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If you were a fan of the Galaxy Golden, Samsung’s modern take on the humble clamshell, well, you are in for a treat today because we have news of its successor the SM-G9098 which has appeared on Samsung’s Chinese site. Like the Galaxy Golden before it, the Dual-SIM, dual-display SM-G9098 is aimed at the Chinese market, where the clamshell form factor is apparently still quite popular. You would think that the Galaxy Golden must have seen at least moderately decent sales if Samsung have deemed it necessary to offer a successor. Still, this is Samsung, and as we all know, Samsung aren’t the type of company to leave any potential revenue stream unexplored.
On to the specifications, and the SM-G9098 has an impressive array of components in most areas. Like the previous batch of flagship handsets, the SM-G9098 is powered by a quad-core processor which is clocked at 2.3GHz (almost certainly the Snapdragon 800), and the 2GB of RAM is pretty decent as well. In no way is the SM-G9098 under-powered. There’s no details regarding internal storage other than the acknowledgement that the device supports up to 64GB Micro-SD cards. Like many phones that are targeted at the Chinese market, the Sm-G9098 has Dual-SIM support, which comes in handy when you are juggling work and personal SIM cards.
The SM-G9098 offers the novelty of dual-displays, with both inside and outside displays being of the 3.67-inch Super-AMOLED variety. Neither display will blow you away, with both screens being of WVGA 480 x 800 resolution, just a little disappointing in this day and age. Still, there are two of them, perhaps in this case its quantity over quality. On a more positive note, the SM-G9098 includes the standard 2MP front camera, and a more than useful 13MP rear-facing camera.
Considering that the SM-G9098 (the model number hardly rolls off the tongue does it?) has dimensions of 117 x 59.5 x 15.8mm and weighs 179 grams, the battery that has to power both screens is a paltry 1900 mAH, which perhaps partly explains the lower resolution dual-displays. There’s no mention of which version of Android the SM-G9098 runs on, but support for the Galaxy Gear Manager App is mentioned, so one would think that it would have to be at least Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean or above. The rear of the phone is said to have a Faux leather texture like the Note 3.
Like me, you probably thought clamshell phones were a thing of the past, old phones that you sometimes come across whilst spring cleaning. Is Samsung on the right track? Would you like the SM-G9098 to be released in your country as well? And could the clamshell make a comeback? Let us know in the comments or at our Google Plus page.
