Today Samsung along with Google officially announced the Galaxy Nexus, the first phone to run Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. It’s planned to be released in November to US, Europe, and Asia through NTT DoCoMo in Japan. The Android’s UI has been tweaked considerably in Ice Cream Sandwich, to be as Google puts it, “a pure Google experience”. This therefore means no longer any manufacturer created skins. ICS has a cleaner interface and is driven entirely on screen. Much like what Nokia introduced with the Nokia N9 running MeeGo, there is no longer a need for any hardware buttons. The commands you commonly use, like Home, Back, and a multitask button, appear directly on the display.
The Galaxy Nexus features a 4.65-inch 1280 x 720 HD Super AMOLED screen with a reported 1/100th of a millisecond response time. It runs a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, has 1GB of RAM, 16GB or 32GB internal memory, and a 1750mAh battery. It also has a front 1.3 megapixel camera for video calling, and a 5 megapixel camera with LED flash on the back. Samsung say it will take stills “with zero shutter lag” and video up to 1080p at 30fps. For connectivity there is Bluetooth 3.0, USB 2.0, 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi (2.4GHz and 5GHz), and also NFC. It supports Pentaband HSPA+, and for some regions an LTE version will also be available. There still no USB-OTG support though it seems.
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