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Samsung Nexus S (photos)

The Samsung Nexus S gets points for its slick design, satisfying performance, and authentic Android user interface. But outside of the new Gingerbread OS and a faster processor, it doesn't offer as many new features as we had hoped.

Kent German
Kent was a senior managing editor at CNET News. A veteran of CNET since 2003, he reviewed the first iPhone and worked in both the London and San Francisco offices. When not working, he's planning his next vacation, walking his dog or watching planes land at the airport (yes, really).
Kent German
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1 of 10 Josh Miller/CNET
The Nexus S's candy bar design resembles most of the company's Galaxy S handsets. Yet, the overall effect is sleek and polished.
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2 of 10 Josh Miller/CNET
The 4-inch Super AMOLED display is rich and vibrant. The "crawl" design of the main menu will be familiar to Nexus One users.
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3 of 10 Josh Miller/CNET
The Nexus S (left) barely resembles its predecessor. It lacks a navigation trackball, which we missed just a bit, but it has the same touch controls below the display.
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4 of 10 Josh Miller/CNET
On the downside, the Nexus S feels a bit fragile. Also, its plastic skin attracts a lot of fingerprints. Here you can see the dial pad interface.
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5 of 10 Josh Miller/CNET
Gingerbread brings a new virtual keyboard design to the Nexus S. The individual buttons are more rectangular and the suggested text from the dictionary is more visible.
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6 of 10 Josh Miller/CNET
In this profile you can see that the Nexus S has a slight curved shape. The "contour" display is designed to mimic the shape of your head, but we didn't think much of it.
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The Nexus S's camera and flash sit on its back side.
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8 of 10 Google

Home screen

Thanks to Gingerbread, the pop-up menu on the home screen has a black background and a new "Manage apps" icon.
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9 of 10 Google

Copy and paste

We like the new Gingerbread copy and paste interface.
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Manage your power

We also welcome the new "battery use" information that shows a visual representation of how much power each feature is using and how much time the battery has left.

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