Samsung
made a bold move when it announced the Galaxy S III mini. Here was an
Android phone with the potential to take the iPhone 5 head-on. While the
original Galaxy S III is
clearly the flagship, its 4.8-inch display means it's literally too much for
some people to handle. By matching Apple's screen size inch for inch, it could
have been pitched as a device aimed at winning over some iOS fence-sitters.
However, when you look at the specifications: a dual-core 1GHz processor, WVGA
(800 x 480) display and a 5-megapixel camera, it's clear that Samsung had other
ideas, opting to fish for a more mid-range customer instead.
Fast forward to the present, and it's no longer a
matter of intellectual debate as to what the mini is all about: the phone is
here, and on sale in much of Europe for £299 / €379. So hubris, brand appeal
and pundit talk aside, is this the real-deal Galaxy S III, just for smaller
hands? Or is it a budget phone simply wearing its elder sibling's tuxedo to the
ball? We spent some time getting to know the phone in an attempt to find out.