Samsung will be releasing the Galaxy S4 later this week and expectations couldn't be any higher. With major releases like the BlackBerry Z10, iPhone 5S, Xperia Z and HTC One on the horizon, the Galaxy S4 will need to be pretty impressive to secure a foothold in the crowded smartphone market.
It's hard to predict at this point if the phone will be a success, but we can guarantee with near certainty that it will be an utter failure without the following four features/improvements.
Higher Quality Build
Let's face it: the Samsung Galaxy S3 was a cheap-looking piece of plastic, especially so when compared to the iPhone with its aluminum chassis. Samsung cannot afford to repeat this mistake. Maybe five years ago, a developer could get away with a handset built out of the same stuff they make cases out of, but in 2013, any handset not built from anodized aluminum or glass is basically dead on arrival.
Improved Battery Life
This has been a persistent issue for Galaxy S3 users since the phone's debut. Ars Technica surveyed its readers and found that many would be in support of a slightly thicker handset if it meant a longer battery life.
"I would like the standard battery to be roughly equivalent to what's now an extended battery," wrote on reader. "Adding a few mm to the depth of the phone would not only be acceptable to me, but desirable. Most modern phones are actually too thin for comfort for me."
Weirdo.
One International Version. Just One
Most analysts were fairly impressed with the Galaxy S3's 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor when it came out. Many were also puzzled when the international version debuted with a quad core processor, but inexplicably lacked LTE.
By today's standards, both versions of the S3's processor are a joke. While we can maybe hope for a quad-core chipset that will be standardized across all markets, Samsung should really be working on an eight-core design if it's serious.
Make TouchWiz Not Suck Utterly, Or Just Toss It
Google's Android works fairly well out of the box. Why Samsung opted to develop a custom skin and completely desecrate it is anybody's guess.
Nobody will tolerate a new, shoddy version of TouchWiz. Ideally, Samsung has invested a little more into design this time around and created something with a modicum of grace. At the very least though, they should give users the option of running Jelly Bean 4.2, the way Google intended.
