In case you missed the Samsung event that officially launched the Samsung Galaxy S3, you can check our preview of the phone. Of course, you have seen that the Samsung Galaxy S3, as presented on stage, featured a quad-core chip, most likely a Samsung Exynos. However, that smartphone was also likely to have been an HSPA+ device, and not a 4G LTE device.
And in the absence of an Exynos chip with built-in 4G LTE, Samsung would have to use 1/an Exynos with an external 4G LTE modem or 2/a non-Samsung dual-core chip, if it wants to ship an LTE quad-core phone to Verizon (some facts point to this) and AT&T. The downside of going with the external modem is two-fold: battery life, and a possible bump in thickness.
Will the USA 4G LTE Samsung Galaxy S3 have the same fate than the HTC One X 4G LTE, which shipped with a dual-core chip instead of the quad-core chip that was demonstrated with at Mobile World Congress? We don’t know, but it’s possible and it that was the case, T-Mobile would be the only carrier in the USA to feature a quad-core Samsung Galaxy S3, simply because T-Mobile is HSPA+ only, for now. Btw, this is speculation is also valid for the HTC One X.
And while it is true that quad-core isn’t a silver bullet that solves every problem, the commercialization of the HTC One X as a dual-core phone has created some negative feedback among users eager to get the most powerful CPUs in their phones. What’s your take? Would you mind having a dual-core Galaxy S3?