Is a Samsung S5 'old' now?

[Subressor]

So 2 years coming up with my S5. I love it! Dust & water resistant, decently fast. But the S8 is coming out this year, should I upgrade to another device?

I use my phone for Whatsapp, calls, messaging, games (Hearthstone, which is slow!) and camera. Will upgrading to any other phone right now be beneficial?

Budget is no issue, but I would like value for money.

Thanks!

 

[Solandri]

The hardware is not old at all. The problem is manufacturers typically haven't been upgrading devices 2+ years old to the latest version of Android. Right now it looks like Samsung has no plans to roll out Nougat for the S5.

https://news.samsung.com/global/samsung-begins-rollout-of-android-7-0-nougat

The new features in Nougat aren't that big a deal compared to Marshmallow (which changed how binaries are stored and run, and gave you per-app control of permissions). The problem is lack of security updates on older versions of Android. I'm on a Nexus 5 which also got left off the Nougat bandwagon, so I'll probably end up upgrading this year. Google only provides security updates for older devices and Android versions for 3 years.

Bear in mind that the S5 still has a user-replaceable battery. They got rid of that and the microSD card slot in the S6. The S7 got the microSD card slot back, but the battery is still internal. No idea what the S8 will bring, but I don't see a user-replaceable battery in the cards. The battery was the reason there were complaints about the S5 waterproof seal failing (people failing to securely snap the back cover on).

 

[Subressor]

Thanks for the reply. The use replacable battery was a great thing for me as the battery is usually the first thing to cause annoyance with aging phones (and the ability to change it out for a fresh one if I'm travellling). SD card is also mandatory for me (why the hell wouldn't anyone put a slot it in apart from to grab money)

You say the hardware of the S5 is not old (CPU/RAM/Camera)? Would you notice any real difference in upgrading or is it just small "tick" iterations and poor value for money?

 

[The Paladin]

I cant say I am still running my Samsung Note 3 😛 was going to do Note 7 but we all know how those ended.... guess Ill wait more.

 

[Solandri]

You say the hardware of the S5 is not old (CPU/RAM/Camera)? Would you notice any real difference in upgrading or is it just small "tick" iterations and poor value for money?

The newer processors are about twice as fast as the S5's processor. But the real question is, is that something you'd notice? It's not like a laptop where you're number-crunching a huge spreadsheet that used to take 10 seconds to refresh, and it can refresh in 5 seconds on the newer hardware. If a swipe animation takes 10 ms when it used to take 20 ms, you're not gonna notice that unless you do a side-by-side test.

The newer processors are 64-bit vs the 32-bit Snapdragon 801 in the S5. But that really doesn't matter much unless the device has more than 4GB of RAM.

I'm not as up to date on the mobile GPUs. You'll have to research that yourself if you're into 3D gaming on your phone.

Here are the specs for the S5 vs the S7. GSMArena is a pretty good site for thorough specs, so look up the S8 when it's released.
http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s5-6033.php
http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s7-7821.php