Samsung Galaxy Note 7 review
Here we are – Samsung went ahead and skipped a whole number to bring out their newest Note device. Though the main reason makes a lot of sense – Samsung wanted unification of their Galaxy line – the very notion of skipping a whole version is an interesting one. Does the phone actually innovate or jump forward to justify going from 5 to 7?
Or, as we have started to see in the Galaxy over the last couple years, are we just subject to the decisions of big Samsung and are getting a small step forward in an otherwise established line of smartphones? If history is privy to repetition, is it entirely possible that the next in the Note line simply repeats the same while coating it in what they hope looks different? All of these questions are pondered in this, our full review of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7.
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Design
It feels like a long time since we were introduced to Samsung’s unibody dual glass design on the Galaxy S6, a move that plenty of us thought was a welcome far cry from the plastic phones of the past. Since then, Samsung has tried to incorporate new design elements into what their Galaxy phones were clearly going to look like moving forward. This included the Edge, originally brought to the forefront in the Galaxy Note Edge – perhaps a phone that hasn’t been given the credit it deserves, with the Edge now being a Galaxy mainstay. And there’s no better place to see that than in the Galaxy Note 7.
So, at its core, there are basically no surprises with the way the Note 7 looks – a dual glass design with tactile home button and single camera optics on the rear next to a heart rate sensor. Then there is the Iris Scanner, a dedicated secondary camera module and LED light that accompany the existing front facing camera and notification light. A USB-C charging port is one of the more obvious changes, centered between the speaker, the headphone jack – that the Galaxy is thankfully still holding on to – and the Note-defining S-Pen.
The S-Pen doesn’t go backwards into the slot anymore, thankfully – so no Pengate this year – and it manages to do that with a clicky-top that is just wider than the rest of the pen and the slot that it slides into. All that aside, the S Pen and its singular button feel exactly the same as last year despite some subtle changes – a thinner tip means better precision on the highly pressure sensitive screen and the pen itself is as long as a standard ballpen. None of this means an even slightly different experience physically using the Note 7’s little friend.
Subtle is the word to use for the refinements to the phone’s overall design, but they actually work to change the handling experience of Samsung’s famously large smartphone. The 5.7 inch screen is now curved – and that is the deal, as there will be no flat version of the Note nor any other types to accommodate the Edge – but a curve is actually found on the backing, too, much like the previous Note 5. The marriage of these two curves was summarized in one main word that Samsung was keen to make very clear in the phone’s introduction:
Symmetry. It is a design term that is not always used in the world of smartphones and, indeed, is often relegated to art and architecture. But designers of the Note 7 made it a big focus this year, to wonderful effect. The symmetry is not lost on the eyes, but it does have to somewhat be searched for, because the Note 7 retains the overall design DNA of the Galaxy S7 Edge. But it’s when one grabs and handles the phone that the symmetry becomes one of the most welcome additions to what used to be a functional, powerful, but ultimately somewhat tone-deaf Samsung design history.
Of course, the final change to the design here is IP certification. Now, the Galaxy Note 7 can be submerged in water for some time and still tick; or write, rather, because it is possible to use the S Pen underwater. Maybe users won’t be writing or drawing in the pool or ocean, but for the vast majority of people, at least this phone won’t break due to a splash.
What Samsung has managed to do with the Note 7 is something users like myself probably didn’t know they wanted – a larger phone experience that feels accessible. Even though the Note 7 might not win any medals for one handed usage, it is definitely one of the most comfortable big screen experiences that we have ever had the pleasure of using.
Display
Samsung hasn’t really leapt forward in much of the Note 7, and that starts with the display – a Quad-HD resolution Super AMOLED display that pumps out some of the most saturated colors in smartphones. Granted, this can be changed in the settings among a couple AMOLED modes, a bland (in comparison) Basic mode, and the default Adaptive mode that tries to change it up according to what is being displayed.
Speaking of color, a Blue Light Filter is easily accessible in the notification shade and can be set on a schedule so that it only triggers when it matters – after the sun goes down. Users might not be all that in tune with the benefits of a Blue Light Filter, so allow me to explain it plainly – the harsh blue light of electronic displays, especially late at night, make it harder to get more sleep both in quantity and quality. As one of our resident AA health-nuts, I make plenty use of this feature.
It is important to note that the resolution can also be changed in the name of battery savings. In the Device Maintenance area of the settings, the resolution of this 5.7 inch display can actually be made as low as 720p. It’s easy to see the difference between Quad HD and regular HD, which means we don’t think users will change resolutions often unless power saving is highly in demand.
A big deal from the Galaxy S7 line now makes it over to the Note, and that is the Always On Display. Though we found it nice to have the time or a calendar always at the ready on the Galaxy S phones, Samsung has brought it a step further by making it a little more customizable.
In the settings, the AOD can be changed to have a number of different clocks, a few different calendars, and a small number of canned images. A favorite of these options is the ability to put in a personalized block of text. The AOD lists the different notification icons that are sitting in the notification shade, so you can get a quick glance at what is waiting for you under the lock screen.
Considering the Note now employs the curved display, the Edge screen elements also move over from the S7 Edge – but there isn’t really anything new in the Edge UX. What is worthy of note is that the angle and curve of the display isn’t very egregious, so accidental presses from user palms shouldn’t be that much of nuisance. As a matter of fact, we found touches to the very edges of the curve harder to trigger – thankfully, this is pretty much never an issue and doesn’t impede in any typical tasks users may do. It is far more common to slide from the edge to the middle of the display, like with the Edge UX.
Though subtle, another aspect of the curved screens comes to the Note – Material Design elements that slide from either side of the interface seem to curve into view, which is a rather lovely effect when noticed. A related but somewhat negative side effect of this is a bit of difficulty reading text that bleeds all the way to the actual curves of the display.
Of course, the above aspects are somewhat nitpicky to what is otherwise an expectedly wonderful viewing experience. Text is sharp across the board, video playback is always nice on a larger display, and playing games like MOBIUS Final Fantasy proved to be really fun with such a vivid screen. Though there are a few additions made to the overall experience, they do well to bolster what was already considered a great experience in the Note line. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” might be the axiom to employ here, but it might be more practical to just say there are little to no complaints here.
Performance
The same sentiment can just barely be used with the processing power and overall performance experience, too. Users familiar with the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge know what to expect here – the Snapdragon 820 with the Adreno 530 and 4GB of RAM. It is worthy of note that the Exynos 8890 edition of the phone will also be produced but it won’t be the version made readily available to users in the West.
It’s not hard to merit the Snapdragon 820, one of the most abundantly available SoC packages found today, because it has proven itself as a reliable and good performing processor. The same can be said for the Adreno 530, which has been able to render and play MOBIUS Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy IX with the best of them.
Where we find a little bit of a fleeting desire is in the amount of RAM installed. 4GB of RAM will not make the majority of users feel like they are lacking, but some users have already lamented that the Galaxy simply does not have good RAM management.
Even if that were not the case, we’re dealing with one of the most feature-heavy devices on the market, the Note – this is a phone that takes on all of the already existing demands of smartphone users and adds a myriad of capabilities in the form of the S Pen and its software. While we don’t think that there is a huge hurting for higher RAM capacities like the nice 6GB found in the OnePlus 3, we also can’t help but think that perhaps an amount like that could have been the inch that feels like a mile.
We didn’t have these feelings often, as slowdowns were still rather far and few between. Still, that little bit of forward thinking could have made a huge difference. For the vast majority of the time, the Note 7 will perform just as well as any other Snapdragon 820 powered device, even with the laundry list of features that Samsung puts into their software – which we will explore soon.
Hardware
Despite the lack of higher RAM capacities, which would have been a great move supporting power users, Samsung did well to close the gaps in storage – 64GB is the built-in storage option, with no higher or lower options to be made available. Unification of the line, indeed. And even then, the ability to put in a microSD card is another boon to Samsung, who have just released a 256GB microSD card that we gladly popped into the phone for that added peace of mind.
Calls on the Note 7 all sound fine, with no real frills or thrills, even with Wi-Fi calling getting some front exposure depending on what carrier you are on – mine was on T-Mobile. Nonetheless, both ends had no issues with the call quality and there were no drops. The on-board speaker, unfortunately, doesn’t evoke the same sentiment – it is simply not loud compared to even other bottom mounted speakers, much less any front facing or dual stereo speakers we’ve seen on plenty of other phones. Simply put, it is continually one of the weakest points of the Galaxy line.
Plug some headphones into the headphone jack, and breathe a sigh of relief – if the headphone jack is to go away in the near future for Samsung, you might as well cherish it right now. Thankfully, the experience is above average, even if not by leaps and bounds. There is no dedicated DAC working in especially this Snapdragon 820 edition of the phone, nor is there an AMP to really drive a good pair of cans like my Audio Technica M50x headphones. That said, Samsung does put its best foot forward by providing plenty opportunity to tweak what they were given to work with.
Some users might remember SoundAlive from a few other Samsung devices, and it returns in the Note 7 to provide sliders and dials to cater the sound coming out of that headphone jack. At its simpler level, emphasizing bass or treble and instrumentals or vocals can get the sound to lean more in the direction one wants, but for even more fine tuned control, the Note 7 can analyze and enhance plugged in headphones through a rather long process of beeps and user input.
By figuring out the headphones by way of the listener’s ability to hear said beeps, the EQ will adjust to bring out the best possible sound. Of course, this means little if the phone cannot drive headphones with the power audiophiles want, but I was plenty happy with what resulted. It might not be HTC 10 levels of audio, but it is certainly in the right direction.
Battery Life
Battery life was a key focus in the Note 7, a phone that comes at moment in time when users are simply going to deal with what having bigger batteries entails. Thankfully for the Note 7, 3500mAh is the capacity standard and it is what users get in a pretty slender and sleek body. Anyone looking for more than this might have to contend with the brick of a phone that results, but at least with 3500mAh there is plenty to work with.
