It’s no secret that the smartphone has dramatically cannibalized the normal digital digicam house over the previous a number of years. According to Statista, worldwide income for digital cameras was US$21.26 billion in 2022, down from a excessive of $29.03 billion in 2014.
At Wednesday’s Galaxy Unpacked 2023 occasion in San Francisco, Samsung unveiled its new Galaxy S23 sequence. Judging by the specs and new options on this new smartphone lineup, it’s onerous to fathom how the normal digital digicam house will ever get well.
In addition, Samsung had just a few issues up its sleeves to announce within the laptop computer house. Let’s spotlight just a few gadgets that caught my consideration.

S22 Ultra on Steroids
While it may very well be mentioned that the brand new S23 Ultra is just an iterative replace to the present S22 Ultra, the revised options are nothing to sneeze at: an up to date Snapdragon processor, a brand new 200-megapixel main digicam sensor, and a comparatively modest change to the machine’s physique.
The S23 Ultra retains an built-in stylus, its S Pen. Mercifully, Samsung selected to not enhance costs in comparison with the present flagship S22 Ultra. Samsung’s devotees shall be happy to see that the beginning MSRP of the S23 Ultra is $1,199, nevertheless it now comes with 256GB of storage, twice the quantity in comparison with final 12 months’s mannequin. Unfortunately, don’t count on the egg business to emulate Samsung’s pricing technique.

Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra specs (Image Credit: Samsung)

As it has been for the previous a number of years, the massive information is the premium high-res digicam on the S23 Ultra. The machine jumps from 108 megapixels in final 12 months’s mannequin to a whopping 200 megapixels this 12 months. However, earlier than one will get too enthusiastic about capturing 200-megapixel photographs with it (simply think about the file dimension), the S23 Ultra’s computational pictures functionality stitches 16 pixels collectively to reinforce mild and produces a way more pragmatic 12-megapixel picture.
Of course, you possibly can change the cellphone’s settings to take a 200-megapixel picture, however these sizes are often wanted solely by skilled content material creators needing high-resolution wall-size photographs. Much extra useful is Samsung’s declare that the primary digicam’s optical picture stabilization is considerably stouter, mechanically correcting for 3 levels of vibration versus the present 1.5 within the S22 Ultra.
DSLR Replacement
A number of different delicate “under the hood” tweaks to the S23 Ultra caught my consideration. The S23 Ultra incorporates a “vision booster” tone mapping algorithm that not solely enhances the display for viewing in very brilliant mild environments however can even adapt to a big selection of lighting situations, permitting the machine to enhance its battery efficiency.

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What additionally stood out to me throughout the occasion was Samsung continued positioning of its premium smartphones as a basic alternative for skilled video and movie manufacturing.
To that finish, famed film director Ridley Scott, in a recorded interview broadcast throughout the occasion, effusively spoke about how he makes use of high-end Samsung smartphones to shoot practically all of the footage in his newest film, professional-grade video high quality, and the flexibility to shoot in small areas which might be merely not attainable with bigger legacy DSLR cameras.

Director Ridley Scott discusses how he makes use of Samsung smartphones to shoot film footage. (Image Credit: Samsung)

Of course, that is one thing of a “me too” side, contemplating that Stephen Spielberg used an iPhone to shoot a music video final 12 months.
Nevertheless, Samsung’s (with Apple in tow) embrace of computational pictures of their premium smartphones is right here to remain. Like Stephen Spielberg’s younger alter ego in “The Fablemans” — which is nominated for Best Picture at this 12 months’s Oscars — it’s breathtaking to ponder the fashionable smartphone’s influence on younger filmmakers.
New Galaxy Laptops

Image Credit: Author

While Galaxy Unpacked 2023 was vacant of any new pill, earbud, or smartwatch announcement, new Samsung laptops received vital consideration. Samsung has a modest laptop computer market share within the United States in comparison with rivals like Dell, HP, and Lenovo, however these new fashions may increase some eyebrows.
Galaxy Book3 Ultra
Thin and attractively designed, Samsung’s new Galaxy Book3 Ultra is a reputable problem to the vaunted Apple MacBook Pro. With a 16″ AMOLED show with a 3K decision of 2880×1800 and a 120Hz refresh fee, this laptop computer has one of many brightest and most vivid screens I’ve seen.
Sporting a top-shelf Intel 13th Gen Core i7 or Core i9 processor with the newest Nvidia GeForce RTX graphics, it’s excellent for gaming {and professional} content material producers.

