Gadgetory

hello everyone Eber here with hardware connects and this is the Samsung Galaxy S 9 not the s 9 plus but it's little brother the s 9 and it's a successor to the very popular galaxy s 8 and the S 8 plus I was actually fortunate to test those devices last year and let's just say that I had a lot to discuss in terms of Samsung's design and software choices and for those of you who watched a review should get a rough understanding as to where I'm coming from and what my expectations and preferences are when it comes to a flagship Android advise personally I had mixed feelings about the s8 and it was just not my favorite device from last year but against mantra reviews are always subjective but let's talk about the s9 and what improvements Samsung has done to it to make it a compelling upgrade over last year's device or any other smartphone so let's dive into it but first a quick message from our sponsor welcome to you a new keyboard train first attach the magnetic wrist wrist it simply pops in don't forget about the USB pass-through port and the headphone jack to simplify your connectivity you're the boss of the meeting control which is right over here fiery red key caps are included because it is a gaming product with RGB / key elimination and under the hood we've got cherry MX silver speed and blue switches for those legit actuations and finally don't forget about the voice control enjoy your new x1 by thermaltake check it out in the description below alright so what are the new changes let's analyze it step by step and ultimately you can decide if it's worth your hard earned cash first and foremost the design and honestly it's not that different from the s8 at least when you look at it from an arm's reach the insulin still features curved edges smooth metal unibody construction corrala classified both at the front and the back which again is a fingerprint magnet I have already noticed scratches at the back of my sample with just a month of usage and it looks ridiculous so a case or skin is highly recommended although I do want to mention that while a case could protect the rear end of the phone it wouldn't necessarily protect the screen at the front and here's why you see the curved screen design sort of blends in with the metal the device so when you install a case that tiny gap is still prone to damage a friend of mine bought the s8 last year and she has already been through two replacements which is mind-blowing considering it's only been a year and this is a picture of a recent s8 device with a case installed and it still has a cracked screen now I know what some of you might be thinking why not install an Otterbox case or any other military-grade material to give it the ultimate protection it needs but that would add more weight it would take away the physical aesthetics order the beautful aesthetics of the device and it just wouldn't make any sense purchasing the s9 in the first place because the design is the most attractive element of the smartphone I think we've reached peak smartphone design in 2018 I mean Samsung brought their a-game to the table with the introduction of the s8 and we saw competitors sort of take inspiration from that and implement them in their own flagship devices sure they all look beautiful in person but from a practicality standpoint I just can't recommend phones with curved screens and glass backs it just it's just not my taste but I'd love to hear your thoughts on that in the comments moving on to the display well nothing has actually changed in that area you get the same 5.8 inch Super AMOLED screen with a qhd+ resolution the screen to body ratio remains identical so nothing super exciting but hey it's still one of the best displays I've encountered on a smartphone colors are super vibrant if you've owned a Samsung device in the last few years this should feel like home I'll be it a little bit better due to the improvements in contrast ratio and a wider color space support Samsung does include options for different color profiles my pick was the basic mode as the colors seem more neutral to my eyes especially coming from the pixel to also fun fact the pixel to screen gets a lot brighter than the s9 so Ewing content outdoors might not give you the best experience on the s9 when compared to the pixel - that being said nice lens brightness can be dimmed a lot lower than the pixels so at least that's nice I still can't get over the curved screen while watching content remember on my essay review I mentioned how the edges got reflective and it kind of got in the way when watching content or just watching video or something it's the same story with the s9 and I didn't like that now given the screen so much flush to the metal frame there's no room to hold the phone comfortably and I've run into times where I've accidentally skipped to another part of the video because the playback meter within the app in this case YouTube automatically detects my thumb's position and registers that timestamp which I found to be really annoying this is one of the downsides of a bezel as smartphone there's just no room to comfortably place your fingers around and I think a case might come in as a solution once again because it adds a