Thankfully, battery saving options are abundant, with a lot of customizable options to get the most out of the phone. This is all found in the Device Maintenance area of the settings, where a number of tweaks can be made to the user experience – clearing out some storage, some RAM, and changing some settings to get better battery life.
These options include not only the toning down of the processor power, but also the lowering of resolution in the screen. Yes, you can make the Quad HD capable display output only HD Android. All of these options can bring up the amount of hours one has left in the battery – according to Samsung – and it always seems to be a little generous, as always.
But our time with the Note 7 has been properly mixed, and by that I mean depending on one’s usage and circumstances, the battery can certainly go the distance. A short test from our own Android Authority battery testing app used a mixture of gameplay, web browsing, and video playback while on Wi-Fi, and predicted that the screen on time can be more than 6 hours.
In my own testing, I decided to try and recreate this with my own real life usage, I binged YouTube on my home Wi-Fi network for a very large portion of the day (for science!) and played some Final Fantasy before bed. Sure enough, the Note 7 was able to take the hour long episodes of the Game Grumps with no problems as it blasted past 4 hours, then 5 hours, and then conked out at around 6 hours and 15 minutes.
When circumstances change, however, the results should, as well. A very heavy usage day out and about on mobile networks and doing a lot of Google Maps Navigation brought the battery down to single digits in about 9 hours, with a screen on time of just under 3 and a half. Thankfully, a normal day shouldn’t be so hard on the Note that it only works in the extremes. Normal days with this phone were between the 4 and 5 hour marks in screen on time while easily making it to bedtime without any issues.
But we’re also in a time when fast charging is not just a great feature to have, but almost a full-on requirement of a smartphone. And in Samsung’s case, the USB Type C port brings its brand of fast charging that, they claim, can get the Note 7 charged up in the same time that the Galaxy S7 and its smaller battery took.
That has been largely true in our testing, as the Note 7 got to half battery in about half an hour – if you’re really hurting for juice, it’s little effort to plug in the phone or put it on a wireless charging mat (fast wireless charging is a thing, but when wired fast charging is so good, the convenience of a pad or mat is about all it can boast) in order to get the power you need. And even then, the included adapter will make microUSB cords play nicely with the Note 7 – just remember to use the charging brick included with the phone or there will be diminishing returns to the fast charging claims.
All of this goodness is now in a body that is IP certified – not only will dust never get into the device, but the Note 7 will keep on going even if it gets wet. This is a wonderful feature for everyone’s inner klutz, as a bit more peace of mind never hurt anyone. And though Samsung did try to really push the fact that this phone can write notes underwater – after all, the S Pen is also IP certified – we would just be happy with a phone that still works even in the rain or after picking it out of a spill.
Iris Scanner
Finally, we come to the Iris Scanner. This is where we’ll talk about Samsung’s new foray into biometric security and it will do nicely as a segue into the Camera talk. After all, this is a new dedicated infrared camera that will scan one’s Iris – the composition of one’s eyes – as a way to unlock the device or other parts of the phone. It takes a little bit of setup, but not much – remove glasses and stare into the Scanner, keeping one’s eyes in the designated areas. After it gets a snapshot of one’s eyes, it’s all set. Having contacts or glasses on, Samsung disclaims after setup, can impede the Scanner’s ability to read Irises, so users have to be wary.
Honestly, after you get the hang of it, the Iris Scanner is surprisingly easy and fast to use. It is still debatable if this is actually faster than fingerprint readers, but the novelty will definitely stick around for a while. To unlock the phone with an iris, one has to wake the device and swipe to start the Scanner. Once we knew exactly where to look and got the muscle memory down to about how far the phone needs to be, this method of unlocking the phone was a piece of cake. All we had to do was already be looking at that part of the phone and when the wake and swipe commenced, the viewfinder didn’t even need to appear – the lock screen would just disappear in an instant.
I just wanted to be sure my eyes were wide open for the Scanner.
If you do need some guidance as to where your eyes need to go, there are a few different masks that can make the job easier – or cuter, if you actually pick the cat or dog face ones. Still, the method and the requirements are the same. It can lead to some interesting reactions, but the best one that I’ve gotten was a friend telling me it looked like I hated my phone. When I asked why, she told me that I kept giving it the evil eye every time I held it up to my face. I just wanted to be sure my eyes were wide open for the Scanner.
Camera
A whole other reason to look at that area above the display is when taking a selfie, and in the camera department, Samsung seems to be confident enough in what they’ve achieved with the Galaxy S7 that the same package makes an encore in the Note 7. Once again, unification of the line takes on a tangible quality.
So, the 12 megapixel f/1.7 dual-pixel shooter of the Note 7 is the same as before – that might not be a very bad thing, honestly, as the S7 was one of the top performing cameras of the year. That large, dual-pixel technology is supposed to help with fast autofocus and better low light performance, which we agreed did the job fairly well in the S7 . And finally, the front facing camera is 5MP still, at f/1.7 and wide angle.
If there are any real improvements in the Note 7, it’s in the camera app, still easily launched via a double tap of the home button. Any users that found the app convoluted and full of too many options might not change their tune, still – but at the very least, all of those elements and settings are easily available using one hand.
This is because key functions have been put into swipe actions on the viewfinder – swipe up or down to change which camera you’re using, and swipe left to access the different filters or right to bring up the many modes. The only viewfinder elements that are still out of reach for one hand are the deeper settings which probably should already be setup (to 4k video recording and Quad HD for the front facing camera, for example) and HDR (which could be on Auto already, anyway).
Anyone familiar with the Galaxy S7 and its top-notch camera quality will know what to expect from the Note 7. It is still capable of some of the better batches of photos in good lighting, providing good saturation and good colors bordering on almost oversaturated. For an even bigger punch in colors, HDR does a good job of bringing up the shadows in situations where it really calls for it – but don’t expect HDR to spruce up every single photo you take.
Details are captured quite well, with only some softness showing up when zooming into these photos – small text is still legible in some of these photos that have it.
Self portraits are still not the super high quality that some might be expecting, especially in indoor conditions where lighting is less than the power of the sun. We will give all the credit in the world to the f/1.7 lens for doing what it can, but lower light will still hinder the quality of a selfie.
The same can somewhat be said for the main camera in low light, as its optical image stabilization, f/1.7 aperture lens, and large pixel construction all work together to bring passable dark photos. As we generally find the case to be in low light, the color temperature tends to get quite warm – and a steady hand can be required from time to time as shutter speeds have to get much slower to expose darker scenes. This didn’t happen to often, though, as we were happy with quite a few photos we got in dark, late night restaurant scenes – the foodies will still be proud with this camera package.
I think that this year has been a great one for videographers, as every flagship has had a big feature to boast for their video cameras – the S7 didn’t have a wide angle lens like the LG G5 or the OIS in the front facing camera like the HTC 10, but it was the only camera to record front facing video at 2K resolution. This doesn’t sound like a huge deal, but it made the Galaxy S7 one of the better choices for vloggers like myself.
Galaxy Note 7 Camera Samples
With more resolution, there was quite literally a little more room to work with in terms of editing and quality. That same feature comes on the Note 7 – and coupled with the high onboard storage and the potential 256GB microSD card storage added on top, the Note 7 can be a powerful tool for videographers. (Until we get whatever LG has cooking with their manual video controls in the next V series phone, of course – that’s a comparison we’re excited to do.)
In the end, the cameras of the Note 7 prove as useful as ever, even if we’ve seen them before. But like much of this phone seems to be to Samsung, it’s a “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” kind of device. Easier handling of the camera app is nice to have, but ultimately it is the same experience as the Galaxy S generation we got this year – and that’s definitely not a bad thing.
Software and the S Pen
The software experience for a Note device always centers around the S Pen – that is definitely the case in the Note 7, but there have been some refinements to Samsung’s version of Android. Overall, the user interface has been given some unified colors in order to make everything feel more coherent. Lighter colors are abound, with only the important bits and buttons providing the splashes of color. The notification shade and the settings page are the best places to see this; and even then, the settings page has been simplified so that things are easier to navigate.
Sections of the settings page are consolidated in categories that include some main examples of what users might expect to find after going deeper, and this hopefully will make the usually daunting Samsung UI easier to navigate. Indeed, Samsung wants to guide the users more than ever without the pesky dialog boxes that used to appear out of nowhere and incessantly, which was more annoying than helpful in the past. Instead, there are little texts for just about every setting and there are arrows in the notification shade showing that pressing the text of an option will provide a little more information.
Of course, there are still all of the main tropes of the Samsung interface, including the rather cartoonish and rounded icons and folders, but the round backgrounds for non-Samsung apps can be removed. Briefing is still the news aggregator found to the left of the homescreens, but that can also be disabled. And all of this can be themed through the Themes area of the settings, which provides quite a few different options for changing the look of the interface without tampering with function.
Which brings us to the extras – the flourishes, if you will, of Samsung’s software design. Given that this is a curved display phone, the Edge UX makes an appearance and is largely the same as the one found on the Galaxy S7 Edge. Sliding from either the left or right side will bring up the Edges, a number of different panels that are able to house either contacts for quick dialing, icons for quick launching, or tickers for various forms of information like CNN News or a compass. If you find yourself actually using the Edges for their convenience, then these are welcome additions to an already fully functional Android launcher experience – if not, they are neatly out of the way and don’t really get triggered accidentally.
The other addition focuses on security – the Secure Folder. Used as a sort of triage area for apps and accounts, the Secure Folder can best be described as a clean slate area. Files, apps, and content put into it are locked under any of the same security measures that are used to unlock the device (yes, including Iris). It is basically like putting a second copy of an app on your phone – for example, when putting Instagram in the Secure Folder, opening it brought up the initial login page, so that I could feasibly put in a personal or work account there depending on what configuration I wanted. It’s a power little folder that can actually be hidden for even more security.