Galaxy Book3 Ultra (Image Credit: Samsung)

I like Samsung’s alternative of discrete graphics because it helps Nvidia Broadcast functionality with Eye Contact correction, which is sorely wanted for podcast manufacturing and videoconferencing. With such horsepower in a compact and impressively slim type issue, I’ll have an interest to see how loud the unit runs, which was inconceivable to evaluate given the ambient noise within the demo space of the occasion.
With a beginning value of $2,199, it’s an intriguing different, at a extra inexpensive value, to a comparable MacBook Pro.
Galaxy Book3 Pro 360
More reasonably priced laptops have been introduced as properly. Samsung’s new Galaxy Book3 Pro 360, which additionally comes with a 16″ AMOLED show with a 120Hz refresh, has a touchscreen and built-in fashion. This mannequin makes use of Intel’s 13th Gen i5 or Core i7 processors and contains non-obligatory 5G radio help and customary Wi-Fi.

Galaxy Book3 Pro 360 2-in-1 Laptop with S Pen (Image Credit: Samsung)

Available in a number of reminiscence and storage configurations, the Galaxy Book3 Pro 360 has a beginning value level of $1,399.
Galaxy Book3 Pro
Last however not least, Samsung introduced the entry-level Galaxy Book3 Pro with a beginning value level of $1,149. This mannequin is on the market with both 14″ or 16″ AMOLED shows, Intel 13th Gen processors, and extra modest reminiscence (8GB, 16GB, and 32GB) and storage configurations (256GB, 512GB, and 1TB).

Galaxy Book3 Pro in Graphite (Image Credit: Samsung)

Analyst’s Thoughts
It’s onerous to evaluate the Galaxy Unpacked 2023 occasion within the correct context till Apple begins to indicate its playing cards, beginning at WWDC within the June timeframe, adopted up by its presumed iPhone 15 announcement, which typically happens in September.
At this second, Samsung continues to push the accelerator on the computational pictures side of the smartphone. Interestingly, no new foldable smartphone designs have been introduced at Galaxy Unpacked 2023, signaling restricted market attraction for these gadgets as a result of excessive pricing and unconvincing utilization fashions.

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Samsung could not wish to acknowledge this, however the firm — and the business — wants Apple to leap into this class and validate the house. However, if business rumors are correct, Apple could not provide foldable smartphone (or pill) fashions till 2024 or 2025.
Ecosystem Advantages
Beyond the {hardware} features of the laptops launched yesterday, it’s price stating that Samsung emphasizes the significance of an built-in ecosystem amongst customers. Apple has constructed a multi-billion-dollar enterprise convincing customers that there are integration virtues with proudly owning Apple-branded gadgets that may seamlessly share content material and resume work from machine to machine with a standard consumer expertise.
Samsung’s Galaxy Book expertise places a consumer’s total library of Galaxy apps and options in a single place, making it simpler to handle the consumer’s Samsung account.

Samsung Galaxy Book3 Pro multi-device expertise presentation. (Image Credit: Samsung)

Other PC distributors have tried to do that with so-so outcomes, mainly due to the OEM differentiation dynamic and Window’s open nature, which doesn’t simply facilitate a shared expertise. It stays to be seen if Samsung can pull that off.
It additionally doesn’t assist that iPhone customers — about half of the whole smartphone market — aren’t part of the legacy Windows ecosystem from a textual content messaging standpoint. The incapacity to entry iMessage on a Windows machine is without doubt one of the core explanation why I stay ensconced within the Apple ecosystem, although Windows-based gadgets are sometimes extra attractively priced and featured than comparable Apple merchandise. I think I’m not the one one caught on this quagmire.
Regardless, due to its legacy smartphone market presence, Samsung is without doubt one of the few corporations that may provide an fascinating different to Apple’s ecosystem. While the corporate is enjoying catchup to a level with Apple, give Samsung credit score for presenting a reputable alternative for customers, because it’s all the time a win for customers once they could make clever picks that finest go well with their utilization mannequin wants.