Samsung has finally unveiled its new flagship with the Galaxy S7, which debuted during Mobile World Congress that began on Sunday, Feb. 21. While it looks plenty similar to that of last year’s S6 line, the S7 promises to make consumers “rethink what a phone can do.”
While the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 SoC (Exynos for some regions) with which the S7 comes fitted, and the expandable memory support are causing much of the buzz regarding the newly-released mobile device, the catchphrase that appears at the end of Samsung’s official launch video for the S7 seems to point to its visuals and gaming pedigree. More precisely, the new Vulkan application programming interface (API) and a water-cooling system.
Vulcan
The Vulkan API was developed by the Khronos Group using components from AMD’s Mantle API. Skipping the rest of the history lesson, the new API is said to offer better performance and lesser CPU usage and better work distribution on multiple-core processors. That should translate to less power consumption by the device.
“[Vulkan API] can help mobile devices run games while conserving battery life,” PC World’s Agam Shah comments on the Vulkan API. “[It] will also make games sharper on Android devices like Galaxy smartphones, and lead to the development of more titles.”
Simply put, games running on the Galaxy S7’s 5.1-inch 1440p display will look crisper if they support the Vulkan API.
Water-Cooling
Water-cooling desktops is not new and have been around for years. However, water-cooling for a handheld device is not as common. A couple of years ago, Japanese IT company NEC tried this with the Medias X N-06E but managed to raise as many eyebrows as thumbs. Two years later, Samsung has decided to showcase its take on a water-cooled phone with the Galaxy S7.
“Obviously the scale is miniature compared to desktop water cooling, but the sealed copper cooling system will still do its best to shift excess heat away from the S7's processor when games push things to the phone's thermal limits,” CNet’s Seamus Bryne reports.
There are several questions surrounding the water-cooling system and how effectively it can dissipate heat compared with other devices that don’t have such a feature. At the very least, however, the IP68 water-resistant rating for the Samsung Galaxy S7 will put some minds at ease regarding the fluid in it.
In any case, Samsung seems to have its new device ready for a bigger mobile gaming era. Features for easily taking screen shots and recording gaming sessions, including a do-no-disturb function that blocks notifications that may interfere with “intense” mobile gaming, were also added.
The Samsung Galaxy S7 will ship with a 3,000 mAh battery and Android 6.0 Marshmallow onboard. Gold platinum and black onyx are the color options.
