OT: Samsung Galaxy S9

[p nut]

My wife's old iPhone 6 needs to be replaced. Natural upgrade is to an 8 or X; however, she's taken a fancy to the new Samsung S9's. Mostly for the amazing camera. And the not-so-great reviews of the new gen iPhones.

There will be some loss of home electronics integration (i.e. Homepod, AppleTV, etc); however, probably not a big deal for her. We'll keep Apple music for the homepod. She only uses Pandora on her phone anyway.

Anybody made the switch to Samsung from Apple? I've never owned a Samsung Galaxy. They seem like a solid product.

[SoCalSteve]

Not what you asked or even want to hear...but I’ll say it anyways...:)

Just go the iPhone X and am really happy with it. The Face ID feature works amazingly well, it’s super fast and I don’t miss the home button at all. Actually the swipes are more intuitive.

Just throwing it out there ( and no, I don’t own Apple stock ).

[eddief]

I'm an Android guy. Been taking vaca photos with my Galaxies for a while. Ireland in the last couple of weeks. These look better on my Samsung tablet than on my desktop:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/q1q5sBaKsW46kokx1

[eippo1]

Used an S7 and an iphone at the same time. Now just using the S9. My old galaxy was fine, but the S9 is just a lot more solid in terms of acting like a minicomputer.

Fast, tons of storage, and good android app selection. Plus I have a lot more control over the interface, storage, optimizations etc. If you want something for facetime, Google Duo is pretty awesome and will work across platforms. The camera is actually fantastic and has a decent shutter speed and ability to take low light photos. Head and shoulders better than the S7 in that regard.

Also, there's the part where I really, really hate the iphone interface and wanted to throw that thing against the wall more than every once in a while.

[Rada]

Not what you asked or even want to hear...but I’ll say it anyways...:)

Just go the iPhone X and am really happy with it. The Face ID feature works amazingly well, it’s super fast and I don’t miss the home button at all. Actually the swipes are more intuitive.

Just throwing it out there ( and no, I don’t own Apple stock ).

Better grab one quick. Rumor is Apple is going to stop making the X.

[benb]

I tried a galaxy and went back to an iPhone before 2 years.

The Samsung phones look cool but they're never as well integrated as the iPhones and Samsung stops caring about your experience the day you buy it. As you use it you find more and more little things that are annoying. All they care about once you have bought one is getting you to buy a new one. So the phones degrade over time like old Windows computers.. security updates and patches lag a lot compared to Apple. iPhones have their issues over time too but the time frame is much longer.

[p nut]

Thanks for the feedback. I think I will go ahead and order one for her (mother's day). If she decides she doesn't like it, it's easy enough to re-sell it (I will get the unlocked version). Then get her an 8 or X.

[eippo1]

I tried a galaxy and went back to an iPhone before 2 years.

The Samsung phones look cool but they're never as well integrated as the iPhones and Samsung stops caring about your experience the day you buy it. As you use it you find more and more little things that are annoying. All they care about once you have bought one is getting you to buy a new one. So the phones degrade over time like old Windows computers.. security updates and patches lag a lot compared to Apple. iPhones have their issues over time too but the time frame is much longer.

There is truth to this, but it can be mostly fixed by backing up the phone every 12-18 months and then doing a factory reset (except for the battery degrade, but iphones have that issue too).

[biker72]

I started out with an iphone 4S. Started having issues so changed to a Samsung Galaxy S4. Upgraded to a S5 when they first came out and still have it. I believe this is the last Galaxy that the battery can easily be changed.

[mktng]

Beauty of that phone is in that price range. The door is open to other great options. Like what One Plus and Google have to offer. The Pixel phones are amazing.

[tylercheung]

I will have to say - the iPhone reviews and the Samsung reviews are held to different standards. iPhone reviews are extremely critical as everyone regards Apple as a perfectionist, so any minor flaw and the reviews tend to jump on it. Samsung - if they do a good job, people gush over it. But if you look at people's experiences after owning Samsungs or other android phones after a year or two, the flaws bubble up to the surface.

I would say, the iPhone X and iPhone 8's are by far still the best on the market hardware-wise, and software-wise (including cameras...Android reviewers cherry pick a lot of numerical stats to say this model or that model is "better" but in real world photos, iPhone digital cameras are second to none.)

Reasons to consider Android are if you are heavily invested into Google services and apps and nothing else, or you enjoy tinkering with manually configuring phone settings (and are willing to put in the trade off for less sophistated hardware), or if a specific feature is better or worse.

Of the android phones worth considering / comparison shipping vs. the iPhones, Samsung is decent, but I would also check out the Google Pixel. Both phones have slower chips than the iPhones, and are less power efficient meaning bigger and heavier batteries. Samsung's versions of Android have always been clunky, but the Pixels have received more direct attention from Google so that may be less buggy as a result, and the Pixels do have fancy algorithms to create photo effects.