Various other features return from previous Galaxy devices like the MultiWindow and Pop Up View for multitasking, and the gesture for One-Handed Operation. Digging through the settings shows all of these different features that don’t appear in the annoying dialog boxes to throw themselves in your face – so, users are expected to dig and find these features to hopefully use them on the regular.
But, of course, the crux of the Note 7 is the S Pen – and there is a mixture of streamlining and adding to the formula to make this iteration probably the most practical one yet. Hovering the pen tip over the screen can still provide previews into various parts of the UI and selecting multiple items is still simple with the mouse-like nature of the S Pen and its button.
Removing the S Pen (again, can’t be put in backwards anymore) while the screen is on will bring up the Air Command menu, which has a few features that return from the Note 5 and the main additions now introduced. While these shortcuts can be edited to open up pretty much any application, the main ones for the S Pen still include a straight note creation, Smart Select for some more creative captures, and Screen Write for capturing what the screen is currently showing (or scrolling, if one is currently on a scrollable page) for writing and editing and sharing.
Smart Select got one of the bigger and probably funner additions, Animation select. A frame of any size the user chooses appears and can be put over any part of the screen to record a 15 second GIF, making GIF creation just about as easy as GIF searching. Or, if you ever have that GIF you can never find, now you have the method to save it.
The Smart Select Animation can quite literally capture anything, like video content from Instagram or YouTube for easy sharing in only the easy way the S Pen does it – just hit share and it goes straight to the place of your choice. In the age of the emoji and GIF keyboards, this might be one of the trendier additions Samsung has ever put into their phones, and after a few GIF shares, we’re liking it.
The other additions to the S Pen software family are not quite as deep, but they are useful in their own rights. Magnify provides a small square to magnify parts of the screen up to 300%, which can be useful for those times when users do need to get a closer look at something.
Glance is an interesting one that shrinks any app to a small square snapped to corners of the screen – hovering the S Pen over the square makes it large again for easy checking or for continued regular usage. It might be a nice way to tuck an app away for quick glances at any changes that may have happened on it, but the use cases still don’t feel very vast.
And finally there is Translate, perhaps the feature that we really want to see evolve. Translate uses the S Pen hover to quickly search for singular words’ translation in Google Translate – there are a myriad of languages available to go to and from, which makes this easy translation method already pretty robust. Though would like to see full sentences and phrase become a part of Translate, we applaud Samsung for included it in this new version of the Note.
The final addition to the S Pen adds upon the Screen Off Memo, which was a feature well-liked from the Note 5. Removing the S Pen while the screen is off brings up a black screen where one can quickly jot down a scribble. Returning the S Pen to its slot puts the memo into the Notes app, just like any other note. However, now the memo can be pinned to the Screen Off Memo so that it is always within view. This can be useful for task lists or reminders you don’t need to be around for more than a short amount of time.
All of these notes are now put into one singular Notes application, which consolidates all of the different methods and abilities the S Pen used to have splashed across the UI – Action Memo and S Note, for example. By putting everything under one roof, the Notes application is now one of the most robust apps for notation and will eventually be made available for even the Galaxy S devices.
While the small but noticeable changes to the Android experience on the Note 7 are already welcome, it seems that this year Samsung really wants users to start pulling the S Pen out more. Why else include a GIF creator, if not to make it so that this year S Pen usage hopefully shoots up? After all, plenty of users report that they never use the S Pen or its myriad of features and instead just look at the Note as a standalone device with a lot of power. Will these features make that change? That remains to be seen, but there seems to be a lot of thought put into the S Pen this year and the effort is not lost on us here at Android Authority.
Specifications
| Display | 5.7-inch Dual-edge Super AMOLED display 2560 x 1440 resolution 518ppi |
| Processor | Quad-core 64-bit (2.15GHz Dual + 1.6GHz Dual) Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 or Octa-core Samsung Exynos 8890 |
| RAM | 4GB, LPDDR4 |
| Storage | 64GB |
| MicroSD | Yes, up to 256GB |
| Cameras | Rear: Dual Pixel 12MP sensor with OIS, f/1.7 aperture Front: 5MP sensor with f/1.7 aperture |
| Battery | 3,500mAh Fast charging WPC and PMA wireless charging |
| Water resistance | IP68 rating |
| Connectivity | WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac (2.4/5GHz) MU-MIMO(2×2) 620Mbps Bluetooth v 4.2 LE ANT+ USB Type-C NFC Location (GPS, Glonass, Beidou) |
| Sensors | Barometer, Fingerprint Sensor, Gyro Sensor, Geomagnetic Sensor, Hall Sensor, HR Sensor, Iris Sensor, Proximity Sensor, RGB Light Sensor |
| Software | Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow |
| Colors | Silver, Gold Platinum, Blue Coral, Black Onyx |
| Dimensions and weight | 153.5 x 73.9 x 7.9mm 169g |
Gallery
Pricing and final thoughts
And, indeed, that effort permeates throughout the phone, where a number of different aspects have been either refined or straight up upgraded. The onboard storage and microSD card slots really speak to power users while the design will make this phone more accessible for many users who are even the slightest bit apprehensive toward larger displays. Even then, the display experience is growing to be more than just a conduit for showing off Android interfaces, and the S Pen is probably the most useful than it has ever been.
But users who are familiar with Samsung’s pedigree might scoff at these changes, knowing that plenty of things have remained the same from before – indeed, if you have a Galaxy S7 Edge, you are basically adding in the S Pen as the justification to pay so much for a new phone.
So, all of this comes at a price – not just a monetary price, which we will get to in a second – a learning curve that is different for every user. While the larger Note device will work really well for just about anyone, those who want to get a little more out of their phones have a lot of things to discover and learn deeper in the most feature packed phone Samsung has ever put out.
Just think about the different things you can do with this phone – GIF creation, MultiWindow, Pop Up View, One Handed Operation, Screen Off Memo, Edge UX, Always On Display customization, Theming, and SoundAlert, just to name a few. Each and every one of these features requires some familiarity, not to mention actually finding them in the settings menus or by chance. To get the most out of this device, users will have to do their homework – and we can’t say that will be a good or bad thing, as that answer might be different for everyone.
Bar none, the Galaxy Note 7 is the best big screen smartphone Samsung has ever made
Perhaps for one of the few times in their tenure, Samsung has made a phone that is trying its darnedest to justify its very high price point. Currently, on the Samsung website, the phone is available for a total $849.99 – a very steep price for a phone that simultaneously feels fresh yet undeniably familiar. With all that being said – bar none, the Galaxy Note 7 is the best big screen smartphone Samsung has ever made.
The images in this review were captured by @autom3otives
Buy the Galaxy Note 7 now!
Lenovo IdeaCentre Y710 Cube Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET
One of the best-kept secrets in PC gaming continues to be Lenovo’s line of gaming laptops and desktops — for years, the company, best known for ThinkPad and Yoga laptops, has put out a series of decent, if not flashy, game-ready laptops and desktops at very reasonable prices.
The latest is a small desktop, which Lenovo calls the Y710 Cube. It reminds me of similar breadbox-style PCs like the Falcon Northwest Fragbox. The idea is that it’s smaller than a full gaming desktop, can fit in the latest GPUs, like Nvidia’s new GeForce 1000-series cards — and it’s got a big handle on top so you can lug it to gaming events, a friend’s house, down into your man cave, wherever.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Unlike some of the very squared-off gaming cubes we’ve seen before, this guy isn’t trying to hide discreetly behind your desk. It’s got the red lights and sharp angles of the bigger Lenovo gaming desktops, and since it runs current-gen desktop-level graphics, it should be able to handle virtual-reality headsets like the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, without a hitch.
There’s also one new feature I haven’t seen in action yet, but sounds very promising — you’ll have an option to get an integrated Xbox wireless controller receiver, so you can sync a gamepad without having to have the giant Xbox wireless stick that makes using a game controller on a PC such a hassle.
The Y710 Cube will be available in the US starting at $1,299 in October. A sister model, the IdeaCentre AIO Y910 — an all-in-one 27-inch desktop with Nvidia GeForce graphics — starts at $1,799. Prices and availability for the UK and Australia have yet to be announced, but those prices convert to roughly £1,000 and £1,385, or AU$1,680 and AU$2,325.
Samsung Galaxy Note 7 review – CNET
The Good The Galaxy Note 7 is a beautiful, capable Android phone that showcases Samsung’s best in design, battery life, speed and features. The 64GB base model leaves you plenty of space for photos, videos and games, and it’s a real improvement over 2015’s Note 5.
The Bad It’s pricier than almost every other Android phone, and a little heavy. After seven iterations, there are still minor problems writing with the S Pen stylus. Fine particles, like beach sand, can wedge the stylus in its holder.
The Bottom Line The Galaxy Note 7 is the best no-compromise, big-screen phone you can buy if price is no object. All but the most devoted stylus lovers, however, will do just as well with the cheaper S7 models.
The 5.7-inch, stylus-slinging Samsung Galaxy Note 7 is a damn fine phone. Its sexy wraparound glass, precise S Pen and brilliant screen would impress anyone, but it’s ideal for artists, architects and people who would rather write with their own hand than type on a screen.
It has a gorgeous, symmetrical design that looks particularly stunning in Coral Blue. It takes great photos and has both the water resistance and expandable memory slot that last year’s Galaxy Note 5 lacked (oh yeah, there is no Note 6). Battery life goes on and on — but not as long as the Galaxy S7 Edge — and you can charge up wirelessly.
This is Samsung’s ultimate phone, with all the Edge’s curved-screen goodies and more: 64GB of storage instead of the Edge’s 32GB. An iris scanner for unlocking the phone with your eyes. A good, refreshed take on Android. A USB-C charger port that also charges up your other devices (you should buy a USB 3.1 cable for faster data speeds). New pen tricks to magnify, translate languages and make an animated GIF. A nighttime filter you can schedule to automatically give your weary, screen-staring eyes a break.
