You may have been following our live blog of Samsung’s “Unpacked: Part I” event at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. If you did you would know that, much to the chagrin of most of the event’s attendants, it sort of dragged; we heard the same things repeated over and over again by various members of Samsung’s team. However, after we’ve had some hands-on time with the star of the show, the Galaxy S II, we think we know why it got such and exhaustive introduction: it’s a really, really great smartphone. Sammy has obviously invested a large amount of time and energy into the next Galaxy S, and you can really feel all that effort and energy when you pick up the device. It’s incredibly light, incredibly thin, and incredibly responsive. The TouchWiz UI has gotten a serious makeover that makes it much more appealing than its previous iteration. Customization options, social networking hook-ins, it’s all there. Not to mention some of those high-end specs: dual-core processor, Wi-Fi direct support, HSPA +21 Mbps radio, 1080p HD recording and playback at 30fps, and hardware accelerated encryption — just to name a few. Oh, and who could forget that 4.3-inch Super AMOLED Plus screen… you really have to see it to appreciate it. In short: the phone is gorgeous, feels solid, and responds just like you want it to. Will the Galaxy S II make its way to the U.S. in a non carrier-bastardized form? That’s the $1,000,000 question. Sammy is hosting another event tomorrow evening where it may reveal more details about its strategy for the United States — if we’re lucky we may even get a timetable. Until then, hit up our hands-on gallery and let us know what you think!

Dell is having a hard time getting its T-Mobile compliant Windows Phone 7 handset — the Venue Pro – shipped in time for the holidays, but that hasn’t stopped the company from sending at second iteration of the device to the FCC for approval. A Venue Pro sporting WCDMA bands II and V — AT&T’s 850MHz and 1900MHz 3G bands — has crossed the government agency’s desk. If you’re an AT&T, Bell, Rogers, or Telus customer, and fancy the vertical-sliding device, this is encouraging news. While FCC approval doesn’t guarantee a release, it is certainly a step in the right direction. Any customers of the aforementioned carriers interested in the Venue Pro?

[Via Engadget]

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Thanks to one of our connects, we’ve scored a shot of Sprint’s playbook which contains some upcoming launch dates. The first on the list confirms that the Motorola i1 we scooped way back will definitely launch on June 20th in stores. However, it won’t be available in stores for purchase until July 11th. Next up is the Samsung Intercept M910 (what some have referred to as the Samsung Moment II). The presumably Android-based Samsung Intercept is due to launch on July 11th as well, for online and in store purchases. What would the nation’s first 4G carrier be without some 4G market launches? We’ll see a number of cities get lit up for Sprint Speed in July, and some of these include Rochester, NY, Syracuse, NY, Kennewick, WA, Pasco, WA, Visalia, WA and more.

While LG may have shown off the Viewty II at a trade show or two, it’s actual existence had never been officially acknowledged by the Korean company until now, as the handset has been officially featured on LG’s German blog. Although the company did reveal some very nice photos of the device which has also been given the nickname Viewty Smart, very little was mentioned in regards to the specs of the phone itself. However, since its spec sheet was captured by an eagle-eyed trade show attendee a few months back, we know the following:

• 12.4mm thin, 90g
• S-Class 3D UI
• 3-inch WVGA (800 x 480 pixels) touchscreen display
• Quad-band GSM, HSPA, WiFi, aGPS
• 8 megapixel Schneider-Kreuznach camera, Xenon flash
• 32GB storage
• DivX playback

Find it odd that the company would provide such a small amount of info on its blog? Yeah, it looks like there was a bit of a mix up as the post in question has since been pulled — though the bright side is that the blog now states more info will be available in a few days. Perhaps then we’ll get a better idea of pricing and release timing as well.

Hit the jump for a few more pics of the sexy handset.

[Via PhoneArena]

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