Samsung starts the year with premium Galaxy A series smartphones

Samsung is changing its mobile strategy with the release of the Galaxy A series. Samsung Philippines showcased its new line-up last week, days ahead of the global announcement.

With the fierce competition in the smartphone market, especially with Android devices, Samsung is changing its mobile strategy with the release of the Galaxy A series. Samsung Philippines showcased its new line-up last week, days ahead of the global announcement.

These new handsets are targeted for the mid-market segment yet are more polished and built with premium materials. The design signature is inspired by the original Galaxy Alpha, which Samsung positioned as a high-end premium model. Hence, it is no wonder this new line-up took the Galaxy A nomenclature.

There are three models introduced with the new A series — the Galaxy A3 is the smallest with a 4.5-inch display, followed by the Galaxy A5 with a 5-inch display and then there’s the Galaxy A7 with a 5.5-inch screen.

Of the three, the Galaxy A7 takes the cake as the slimmest of any Samsung handset ever released, measuring only 6.3mm on the side.

All three smartphones are built with a solid metallic frame with a matte polycarbonate back cover. They all have the same look and feel that is reminiscent of the Galaxy Note 4, only in smaller sizes.

Samsung is definitely going in a direction that ups the ante in terms of build quality and design. We could be seeing more of this kind of devices from Samsung for the rest of the year.

Here are the complete configurations of each of the Galaxy A models that Samsung announced.

Samsung Galaxy A7 specs:

5.5-inch Super AMOLED display @ 1080 x 1920 pixels, 401ppi

Samsung Exynos 5433 octa-core processor

4 x ARM Cortex A5 cores @ 1.8GHz, 4 x ARM Cortex-A53 cores  @ 1.3GHz

2GB RAM

16 GB Internal storage

expandable up to 64GB via microSD

Dual-SIM, Dual-Standby

LTE, HSPA+

NFC

Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, dual-band

Bluetooth 4.0, A2DP

12-megapixel AF rear camera with LED flash

5 megapixel front camera

GPS with A-GPS support, GLONASS

2,600mAh Li-On battery

Android 4.4.2 KitKat

150.9 x 75.9 x 6.3 mm (dimensions)

141 grams (weight)

Samsung Galaxy A5 specs:

5-inch HD Super AMOLED display@ 720x1280 pixels, 294ppi

Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 1.2GHz quad-core processor

Adreno 306 Graphics

2GB RAM

16GB internal storage

up to 64GB via microSD

4G LTE, 3G HSPA+

WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n

NFC (LTE version only)

Bluetooth 4.0 BLE, ANT+

13 megapixel rear AF camera w/ LED flash

5 megapixel front camera

GPS with A-GPS support, GLONASS

Android 4.4 KitKat

2,300mAh battery

139.3 x 69.7 x 6.7mm (dimensions)

123g (weight)

Samsung Galaxy A3 specs:

4.5-inch qHD Super AMOLED display @ 540x960 pixels, 245ppi

1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 quad-core processor

Adreno 306 Graphics

1GB RAM

16GB internal storage

up to 64GB via microSD

8 megapixel AF rear camera w/ LED flash

5 megapixel front camera

4G LTE, 3G HSPA+

WiFi 802.11 b/g/n

NFC (LTE version only)

Bluetooth 4.0 BLE, ANT+

GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS

Android 4.4 KitKat

1,900mAh battery

130.1 x 65.5 x 6.9mm (dimensions)

110.3 grams (weight)

The Samsung Galaxy A3, A5 and A7 will retail for P16,990, P19,990, and P24,990, respectively. All three will be available later this month in stores nationwide.