Samsung’s Galaxy Note 7 looks awesome in…
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The question you have to ask yourself is how much all this is worth to you. Because the Note 7 is one of the most expensive phones you can buy. It’s comparable to Apple’s large-screen iPhone 6S Plus (the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus are right around the corner), but costs more than the already pricey Edge, and twice the OnePlus 3, a CNET Editor’s Choice winner for its excellence as an all-round midprice phone. In the US, promotions that bundle a free memory card or Samsung wearable help soothe the sting.
The Note 7 will let you leave the laptop at your desk more often.
Josh Miller/CNET
As much as I loved my time with the compelling, beautiful, functional Note 7 — and I really did — I hesitate to recommend it to anyone who isn’t serious about using that digital S Pen to draw, write and navigate on the phone. The S Pen has some minor issues, too. It isn’t perfect at everything. Sometimes wielding the stylus feels natural; other times tapping and typing make more sense. (Though it does make really great annotated photos, Snapchat snaps and social media GIFs.)
At the end of the day, most people can easily live without the Note 7, especially with the capable S7 Edge a near doppelganger. If you’re ready to move on from the Note 4, switching to the Note 7 gets you more storage and power, an upgradable Android version and a far better S Pen. If you’re happy with the Note 5, wait a year. If not, you get waterproofing, expandable storage and software shortcuts on those curved edges. With its elevated features and fee, the Note 7 is for rarified buyers who delight in details. Buy it and you get an excellent phone — but if you aren’t going to use that pen, forget it.
- Here’s how the Note 7 compares to the S7 Edge, Motorola Moto Z, iPhone 6S and OnePlus 3
Samsung Galaxy Note 7 pricing and availability
| August 19 | $834-$880 (varies by carrier) | Blue, black and silver |
| September 2 | £580-£630* | Blue, black and silver |
| August 19 | AU$1,349 | Black, silver and gold |
* = based on conversion
Using the new S Pen stylus: Smooth, precise, tricked-out
Without the S Pen, the Note 7 is just a refined S7 Edge with steeper curved sides. This year’s digital stylus has a fine, precise point and senses 4,096 levels of pressure, double last year’s model. I wrote countless notes and a haiku, doodled all over, even handed the phone to CNET’s art director for his professional assessment. And? It’s very good. But, compared to a 10-inch tablet, the screen is a small for creating fine art, though it handles notes and more casual drawings very well.
You can sketch some really cool things with the Note 7. CNET’s art director, Marc Mendell, put my doodles to shame.
Josh Miller/CNET
A few things bothered me with execution. Including the Note Edge, this is the seventh Note phone ever made, so all S Pen maneuvers should be flawless by now. But I still found it hard to paint an entire canvas without on-screen buttons getting in the way (they’ll move if you get it right). It’s easy to accidentally exit or press unintended controls that mysteriously shift the layout into something you don’t want. That’s frustrating, especially when you can’t get figure out how to resume the original canvas.
Here’s what’s good about the new S Pen:
- Navigating with the pen keeps the screen cleaner and reduces repetitive-stress finger strain.
- There’s now just one Notes app for all your writing, not five separate apps.
- You can jot a note from the lock screen, and pin it there.
- The stylus won’t get stuck in its holder if you put it in upside down (it might actually spring across the room).
- The S Pen worked after we dunked the entire phone in 2.5 feet of water for 28 minutes (it’s rated for 30 minutes in about 5 feet of water).
Here’s what’s not so good:
Using the S Pen helps keep gross, oily prints off the screen.
Sarah Tew/CNET
- You can type faster with your fingers than you can handwrite, keyboard-trace or touch-type with the S Pen. Handwriting mode, where you write with the pen in a specific text field, created many errors, especially if you write quickly.
- You can only see the note you pin to the lock screen when you tap an icon…with your finger. It won’t respond to the S Pen. (Oh, the irony.) It’d be better to see the note ghosted onto the Always On display.
- A few times I worried I’d lose the stylus. Magnetic sides would make it a more loyal sidekick when the S Pen is outside its holder.
- At the beach, grains of sand wedged in between the pen and its holder, and wouldn’t dislodge with fingernails, a slim knife blade or a flat set of Swiss Army Knife tweezers. It’s forever stuck. An outlier case, but it could happen to you, too.
Streamlined Android software, new iris scanner and waterproofing
The Note 7 runs Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow, but will upgrade to Android Nougat down the line. Samsung’s refreshed custom layer is a more colorful, trimmed down take on its TouchWiz software interface, and feels cleaner and easier to read. If you don’t like digging around, simply search the app tray and settings menu for what you need.
Samsung Galaxy Note 7 review: Sleeker, simpler, better than ever
Samsung has come a long way. When the very first Galaxy Note launched in 2011, it felt like a quirky anachronism — wasn’t the age of the stylus over? The answer, as evidenced by the Note line’s continued existence, is a resounding “no.” In fact, somewhere along the way, the Note transformed from a curiosity into a premium device that can (and does) outshine the Galaxy S line on which it was based. This year’s attempt — the $850+ Galaxy Note 7 — builds off what Samsung learned making the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge, and you know what? The company wound up making its best phone yet in the process.
Hardware
Every year, Samsung tweaks its design language for its new Galaxy S phones and applies it to whatever Note device it releases later that year. It’s no surprise, then, that the Note 7 has more in common with the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge than last year’s Note 5. Since these smartphones share so much, it’s no surprise that the subtle differences are what make the Note 7 shine.
Consider its curves, for instance. Samsung built the Note 7 with a symmetrically curved front and back; that is, the metal-and-glass body is curved the same way on both sides. As a result, there’s more of an edge for your thumb to rest on so your hand is less likely to accidentally tap something on-screen. I couldn’t count the number of times that happened to me with the S7 Edge, and it eventually got so annoying that I gave up on the phone entirely. Here’s hoping Samsung applies this knowledge to next year’s Edge. The added benefit is that these curves make the Note 7 really, really nice to hold. This symmetry of design, coupled with the phone’s light weight and lack of bezels around its 5.7-inch screen mean this is easily the nicest Galaxy Note to actually carry around and use. It’s a big phone that doesn’t feel like one.
Samsung also opted for a USB Type-C port for power and data transfer instead of the micro-USB seen on the S7. It was only a matter of time before Samsung made the switch, but I’m just a little surprised the company didn’t wait until next year. And then there’s the storage situation: The Note 7 ships with 64GB of storage, up from 32GB on both US versions of the Galaxy S7. It’s a welcome move, but maybe not a surprising one since the Note series phones were always billed as more premium devices.
The Note 7’s partner, the S Pen, has also benefitted from some thoughtful little changes. It now has a smaller, 0.7mm nib — the same size as a typical ballpoint pen — for more natural writing. You can’t stick the S Pen into its slot backward either, because Samsung really didn’t need another year’s worth of embarrassment. On the flip side, though, this year’s S Pen is slightly slimmer than the last one, which makes it just a little less comfortable to grip. Samsung couldn’t please everyone.
Some changes, however, are hardly what you’d call subtle. There’s an iris scanner above the screen for hands-free unlocking, and it works better in some situations than others. If you don’t need corrective lenses, well, congratulations: Assuming you line your eyes up properly, the Note 7 will unlock itself in less than a second. Folks who wear contacts (like I do sometimes) fall into this category too. If you wear glasses, though, expect the phone to take much longer… if it works at all.
Now, about those similarities. There are, uh, a lot of them. Most notable is the silicon, running the show, including a Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 chipset, 4GB of RAM and an Adreno 530 GPU. All three phones also share the same 12-megapixel, DualPixel camera setups — that’s just as well since that particular sensor is arguably at the front of the Android smartphone camera pack. (The 5-megapixel front-facing camera is the same too, but that’s way less interesting.)
Now, about those similarities. There are, uh, a lot of them. Most notable is the silicon, running the show, including a Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 chipset, 4GB of RAM and an Adreno 530 GPU. All three phones also share the same 12-megapixel, DualPixel camera setups — that’s just as well since that particular sensor is arguably at the front of the Android smartphone camera pack. (The 5-megapixel front-facing camera is the same too, but that’s way less interesting.)
There’s also a spot for a microSD card in the SIM tray, just like with the S7 line, and the phone is also IP68-rated waterproof, a first for the Note line. Meanwhile, I wish Samsung could have transplanted the 3,600mAh battery from the S7 Edge into the Note 7, but it seems Samsung could only fit a 3,500mAh cell into the Note 7’s curved body. Thankfully, the difference in longevity is minimal (as you’ll see later on).
Display and sound
As mentioned, the Note 7 sports a 5.7-inch Super AMOLED display running at 2,560 x 1,440 (or Quad HD, or 2K, or whatever you want to call it). And wouldn’t you know it, this screen is just fantastic, replete with great viewing angles and the vivid, sumptuous colors that Samsung’s AMOLED panels are known for. (If the default color temperature is a little lurid, you can always change display modes in the settings menu.)
The screen’s bigger size means its pixel density (518 pixels per inch) is lower than that of the S7 and S7’s displays, but really, the difference is nigh-impossible to pick out; text and photos are rendered with excellent crispness. It’s a summertime champ too: With the brightness cranked to max, I had no trouble sifting through tweets and agonizing over potential Instagram filters under the sweltering August sun. If all of this sounds familiar, well, sorry. Samsung’s screens are typically first-rate, but the Note 7’s is especially pleasant (particularly since the weird, pulsating effect I noticed on last year’s Note 5 is nowhere in sight).
