The launch of the Samsung Galaxy S Advance sees the newest edition to the Galaxy range sporting suspiciously similar specs to its sibling the Galaxy R.

The Galaxy S Advance comes with a 4-inch Super AMOLED screen (480 x 800), a 1.0GHz dual-core processor, 8GB/16GB of internal memory, front facing 1.3MP camera and a rear facing 5MP camera with 720p video recording.

The specs are certainly not going to set the world on fire and disappointingly it's running Android 2.3, with no word on whether is will get an Ice Cream Sandwich update.

Russia will be the first to see the handset, due in late February and then Samsung are planning on rolling it out to Europe, CIS, Africa, Middle East, Asia, Latin America and China. There is currently no confirmation whether the handset will make it to the UK.

Attack of the clones

It has been noted the Galaxy S Advance is very similar to the Galaxy R, with the main difference being the S Advance packs a Super AMOLED screen. With it being such a copy-cat device it does beg the question, what's the point of this handset?

Samsung has not revealed the price of the Galaxy S Advance, but we expect it to fall in the mid-range bracket and not the £340 range rumoured in the Philippines.

With initial availability mooted to be February, we expect the Galaxy S Advance to feature at MWC 2012 in Barcelona, where it may or may not be joined on stage with the Samsung Galaxy S3.

Have Samsung got carried away releasing handset after handset, or is this amount of choice a good thing? Let us know your thoughts below.