Samsung Galaxy S II out on May 1st

Samsung has finally spilled the beans on the UK release date for the hotly-anticipated Galaxy S II (or ‘S2’ if you have an aversion to Roman numerals).

As mentioned in the rumour last week, the S II will be out on May 1st and has been upgraded to a 1.2GHz dual-core processor - as opposed to the original 1GHz model seen at Mobile World Congress in Feburary.

That theoretically makes it the fastest handset on the market at the time of its release, especially if it’s followed the Galaxy S’s example and popped the latest Imagination Technologies-designed SGX GPU inside (as featured in the iPad 2).

The phone is capable of 1080p recording thanks to the extra grunt inside and the 8-megapixel camera on the outside, while the Super AMOLED Plus screen marks the first time this technology has been deployed on a Sammy blower.

On the software side of things, Samsung has decided to brush up Gingerbread with a new ‘Live Panel’ function, which is obviously nothing to do with Windows Phone 7’s Live Tiles despite sounding exactly like them - offering up-to-the-minute updates on social networks and applications from the home screen.

There have been no announced prices for the Galaxy S II just yet, but we’ll no doubt hear from the major networks over the next few days.