As you might expect, the Note 7 inherited the S7’s always-on display mode, and it’s as handy as eve. Samsung updated it with new designs, though: There are three more designs for the persistent clock and one new image (of constellations) that should wind up on the company’s earlier flagships before long. And while we’re on the subject of minor additions, there’s also a blue light filter mode that’s meant to reduce eye-strain and preserve the sanctity of your sleep cycle. These display modes are popping up all over the place, and whether they actually help is up for debate, but it’s a welcome touch as I write this review in the middle of the night.
As usual, though, the quality of the Note’s speaker setup lags behind that of the display. There’s a single grille etched into the phone’s bottom between the Type-C port and the S Pen’s hiding place, and it’s capable of churning out loud (if somewhat lifeless) audio. Things get better when you plug in a pair of headphones, at least: Samsung’s high-quality audio upscaler adds just a little more oomph to your tracks, with options for simulated surround sound, tube amp effects and concert hall reverb. I didn’t really love these effects when they first showed up on the S7s, but they grew on me — spacey, vocal-centric songs can benefit a lot from that faux surround sound, for example. Still, if you hated these effects the first time around, don’t expect to change your mind.
Software
Like all the other flagships that launched this year, the Note 7 ships with Android 6.0.1 onboard — that means you’ve got those new permissions controls, Now on Tap’s handy info cards and all the other core Marshmallow features we’ve been enjoying for nearly a year now. More interesting is how Samsung’s approach to TouchWiz continues to evolve: What used to be a bloated, obnoxious punchline of an interface gradually became bearable, and then eventually pretty nice. Lots of us (including yours truly) will always prefer stock Android, but Samsung has spent the past few years cleaning up its act and that’s worthy of some praise.
At first glance, not much has changed since the days of the S7/Edge — Flipboard’s Briefing lives to the left of your homescreens, and Samsung’s Edge UX is back. Quick recap if you haven’t used an S7 Edge: Swiping the tab on the right side (by default) of the screen brings up panes with shortcuts to your chosen apps, contacts and “tasks” like composing messages and taking selfies. You can flesh out your list with third-party “edges” for Yahoo Sports and Finance, but we still can’t craft macro-like tasks the way we could on a full-blown computer. Once it’s set up, the Samsung Pay tab lives at the bottom of the screen too — a flick upward loads your payment method and preps it for either an NFC or a magnetic “swipe” transaction.
The differences will become more apparent as you start digging a little deeper, and you’ll wonder why some of these changes haven’t been in TouchWiz from the start. Pulling down the notification shade, for instance, reveals a search bar, brightness slider and a distinct lack of circular icons — Samsung ditched them for a cleaner grid of quick settings icons. The app launcher has a search bar sitting up top too, making it easier for find the app you’re looking for. That sure beats the clumsy search button on the S7 and S7 Edge. This streamlined approach carries over into the Note 7’s settings page, where Samsung excised the circular icons and trademark teal in favor of a much simpler list of options. (Don’t worry, the interface is still punctuated with blue here and there, in case you’re not great with change.) And if you hate those rounded white frames encasing your app icons, you can turn them off. One word: hallelujah.
Naturally, there’s more going here beyond the Note 7’s clean new look. Let’s say you’re trying to keep your Tinder habits on the down low — you have the option to download the app directly into Samsung’s new secure folder, keeping it perpetually hidden from prying eyes. But what if it’s already installed? Easy. You can add the app to the secure folder and then uninstall the original instance, leaving an independent, fully functional copy hidden from the rest of the world. You can lock down this digital storehouse with a PIN, password, a fingerprint or an iris scan, but the latter two require you to set up a password just in case your biometric signature doesn’t pass muster. What you use the secure folder for is your business, but regardless, Samsung’s implementation is both clever and useful.
Samsung’s browser is also more useful thanks to its support for extensions, including a QR code reader and an “Amazon assistant” that’s meant to “get instant product matches while you shop across the web.” I’d love to tell you more about how Amazon is removing barriers between you and your darkest buying impulses, but this extension wasn’t live as of this writing. Then there are the updated power saving modes. In addition to dialing down the screen’s brightness and throttling performance, they’ll also reduce the Note 7’s screen resolution (down to as low as 720p) to conserve even more juice. Huawei adopted this trick first, but it’s remarkably handy for keeping your Note 7 alive when its battery level gets grim.
Thankfully, there aren’t a ton of pointlessly pre-loaded apps. We have the usual slew of Google apps, plus Samsung’s email client, browser, file manager and S Health app, along with all the Note-specific stuff, which I’ll get to in a second. My review unit is a T-Mobile model, and Legere’s crew thankfully didn’t go too crazy with the bloatware. All told, this version of the Note 7 comes with eight carrier apps pre-installed, ranging from the pretty useful (SlingTV was handy for following the Olympics on the move) to the irritating (I can manage my security fine, Lookout, but thanks).
Another year, another S Pen
Weird as it sounds, the Note 7 is so well put together and pleasant to use that it’s sometimes easy to forget there’s a stylus hidden inside. This year’s S Pen doesn’t look dramatically different from the Note 5’s but the changes are there if you look closely enough. As mentioned earlier, the nib is smaller for more fluid writing and sketching, and the S Pen’s body is ever so slightly narrower and lighter. You wouldn’t think a change this minute would be apparent, but it sort of is — despite near-identical dimensions, this S Pen feels a little flimsier than the one we got last year. Funny how big a difference this stuff makes.
Still, the Note 7’s S Pen still has few clear advantages. For one, it’s water resistant just like the phone itself. Since the entire package is IP68-rated, you can actually write things on the Note 7’s screen while underwater, though I’m not sure when anyone would ever actually need to. (Getting phone numbers at the beach? Who knows.) Speaking of the screen, the Note 7’s can now recognize up to 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity, or double what the Note 5 was capable of. It’s one of those differences that’s only really noticeable when you have the two devices side by side: light strokes that didn’t register on the Note 5’s display showed up just fine on the Note 7, making it a better choice for artsy types who value precision. If all you’re going to do is dash off notes and reminders, though, you probably won’t notice the change much.
While we’re talking about the screen, I’m pleased that one of the Note 5’s best features has made it over to the Note 7. Removing the S Pen while the display is off brings up a dark interface for (appropriately enough) screen-off memos. Here, you can draw or leave yourself a note, and then pin it to the always-on display for easy reference throughout the day. The inherent lack of friction in this process means anyone who picks up your phone can pin doodles to your display, which in my case led to lots of juvenile drawings all over my sleeping screen. Thanks, guys.
Samsung is all too aware that the S Pen isn’t for everyone, so it cooked up a few new Air Command features to make its stylus more versatile. My eyes are pretty terrible, so it was neat being able to magnify anything on the screen up to 300 percent when pinching-to-zoom wasn’t an option. Cool? Sure. Consistently useful? Eh.
You can now translate words on-screen from one language to another too, though the translations aren’t as elegant as I’d wanted. Here’s the thing: The feature only lets you translate one word at a time, rather than sentences or paragraphs. As such, it’s handy for picking up bits of a language you don’t know, and lousy for interpreting lots of information.
And then there are the GIFs. The “smart select” feature has been updated to let you choose parts of the screen with the pen, record them and turn them into GIFs. I didn’t have high hopes for this process since making GIFs on a regular computer is sort of a pain, but it turned out to be surprisingly elegant. Once the recording is done (you can capture up to 15 seconds), it’s simple enough to doodle on top of them, change how they loop and share them everywhere. Meanwhile, Samsung’s software cleaning spree continues with S Pen stuff: Four(!) separate S Pen-specific applications have been combined into a single one called Samsung Notes. This is where you’ll do most of your note taking and doodling, and it’s perfectly serviceable; it’s good enough that I didn’t miss any of the old standalone S Pen apps.
All of these tweaks are steps in the right direction, but I wonder whether they’ll actually change anyone’s mind about the S Pen. The fact that Samsung keeps churning these devices out must mean a lot of people out there dig using a stylus, but if you weren’t sold before, you probably won’t be now.
Camera
We can keep this part brief: Both of the Note 7’s cameras are identical to the ones in the S7 and S7 Edge, and are therefore really damned good. The photos I shot over the course of a week were almost uniformly well exposed, with lots of detail (they really pop on this AMOLED screen) and vibrant, accurate colors. It’s damned fast at focusing too, thanks to the camera’s DualPixel setup. If you’ll pardon the extremely unscientific explanation, every 1.4 µm pixel on that 12-megapixel sensor is split into two photodiodes that are used to gauge the distance between the camera and the subject. Since every single pixel is used to for these focus calculations, the Note 7 is super fast at locking onto whatever’s in front of it, even when the subject is a finicky, adorable toddler celebrating her second birthday.
It goes without saying that smartphone cameras tend to suck in the dark, but the Note 7 fares well thanks to the size of the pixels on its sensor. There’s surprisingly little noise, even in shots taken outside at night, and the always-there exposure controls help reduce the influence of extra light that could otherwise soften a shot’s sharpness. In short, the Note 7 is a very impressive all-around shooter, ranking alongside the S7 and S7 Edge as one of Android-powered cameras to beat. Meanwhile, the 5-megapixel camera up front takes respectable selfies with enough verve to please all the but the most terminally vain. I just wish Samsung had bumped up the resolution a bit this time around.
The camera sensors might not have changed, but the camera interface sure has. Remember all the different mode and settings icons that used to pepper the main view of the camera app? Many of them have been moved out of sight to give you a cleaner interface. All of the photo modes from the S7 — Pro, panorama, selective focus, slow motion, hyperlapse and more — are back and still available by swiping to the right. Instead of tapping a separate button to switch cameras, though, you’ll have to swipe up.
Camera resolution options and the timer has been moved into a separate settings menu, while live filter effects can be applied by swiping to the left. Trust me: It’s all much more intuitive than it sounds, and the “out of sight, out of mind” ethos here is fine by me. After all, just about every photo I took on full auto looked great. Shooting video was similarly painless and yielded accurate, handsome footage no matter what resolution I picked. (Fair warning: Tracking autofocus doesn’t work when shooting 4K video, so be prepared to handle it yourself).
