The Galaxy S7: imperfect, but still the best phone in 2016 [review]
I’ve now spent about three weeks with Samsung’s newest flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S7. Like any experience with a new smartphone, it has its benefits and drawbacks, its features and its quirks. You may have read a few weeks ago that I’m planning on sticking with my Nexus 6P over the Galaxy S7 (Edge) and that’s still true but a lot of my original gripes have faded away over time. Pending what we see from HTC in the “10” smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S7 is shaping up to be the best smartphone in 2016.
The specs are pretty standard for what we’ll be seeing this year:
- Display: 5.1″ QHD (1440×2560, 577 PPI) Super AMOLED panel
- SoC: Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 (MSM8996)
- Memory: 4GB RAM
- Storage: 32 GB, with microSD expansion up to 200GB
- Cameras: 12 MP, f/1.7, 26mm, phase detection autofocus, OIS & 5 MP, f/1.7, 22mm
- Battery: 3000 mAh, non-removable
- OS: Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow
Given that it’s pretty much exactly the same on the inside as both the HTC 10 and LG G5, Samsung had to differentiate themselves by what’s on the outside.
Design
The Galaxy S7 is without a doubt the most elegant Android phone ever built. The industrial design of the HTC One series over the last couple of years and then the Nexus 6P last last year are certainly great, but the Galaxy S7’s fusion of metal and glass is absolutely gorgeous and it feels so great in the hand that you don’t want to put it down.
One often overlooked part of the design is where to put the 3.5mm headphone jack. It seems that nearly every OEM has moved this to the top of the phone in recent years, which leaves wires going everywhere if you’re using the phone and listening to headphones at the same time. Samsung put it back on the bottom, which may sound like a small point, but it’s an appreciated design choice.
Speaking of design choices and ports on the bottom of the phone, it is very surprising given Samsung’s propensity for wanting to be on the cutting edge that they would forego the USB type-C port on its new flagship. Every other major Android OEM that has released a phone in the last 6 months has gone with USB type-C and there has even been speculation that Apple may be putting it into the new iPhone in the fall.
The only reason that I have been able to think of that Samsung would have done this was to keep the new model phones compatible with the Gear VR headset. The Gear VR is an awesome accessory, but Samsung could definitely afford to come up with a new Gear VR tomatch the new port.
The Display
Samsung is known for having the most striking displays on the market. Another year, another Galaxy, nothing has changed. The screen on the Galaxy S7 is the same size and resolution as last year’s model. I wouldn’t be the first reviewer to say so but the Galaxy S7 is a refinement upon the S6 and in the case of the screen, there wasn’t a whole lot to improve upon because the screen in the S6 was the best on the market last year and this year it is no different.
Even though this isn’t the Edge variant of the phone, the glass does not stop flat at the edge of the phone, but instead curves around the edge by about 1mm in order to make the overall look and feel of the phone more smooth. The result of such form over function is that you end up constantly touching the screen when you’re just holding the phone normally.
The Software (aka Touchwiz)
This is without a doubt the best spin on Android that Samsung has ever made. I said the same thing last fall when I reviewed the Note 5 and I meant it. Samsung has been steadily making its flavor of Android better and better. I’m not sure how much the modern processors contribute to cleaning the clunk in Touchwiz, but the point is that the Samsung Galaxy S7 is smoother than the Nexus 6P.
Samsung has finally stopped making putting new gimmicks into the OS a selling point for its phones, which is great, but it also means there’s less to talk about on the software side of things. Still, I have some favorite features of Touchwiz that I would like to share.
Much like on the Note 5, one of my favorite features is still the theming engine/store. I’ve been a part of the root/ROM scene since my first smartp
hone in 2010 and theming has always been one of my favorite parts of that. Seeing that feature on mainstream Android devices was a dream come true and still is a lot of fun. It’s a little annoying that it is attached to the Samsung Hub rather than Google Play, but who would actually be surprised by that?
Another one of my favorites was the addition of ultra power save mode. I don’t remember seeing this on the Note 5, which was running Lollipop at the time, but this seems to be 
something that Samsung added with its Marshmallow release. It essentially takes regular power save mode on stock Android and turns it up to 11.
It limits your data and CPU usage, as well as completely shutting off a majority of the apps on your phone except for those that the user deems essential. It also utilizes the AMOLED display and makes everything black and white. It even disables the screenshot function!
The battery life on the Galaxy S7 is pretty good, but I’ve found that in a pinch, ultra power save mode can be invaluable. Ironically, using ultra power save mode disables the themes.
