Earlier this year the Korean firm, Samsung, announced the successor to one of its most successful and highly rated smartphones — Galaxy S, with the Galaxy S II.

The Galaxy SII was recently launched in Jamaica, operational on both major carriers (Digicel and LIME), and to our delight the phone has lived up to the hype, in fact surpassing the expectations of many.

As usual TEENage is the first stop whenever new technology and this time it's no different.

Here's our review:

Hardware

The most noticeable thing after unpacking the Galaxy S II is the sleek beauty of the device.

Super thin with dimensions of 125.3 x 66.1 x 8.5mm, The Galaxy II is easily one of the thinnest smartphones on the market. Coupled with the fact that the device is feather-light, weighing only 116g makes it mind-boggling when one thinks of the wide-range functionality and power that lies within the phone.

Undoubtedly the most spectacular thing about the hardware is the large Super AMOLED Screen, measuring 4.3 inches, excellent for watching High Definition (HD) videos and movies. The quality is unrealistically crisp and super bright; one can easily understand why the Galaxy S II has been lauded by critics as the top media phone of 2011.

The risk of the screen being scratched is very remote due to the durable high quality glass which protects the screen and the overall front exterior of the device.

The only other button on the phone's frontal exterior is the Home button, flanked by the Menu and Back buttons (which are only visible when illuminated by the phone's internal light). This works well in maintaining the sleek, futuristic and uncluttered look of the device. On the two opposite edges of the device are the power and volume buttons. The placement of these buttons make accessibility of both easy yet still keeps their presence inconspicuous.

The only issue of concern with the hardware is an insignificant one, this being the battery cover's plastic and seemingly flimsy feel. This we can forgive Samsung for as unlike other smartphones where battery pulls are necessary, there is really little (if any) need for the battery cover of the Galaxy SII to be removed. And in any event, we can understand this as pursuant to Samsung's objective to keep the Galaxy S II at minimum weight.

The device comes with two cameras.

First there is an 8.0 MP Autofocus camera to the rear equipped with LED Flash. This makes photo taking analogous with standard cameras, another major plus for the Galaxy S II. The camera has multiple of shooting options and though the camera is not the best on the market, it is among the best and will certainly suit the needs of the average person who once in a while wishes to take a good quality photo.

The major drawback is the lack of a physical camera button on the device's exterior. Users will have to select the camera application from the device's menu. This issue can be easily manoeuvred, however, by placing the camera application on the home screen.

The camera application comes with features such as smile and blink detection to reduce the chances of taking photos where subjects aren't smiling or have their eyes closed.

The camera has great video quality, perfecting 30fps 1080p Full HD video recording. The camera also utilises the LEDs for recording in darker scenes. There are also applications to edit photos and videos.

The second camera is a 2.0 MP front facing camera. This clearly pales in comparison to the rear-facing camera. However, it is appropriate for its function — video calling, video conferencing, Skyping, etc.

Notably, the Galaxy S II gives users the ability to switch between cameras during video calls or conference, thereby giving the recipient the opportunity to see a comprehensive HD view of the surroundings.

Software

The Galaxy SII is super fast!

Running on Android OS 2.3.5 and boasting and impressive dual 1.2 GHz Samsung Orion CPU, the device is simply a pleasure to use.

The device also has 1 GB of RAM and 16 GB of flash memory (with removable microSD capability up to 32 GB). Start-up is quite fast with complete booting taking only a few seconds.

The phone utilises the new generation TouchWiz 4.0 user interface. This allows users to navigate the device easily with convenient gesture recognitions for zooming in and out, managing widgets among other things.

As with most touchscreen devices typing can be a hurdle, however the Galaxy S II's large screen with rotational sensitivity makes typing a much easier task.

The phone boasts Samsung's four 'hubs' for convenient bundling of applications, namely: Social Hub, Readers Hub, Music Hub and Game Hub.

Each hub bundles applications by category and makes navigating the device a more efficient process. Social Hub, for example, deals with social networks and communications such as email accounts, Facebook, Twitter, etc, so as to make updating and communication much easier and organised.

The phone also seeks to synchronise all contacts with their social media accounts and information by default.

The Internet browsing capability of the Galaxy SII is also pretty impressive — the SII can handle download speeds of up to 21Mbps on HSDPA. This is probably the fastest download speed we will hear about in smartphones for a while. Its WIFI capabilities allows this to be fully maximised by users.

Browsing is made all the more worthwhile by its stunningly sharp screen. Watching videos online is similarly pleasing as the phone comes with Flash video support. The Galaxy S II is easily the best Flash experience you will have with a smartphone to date, thus watching Youtube videos or live streams is optimum.

The music player on the Galaxy SII comes with an impressive 5.1 virtual surround sound. This makes listening to your favourite music an amazing experience. The music player also has an equaliser and comes with Smart Playlist capabilities. It also supports most media files format for both audio and video files. The phone also comes with FM radio -- a feature often lacking in smartphones.

The Galaxy S II comes with a host of new generation technological features such as Kies 2.0, Kies Air — allows you to navigate and manage your phone via an Internet browser wirelessly; voice recognition (especially impressive for browsing the web, searching YouTube, getting directions, etc); Google voice translation; AllShare (for DLNA) — this allows you to stream media from your phone to a PC or TV or vice versa; Lost Phone Management (excellent for the security of your handset!); Polaris Office — a fully functional office/ document suit allowing users to edit, create or view documents; Google Maps with latitude, places, navigation, QuickOffice application; 'QuickType' by SWYPE; USB on the go; NFC; HDMI mirroring among a plethora of others.

The smartphone has so much to offer it is simply amazing to think that such a slim light-weight device can pack such a powerful punch.

TEENage is usually hesitant to give any device a five-star rating, however we are left with no choice for the Galaxy S II. Its super sleek design, spectacularly crisp super AMOLED screen, powerfully fast dual core processor, multifaceted interface and applications make it a cut above the rest, we would definitely recommend this device as a must have for the new year.

TEENage rating: 5 Stars

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