Performance and battery life
Because of those shared internals, the Note 7 performs almost exactly like the S7 and S7 Edge, which in turn behave much like the rest of this year’s flagship smartphone heap. That means this year’s Note is a smooth operator thanks to the quad-core Snapdragon 820 and 4GB of RAM. I spent my week multitasking lots, playing games like Hearthstone, Asphalt 8, Republique and generally doing my best to make the 7 stutter or slow down. I succeeded, but only rarely and never for long. If you’re concerned about whether the Note 7 can stand up to your hellacious routines, don’t be: This thing brings the heat (sometimes literally, but never to the point of discomfort).
Then again, were you expecting anything else? Qualcomm’s near-monopoly on the mobile chip business has led to a détente where one high-end device more or less performs the same as any other. That makes it hard to write about these things over and over, but it’s still a win for everyone reading this — there’s almost no such thing as a bad choice, at least as far as performance is concerned.
HTC 10
Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge
Samsung Galaxy Note 5
AndEBench Pro
13,601
16,673
13,030
14,152
Vellamo 3.0
4,589
4,876
4,152
4,104
3DMark IS Unlimited
29,697
26,747
26,666
26,981
GFXBench 3.0 1080p Manhattan Offscreen (fps)
47
48
47
47
CF-Bench
49,256
49,891
46,290
36,488
Because their internals are the same, differentiating factors like battery life are more important than ever. Now, the Note 7 might not have the biggest battery in Samsung’s lineup — that distinction goes to the S7 Edge — but it’s still one of the best day-to-day performers I’ve used in some time. When it came to our standard rundown test (looping a high-def video at 50 brightness), the Note 7 lasted just over 14 hours. That’s about a half hour less than the S7 Edge, just a few minutes more than last year’s Note 5, and on par with the Moto Z Force. Not the type to watch the video until your eyes bleed? That’s fine: I routinely got two full days of consistent, mixed use out of the Note 7. With the help of Android Marshmallow’s Doze feature, my runtime stretched closer to three days with more sporadic use, though your mileage may vary.
The competition
It goes without saying that if you’re looking for a phone you can use with a stylus, you can’t do better the Galaxy Note 7. That said, if you’re looking for a great phone-and-stylus combo, I’ve found that the Galaxy Note 5 still holds up really well. It’s been updated to run Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow and put up benchmark figures that were surprisingly close to this year’s model — a testament to the power of the octa-core Exynos chipset lurking inside. Alas, it’s not waterproof and lacks any expandable storage options, though you could easily find a good deal online.
The Note 7 also faces some stiff competition from its cousins, the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge. They have the same brains, after all, not to mention the same waterproofing, the same punchy AMOLED screen technology and the same overarching design language. I still think the S7 Edge is too prone to accidental touches, though, a problem that frankly drives me up the freakin’ wall — I’d definitely take the Note 7 over the Edge (especially since they share those edge-centric features), but the GS7 remains an excellent choice for those who want Samsung’s best in a more compact form factor.
Meanwhile, fans of first-rate build quality should consider the HTC 10, a phenomenal smartphone that offers power and style in spades. It, too, makes use of the Snapdragon 820 chipset, but the company’s attention to detail is what really makes the HTC 10 shine — the build quality is impeccable, the phone packs a low-latency touchscreen, and it’s the first Android phone that natively supports Apple’s AirPlay streaming standard. The 10’s battery and camera aren’t quite as good as the Note 7’s, though, so you’ll have to love HTC’s design and its approach to software.
Wrap-up
When I reviewed the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge earlier this year, I was already convinced Samsung was operating at the top of its game. After using phones as well crafted as those, I didn’t think it would be possible to love the inevitable follow-up as much. I was wrong. The Note 7 isn’t a perfect phone: It’s expensive and there still isn’t a hugely compelling reason to buy into the S Pen lifestyle if you haven’t already. Even so, by combining the updates that went into the S7 siblings with a number of subtle improvements to the Note’s design and software, Samsung has built its finest phone yet. The Galaxy Note 7 isn’t just the best Galaxy Note ever — it’s a strong contender as the best Android phone you can find right now.
Samsung’s new Gear VR is its most comfortable and immersive yet
Samsung’s Gear VR has always been an anomaly among the company’s dizzyingly diverse product lineup. Ever since the first “innovator edition” of the headset debuted alongside the Galaxy Note 4 in 2014, it stood out as something potentially more useful than the company’s various wearables, experimental phones and other gadgets. And, thanks to Samsung’s partnership with Oculus, the Gear VR’s usefulness has only grown over time — in fact, we named last year’s model a “no-brainer” purchase for Samsung owners. Now we have yet another Gear VR model, coinciding with the launch of the Galaxy Note 7, and it’s an even better introduction to virtual reality than ever before.
From afar, the new Gear VR just looks like a color-swapped version of what came before. But the new dark blue shell actually has a legitimate use: It helps to keep images from your phone’s screen from reflecting off of the headset. That was an issue some users had in the past with the white Gear VR models, according to Samsung. And given that the last few models looked fairly similar, it’s about time the company made a big design shift to differentiate its latest and greatest headset.
There are also a handful of small, but genuinely useful, ergonomic tweaks. There’s a new material that rests against your skin that feels as soft as a fleece blanket meant for babies. And Samsung also made the strap that goes over your head significantly longer, which could be useful for some. Those upgrades, coupled with the Gear VR’s light design, make it something you could easily wear for hours on end. After testing both the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, I noticed that small comfort differences go a long way towards making VR feel more immersive, so I appreciate Samsung’s efforts in this regard.
As for other changes, Samsung increased the field of view in this latest headset to 101 degrees from 96 degrees in previous models. That might not sound like a major difference, but it’s yet another tweak that puts you deeper into virtual experiences. And it brings the Gear VR even closer to the wider 110-degree field of view from dedicated headsets like the Oculus Rift and Vive. Other headsets, like the Star VR, claim to offer even more expansive coverage, but they’re not actually on the market yet.
If you look closely, you’ll also notice some upgrades around the new Gear VR’s inputs. The biggest difference? There’s a dedicated “Home” button that takes you right back to the Oculus home screen. Previously, you had to hold down the “Back” button to return home. Doing that now brings up a screen that gives you quick access to your settings and friends list. Samsung also cleared out the directional pad from the last headset, so that it’s now a free-flowing touchpad area which you can swipe at without worrying about exact accuracy.
In a nice move for the Samsung faithful, the new Gear VR is compatible with a handful of the company’s older handsets, in addition to the Note 7. Its support stretches back to the Galaxy Note 5, and also includes the S6, S6 Edge, S6 Edge+, S7 and S7 Edge. Basically, if you’ve bought a Samsung phone recently, you’re covered. While the headset supports USB-C by default (for the Note 7), you can easily swap out that connector with an included micro-USB adapter. You can also adjust the position of the arms holding your phone in place to fit phablets like the Note, or the more sensibly sized Samsung phones.
Since our senior mobile editor Chris Velazco is still hogging the Note 7, I tested out the new Gear VR with the Galaxy S7. Setting up the headset was simple: I removed the faceplate, swapped in the micro-USB adapter, plugged the phone in, and made sure the Gear VR’s arms were positioned for smaller devices. The phone felt securely attached to the headset, even while I shook it vigorously (far more than you would with your head, at least).
When I first plugged in the S7, I was prompted to remove it from the Gear VR and install a bundle of Oculus software. If you don’t have an Oculus account yet, you’ll be asked to create one. Once all that was set, I shoved the S7 (along with a pair of headphones) into the headset and prepared to get my VR on. Within a few seconds, I reached the Oculus Home screen and started shopping around for some apps.
I settled on NBC’s Sports app (featuring the Rio Olympics), Jaunt’s collection of 360-degree videos, Eve Gunjack and Adventure Time: Magic Man’s Head Games. When it came to 360-degree video playback, I definitely noticed the Gear VR’s larger field of view. It still feels like you’re looking through a pair of binoculars, rather than being completely transported somewhere else, but it’s far better than previous models. Unfortunately, the low resolution of most 360-degree video is an an even bigger detractor (it’s hard to follow the Olympics when you can’t determine which fuzzy blob is which).
When it came to games, though, the new Gear VR shined. Both Eve Gunjack and Adventure Time were easier to control with the less restrictive touchpad, and they were also more immersive than on previous Gear VRs. I also loved being able to quickly readjust the volume and brightness setting by holding down the “back” button, as I couldn’t reach my phone’s volume controls when it was plugged into the headset.
Mostly, I appreciated the fact that I could wear this Gear VR for a long time without getting fatigued. Even though it’s powered by mere phones, Samsung’s headset actually has an advantage over desktop VR platforms since it’s completely wireless (well, if you don’t count headphones). This latest model is simply the most comfortable VR headset on the market. It never felt like the headstraps were crushing my skull, or that the headset was resting too heavily on my nose (looking at you, HTC Vive).
As great as the Gear VR is, though, it could have some serious competition from upcoming headsets supporting Google’s Android Daydream VR platform. That’s basically attempting to do what the Gear VR did, but for handsets from multiple manufacturers. If Samsung were smart, it would work together with Google’s platform, but it’s unclear if the company’s deal with Oculus would prevent that.
Even with Daydream headsets on the horizon, though, I don’t have any problem recommending the new Gear VR to Samsung owners. In fact, it’s solid enough that it’s worth considering moving to a Samsung device just for the privilege of using the Gear VR. But the arguments against the Gear VR, and waiting for Daydream, are strong as well.
Google Duo Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET
Google’s new app, Duo, is a simple video-calling service that’s available for Android and iOS today. Alongside the upcoming messaging app Allo, it’s one of two communication apps Google announced earlier this year at its I/O conference, and one of four altogether from the company.