I’ve been using the Verizon variant of the phone, which normally requires the obligatory complaint of bloat. This isn’t to say that there isn’t bloat on this phone, there most certainly is, and you’ll probably want to be disabling some of them if you’re on Big Red lest you get annoying notifications about visiting the Verizon store. I feel sorry for the average Verizon customer who will never think to a install third-party SMS client, but I found that after I settled in with the phone and got it all set up the way that I like, I didn’t care about the apps that came pre-installed.
Samsung doesn’t just stuff things into Android, though, they take things out, too. In Marshmallow they removed two features that I thought were pretty crucial and left me disappointed with the implementation. One was something that I detailed a few weeks ago – they removed the ability for timed or ’til next alarm’ do not disturb. These are pretty small features, but why remove them? It’s really nice to be able to put my phone into do not disturb while I’m at the movies and set it to two hours so I don’t have to remember to turn it back on when I leave!
The other is something that a lot of people probably didn’t know about, maybe don’t care about, and technically can be brought back; and that’s adoptable storage. There was a feature introduced in Android 6.0 Marshmallow where the system could adopt the SD card as though it were internal memory and treat it the same way that it already treats the internal memory. That means that you can install as many apps as you want on a phone that is only sold with 32GB of storage but has been expanded to accommodate up to 160GB of storage. Samsung took this feature out. It can technically be brought back with some work at the command line, but why take it out in the first place?
Battery Life
Like I mentioned before, the battery life on the Galaxy S7 is pretty 
good. It’s not as good as the OnePlus One, but it worked some sort of magic. Impressively, Samsung packed the same 3000 mAh battery that it had in the Galaxy Note 5, which had a lot more physical space to work with and more pixels to push, into the smaller footprint of the Galaxy S7, giving it better battery life than the Note 5. The battery on the S7 regularly lasted me throughout the day and only when I was planning on going past midnight did I bother with recharging before the end of the day.
Like with overall performance, I’m sure that some of the battery performance can be attributed to the Snapdragon 820 under the bonnet, but I’ve heard that the Galaxy S7 with an Exynos 8890 Octa, which is sold everywhere that isn’t America.
The Camera
It’s no secret that Samsung is the unquestioned leader in Android cameras, if not smartphone cameras in general and that hasn’t changed with the Galaxy S7. Photos outdoors come out very crisp and enjoyable and thanks to a lower resolution sensor and some new licenced tech, it’s better than ever in low light and has an impeccably fast shutter speed/auto focus. There’s a little bit of noise in the low light photos but they’re still better than what you’ll typically see from the competition.
I’m not what you would call a photographer and if I were I wouldn’t probably recommend using a smartphone to take pictures. But for the casual snapper, it’s hard to go wrong with the S7.
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Other stuff/Final thoughts
The biggest selling point for the Galaxy S7 after having used it for several weeks is not the phone itself, but the Gear VR headset that came with a lot of early sales. Even for $99, it’s a great accessory to your smartphone.
WIN A GEAR VR!
I’ll be doing a full review of the Gear VR soon, right after we give one away, but it was the highlight of my review and for my roommate’s girlfriend, the only thing she cared about when I told her that I had the Galaxy S7 to review.
In the meanwhile, we’re going to give away a brand new Samsung Gear VR. All you have to do is head to our Instagram page and leave a comment on this post. We’ll pick a winner on April 27!
Overall, I’m still going to keep my Nexus but that doesn’t mean that the Galaxy S7 isn’t a great phone. In fact, I think it’s the best phone you can buy right now, especially if you have already owned Samsung phones and are used to some of their quirks. It’s a gorgeous phone, one that I would be ashamed to put a case on but almost definitely would have to. Make no mistake, you’ll be paying nearly $700 for this phone and almost $800 for it’s edged brethren, and that’s no small amount of money but if you have to live with a phone for two or more years, I don’t think you can go wrong with this one.
Samsung Announces Gear IconX Wireless Earbuds and Gear Fit 2
Samsung today introduced the Gear IconX, a set of wireless earbuds that are similar in style to the Bragi Dash. The IconX earbuds have no wires to connect them to one another and no wire to plug them into a smartphone or other device, instead communicating wirelessly over Bluetooth.
Priced at $199.99, the IconX earbuds feature 4GB of internal storage to hold music and use hooks to securely fit into an ear. There are also built-in fitness sensors for monitoring movement and heart rate, with the data able to be synced to Samsung’s S Health app, and there’s a built-in voice coach feature. Touch gestures like tapping and swiping on the earbud are used for skipping tracks and changing the volume.
