Samsung z130 (SGH-z130) Rumours

Discontinued
29th January 2005

Samsung's z-series range of 3G phones (the z105, z107 and z110) are a range of competent but fairy dull clamshells, which really aren't sufficiently different from most of the competition to get noticed.

Samsung's z130 handset is very different though from the information we've been able to piece together. Although we know for certain that the z130 actually exists, the only reference we have been able to track down is this article on tom.com which contains an alleged photograph of the z130 (pictured right). As you can see, this is a pretty radical design with a camera tucked away behind a rotating screen. Roughly translated, the article says:

"With a rotating screen and megapixel camera, the 3G SGH-Z130 is a product that is likely to be promoted heavily by Samsung, and is derived in part from the existing SGH-Z110 device. The most noticeable feature of this phone is the rotating TFT display, similar to the SCH-V500 CDMA handset. It's a shame though that this device hasn't used the QVGA screen [from the SCH-V500] but has used a lower resolution 176x220 pixel 260,000 colour TFT screen instead. [..] The technical documentation shows that this is a 3G UMTS phone with a one megapixel main camera, but we cannot see it in this picture. There is a relatively low resolution secondary camera which is activated by the rotating screen to allow two-way video calling. [..] The Z130 supports mamy tyupes of multimedia playback, including MPEG4, MP3, AAC, AAC+, H.263 and more, and the phone also provides 64 chord polyphonic ringtones, downloadable Java applications and MMS messaging. As with other Samsung handsets for 2005, this includes Bluetooth as standard."

Although the Samsung z130 looks fairly radical, the only this that is really new here is the rotating screen, and the rest of the components are things similar to other parts of the samsung range. And although it looks fairly unattracive with the screen in the rotated out position, it's clear that in normal use the SGH-z130 looks much more conventional and a little like the Samsung X600.

We anticipate that this handset will be announced soon for 3G markets worldwide. However, takeup of this type of high-end Samsung handset by mobile networks is not guaranteed, but we are hoping that this should be available in Europe at least in the summer of 2005.

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