CTIA Las Vegas hasn’t even officially kicked off and Samsung’s already in full conference-mode. Samsung today went official with the successor to Sprint’s popular Samsung Instinct, the Samsung Instinct S30. Following on the the Samsung Instinct’s record-setting sales performance in the US, Samsung is looking to go for broke with an new Instinct handset. The Samsung Instinct S30 has been widely referred to (for whatever reason) as the Instinct Mini, but the Instinct S30 is no “mini” version of the original Instinct.
The S30 features sleeker styling and picks up where the original Instinct left off – the Instinct S30 sports a 3.2-inch touchscreen display, Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP), GPS (Sprint Navigation), a 2-megapixel camera and uses Opera Mini 4.2 for desktop-like web browsing.
We had a chance to play with the Samsung Instinct S30 and our knee-jerk reaction was that the S30 felt more comfortable in the hand and had much improved touchscreen feel. The battery cover removes easily to reveal hot-swappable SIM card and microSD card slots that weren’t blocked by the battery. Samsung clearly wanted to make it easy to swap out memory cards without having the reboot the Instinct S30. The UI is more of the same touch-based interface that you’ll find on the Samsung Instinct. But, with sleeker curves and more refined styling, the Instinct S30 feels like a completely new device.
We’re expecting the Sprint Instinct S30 to drop April 19 for $129.99 (after $100 mail-in rebate) when purchased with new 2-year contract. The Sprint Samsung Instinct S30 should be available in your choice of Cobalt Metal and Touch of Copper color schemes.
Pre-register your Samsung Instinct S30 from Sprint here.