In a way, it’s Google’s answer to Apple’s FaceTime, and it makes one-to-one calling between Android phones, and from Android to iPhone, very simple. Though both parties have to download the app to begin chatting (unlike FaceTime, which is baked into the dialer of compatible iPhones), it’s still an intuitive app to use.
And while Android users will likely enjoy using Duo to video-call all their friends, iPhone owners won’t find it compelling enough to ring up fellow iPhone users. However, it may certainly become their go-to app when calling up a buddy who uses Android. With that said, here are its main highlights:
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You’ll see previews with Knock Knock
Duo’s unique feature is Knock Knock, which gives you a preview of who is calling by firing up the camera on the other end of the line. If you’re initiating the call, you’ll see a little notice that says your video is visible, which means the other person can see what you’re doing right at that moment in real time. Android users can see Knock Knock regardless of whether Duo is opened or not (like on the lock screen). On the iPhone though, you’ll only see it if you’re in the app. Otherwise, you’ll just get a little notification saying someone’s calling you.
Google’s rationale for this is that Knock Knock already gets you smiling before the call starts. Of course, that’s assuming you actually like/want to speak to the other person who is on the other line. Seeing family members on the other line? That gets me smiling. Seeing the face of my boss? Mmm, not so much (see below). Editor’s Note from said boss: “Hmph.”
Making a call with Knock Knock enabled (left), and receiving a Knock Knock call (right).
Lynn La/CNET
You can disable Knock Knock
Before you worry about seeing anything you don’t want to see from the other line, know that you can only receive Knock Knocks from people who are already in your contact list. You can also block individual people from calling you. (By the way, when you block a person on Duo, the person won’t know it. When they call, they’ll just hear your line ring and ring continuously.)
If Knock Knock really isn’t your thing, you can disable it altogether in Duo’s Settings menu. You can’t disable Knock Knock on a person-to-person basis though, so it’s Knock Knock or nothing.
Its interface is super simple
Duo has an incredibly user-friendly and intuitive interface. Before you begin a call, you’ll see icons to start a video call and your recent contacts. During a call, you’ll see yourself (in a small little circle), and icons to mute audio, switch cameras and hang up. Video from the other line fills up your screen and that’s pretty much it. If you’d rather have your camera fill up the screen (for example, you’re touring a house to the person on the other line), just tap the preview circle and your view will switch.
Before a call you’ll see icons to start video and your recent contacts (left). During a call, you’ll see only a handful of features (right).
Lynn La/CNET
It’s different than Hangouts (no, really)
At this point you might be wondering what makes Duo different than Google’s other video-calling service, Hangouts, and you’re not alone if you think the company has one too many communication tools. But according to Google, Duo is supposed to be way more specialized. Whereas Hangouts can be used on desktops, supports messaging and group chats, and has multiway video for collaboration (and its interface reflects these extra features), Duo does one thing and one thing only: video calls.
Unlike Hangouts, it reaches people through their phone numbers, not their Gmail. Other than downloading the app, you won’t have to force anyone to log into their Google accounts or sign up for a new service. And the best difference between it and Hangouts? It uses end-to-end encryption, so your data can’t be viewed from prying third parties or even Google itself.
It works only as well as your connection
Not surprisingly, if you have a good Wi-Fi or data connection, the app works smoothly. When I used it and had strong coverage, people looked clear and their voices were easy to understand. I experienced some lag from time to time, but it usually lasted just a few seconds.
When one of my colleagues was on a weaker Wi-Fi network, however, he was extremely pixelated. Though audio came in clear, his face just ended up looking like a study in 1880s pointillism. After he switched to a stronger Wi-Fi network, however, his image cleared up and our conversation was stable.
Google
You might actually want to use it
There are loads of apps these days that either center around video chatting or have it as one of their features. Duo is coming into a crowded industry, competing not only against Skype, Facebook Messenger and others, but even Google itself with Hangouts.
But Duo has a few advantages. Aside from its quirky Knock Knock feature, it’s incredibly easy to use, and if all you want is to hop on a video call, it’ll do that for you. This singular functionality frees you from having to sign in another account, make sure your buddy has the same service or take time to learn a new interface. And while iPhone users will probably keep using FaceTime to communicate with one another, Duo bridges the gap between iOS and Android, making it a whole lot easier to say hi and wave hello.
2016 Volkswagen Passat review – Roadshow
The Good The 2016 Volkswagen Passat features a spacious interior, huge trunk and a healthy menu of entertainment and safety technology features. The chassis provides solid handling, while also returning impressive ride comfort.
The Bad Even with updates, the Passat’s styling is forgettable. The turbocharged engine suffers from noticeable boost lag when accelerating from complete stops. Steering weight is overly light.
The Bottom Line The Passat does everything a midsize sedan should, but gets lost in one of the most competitive segments in the automotive space due to its uninspiring appearance.
The midsize sedan segment historically hasn’t been known for visual flash, but that has changed as of late, with models like the Chevrolet Malibu, Ford Fusion, Honda Accord and even Toyota Camry now wearing more stylish sheet metal. For those who still prefer an understated appearance for their daily driver, fear not. Volkswagen’s Passat is still here, and even with a wealth of useful midcycle updates for 2016, it’s design is still a walk on the mild side.
Hard to tell
Upon seeing this Volkswagen Passat SE test car, I honestly had a tough time picking up on its new-for-2016 styling updates. They are there, though, with a new domed hood, chrome four-bar grille, slimmer headlights, revised bumpers, trunk lid and chrome trim around the windows.
The Passat’s design remains clean and inoffensive, but firmly on the dull side of the spectrum. There are no swoopy body lines like the Malibu or Mazda 6. The front end doesn’t stand out like on the Fusion or Kia Optima. It’s just sort of there, taking on the mantle of the no-nonsense family sedan — perfect for people who like to fly completely under the radar.
Updates for 2016 include new headlamps, grille and fascia. Not so you’d notice.
Nick Miotke/Roadshow
Hop inside, and there’s a new dashboard, center console, steering wheel, frameless rearview mirror and chrome accents sprinkled about. Again, it’s tough to pick out the changes, but the straightforward and roomy cabin design remains. Materials throughout are of high quality, and while the front seats are comfortable, they lack much side support. Controls for the dual-zone automatic climate controls are easy to use. Passengers in the roomy back seat also get niceties like heated (outboard) cushions, and a USB port to juice up their electronics when on the go.
As for the trunk, it’s huge and capable of swallowing 15.9 cubic feet of stuff, which came in handy when carrying tons of video equipment for a shoot. The large trunk opening makes loading and unloading simple, and a new easy-open function is great when approaching the car with your hands full. Waving a foot under the rear of the car pops the trunk open when you have the key fob on your person.
Bigger dose of tech
While the Passat leaves something to be desired in the design department, it comes armed with a healthy arsenal of technology. The latest MIB II infotainment system is standard on all Passats, with my SE with Technology trim featuring a 6.3-inch captive touchscreen capable of pinch-zooming and swiping controls, which work great.
A cabin loaded with tech including Apple CarPlay and Android Auto compatibility.
Nick Miotke/Roadshow
The new infotainment system features navigation, USB inputs and Bluetooth, with the latter capable of pairing with two phones at the same time. My car’s MIB II system arrived loaded with VW’s Car-Net program, allowing for the integration of Apple CarPlay, Android Auto and MirrorLink. Car-Net’s security and service also lets owners connect to their car via a computer or smartphone app to locate it in parking lots, lock and unlock doors, view vehicle maintenance status, make service appointments and pre-load destinations into the navigation system.
To keep a watchful eye on younger drivers, owners can set now set geo-boundaries and speed alerts. If the car exceeds the speed limit or goes outside of approved areas, parents will receive a text or email message, giving them ample proof to dole out a stern punishment when the disobedient offspring returns home.
Brita Infinity Smart Water Pitcher with Amazon Dash Filter Replenishment Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET
For $45, the Wi-Fi-equipped Brita Infinity pitcher promises to keep track of how much water is passing through the filter. Once the filter is about spent, it’ll go ahead and automatically order a replacement from Amazon that’ll arrive at your doorstep just when you need it.
Brita’s smart pitcher is $20 more than an identical Brita pitcher with no smarts to speak of, so the question here is whether or not that Amazon Dash integration is worth the extra 20 bucks. In theory, it’s a useful bit of automation — especially if you already buy replacement filters on the regular. In practice, it isn’t all that precise, and more than anything seems designed to get people to buy new filters more often than they would out of habit alone. It certainly isn’t something that anyone needs, but it might make a decent gift for a friend who’s picky about filtered water.
This smart water pitcher orders its own replacement…
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Tyler Lizenby/CNET
The Brita Infinity pitcher isn’t the first smart pitcher we’ve seen. Though it doesn’t have Wi-Fi, the “Autofill Pitcher” found inside the GE GAS18PSJSS top freezer refrigerator fills up on its own each time you put it back in the fridge.
That pitcher uses the refrigerator’s filter, which you’re supposed to change every six months. By comparison, the Brita Infinity pitcher will order a replacement filter after it thinks you’ve filtered 40 gallons of water. If you’re drinking eight 8-ounce glasses of water a day, that means you’ll need a new filter in less than three months. Make that more like a month if you’re sharing this pitcher with the family.
That timeline is pretty typical of filtered water pitchers, but give Brita some credit here. By tying filter replacements to the amount of water consumed instead of an arbitrary timeline, you know that you’ll be getting a new filter when you actually need it and not any earlier. That’s the right approach, especially for people who typically drink less than those eight glasses a day.
You’ll need to log on to Brita’s website in order to pair the pitcher up with your Wi-Fi network, and with Amazon.