When not in use, the earbuds can be placed into a pill-shaped case which also serves as a backup battery, offering two full charges. The battery inside the IconX lasts for one and a half hours when streaming music or for three and a half hours when playing music stored on the earbuds themselves.
Samsung debuted the new earbuds at an event in New York and gave several tech sites a hands-on demo, giving us a first look at some early impressions. According to The Verge, IconX is “pretty good” at blocking outside noises, while TechCrunch points out Samsung is marketing the earbuds as a workout-only accessory given the “dismal” battery life.
Gizmodo thought the controls could be a “little unreliable” but thought the audio quality was impressive, and Engadget said it took a minute to get them secured properly in the ear, but once in place, they “didn’t feel like they were going anywhere.”
Samsung’s Gear IconX earbuds come as rumors suggest Apple is preparing to remove the headphone jack from its iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus devices, set to be released this fall. There have also been rumors indicating Apple is working on its own set of wireless Bluetooth earphones that would be sold alongside the iPhone 7 as a premium accessory with many of the same features in the IconX.
Samsung plans to debut the Gear IconX in blue, black, and white in the third quarter of 2016.
The company has also announced an updated waterproof Gear Fit 2 fitness tracker with a wider 1.5-inch curved Super AMOLED display, 4GB storage, GPS, a heart rate monitor, a barometer for measuring altitude, and features for automatically detecting exercise activities. The Gear Fit 2 will be available for pre-order starting tomorrow at select retailers and available in stores on June 10.
Tag: Samsung
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Twitter’s first 360-degree videos will come from the NBA finals
The likes of Facebook and YouTube have been doing 360-degree videos for some time now. During the NBA Finals that begin tonight, Twitter will also offer the more immersive views for the first time. The social network will post pre- and post-game content, but don’t expect to see any in-game highlights. Samsung is sponsoring the videos, which will be shot with its Gear 360 camera.
The NBA Finals 360-degree videos will be exclusive to Twitter and are expected to include warm-ups, teams just before taking the court, the captain’s meeting and any on-court activity after the game. If you want to follow along, the NBA account will be posting all of the footage and you can expect Samsung Mobile ads promoted tweets with the videos to pop up in your timeline as well. Game 1 between the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Golden State Warriors tips off at 9 PM ET tonight.
With the Gear Fit 2, Samsung tries again at workout wristbands
Samsung’s original Gear Fit was as flawed as it was ambitious, but the market for fitness gadgets is still growing. Of course Samsung was going to try again! That’s where the new $179 Gear Fit 2 comes in: Samsung took the fitness formula it developed two years ago, polished it up a bit and added a few features that have become de rigueur for higher-end workout wearables. You’ll be able to pre-order one starting June 3rd, but join us here for a first look.
First, the broad strokes. The Gear Fit 2 is nearly the same size as the model that came out two years ago; it’s just a little longer and a little wider to accommodate the updated display. That would be the 1.5-inch curved AMOLED screen, which is almost twice as wide as the original to better display your stats. An added bonus of this tweaked design is that the Gear Fit 2 is so, so much more comfortable to wear than its predecessor. Seriously, it’s a night-and-day difference — no small thing on a device you’re supposed to wear 24/7.
There’s a heart rate sensor here too, just like last time, and even in my brief time testing it, the readout seemed a bit more accurate than before. Throw in a dual-core 1GHz Exynos 3250 chipset, 512MB of RAM and a 200mAh battery (rated for three or four days of mixed use) and you have got the foundation for potentially great device.
Meanwhile, the addition of GPS and the ability to automatically recognize and track certain exercises help the Tizen-powered wristband go toe to toe with rivals like the Fitbit Blaze. For those who need some tunes to get them through runs, there’s 4GB of storage inside the band, allowing you to stream saved music to your Bluetooth headphones. Curiously, Samsung inked a deal with Spotify to provide playlists and music curated by athletes because… why not? And if you’re the sort who brags, you can easily share tracked runs to Facebook. Sharing, as it turns out, is a big part of the new Gear Fit experience. Friends and phones contacts who use Samsung’s S Health platform can issue challenges to each other and keep tabs on their progress.
Then there are the plain usability updates. If you ever used the original Gear Fit, you’ll surely remember that sometimes information was displayed vertically on your wrist, and sometimes horizontally. No more of that: The UI is strictly vertical this time around, and while that doesn’t sound like a huge change, it goes a long way in making the Gear Fit 2 feel more refined.
