MWC 2012: Spotlight on the Samsung Galaxy Beam

By Tech Wire Asia | 27 February, 2012

Samsung is looking to catch the competition in front of its headlights at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona with its latest version of the Galaxy Beam. But HTC, LG and Huawei have buff, quad-core phones that are ready for any showdown — except for the light show, that is. The Samsung Galaxy Beam is a mid-range smartphone with a 4-inch screen, 1GHz dual core brain, 5Megapix rear cam and a 15 Lumens projector.

The Galaxy Beam was first released in 2010 as the first Android phone with a built-in projector. Samsung upped the specs a bit for the latest model with a bigger screen (3.7 in to 4.0 in), faster processor (from 720 MHz to 1GHz), brighter bulb (brighter by 5 Lumens), ginormous memory (348MB RAM to 6Gb) and an LED-powered, nHD projector (as opposed to the pico projector in Beam first-gen). Some pundits are skeptical about the RAM blurb, but all will be explained soon — MWC 2012 starts on Monday 27 February to Thursday 1 March.

Some still question the practicality and usefulness of a projector phone, citing the nauseous effects of handheld projectors. The 50-inch wide projection (640-by-360 resolution) might only be good for a family gathering to see your grandparents’ vacation video. Some family members might be horrified to learn that the Samsung Galaxy Beam can play up to three hours of video on a single charge, but need not worry because Gramps uses up a third of the battery life figuring out how to get the projector app going, and usually forgets where he left the charger.

Here are more Galaxy Beam pics, courtesy of Samsung.