The Samsung Galaxy S III, or S3, will launch in Australia shortly after the phone is revealed at the World Mobile Congress in February claim Samsung sources.

The Samsung Galaxy S III, or S3, will launch in Australia shortly after the phone is revealed at the World Mobile Congress in February claim Samsung sources.

The new smartphone which has a 720p screen, quad-core Exynos processor and the Ice Cream Sandwich Android software is tipped to be one of the best selling phones in 2012.

Samsung produced the Galaxy Nexus, the Google-branded phone that currently leads the Android pack in spec terms, and all the Galaxy S III needs to do is add a few bells and whistles to justify turning up 3-6 months later. The screen will reportedly remain the same – a highly impressive 720p Super AMOLED panel – but the processor will be upgraded from dual-core to a quad-core chip and the 1GB of RAM boosted up to 2GB. It’ll also use TouchWiz, Samsung’s staple custom Android UI, but so do virtually all Galaxy phones.

With current Android functionality, this power might be considered overkill, but the Samsung Galaxy S III will also feature 3D video playback to make use of it. Current reports don’t appear to suggest the phone’s screen will be 3D, like Nintendo’s 3DS or HTC Evo 3D, rather that the handset will be able to pipe out 3D content to a 3D-capable television. Samsung’s top-end Galaxy phones offer class-leading media playback skills, so if anyone can pull this off, it’s Samsung.