Samsung has been awarded five iF Material awards by International Forum Design. The award is given to the products which are uniquely designed and Samsung has bagged the most of them this year, including the Gold Award.

The Gold Award was given to G Series USB HDDs for its distinct appearance and the usage of eco-friendly materials in making the drive.

Other products awarded were SRT746ZWKPZ refrigerator for its special photo etched design, Jet phone for the natural gradient effect on the battery cover, ST5500 digital camera and MLT-D105L toner.

Samsung has announced Jet 2 in India and to be honest, it’s the same as original Jet but apparently with an “easy-to-use user interface of a conventional mobile phone”. The Jet 2 feature set remains the same with 800MHz applications processor, 3.1-inch AMOLED touchscreen display (WVGA), Dolfin browser, DLNA compatibility, Media browser, one-finger zoom, FM Radio, SNS widgets and Smart Unlock. The phone runs on TouchWiz UI 2.0 but also features Motion UI and Media Gate 3D.

“Today’s mobile users seek smart features and easy-to-use user interface in their mobiles. Samsung Jet 2 combines both these qualities and gives the user a superior and differentiated experience,” said Ranjeet Yadav, Director- Mobile & IT, Samsung Electronics.

Samsung will retail Jet 2 for Rs. 19,500.

A new firmware of Samsung Jet is floating on the interwebs, claiming to bring in barrage of new features. Users who have installed the new S8000XEII2 firmware, claims the overall performance has been improved.

Amongst specific improvements – the Dolphin web browser and media browser have been worked on to make it faster; 3D Cube interface has got a new background along with new widgets of Twitter, Facebook and MySpace; Media player now supports landscape orientation with a new interface and more.

The firmware is not available officially but interested users can go to the link below to grab it and flash it via unofficial means.

S8000XEII2 [Free registration required]

Dutch site, Tweakers received a profile of Samsung’s M8000 phone that reveals some interesting facts of the Jet lookalike phone. If you remember M8000 was leaked alongside S8000 (better known as Jet) and was slated to be a music-centric variant. Well, music will still be the key but a major revelation is that it will be powered by Symbian S60 v5 OS, akin to what you find on Omnia HD. The screen size is unknown but will sport a resolution of 360×640 pixels with other features like HSDPA, an unspecified ARM processor (likely the same as Jet), 3.5mm headphone jack and 3.2MP camera with single LED flash.

As much as Samsung spends on R&D of phones, it also spends a considerable amount on marketing too. The high profile Jet recently got a viral ad that is fast paced and includes…elephants and UFOs. Not the best of virals we’ve seen from Samsung but conveys the message well. Enjoy the ad.

[Thanks Vincenzo]

Here’s the scenario of the Taiwanese touchscreen mobile market. LG Electronics is the leader with a 17 percent market share while Samsung holds 12 percent. Now to turn things around, Samsung is planning to launch at least 10 touchscreen devices in Taiwan in the remainder of this year as compared to LG who is planning to launch at least 7.

In fact, if we see it’s not really surprising for Samsung to bring more touchscreen phones because their roadmap is already filled with them ranging from entry level to high end.

Taiwan will see touchscreen devices like Jet S8000, Beat DJ M7600, Omnia II I8000, Galaxy I7500, S5600 and more.

Source

Want a free trip to South Korea and visit one of the world’s biggest company’s headquarters? Well, you may want to enter the Samsung Mobile of the Future contest. Samsung and Financial Times have teamed up wherein a user has to write about 200-300 word paragraph about ‘the key features of the phone of the future’. It does not matter if it’s feasible or not but should not fail the two most important criterions – innovation and creativity.

This competition is open to anyone who is over 18 years of age. Fair enough? Head over to the link below to know the mailing details. By the way, you should do it right away because the contest closes today and the entries should be received before 5PM GMT.

The winner will get to know about the future of Samsung phones in their HQ including return business-class airfare and accommodation in a 4-star hotel. Two runners-up will receive Samsung Jet each.

Contest Page

[Image|Via Thanks, Joe]

We have said this before and we’ll say it again, the global launch of Jet has worked highly in favor of Samsung. Today, Samsung unveiled that they have got beyond expectation response for Jet S8000. Firs t the 2m units preorder and now Samsung Electronics Europe is said to be ramping the production in order to meet the demands. Since the launch last month, Jet’s been selling in around 70 countries.

Jet S8000 sports a fast 800MHz processor, 3.1-inch WVGA AMOLED screen, 5MP camera, TouchWiz UI 2.0, Dolfin browser, Media Gate 3D, A-GPS, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

Samsung has unveiled the Korean version of Jet that will be known as W850/W8500/W8550 amongst different operators. To lure the homeland consumers, Samsung has integrated few extra features that won’t be available in the international versions. The first difference that actually cannot be termed as ‘added’ but obvious, is the different placement of front video camera and sensor as compared to S8000 Jet. It’s also got a larger WVGA (800×480) AMOLED screen, measuring 3.5-inches to original Jet’s 3.1-inches and addition of T-DMB.

Rest of the features are same – 5MP AF camera and LED flash, Haptic UI 2.0 (TouchWiz 2.0), 3D Cube, One-touch zoom, multiple video format support like DivX, H.264, MPEG-4 while D1 video recording, GPS, Bluetooth, microSD slot and much more.

The phone will arrive on SK Telecom (SKT), Korea Telecom (KT) and LG Telecom (LGT) at a Korean Won equivalent of around $630.

Source

Looks like the simultaneous announcement worldwide worked for Samsung. They are happily claiming that more than 2 million units have been ordered before the phone hit the retail stores. That’s pretty impressive because this is the first time Samsung has achieved something like this. Even its flagship UltraTouch could only gather about 1.8m before the worldwide launch.

Jet should be available from this week in India for Rs. 24,150.

Source|Via