Verizon rolling out Galaxy S III Jelly Bean upgrade

Verizon has begun operating system upgrades for Samsung Galaxy S III smartphones running on its network.

The New Jersey-based carrier is the last of the four major networks to upgrade its customers’ Galaxy S III phones from Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean -- a more recent version of the Google mobile operating system.

Verizon announced the news in a blog post Friday, saying the upgrade will be pushed out to customers in phases, so they may not get it right away. The company said users who would like to download the upgrade manually from the settings menu will be able to do so within the next week.

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With Jelly Bean, the Galaxy S III will receive Android’s Google Now feature, which attempts to provide users with information they might want whenever they go into the Google Search app.

Additionally, Jelly Bean upgrades Android’s notifications and is supposed to make the entire software run more smoothly.

Verizon said the upgrade will also enhance its Galaxy S III phones’ cameras by letting users add filters. When recording video, users will now be able to pause and continue a shot, “so they can record it all in one take,” the carrier said.

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