Product Review, Smartphone | featured news

The Galaxy S III offers some startlingly creative features, but it may take some time to master... In the galaxy of app phones, this one is a bright, beautiful star.

The Galaxy Nexus, a smartphone that arrived in Verizon Wireless stores on Thursday, is huge -- and not just because of its unusually large size. The new Android phone, which has been available in Britain for weeks, is the first to run Android 4.0, the latest version of the popular mobile operating system that also goes by the adorable name Ice Cream Sandwich. This is a very significant update to Android for smartphones.

Early reviews of the iPhone 4S may have been uniformly great, bordering on glowing. But the best part of Wednesday’s coverage of Apple’s latest has been reviewers’ transcripts of their conversations with Siri — the personal assistant.