I am looking forward to the update so that I can bring this phone to Monaco with me.
Great photos and super clear phone calls. It does what a phone is supposed to do and it does it well. Great job Samsung.
** Disclaimer**: I do not work for any of the major networks, nor am i employed by samsung in any capacity.
Best phone to date...
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I've had the device for a few weeks and LOVE it. It does it all....the size is amazing and screen is awesome. Very very happy with it.
They blocked GSM Data with local SIM cards!
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Update Jan 25 2013
After waiting half a year since the launch of this "Soon to be International" phone finally last month the update comes out. It allows GSM and you can use other phone SIM cards, HOWEVER verizon locked the APN in the firmware so DATA won't work unless you use the Verizon SIM! They removed the ability to change the APN so no DATA unless you use a Verizon SIM, which means internationally you have to roam and pay 10 to 20x the $ to use data as buy a prepaid card. It will make calls with other SIM cards even in the US, so over seas its almost useless. I never would have paid for a permanently locked "international phone". Truly bait and switch!
For Domestic Only,
This one is very good. The display is large and the software works very well. I have a GII (Tmobile) and this phone is replacing a Droid Charge (also Samsung). This one has a huge display and the software just seems to have a bit more polish than the other phones.
Cons:
Camera is not as good as the one on the S II, I think it's firmware.
For some people its too large (not me)
Distorts when used with one of my headphones
Does not have a Micro HDMI port built in you have to get a very expensive adapter.
I would like a bigger battery with extensive life like the Droid Maxx has rather than the extreme thinness that this phone offers.
Pro's
Camera works well.
Screen is very large
Its fast with lots of RAM
Will work internationally when they open up GSM with an update.
I like that Verizon uses a 4G SIM so the activation is really quick and you can still swap back to another Verizon 4G phone if needed.
I would highly recommend this phone, the OS is a pleasure to use now and it does not feel rougher than the current generation famous IOS device with its smaller screen, fixed amount of Flash RAM and lack of 4G network capability.
Phone is awesome, just get it
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First, regarding the browser brightness, this is not a defect, it is a setting. Go to the browser, hit the menu key, then Brightness and Colors, then you can select from high energy saving to default, with default being the brightness of your other screens.
Now, on with the review. The difference going from my Dinc to this is not as dramatic as going from my last dumbphone to the Dinc, but it's not far off. The screen is excellent, though this is as large as I would want as any larger and it become unpocketable. The Touch Wiz is not ideal, but it is more than acceptable and not nearly as bad as many would like to believe. It is much improved over the S2. The phone feels good in the hand. I am not a phone nerd, I probably represent the majority of smartphone users. I want a good phone, a good messaging and internet experience and a good camera. This covers all those bases.
PROs
-Great screen.
-Easy to configure/customize.
-You can do a screen shot by just sweeping the side of your hand across the screen.
-Very fast on LTE.
-Phone is loud and clear.
-Keyboard very easy to use, has SWYPE.
-Camera is just a smidge short of the iPhone, which is plenty good enough. If you want better, carry a dedicated camera.
-I have been getting much better battery life than with my Dinc with the same usage, easily making a full day using LTE.
-Syncing of contacts and accounts is very easy.
CONs
-I wish the home, menu and back buttons were just a little higher up.
-Not crazy about the ring/alarm tones, but there are apps for that.
-It's not an iPhone, so I am going to have to listen to every fanboy tell me how the iPhone is still better, even though they haven't even held an S3.
-Typical Verizon bloatware.
-BIGGEST CON - browser pages do not reformat when you zoom in/zoom out like they did on my Dinc. That is one feature that I do miss that I really hope they change in the not-too-distant future.
I have no regrets about picking the S3.
"No SIM" error
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The phone is great, battery life, display, form factor are all fantastic. I would have given a 5 star review if it weren't for the bugs. Drive mode doesn't work for me at all. Tried everything I could to get it to work, even load my contact information on to my phone instead of syncing from google. Still a no go.
But my biggest gripe with the phone is when I send text messages. My messages fail to send and shortly after kicks me off the network and "no SIM" message pops up on the taskbar. It's an issue that seems to be plaguing a decent amount of users. Verizon claims Samsung is working on a update since it's a new phone, and with new phones, bugs are common. Whatever the case may be, it's an issue that needs to be resolved.
