Upping the ante in the U.S. cameraphone market, Korean handset maker Samsung vows to introduce 3.5 and 5 Megapixel models this year.

In conjunction with its presence at the Photo Marketing Association Show, Samsung today announced that it will bring cameraphones with resolutions of 3.5 and 5 Megapixels to the U.S. market in 2005. Likely, the company will adapt two existing CDMA models for the Korean market, the SCH-S230 and SCH-S250, for a U.S. release later this year.

Featuring a 3x optical zoom lens and a CCD sensor with a resolution of 3.2 Megapixels, the SCH-S230 has a form factor which to an extent is more reminiscent of a digital camera than a typical handset. It's not the only high-end feature of the device, however, which also sports a 262K colour display and a slider design which conceals a numeric keypad with an unusual layout.

The SCH-S250 is an altogether more advanced beast, and will feature a 5 Megapixel CCD sensor coupled with an integrated flash and 92 MB of onboard memory to allow for up to 100 minutes of video at QVGA resolution. QVGA is also the resolution of the 16M colour display of the handset, which also offers a memory expansion slot and comes with a 32 MB card bundled.

Other highlights include a 0,001 second shutter lag, TV connectivity for displaying stills and video directly from the handset, and on-device Text-To-Speech recognition. Like the SCH-S230, the SCH-S250 also features a slider design which protects the camera lens and also partially the display of the device when closed.

Both the SCH-S230 and SCH-S250 have been shipping in Korea since late 2004, however Samsung did not offer any further information as to the expected availability and pricing of the models it will introduce in the U.S. market.


Source : InfoSyncWorld



Samsung SCH-S250 (left) and Samsung SCH-S230 (right)