Samsung Z: World's first Tizen phone with 720p display, quad-core CPU

After years of rumours and speculation, Samsung has finally revealed its first Tizen-based smartphone, the Samsung Z.   This will be the first commercially available smartphone powered by the Tizen platform, which Samsung has been developing in association with other tech companies such as Intel. The Samsung Z will be on show at the Tizen Developer Conference, to be held in San Francisco this week.   The Samsung Z comes with a 4.8-inch HD (720p) Super AMOLED display, which sounds to us to be the same one used in the Galaxy S3. The smartphone comes with 2.3 GHz quad-core processor, though we will hear more about the graphics side of things at the event soon. The Samsung Z hosts a 8MP camera on the back, and a 2.1MP front camera which also feature many presets seen in Samsung’s Android phones such as Mini mode, Quick shot, Best Photo, Drama Shot and Panorama mode. The smartphone sports 2GB RAM with an internal memory of 16GB which is expandable up to 64GB through the microSD slot.   Since it runs Tizen the Samsung Z features a distinctive home and application layout. Using Dynamic Box and Color Theme settings, users can tailor their device to what suits them best. The app drawer seems to have been ditched with an iPhone-like all icons on the homescreen approach. In terms of design, the Z has squared-off edges, which remind us of some of the company’s Bada-based phones. The back cover has the same faux-leather design popularised by the Galaxy Note 3 last year. The phone will be available in gold, as well as dark grey colours. [caption id=“attachment_224901” align=“alignnone” width=“640”]  Features a heart-rate monitor like the Galaxy S5[/caption]   The smartphone provides connectivity options like WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth. It hosts most of the features from the Galaxy S5 such as the accelerometer, gyro, proximity sensor, compass, barometer, fingerprint scanner, an hall effect sensor for enhanced motion tracking, heart rate sensor with the addition of an RGB ambient light. The Samsung Z uses a 2600mAh battery, which sounds plentiful, given that Samsung is talking up Tizen’s power management features as an advantage over Android. It also is one of the reasons, the company moved to Tizen for its Gear series.   The Samsung Z will be available in Q3 starting in Russia and Samsung plans to expand to other markets soon after. Last month, we had heard that the company will be **launching the Samsung Z in India** as well.