little bit more room around the edges for better ergonomics but those are just my thoughts by the way Bixby is still here I don't think Sampson is gonna let go of their virtual assistant anytime soon and they've been adding updates to it since the s8 launched to be frank I have never bothered using it at all since I'm heavily invested into the Google ecosystem and I'm a lot more comfortable using that over Bixby and there are a few reasons for that for example on my pixel 2 I can simply squeeze the device to activate Google assistant and it can ask a certain question or maybe control my smart home devices and it's pretty fast it's consistent it just works whereas with Bixby well that's a different story because you have to ask it as you have to ask question a certain way to get the right answer and another thing is that it's not compatible with my smart home devices because Samsung or the Bixby is directly linked to smart Samsung smartthings which is Samsung's smart or Samsung's separate smart home ecosystem so that's another entity and it just wouldn't work so that's another reason why I didn't even bother using big space however Samsung has pre-booked Google assistant into the s9 so all you have to do is just hold on to the home button to activate Google assistant and you can ask it certain things and it'll just work right away but the problem is that you're having you're kind of competing with two virtual assistants on the same device it's either Bixby or Google or Google assistants so it's like which one would you pick it is confusing you could ultimately turn off Bixby if you really want to and stick with Google assistant on this device but if you want to take advantage of some of the features that Bixby has it's it's a good way I mean one you could ask it to open a certain app and perform certain tasks or Bixby vision is a pretty cool feature essentially you can use the camera to point at certain objects and big speed is a really good job pulling up results that are relatable to that object so for example if I point the camera to a gaming keyboard it'll pull up appropriate results which is pretty awesome and I don't think Google can do that as of right now it does have that feature but it just can't detect certain objects so that's something to keep in mind now one of the things that I mentioned in my essay review was the inability to reprogram this physical bixby button to something else you still can't do that on the s9 unfortunately but you can't actually turn that button off or physically disabled that button so Bixby has finally given you the option to go into the settings and turn off that button to trigger Bixby so if you accidentally keep hitting this button and when it triggers Bixby then you can completely just turn it off so that's nice but the problem is that it's just one physical button that's just sitting there doing nothing you can't really reprogram it although I'm pretty aware that there are third-party applications that can do that it's just that it would've been a lot nicer if Samsung could offered that reprogrammable function on this button so yeah it's it's big space so I really don't know what else can I talk about I should also mention that the fingerprint reader the back has been relocated to a more comfortable spot it's easier to access when compared to the s8 but oddly my review sample has some difficulties recognizing my finger at times but hey I'm glad that they've listened to us from last year's terrible placement the insulin still features ip68 water and dust resistant rating it's a must-have feature in 2018 at this price point and Samsung gets bonus points for keeping the headphone jack because most flagship phones don't come with one and the internal DAC is fantastic you won't have a problem driving high-end headphones like the sennheiser HD 598 Plus Samsung does include a pair of AKG headphones out of the box so you don't have to invest in a pair later on unfortunately I can't comment on how those headphones sound because the provider for my review sample decided not to include one with my sample so it's like yeah but but hey at least they've included one in retail models so that's nice okay so my software experience with the S sign was alright the main interface is relatively easier to navigate around with albeit I'm typically not a fan of om skins on top of Android but you can easily fix that with a third-party launcher like Nova and customize it the way you like unfortunately it's still running android 8.0 and awaiting the 8.1 updates so hopefully Samsung will roll that out soon that being said expecting ton of Samsung related features on top of the OS Bigsby is one of them there are a handful of other advanced features like smarts a one handed mode and other gesture controls there's a separate theme store where you can download custom themes and wallpapers although you have to pay for most of them the apps edge folder lets you instantly access apps you use most often although I typically leave them on my home screen so not really sure who would take advantage of that Samsung has still pre-loaded the s done with their dedicated browser email calendar gallery and some other apps most of them can't be uninstalled and