The other catch are voice assistants - Siri is great for some people but Google's voice recognition is considered better. On an iPhone, if you want to bypass Siri ("Hey Siri"), you have to open the Google app to get access to the Google voice assistant, whereas on the Pixel, it is directly accessible by "OK Google"

The last thing may be the most important. None of these companies are saints, but Samsung's customers are the phone carriers (AT&T, Verizon), Google's customers are its advertisers, and Apple's customers are the consumer purchaser of the phone, directly. So this may figure as to who will have better long term customer support, and who will guard your privacy more zealously.

[benb]

There is truth to this, but it can be mostly fixed by backing up the phone every 12-18 months and then doing a factory reset (except for the battery degrade, but iphones have that issue too).

At 12 months Galaxy X+1 has come out and Samsung has moved on. If the phone is gunked up by software bugs the reset might help but it's not going to get you the latest features that Google's put out if Samsung drags it's feet on updating your now out of date phone. Historically Samsung is middle of the road on that, maybe getting better over time.

As Tyler mentioned I would always advise someone to get a phone that is directly supported by Google like the Pixel over any other Android.

If you want to hack phones Android is the better option. Back in the early days of Android I had a fair bit of fun with that. (I wrote and app and messed around with custom ROMs on early android tablets.) But overall they're a mess if you just want something that works and keeps working for a long time.

[ptourkin]

At 12 months Galaxy X+1 has come out and Samsung has moved on. If the phone is gunked up by software bugs the reset might help but it's not going to get you the latest features that Google's put out if Samsung drags it's feet on updating your now out of date phone. Historically Samsung is middle of the road on that, maybe getting better over time.

As Tyler mentioned I would always advise someone to get a phone that is directly supported by Google like the Pixel over any other Android.

If you want to hack phones Android is the better option. Back in the early days of Android I had a fair bit of fun with that. (I wrote and app and messed around with custom ROMs on early android tablets.) But overall they're a mess if you just want something that works and keeps working for a long time.

That happened with my S3 and S5 but closer to 18 months and can be fixed as others have mentioned. It is not happening to my S7 even though it is now two models ago.

[shoota]

If you're already integrated into the Apple ecosystem just get an iPhone X. I've been happy with mine. The photos are amazing but the thing I've been most impressed with is the battery life. It's unreal good.

[deechee]

I've used both for my work but I personally own the S9. I would caution people's anecdotal evidence, especially when the first iPhone came out just over 10 years ago. A LOT has happened since then, but the phones and market has levelled off quite a bit. Everyone has a bias, no matter what. My personal opinion? They're all the same. For me, it basically came down to

Earphone jack (why everyone is removing this is beyond me)
Memory card slot (I have a lot of music, and I have videos to entertain my son)
Google apps (personal and my work uses google apps)
The amazing camera. It really is fast and the slow-mo is fun.
I HATE iTunes.


As others have said, yes, updates are SLOW. Apple & Pixel phones will always be faster since they do not rely on manufacturers & service providers to verify the changes don't break their software. That said, major OS updates are limited on even Pixels (https://support.google.com/nexus/answer/4457705?hl=en) and Apple (https://www.statista.com/chart/5824/ios-iphone-compatibility/). And honestly, I've rarely seen any difference with iOS updates since I had a 4, and Android since 5.0/Lollipop. Apple might have a lot of updates, but they also have some seriously flawed (https://appleinsider.com/articles/17/12/02/apple-software-sees-disastrous-embarrassing-week-with-ios-springboard-crash-macos-root-user-security-flaw) ones that require another patch within the week...

Yes, older phones do start showing problems (factory resets usually do wonders but I've also seen some OS updates that permanently broke the UX). The only reason I replaced my S7 was because my son cracked the screen and I got a deal from my carrier to upgrade. And it's not just Android, let's not forget the whole debacle over the iPhones being slowed down and the discounted battery offer from Apple which is ongoing until the end of the year. (I think your iphone6 is eligible.) . The Samsung glass parts are expensive - but so is the iPhone X. Older phones were much cheaper to replace (<100$) but these new flagships reach a whole other level of impossible-to-fix-yourself status.

So far I am very happy with the S9. Yes, the battery size did not change but honestly, the chipset seems to draw less power. The phone lasts pretty well for me despite not charging it at work.

[SoCalSteve]

Better grab one quick. Rumor is Apple is going to stop making the X.

Funny! Of course Apple is going to stop making the X. They discontinue every phone after a short time. This would be the 9th generation of iPhones since it’s inception middle of 2007.