Indeed, refinement is the overarching theme here. Samsung had high hopes for the original Gear Fit but didn’t (or couldn’t) build a device that adequately ticked off all the boxes they laid out. After making wearables like the Gear S2, the company is better prepared to build high-quality Tizen devices. If we’re lucky, that experience will make the Gear Fit 2 more than just a pretty bauble when it launches on June 10th.
Samsung’s new smart earbuds track your steps and heart rate
The newly announced Gear Fit 2 is probably the fitness band Samsung should have made in the first place, but does the world even need another wrist-worn gewgaw? In case your answer to that is “no,” Samsung is unveiling a second exercise-friendly wearable today: a $199 pair of smart earbuds called the Gear IconX. (And no, the name doesn’t make any sense to us either.)
Samsung says the IconX is meant for people who have a more casual relationship with exercise (the Gear Fit 2, meanwhile, is meant for the truly dedicated). Still, that doesn’t mean Samsung skimped on the fitness tech here. Each bud weighs 6.3 grams — a hair or two heavier than a US quarter. The device tells you how far you’ve run, how fast you’re going and how fast your heart is beating. Yes, there’s a heart rate sensor built into these things. More importantly, there’s a voice coach feature (which I didn’t get to test), which is meant to help runners trim their lap times and surge into higher intensity zones.
I spent about 20 minutes pacing around a room while wearing the earbuds, and the audio was rich in treble, though there seemed to be more reverb than usual. The IconX has 4GB of internal storage, like the Gear Fit 2, though it seems immune to the sort of sound syncing issues I’ve experienced with other tiny Bluetooth buds. Usually, only one earbud is connected directly to the phone; the other connects to the first bud to keep audio playing at the same time. The thing is, that bud-to-bud connection can be weak, leading to audio dropouts while moving. Samsung’s approach cleverly puts a copy of each song onto both earbuds. From there, it just takes a little software to make sure they’re playing at the same time.
My ear canals are a little oddly configured, so testing in-ears can be a little tricky. It took a few moments to figure out just how the IconX buds were supposed to fit me. At the very least, they’re not barrel-shaped like the Earin, so they won’t roll away if you ever drop them. Once they’re in, though, they didn’t feel like they were going anywhere. As it turns out, that’s pretty damn important since you’ll frequently be tapping and swiping to control them.
Each bud has a sort of capacitive touch patch on it, and the gestures needed to use it are easy to learn. Need to change tracks? Double-tap to skip to the next one or triple-tap to go back. Changing volume can be a little trickier since you have to swipe up and down on such a tiny space, but the most important gesture is arguably the long press. That fires up the ambient sound mode, which is crucial for urban runners: It lets you hear what’s going on around you in hopes that you’ll cross Broadway without violently intersecting with an ambulance.
So yeah, the IconX is arguably more interesting than the Gear Fit 2, and we’re really looking forward to its launch in Q3, later this year. The thing you have to remember is that battery life can vary dramatically based on your usage. Let’s say you’re just listening to music saved on the buds: The IconX will last for 3.6 hours on a charge. That estimate dips to 3.4 hours if you throw in some workout tracking, and plummets to 1.5 hours if you’re streaming music from a phone with activity tracking on. Fortunately, the IconX’s case doubles as a battery pack that will charge the buds from bone-dry to full twice. The potentially short battery life won’t be a deal-breaker for some, but it’s a reminder of the limitations of fully wireless buds. Still, I’m already sold on the concept. Now we just need to see if the IconX lives up to its promise.
Samsung adds ‘Just Dance Now’ to its smart TV hub
It’s not that hard to start playing Just Dance Now — you only have to download and install the app. Samsung, however, is making it easier to access on its smart TVs by adding the app to its new Smart Hub interface. The Smart Hub gives you quick access to content from different sources like Netflix, YouTube, Hulu and Amazon Prime Videos, eliminating the need to jump from one application to another. You’ll be able to access Just Dance Now under games, and you can even pay for a subscription through Samsung’s billing system.
In case you haven’t tried it yet, Just Dance Now is the mobile, online multiplayer version of the popular franchise. It uses your phone as a motion controller, so you need to hold it while you’re following the steps shown on your desktop, laptop or television. You’ll be able to access it through Samsung’s Smart Hub in 50 countries, so long as you have a 2015 or a 2016 smart TV model.
