Flashback: Samsung S8500 Wave, the primary telephone with Tremendous AMOLED and first with Bada OS

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Have you learnt which was the primary telephone with a Tremendous AMOLED show? A few of you will have answered “the unique Galaxy S”, however that’s not the case – should you learn our story of OLED shows on cellphones you’ll know that it was the Samsung S8500 Wave, which beat the Galaxy S to market by two months.




Again then we known as this a “modest retail package deal” – if solely we knew what was coming

Or perhaps you answered appropriately since you nonetheless keep in mind the Wave telephones and the OS they ran – Bada (Korean for “ocean”). It was a precursor to Tizen, the OS that runs on Samsung sensible TVs as we speak and was once a serious a part of the corporate’s smartwatches too (although that appears to have come to an finish with the Galaxy Watch4 collection, which switched to Google’s Put on OS).




Meet the Samsung S8500 Wave – the primary telephone with a Tremendous AMOLED show

Let’s rewind a bit. Maemo was a Linux-based working system for cell units (“web tablets” and smartphones) developed by Nokia. Intel had an analogous system dubbed Moblin. Then the 2 tech giants determined to mix their efforts into MeeGo (which is a part of what made the Nokia N9 superior).

However then Nokia deserted Intel to pursue different love pursuits (you recognize the one). So, Intel and others – Samsung amongst them – began the Tizen undertaking as a sequel to MeeGo. Samsung had its personal Linux-based OS on the time, Bada, which was ultimately merged into Tizen in 2013. The corporate has been the primary consumer of Tizen ever since. The household tree of Linux-based cell working methods is convoluted to say the least.






The Wave was a lovely telephone • It even had 3.5 mm jacks and digital camera buttons

Again to the S8500 Wave. Apart from the OS, it was like a smaller Galaxy S. It ran on the identical Hummingbird chipset (1.0 GHz Cortex-A8 CPU), an early Samsung chip predating the Exynos line. The telephone had the identical 5 MP digital camera with autofocus and 720p video recording too, identical 1,500 mAh battery even.

The display screen was smaller, 3.3 inches, than that of the Galaxy S (4.0″), although it had the identical decision – 480 x 800 px. Like on the Galaxy, this show loved the safety of first era Gorilla Glass.

And whereas we had seen AMOLED shows earlier than, this one was particular. With no hole between the show itself and the protecting glass (that is a part of what made it “Tremendous” AMOLED), the entire interface appeared to drift on the floor of the glass. The show had vibrant colours and true blacks, after all. Right here it’s in comparison with some excessive profile competitors:






The primary Tremendous AMOLED show confirmed nice promise

The Wave and the Galaxy S might have ran completely different OSes, it wasn’t instantly apparent – each have been skinned with TouchWiz, the UI Samsung used for many of its telephones (beginning with its touch-operated featurephones). The {hardware} was related sufficient that industrious builders managed to get Android operating, all the best way as much as 4.4 KitKat (2013). Even the Galaxy S itself formally solely acquired as much as 2.3 Gingerbread.






TouchWiz made each Bada and Android look the identical






Notification shades and fast toggles are cool in any OS

As for official software program releases from Samsung, the Wave was up to date to Bada OS 2.0 in late 2011 with a totally redesigned UI and full multitasking. Bada 1.x was able to multitasking (it’s Linux, in spite of everything), nonetheless, it restricted third-party apps to operating solely separately (an influence saving characteristic). Model 2.0 lifted that restriction.

Because it didn’t run Android, Symbian, Window Cellular or any one of many different established working methods, Bada wanted an app retailer. And it had one, Samsung Apps. Once we reviewed the unique Wave the shop had solely 60 apps (all of them free), although Samsung had promised to carry that quantity as much as 100 by the point the telephone launched.






The Bada OS app switcher • The Samsung Apps retailer for Bada software program

Lack of apps was a serious subject for Home windows Telephone as properly, Microsoft’s misguided bid to stay related within the smartphone section. In case your platform doesn’t have apps for the foremost social networks, prompt messengers, streaming and different widespread companies, then it’s useless within the water.

Classes discovered. Now, feast your eyes on some pictures we took with that 5MP digital camera on the Wave. The telephone had a digital camera key that launched the app and may very well be used to take a photograph (however no focus, although, this was a single-stage button).










Samsung S8500 Wave digital camera samples

And here’s a video pattern – the Wave had a kind of early 720p-capable cameras. Not the perfect, however essential because the world was transitioning from SD to HD:

Whereas Samsung launched a number of different Wave telephones (together with the Wave II and Wave 3, plus lower-end fashions), the top got here swiftly for Bada – the final launch was in 2011, lower than two years after the primary.




The Samsung S8500 Wave was the primary of its sort – sadly, its sort did not final very lengthy

A bit later the Samsung Z collection launched with the brand new Tizen OS, the successor to Bada. That too fizzled out fairly shortly, the Samsung Z got here in 2014 and the final Tizen telephone, the Samsung Z3 Company version, launched in mid-2016. And that was all she wrote.

In fact, Tizen continued for use in Samsung’s sensible TVs and smartwatches, however after years of attempting the corporate discovered that it doesn’t really want another smartphone OS to Android.

Actually, in 2019 TouchWiz, the symptom of Samsung utilizing too many telephone OSes, was killed off in favor of One UI – the one true software program for Samsung telephones. Even Microsoft, Nokia’s associate in crime, discovered the lesson {that a} good Android pores and skin is value greater than a proprietary OS. Now each Samsung and Microsoft are working with Google to implement cool new options for Android (particularly for foldable and dual-screen telephones).