If you only remember three things about the
Samsung Z, make them these: 1) it's the company's first phone to run Samsung's
home brew Tizen operating system; 2) it launches first in Russia in Q3; and it
looks a lot more like the Android-based Samsung Galaxy S5 flagship phone than
you might expect.
Tizen
on the Samsung Z
The most important thing about the Samsung phone
demoed at the Tizen Developer Conference in San Francisco is the Z's OS and
interface. As with its custom TouchWiz layer on top of Android,
you get multiple home screens, an app tray, a notifications tab, and widgets.
It all just looks a little different.
Also like Android (and others), you'll slide down a shade at the top of the screen to access notifications and system settings like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and power-saving mode. You can also hold down the physical home button to view tabs of your recent apps and slide them away. Also familiar? A long press on the home screen (or tap of the menu button) calls up options to change the wallpaper and add widgets, which Samsung calls "Dynamic Boxes" in Tizen.Samsung has employed a kind of split screen mode that lets you swipe among widget-festooned home screens on the top portion of the screen, while a block of circular icons sits along the bottom. You can tap these shortcuts -- for the dialer, messenger, and browser, for instance -- or slide them up to reach the app tray.
The Z's lock screen layout is also the spitting
image of its Android frenemy the Galaxy S5, with the look and placement of its
camera icon, the nearly-identical Settings menu, and the camera module,
complete with filters like Beauty Face, Dual Shot using the front and rear
cameras, HDR, and panorama. Neither the settings menu or camera app has every
one of the Galaxy S5's options, but the main functionality and feel is there in
spades.
Apps
and features
Samsung also carries over a tremendous amount of
functionality that we saw built on top of the S5's Android OS to the new
Tizen-based Z, including safety assistance, the ultra power-saving mode, and
the fingerprint scanner. There's Private Mode, a simple start screen mode,
blocking mode, the download booster that utilizes both Wi-Fi and the data
network, and split screen multitasking.
You'll also find Samsung's bevy of apps, like
the new S Health, S Voice, S Translator, and the WatchOn remote for controlling
your TV. Color themes is a new addition that adds a little more visual pep. I
wouldn't be surprised if it cropped up in the Galaxy line as well.