Source: Samsung
Samsung brings back its free Gear VR promo
Miss out on your chance to get a free Gear VR headset by pre-ordering a Galaxy S7? You can rest easy. Samsung is launching a US Father’s Day promo that gives you a gratis Gear VR when you buy one of the company’s higher-end phones from the past year, including most Galaxy S6 and S7 variants (sorry, no S6 Active) and the Galaxy Note 5. The deal also gives you an Oculus bundle with “hit games and experiences.” You’ll have to buy the phone between now and June 19th to qualify, but that’s no big deal if you were already thinking about an upgrade and just needed a nudge to get moving.
Source: Samsung Promotions
Samsung’s new 512GB SSD is smaller than a postage stamp
Storage in your laptop or smartphone is a compromise between volume, access speed and physical size. But, the industry’s competition to shrink them while boosting their specifications is fierce. A few months after shipping a 16TB solid-state drive, Samsung has announced a fast, efficient 512GB SSD that’s half the size of a postage stamp.
Samsung’s press release claims that the drive is the first mass-produced 512GB SSD with non-volatile memory express (NVMe), a host-controller interface with a streamlined register for speed, in a single package. Unlike other hard drives in multi-chip packages (MCP), Samsung’s new drive is organized in a ball grid array into a collected unit, making it simpler to fit in and connect to other parts in the device. This makes the drive ideal for the ultra-slim notebook PC market, where space and weight are at a premium.
A senior Samsung VP said in a press release that the tiny drive triples the performance of a typical SATA SSD. Its read/write speeds of up to 1,500MB/s and 900MB/s, respectively, mean you could transfer a 5GB HD video in 3 seconds. Samsung will start selling the drive in June in 512GB, 256GB and 128GB models.
Source: Samsung
Samsung Announces 512GB NVMe SSD That’s Smaller Than a Stamp
Samsung today announced that mass production has begun on a new NVMe PCIe solid state drive in a ball grid array package, the first of its kind to be available in large quantities. The SSD, called the PM971-NVMe, is tiny, merging all SSD components into a package that’s smaller than a standard U.S. postage stamp.
Designed for next-generation PCs and ultra-slim notebooks, the PM971-NVMe measures in at 20mm x 16mm x 1.5mm and weighs approximately a gram. Its volume is about a hundredth of a 2.5-inch SSD or HDD, and it offers performance able to surpass a SATA 6Gb/s interface with sequential read/write speeds of up to 1500MB/s and 900MB/s, respectively.
According to Samsung, it takes 3 seconds to transfer a 5GB-equivalent full-HD movie and is up to 1500 times faster than a standard hard drive when it comes to random read/write input output operations per second (190K and 150K, respectively). Samsung plans to offer the SSD in 128, 256, and 512GB configurations.
“Samsung’s new BGA NVMe SSD triples the performance of a typical SATA SSD, in the smallest form factor available, with storage capacity reaching up to 512GB,” said Jung-bae Lee, senior vice president, Memory Product Planning & Application Engineering Team, Samsung Electronics. “The introduction of this small-scale SSD will help global PC companies to make timely launches of slimmer, more stylish computing devices, while offering consumers a more satisfactory computing environment.”
Apple has used Samsung SSDs in its Mac machines in the past, and it stands to reason that the company could adopt Samsung’s newest technology in the future. There’s no guarantee that will happen, but Apple often likes to include cutting-edge technology in its products.
Apple has been using a faster NVM Express interface for the SSDs of its most recent machines, starting with the 12-inch Retina MacBook. Intel is also developing next-generation 3D Xpoint SSD technology that’s set to launch in 2016 in its forthcoming Optane solid state drives, another hardware option that may be of interest to Apple.
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Samsung is packing more ads into its smart TV interface
Samsung wants to be more than just a hardware company, which is why it’s strengthening its longstanding flirtation with the ad business. The Wall Street Journal claims that the manufacturer, struggling to turn a profit in TVs, will increase the number of tile ads that it displays in the menu bar of its smart TVs. These small squares are currently only available in the US, although the paper believes that Europe will be added to the program in the near future. In addition, older models will get the ads delivered to the home screen thanks to a future software update.
It’s believed that Samsung has turned to Lee Won-jin, a former Google executive, to help spearhead its push into advertising. Much like its mobile division, its TV arm is struggling to make a profit on devices in an age when 40-inch-plus displays can be bought for a few hundred dollars. Then again, it’s likely that people, resentful of paying big bucks for a premium TV set that becomes yet another ad platform, will opt for a cheaper device that doesn’t come with that risk.
Source: WSJ
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