Samsung Galaxy S II Android phone comes to Telstra July 26

Software changes made to improve user experience

Telstra has announced the high-end Android smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S II, will be available on its network from July 26.

The Galaxy S II will be available on the freedom connect plans, including on the $59 plan with a mobile repayment option of $20 per month (after a bonus) for 24 months.

Business customers can get the Galaxy SII on a $79 business mobile maximiser plan with a $15 phone payment per month over 24 months. It can also be purchased outright for $840.

Telstra has been teasing the public with various Galaxy S II announcements over the past two months, but finally came clean on its Exchange blog this week.

One intrepid TechWorld reader actually predicted the release date of the S II, commenting it would be available on July 27.

“I have been informed by The Telstra Cloc that the release of the Samsung Galxy S II is July the 27th,” the infomer wrote.

One day off ain’t bad for a rumour. Last week we asked Telstra’s PR machine to confirm whether it was true and got the standard “we don’t comment on rumours” response.

Although we did get another snippet of info from Telstra with “we expect to announce Galaxy S II availability early next week”, which has tuned out to be true.

Unveiled in February, the Galaxy S II is regarded as the premier Android-based smartphone for its specs and styling, and just this week Samsung announced it had sold 3 million S II handsets outside the US.

Why the delay compared to Optus and Vodafone? Well Telstra believes its quality assurance processes are second to none and even managed to sway Samsung into making some changes to the S II’s default software.

According to the telco, Telstra’s Galaxy S IIs will have better mobile signal sensitivity thus reducing call drops and improving data speeds; improved UI performance; better data throughput when used tethering; improved e-mail attachment handling; and more stability when used as a Wi-Fi hotspot.

Over the past few months Telstra has added the HTC Desire S, HTC Wildfire S, the HTC Sensation and the Motorola Atrix to its Android handset line up.

Follow Rodney Gedda on Twitter: @rodneygedda

Follow TechWorld Australia on Twitter: @Techworld_AU

Join the newsletter!

Or

Sign up to gain exclusive access to email subscriptions, event invitations, competitions, giveaways, and much more.

Membership is free, and your security and privacy remain protected. View our privacy policy before signing up.

Error: Please check your email address.

Tags smartphonesTelstraAndroidsamsungsamsung galaxy ssamsung galaxy s ii

More about etworkGalaxyHTCMotorolaOptusSamsungTelstra CorporationVodafone

Show Comments
[]