Samsung Galaxy Young Duos Preview

Introduction:

The Samsung Galaxy Young Duos arrives at the bottom low of Samsung’s 2013 Android lineup, at a place where it can replace devices like last year’s Galaxy Y. A smartphone for those on budget, it might not feature the bleeding edge of technology, but it is rather about compromise for price.

Good news is in 2013 you have to compromise less at the same low price points and now the bottom low of Samsung’s Android lineup brings you a 3.3-inch display, a 1GHz processor and an (almost) up-to-date version of Android, 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Samsung is also delivering both a single and dual-SIM versions of the Galaxy Young Duos from the get-go which is good news for those in emerging markets where the second SIM card is always of good value. With all this in mind, is the new Galaxy Young Duos a good compromise, and how does it fare against its rivals? Read on to find out.

Design:

With a slightly elongated compact body with rounded edges and built out of plastic, the Galaxy Young Duos is a typical Samsung, like it or not. That approach to design with plastic build and similarly styled devices from the top-line devices to the most affordable like this one here has proved practical for Samsung, which is capable of quickly releasing new models.

The Galaxy Young Duos in particular feels surprisingly solid in the hand with its nearly 4 oz of weight (112g) and it looks that way too with its chromed plastic siding that might fool onlookers into thinking it’s metallic.


The device is fairly thick at 0.49 inches (12.5mm), but at its compact size that’s not much of a problem.

In terms of buttons, you have a single physical home key in the front and a capacitive back and menu key around it. The Galaxy Young Duos ships in white, deep blue, wine red and metallic silver.


Display:

The handset features a 3.27-inch (further rounded up to 3.3” for convenience) screen with a 320 x 480-pixel resolution. While that might sound paltry to those used to hearing about large 720p and 1080p displays, it is a move up in the affordable segment where last year’s Galaxy Y for instance only had a 3-inch 240 x 320-pixel screen.

With a pixel density of 176ppi you can definitely see the jagged edges of pixels, one important compromise for the low price.

The display has 262k colors only and you’d notice this in gradients where the borders between colors do not flow smoothly.

Viewing angles were mediocre at best and reflections were also a hurdle in using the device on a bright sunny day.



Interface and Functionality:

Good news is the Samsung Galaxy Young Duos runs on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean with TouchWiz Nature UX on top. Having the modern Android 4.1 Jelly Bean means you can download applications from the Play store with no limitations due to an outdated version of the system.

TouchWiz Nature UX is a smooth affair that adds a few important usability tweaks that we appreciate. Small things ranging from creating folders in the app drawer to the ability to directly attach your location in text messages are just two examples of the added value of Samsung’s skin.


Basic functionality is also tweaked with the contacts app supporting swipe gestures. Swipe a contact’s name to the right to directly call, and to the left to send a text message.

You have dual-SIM card support and you can easily manage which card to use as default for calls, messaging and data.

Functionality is also boosted by the presence of Google Now, with all blows and whistles of the smart card-based notification system.


Processor and Memory:

Samsung has equipped the Galaxy Young Duos with a single-core 1GHz processor and a whopping 768MB of RAM, and given the device’s fairly modest screen resolution, this combination works well enough, and in most cases we enjoyed a lag-free experience. We should however note that we are looking at a non-final version, and things might get even more fluidity in the final one.

The handset ships with 4GB of internal storage and that is also expandable via microSD cards of up to 64GB.

Internet and Connectivity:

Interestingly, the Galaxy Young Duos comes with both Chrome and the stock Android browser pre-installed. It’s clear that Google is slowly shifting gears towards having Chrome as the one and only browser, but right now it coexists with the traditional Android browser. Looking at the stock browser, performance was smooth with no stutter when pinching to zoom in and out, and only a slight occasional slowdown when quickly scrolling around pages.


Connectivity is covered with a 3G chip supporting downloads of up to 7.2Mbps, Wi-Fi b/g/n, Bluetooth 3.0 and GPS.

Camera:

The Galaxy Young Duos has a 3-megapixel rear camera capable of recording 480p video at 24 frames per second.

The camera has no flash, and with our non-final united we captured passable images on a sunny day. In all other conditions where light is not so ample, noise starts getting in the way too much. Images we captured are on the soft side, lacking in fine details, and with somewhat muted colors that lacked a punch.


The camera is also of the fixed focus kind which means that everything a foot away or closer will be out of the focus, so macro shot attempts are definitely not an option.

480p video at 24fps sounds like something that you could possibly use not just in an MMS message, but in reality footage turned out very fuzzy and skipping frames. Again, we wouldn’t want to give our final judgment now as this is not the final unit, but there’s definitely room for improvement.

Samsung Galaxy Young Duos Sample Video:



Multimedia:

The music player is the usual Samsung affair, rich in options with an equalizer and gimmicks like the possibility to build playlists based on your mood via the Music Square feature that scans your music. For music, the loudspeaker was of excellent quality with loud and clear sounds at even the maximum volume.


The default video player on the device easily plays back 480p videos in common formats like MPEG-4, but if you want to watch DivX/Xvid-encoded files you’d need a third-party app like MX Player.

Expectations:

The Samsung Galaxy Young Duos is a typical Samsung device starting from the design and plastic build, and ending with TouchWiz Nature skin. We expect it to take the place of last year’s Galaxy Y in the bottom low of the Android market, and as such it offers some valuable assets like a slightly larger and better display, a modern version of Android and a good enough hardware backbone for fluid performance. The existing dual-SIM version from the start is also good news to those in developing markets.

Its success largely depends on the final price, but judging from Samsung’s aggressive pricing strategy we have no reason to doubt it will be a good compromise for the money. If you want the most affordable smartphone, this would be one of your good options this year.

Samsung Galaxy Young DUOS Video Preview: