Gadgetory

in a direct comparison earlier this week we showed you why you shouldn't necessarily be ticked off if you opted for a standard galaxy s5 over the new LTE a version they're very similar devices from a day-to-day standpoint and for now this one's only available in South Korea to boot but if you're thinking of importing one maybe because you think it's the best Samsung Galaxy s5 you can find well we don't necessarily disagree and we're here to give you a quick look at what you can expect I'm Michael Fisher this is PocketNow and this is our video review of the Samsung Galaxy s5 LTE a if you ultimately decide to spring for the phone some are calling the galaxy s5 prime do what we did get in touch with the folks at 28 mobile they provided the demo device for this review for which we thank them and they have the phone in stock linked in the description below physically there's not much new to this version of the galaxy s5 which comes in a few more colors but otherwise is almost exactly the same as its predecessor in terms of look and feel and fit and finish the removable battery and microSD slot sit behind a gasketed back cover that when properly sealed protects the phone against dust and fresh water immersion just don't get your fingers too wet if you're using the fingerprint scanner or heart rate sensor both of which work about as well here as they do on the standard s5 the whole thing is fronted by a quad HD display under a sheet of damage resistant Gorilla Glass 3 the Super AMOLED screen is a little bluer than we're used to but it's dense with dots and capable of both overpowering brightness and dark room dimness and that combined with the strong color saturation and almost perfect blacks make it a real beauty in almost all conditions the Snapdragon 805 powering it packs the latest graphics and image signal processors making for a very slick software experience out of the box slick has its limits of course and we'd be interested to see how well Samsung's custom software ages overtime despite the powerful processor the interface formerly known as TouchWiz has transition animations that function is kind of an unfortunate speed bump it's no worse than the animations in say iOS but combined with the kind of half-finished aesthetic we complained about in our u.s. Galaxy s5 review it does get a little frustrating at times fortunately there's cool stuff here that makes up for that once you've used multi-window to keep a chat going while watching a youtube video at the same time you start to understand the utility that TouchWiz brings to the table and you're more inclined to forgive it's cosmetic shortcomings also there are options here not present on US versions of this phone there's a button right in the dialer to record calls in progress which should be standard on all smartphones and you've got a download booster - which uses both LTE and Wi-Fi to speed up file transfers there's also some cutesy stuff like festival effect for date specific wallpapers and such but that's nothing we haven't seen before for those ground-pounders interested in using the prime - it's full exercise potential s-health is still here and it's mostly identical to what we're used to there's no signal life coach so you don't need to worry about your phone judging your lifestyle and you also need to manually pair your gear fit if you have one as the manager isn't available through Samsung Apps odds are if you're importing an out of region smartphone you're used to these kind of bumps in the road speaking of bumps you'll still feel most of them when recording video in motion on the s5 prime no matter which of the five available resolutions you're shooting it the lack of optical stabilization is still a sore point and the software stabilization isn't as good as say Sony's also low-light photography really stinks at drawing out the detail from a scene fortunately still shots in good lighting come out nicely if you hold the phone still enough and the software benefits from the added juice of the phone's new image signal processor making the camera speedier on the whole we're glad Samsung offers the ability to modify the shooting mode selector here but the 27 individual settings toggles really need to be pared down to make this a more usable experience at least the volume key toggle is handy for snapping underwater photos where the display is useless once we got this device set up to use a TTS network here in the States performance was on par with what we've come to expect from both big orange and Samsung while there's no American LTE advanced network to take advantage of throughput is still excellent over 4G and reception is solid on the phone's end which also helps out with calling Samsung's Galaxy S Line has never been a favorite of ours in terms of voice quality which is usually a little muddy on both ends of the call in both modes and the rear firing speakerphone doesn't help matters fortunately it is loud enough to take in a movie or a Spotify track and quiet and it's also plenty loud for gaming which as you might expect is an excellent experience it's still possible to find hiccups in unoptimized titles as always but by and large the excellent hardware lives up to its name specs may not always matter but to a gamer they're crucial and the galaxy s5 lte-a is effectively the best you can get on Android finally we were surprised at the phone's endurance despite what we presume is quite a power drain from the pixel Pak display the optimizations within the Snapdragon 805 SOC overcome that giving the prime about the same battery life as the stock s5 over our four days of testing that doesn't mean it's got the staying power of some of its super-sized competition but it's still respectable and there's even a spare battery in the box and at least some units which sweetens the pot quite a bit just like its stock cousin the galaxy s5 lte-a is not the phone for everyone it's got a boring design uninspired software and despite Samsung's recent progress more gimmicks than it should but if you care more about performance damage resistance and the best combination of specs you can find on an Android phone well this is the device that's going to pop your corn for many it's the phone the stock galaxy s5 should have been and whether you agree with that or not it can't be denied that this is a very powerful and capable product no matter how predictable the package it comes in maybe once again if you're in the United States and you'd like one of these you won't find it on your carrier's shelves visit 28 mobile linked in the description below be sure to check out our s5 prime vs s5 comparison and our original s5 review also here on YouTube and toss us a like and to subscribe if you did enjoy this video until next time this has been michael fisher with PocketNow thanks for watching and we'll see you on the next one I'm Michael Fisher this is PocketNow and this is our review of the video 5 it's alpha mm-hmm what about can Hanukkah come on damn it so you decided a hold focus on my face if I did that does that change up on you I was ready to send out a search party get your gold back on track by completing a mission off coach and this is our video review of the Samsung Galaxy s5 lte-a I wasn't really sure about myself on that one I was I suppose your baby but Adam