Screenshot by Ry Crist/CNET
To get started with the pitcher, you’ll need to log on to the Brita Infinity website, where you’ll receive instructions on pairing your pitcher with your home’s Wi-Fi network. To do so, you’ll hold down a button on the top of the pitcher until a light starts flashing blue, which tells you that the pitcher is broadcasting a Wi-Fi connection. Connect to it, then tell Brita’s website your home Wi-Fi info, and everything will sync right up.
You’ll find three little lights on the top of the pitcher that correspond to how much the filter has been used: green for 0 to 36 gallons, yellow for 36 to 40 gallons, and red for 40-plus gallons. The lights will come on for a few seconds each time you open and close the lid to give you a quick indication of how far you are into the filter’s life cycle.
The opening of the lid is how this smart pitcher keeps track of usage. It doesn’t measure how much water passes through the filter, nor does it measure how much you pour out. Instead, it tracks lid lifts to approximate the number of fill-ups and give it a rough sense of when it’s time to order a new filter.
To test it, I set the counter to zero and then re-filled the Infinity over and over again by pouring water back and forth with another pitcher. A full Infinity Pitcher is eight cups of water, or half a gallon — that means I’d need 80 pours back and forth in order to hit that 40-gallon benchmark.
106 pours. Approximately 53 gallons of water. The filter sensor still thinks I’ve poured between 0 and 36 gallons. pic.twitter.com/t4nGHzWHg9
— Ry Crist (@rycrist) August 12, 2016
Tyler Lizenby/CNET
Eighty pours and two tired wrists later, I still hadn’t hit it. So, I pressed on. Eighty-five pours. Ninety pours. A hundred pours. Still no change, even at 50 gallons.
The problem seemed to be the sensors in the lid. The light would only come on about once every four or five times, and in sporadic fashion. Sometimes it would work three or four times in a row. Other times, it would go five or six refills without ever lighting up.
In the end, that meant that the Infinity Pitcher wasn’t catching all of my refills. The lid sensor just isn’t that sensitive, which explains why it thought I had poured less than 36 gallons. This might be by design, as an over-sensitive lid would just end up wasting people’s money. Good for Brita in that case — but I still wish it were more accurate.
Tyler Lizenby/CNET
There’s also a question of value. With the Amazon Dash replenishment turned on, the pitcher will automatically order a single filter when it thinks you need a new one. Those pitchers currently sell for five or six bucks a piece, but they’re more affordable if you buy in bulk. That isn’t an option with Infinity.
Another point of note: the batteries. Amazon says that they’ll last five years, but they’re sealed in place within the lid. That means that there’s no way to replace them when the juice runs out (unless, of course, you’re comfortable taking a box cutter to your smart pitcher.)
In the end, the Infinity seems to be designed for people who like having a pitcher of filtered water on hand, but who also might not care enough to order new filters when the time comes. The Infinity gets them on board with Brita’s business model by doing the ordering for them.
For people who already order new filters every few months, the Infinity offers a bit of extra convenience — but it’s undercut by the inaccurate lid sensor. I’m not yet convinced that it’s worth the extra 20 bucks, but we’ll keep it on hand in the CNET Smart Home to see if it grows on us.
Samsung Notebook 7 Spin review – CNET
The Good The Samsung Notebook 7 Spin offers very good Core i7 performance, some basic game-ready graphics, and impressive battery life.
The Bad The design is bland, especially for a laptop that costs more than $1,000. You’re not going to love the touchpad, and the hyped HDR video mode offers only very subtle improvement.
The Bottom Line It doesn’t have a lot of wow factor, but the 15-inch Samsung Notebook 7 Spin packs in decent premium features, including some you won’t find in other hybrids.
Many Windows hybrids are essentially full-time tablets that get a keyboard added on to become a part-time laptop. Potentially more useful is something like the Samsung Notebook 7 Spin, which looks and feels like a standard 15-inch laptop, but has a 360-degree hinge, allowing it to fold back into a touchscreen tablet without compromising its laptop ergonomics.
Like other 360-degree hinge hybrids, including the popular Lenovo Yoga series, you can stop at a few points along the way, such as a kiosk mode or table tent mode, which puts the display front and center.
But there are a lot of hybrid laptops with 360-degree hinges out there. At this point, making waves in this crowded pool requires adding new features, better designs or other extras. In the case of this 15-inch version of the Notebook 7 Spin, you get a full-HD touchscreen with an interesting special feature. Samsung has included what it calls an HDR mode — which mean high dynamic range.
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Sarah Tew/CNET
Now, some new televisions support a new video format also called HDR, which means special HDR content viewed on an HDR TV will have better contrast and clarity — essentially a better balance between the light and dark parts of the picture.
In this case, Samsung has created a software HDR filter. When flipped on, it applies an HDR-like effect to any video you’re watching. Honestly, in action the effect is pretty subtle, but it’s an interesting idea, and if you don’t like the effect on your favorite Netflix show, you can just turn it off.
Watching a variety of content on the Notebook 7 Spin with our in-house TV expert David Katzmaier, he described the effect of the HDR filter as a simple gamma change. In most of the examples we watched, flipping it on kept the bright parts of scenes correctly lit while deepening the black levels of other parts of the scene.
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Sarah Tew/CNET
Overall, Katzmaier said he preferred the effect to not having it switched on, but it also was a very subtle change. Trying some actual Netflix content specially encoded for HDR televisions (you’ll need the highest-end UHD Netflix account for that), there was no evidence that the laptop was making use of the native HDR-encoded content.
There’s one other interesting extra in this model, an Nvidia 940MX graphics chip. That’s not going to make you a top-flight gamer, but I could play some mainstream games at medium settings and full HD resolution, so that makes the Samsung Notebook 7 Spin one of the only game-friendly hybrids I’ve seen.
The 15-inch version of the Notebook 7 Spin comes in two configurations, currently discounted by $100 each in the US to $899 and $1,099. Both include Intel Core i7 processors and the Nvidia graphics chip, but the higher end model goes from 12GB to 16GB of RAM, and adds a 128GB SSD to the 1TB of platter hard drive space both machines share. We’re testing the high-end of those two models. Samsung doesn’t currently offer Windows laptops in the UK or Australia, but that works out to £845 or AU$1,420. There’s also a $799 (£615, AU$1,040) 13-inch version that skips the Nvidia graphics and knocks the CPU down to a Core i5.
Yamaha RV-X481 review – CNET
The Good The Yamaha RX-V481 offers very good audio performance in a relatively affordable bundle. It offers numerous streaming services over Wi-Fi plus the ability to stream to a Bluetooth headphone. HDMI ports support 4K video and HDR sources.
The Bad The total of just four HDMI ports means users with more than one gaming console, for example, may need to look elsewhere. Competitors such as Pioneer and Sony are supporting the versatile Google Cast system.
The Bottom Line The Yamaha RX-V481 checks most of the must-have feature boxes, and still delivers excellent sound quality for a mid-price receiver.
Yamaha has been hammering away at the AV anvil for a good while now, and many of its receiver products gleam like Excalibur. One fine examples is the RX-V481, a well-honed blade with a good balance of must-have features and superb sound quality for the buck.
Yamaha’s MusicCast multiroom system and Bluetooth in/out highlight a solid feature set. Our only disappointment is that Yamaha cut the number of HDMI ports on this unit from six to four. The consolation is that all are state-of-the-art, with the ability to carry 4K signals with all the latest HDR information still attached.
Performance of the RX-V481 is a little better than the RX-V479 it replaces, but Yamaha’s competitors, namely Sony and Pioneer, have also made gains in 2016. For example, the Sony STR-DN1070 offers better features and better sound than the Yamaha, although it is somewhat more expensive. If you want a high-quality weapon in your home theater arsenal but want to stay on a midrange budget, the V481, available now for $399, £399 in the UK or AU$849 in Australia, is a winning choice.
Design
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The Yamaha RX-V481 is a 5.12 receiver which features four 4K-compliant HDMI inputs and multi-room streaming capabilities.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Buttons. Come get your buttons! While some companies opt for austere front panels with two knobs and not much else, Yamaha is on the “airplane cockpit” side of receiver design. As a result the face is more cluttered than most, but at least the RX-481 includes the most oft-used buttons in an easy-to-grasp layout. We award bonus points for the shortcut buttons to the most popular inputs.
The onscreen interface has received a light polish this year. It’s now in high definition, unlike the 480p interfaces of old, and is relatively easy to navigate for users familiar with AVRs.
The remote control is friendly and easy-to-use and is virtually identical to the model which the company unveiled with the previous RX-V479.
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The receiver’s remote controller.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Features
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The ports on the back of the receiver.
Sarah Tew/CNET
The old RX-V479 was a beauty: it sounded great and it offered plenty of features, including six HDMI ports. While the ‘481 is cut from the same cloth, there have been some changes to the pattern. Namely, the number of HDMI ports has been slashed from six to four. While all of these ports are now HDCP 2.2 and HDMI 2.0 compliant, it’s fair to say almost no one has four compatible devices right now — connecting legacy equipment is much more important. Otherwise, connectivity is pretty decent with both Bluetooth in and Bluetooth out (to compatible headphones or a speaker).
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The MusicCast app for iOS and Android offers streaming from Pandora, Spotify and more
Screenshot: Ty Pendlebury/CNET
Yamaha’s proprietary MusicCast system is over a year old now. While it’s added a couple more services, it’s still not as compelling as competitors — some of which can offer dozens of streaming providers. In order of least interesting to the most, they include Rhapsody, SiriusXM, Pandora and Spotify. It also comes with the ability to read from users’ phones or network devices (up to 24-bit/96kHz) as well as transmit over Apple’s AirPlay.
One feature the Yamaha misses is Google Cast. For Android and iOS phones and tablets, Google Cast offers the ability to stream directly from a music app rather than use a proprietary one like MusicCast. Competitors like Sony, Pioneer and Onkyo have Google Cast now, and are in the process of upgrading it for multiroom functionality.
AIVAnet 