if you're getting the device to a carrier expect even a lot more bloatware one of the things that completely threw me off while using ys9 was the ability to turn on mobile data on the go and as much as silly as that may sound hermia for a second you see enabling data on most Android smartphones is pretty straightforward all you have to do is pull down the quick settings tab and tap on the data toggle it instantly enables data and it's a quick and easy way especially for people who have limited data plans that's not the case with the S 9 because Samsung for some odd reason decided to remove that toggle from quick settings so if you need to turn on data you'll have to navigate yourself through the main Settings app tap on connections then mobile data and then tap on the toggle trust me it's been a brutal experience going through that process and I honestly have no idea why Samsung decided to remove that feature it was there on the essayed I just don't why they were moved it on the s9 it just this doesn't make any sense I mean I mean Samsung moving on the S line still features a three thousand milliamp hour battery just like the s8 I'll keep your expectations pretty low because battery life is respectable but not great like the Google pixel - there's so much stuff going on with the s9 like the Super AMOLED qhd+ display a faster processor and of course Samsung skin-on running on top of Android you can definitely get away throughout the day without plugging in as long as you're not planning on using it heavily for example streaming music via bluetooth or constantly watching Netflix or YouTube I was able to get around three and a half to four hours of screen on time and my usage consists of casually checking social media watching a few YouTube videos messaging the usual stuff I need to emphasize that battery life heavily depends on your usage so if you are a heavy user you're definitely not gonna expect the greatest results on the s9 so I'd recommend a portable power bank just in case and the good thing is that it actually charges via USB type-c and exports call comes quick charge 2.0 protocol now if I compare to something like the Google pixel - I think this is still a lot better in terms of standby time because Google has done a fantastic job optimizing the software with the hardware so if you're looking for another alternative I definitely recommend the Google pixel 2 over the s9 just in terms of battery life because it's a lot better than this guy all right our last topic to discuss here is camera performance and Samsung has added a few features to make it look like a compelling upgrade over the Galaxy s8 but let me walk you through what exactly they've done here so it features the same 12 megapixel sensor like the s8 but they've added a variable aperture mode meaning you can switch between two different F stops in this case between F 2.4 and F 1.5 which is incredible considering how much light it can let in in darker scenarios now do I see myself taking advantage of this feature maybe maybe not I should most of my pictures in Auto mode with HDR on a smartphone and in this case the esslyn automatically detects lighting conditions and adjust the aperture accordingly but if you want full control of that as well as shutter speed ISO white balance etc Samsung's pro mode is the way to go and there is this so this is an example of a our emoji I'm not exactly sure how I'm supposed to react to this definitely the tracking is pretty weird it's not as accurate like what you find with an emoji zone on the iPhones but I guess this is Samsung's way of responding to Apple's offering and I don't see myself using this feature at all so I don't know I I don't know how to react to this another thing to mention here with the air emoji stuff is that once you've created your avatar Samsung automatically generates a handful of animated emojis with different expressions so if this is something that you're interested in the s9 could be a good option video recording has also improved now you can shoot up to 4k at 60 frames per second 1080p up to 240 frames per second and 720p up to a whopping 960 frames per second or in other words known as super slow motion you can shoot that boat in auto or manual so for instance if you're in auto mode all you have to do is tap the record button and the sensor will automatically detect objects that are in the square and when there's a motion it'll trigger slow motion whereas with manual you'd have to tap the slow motion icon to capture that motion the results are pretty interesting it's not the best quality out there because it's 720p but the option to shoot 1080p at 240 frames per second is a fantastic alternative it's a lot better in terms of quality and while you're losing a bit on the frame rate sign I think it's okay pictures on the other hand work good there's great dynamic range and the sensor does a really good job capturing detail although I've ran into times where it would accidentally over expose for a particular shot destroying the shadows the colors are of course nice and vibrant just like what you'd expect from a Samsung device but personally I still prefer the image coming out of the pixel too just because it does a much better job