Loving this phone
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I've had this phone for just over a month and I'm still loving it... I get bored easily with new gadgets so this is an accomplishment. I did have a problem when I first got the phone--it just decided at about 7pm every evening to stop sending and receiving texts. After over an hour with tech support on the phone and 2 hours in-store with a tech, they replaced the phone because there was no reason for the phone to be behaving as such (this was under the 14 day return period, so I got a new phone not refurbished)
As of right now, it's running 4.1.1 and Verizon hasn't said when 4.1.2 is coming. (The leaked version of 4.1.2 doesn't seem to include Premium Suite like everyone else's. IDK, but that's what other articles online are saying, hopefully that's not true for the final release or it's not worth updating to).
Pros:
fabulous camera--the burst shot helps get those action shots other cameras miss (so handy since I have active kids!)
I haven't had any dropped calls, even with the lower signal at my house. (seriously, I get -112 to -107dBm most of the time here which is HORRIBLE)
Super fast response from phone when I pull up an app.
The motion features are great, I don't use all of them but the ones I do eliminate issues I've had in the past (such as it knows when I'm laying down and looking at the phone) You can mute the phone simply by laying it face down--it's a great feature!
Cons:
There's a common glitch I have... message tones won't play all the way through after a while--the remedy is to clear out all your messages and it will play again. A small annoyance, but one I can live with--others may not.
You can customize your lock-screen icons, but you can't customize what is in your notification panel--this is supposed to be a part of the 4.1.2 update though.
You can no longer go into app manager to move apps to the sd card but that seems to be with most phones. You CAN do it though file manager, but you wind up with multiple copies of everything after a while.
Great Productivity Phone!
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We had our phones for about two weeks now. The Motorola Razor Maxx was the other alternative.
We found the display size and resolution to be a winning attribute but for a different reason most would. The ease of use of the virtual keyboard was fantastic. The size is visibly thing and not to big for our view. Still fits in a shirt pocket and easy to carry.
Battery seems to have a some stain holding its charge. Not sure if this is an improvement or it is just new but it is definitely better than other phones. Noticeable is the quick charging time and hold power time.
The Chrome browser works better than the computer version without any signs of slowing down or crashing with the adobe flash player.
The speed and navigation between Apps is a lot better. Maybe the processor upgrade or the LTE network speed.
Noticeable improvement with the 8M Pixel camera. Pictures and video are crisp and clear. New feature to view pictures as tiles rotating from the background is really hot.
The upgrade to this phone require us to give up our unlimited plan. Verizon is offering a 2Gig data plan per phone and sells 4, 6, 8. This could be costly if you use your phone for watching movies as they use about 1Gig of data.
For the first time, we purchased our phone through Costco at the same price as the Verizon store. Sales tax on the phone at Costco is based on the 199 price at Verizon is based on retail price of $699. Costco provides a leather case, screen protectors, and car charger kit. So we saved on accessories and taxes.
No negatives that I can think off so far. Versions of Apps works better than expected.
Overall experience has been great. We are simple users, but feel more productive using this versions calendar, notes, text, and browser thus we rated it five stars.
Great Phone, Amamzing Picture and Size
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I bought this phone for my mom since her birthday is only 3 days away. See needed and upgrade from her Samsung Fascinate. It was a good phone but this phone just does circles. It has amazing picture quality the size and awesome and the weight isn't so bad. I played with the phone and has a lot of amazing features. The T9 really ticked me off that I had to turn that off. Make sure that you TURN OFF T9. The only problem with this phone is that the battery doesn't last that long. Make sure if you get this phone to carry your charger with you at all times. Overall really happy with the phone...
Great Phone
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I've had this phone for about 2 weeks now and I'm very happy with my purchase.
Likes:
Large screen, but I can still perform one hand operation of device
Fast
Great camera
Dislikes:
Phone is a little too slick to the touch. I never bought cases for my phones in the past, however I needed one with the SG3.
The battery is fine. For the most part lasts the whole day.
