Samsung Galaxy S4 Rumors: January CES 2013 Unveiling Unlikely

There are plenty of rumors and reports floating around about Samsung's next flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S4. An earlier release date rumor was debunked by Samsung, and now it seems that new one has reared its speculative head. Some reports are now claiming that Samsung could show off the Galaxy S4 at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2013 in Las Vegas. 

Before you get too excited, however, there are some factors that make this seem like an unlikely scenario. For starters, CES 2013 runs from January 8-11, meaning the trade show is less than two months away. With the Galaxy S3 still going strong (recently surpassing the 30-million sales mark) there is no reason for Samsung to divert attention away from a trending device so quickly. The Galaxy S3 has plenty of life left in it, as Samsung is set to update the handset to Android 4.1.2 by the end of this year and Android 4.2 during Q1 2013. 

What most likely happened is that the reports confused the CES 2013 unveiling of Samsung's 4.99-inch 1080p Super AMOLED display with the actual unveiling of the Galaxy S4. The 4.99-inch Super AMOLED display will feature a resolution of 1920X1080, giving it 441 pixels per inch (ppi), and is expected to be the display for the Galaxy S4. Samsung is beginning to mass produce the screen, and should be showcasing it at CES 2013.Samsung will instead probably hold a Galaxy S4 launch event before summer hits next year, much like it did with the Galaxy S3. 

While the unveil and release dates for the Samsung Galaxy S4 are still up in the air, a vague, unofficial outline of the Galaxy S4's specs are beginning to take form. The handset will most likely use the above-mentioned 4.99-inch 1080p display and come with 2.0GHz quad-core Exynos processor running the latest version of Android at the moment. On top of that the handset should feature a minimum of 2GB RAM and even a 13-megapixel camera on top of it all. 

If everything adds up, the Galaxy S4 will undoubtedly be a powerful and appealing handset, but for now, consumers will have to be content with the Galaxy S3, which is still one of the most high-end smartphones around.