processing HDR and exposing properly I've taken a few samples for comparison so let me know what you think about it in the comments all right so this is the video test from the Samsung Galaxy S 9 currently shooting 4k at 60 frames per second but my premiere timeline is 24 P so I guess you might notice a little bit of jitter as you can see the sensor does come with image stabilization so does a really good job stabilizing the footage here's a quick test of the auto focusing it works really well and as I'm walking down this pathway I'm actually really impressed with the video quality coming out of the guest 9 there's good dynamic range auto focusing is great colors are nice and vibrant but surprisingly it doesn't get that it doesn't over expose that well so or it doesn't blow out the highlights which is great but let me know what you guys think about the video quality in the comments now portrait mode has sort of made its way into the s 9 but it's renamed a selective focus essentially this allows the user to shifts focus between subjects after taking the picture you can't necessarily adjust the blurriness of the background like the note aid or the s9 because both those devices feature two cameras but once again it's nowhere as good as the pixel two same story goes for the selfie camera to the sensor on my sample for some reason over exposes a little bit for the highlights not exactly sure what's going on but overall I'm not that impressed with the camera performance on the s9 so I think it's about time to wrap my thoughts on galaxy s 9 it's a minor improvement over the SI if you are a current SI toner I wouldn't recommend hopping onto the s9 right away because you're not really getting that much in terms of paying that premium for one the design is almost identical sure they relocated the fingerprint reader which is crane but rest aside you're getting the same display with the same resolution one of the cool things that actually included dual front-facing speakers or dual speakers this time so you have a one firing it from the bottom and one of them firing from the earpiece so it gives you a nice dual stereo imaging which is green which the SI didn't have and the camera improvements might not seem like a major one unless if you really need to take advantage of super slow motion and maybe the variable aperture mode if you see yourself taking image of that and of course taking range of Samsung's Pro Mode and of course maybe get accustomed to the Samsung related features then the s9 might seem like a pretty good option but I just personally can't recommend this phone and there are a few reasons for that one I'm not really a fan of Samsung's software experience it's not the best I'm I'm you know I'm more of a stock Android type of guy I prefer the experience coming out of the pixel to over the s9 and to be honest you're really not getting that much in terms of features when compared to pixel two for example the battery life is a lot better on this guy when compared to the s9 the camera is of course a lot better on the pixel too when compared ds9 and while the display might seem a lot better on the s9 compared the pixel 2 because this has a 1080p display compared to a qhd+ display I'd really don't care about that it's just what I care about is something that functions and I think basil 2 is functional whereas the s is not because the curved screen not a fan of that it gets super slippery glass backs not a fan of that it gets super slippery it's a fingerprint magnet not my best and the one major thing that threw me off totally while using this device was you know Samsung just decided to remove that mobile data toggle on the quick settings app it's just I'm not sure why they decided to do it but I'm really disappointed in that decision it just I just can't pricing on the s9 starts at seven hundred twenty dollars and it can vary depending on carriers and in Canada there are two color options that you can choose from there's a titanium gray and lilac purple I prefer titanium gray but I also would have preferred to see midnight black into the Canadian market but unfortunately we don't have that option quickly on our performance I know I haven't mentioned that in the review but there's just nothing really to talk about because it's got a flagship processor in it four gigs of ram and it just flies through multitasking expect blazing fast performance you're not gonna notice any slowdowns and I didn't notice any slowdowns over my testing period so that's nice although one thing that I'm kind of aware of or a little worried about is the device is receiving constant updates later on I'm not sure when the 8.1 update is gonna roll out in the s9 hopefully they'll roll it out soon but that is something to keep in mind so that about wraps up my long-term review of the samsung galaxy s 9 I'd love to hear your thoughts on this device what do you guys think about it if you're an existing SI would you actually consider I'm going to the s9 or if you are coming from the s6 or the s7 or if you're thinking about switching from an iPhone would you consider the s9 let me know the comments down below I Mira with high reckon axe thank you so much for watching and we'll see you in the next one