Samsung Galaxy S5 Smartphone Review

[Guest]

Will the gravity well from Galaxy S5 capture your interest, or will you streak past with escape velocity?

Samsung Galaxy S5 Smartphone Review : Read more

 

[Agera One]

A one year late review?

 

[grumpigeek]

My Galaxy S5 in in an Urban Armor Gear case that looks great and protects the phone, so I don't really care what it looks like.

The device is 100% reliable and I have found the battery life to be excellent - way better than any smartphone I have had previously.

 

[implantedcaries]

Guys you are reviewing a mobile which was released a year and then calling it average compared to competiti

 

[firefoxx04]

I have an s5. This review would have been welcomed a year ago.

The phone is top notch. I've known this for a while.

 

[implantedcaries]

Guys you are reviewing a mobile which was released a year back and then calling it average compared to competition?? Seriously? Yes I agree S5 is not the most exciting prospect out there for new mobile buyers now, but it wasn't so in 2014 when it was actually launched. Also its one of the very few mobiles already receiving lollipop updates.. No mention of that.. Any hidden agenda against Samsung?

 

[Porcodio]

Temperature and humidity sensor? Is that correct?

 

[FritzEiv]

Folks, you're right. This review is quite late. We began testing the S5 a long time ago, but we've had a bit of a backlog of smartphones to review since Matt (our senior mobile editor) started on staff and we're just catching up. We aren't trying to pretend it's a new phone, thus we haven't put it up in our main feature carousel; but we did want to publish this and others just to have them for archival and future referral and comparison purposes. We are working on other smartphones that are little more current and then we hope to be "on time" as new ones arrive. Hence, for example, Matt's performance preview of Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810 earlier this week. We've been a bit more timely on devices like the OnePlus and the iPhone reviews as well. But hey, continue your sarcasm, because we probably deserve it. Just want you to know why we are doing this, that we're not trying to fool anyone, and that we'll be caught up in short order. Thanks for your patience.

- Fritz (Editor-in-chief)

 

[Mac266]

One thing in this review irritated me: the whole "it's ugly" thing. It might not suit you, but lots of people like the way it looks. Aesthetics are purely subjective, and should definitely not be judged a con on one mans opinion.

 

[peterf28]

Iam not buying a smartphone again where the chipset drivers are not open source. Like what samsung did with the S3, it is stuck on Android 4.3, and there is nothing you can do. All the custom roms are unstable crap because there are no up to date drivers For current kernels. It is like buying a PC without the possibility to update the OS . Would you buy that ?

 

[jdrch]

FYI phone speakers are placed on the back of phones to take advantage of acoustics when the phone is laying on a surface. The surface spreads and reflects the sounds back to the user much better than the speaker itself would. Try it yourself.

 

[Gaidax]

Honestly, as a Galaxy S4 owner, S5 left me dead cold... The upgrade was meager... the only thing worth noting is LTE, which was more of a huge S4 failure (the lack of it) rather than S5 amazing feature. Everything else almost the same - tiny bit better CPU, tiny bit larger screen with same resolution.

I really hope Samsung gets their shit together with S6, because really, anything less than astounding won't make me switch from S4.

 

[egmccann]

Hey, hey, it's a year late. Give 'em a break. Besides, I hear they're almost done with their Windows 95 review, in which they complain no modern browser works on it and the interface is dated.

And seriously, the whole "looks" thing? The phone looks fine. It might not be the reviewer's *taste* but nothing does it for everyone. Besides, how many people are running around with nothing on the smartphone, at the very least a gel case/skin/whatever you want to call it?

I went from an S3 to an S5... that only because the actual screen (not glass) got cracked somehow in the S3. Love the larger screen, the heart rate sensor made me go "um... ok, why did my phone need this?," the water cover I'm expecting to break at some point, the "micro USB 3" isn't particularly ridiculous (and it's fairly obvious which way is up - and it still charges just fine with USB 2,) and my only complaint (pre-hardcase) is that it felt too light... for the two minutes or so before it went into the hardcase.

 

[dmb77]

Oh lighten up girls. You 've already had 50 reviews over the past year . So what it this is more of an addendum. I used to be hung up on the whole brushed metal frames/cases until I saw a few scratched up and bent . That was enough for me to appreciate my S5 and it's plastic. There's no other android phone that makes me wish I had chosen something else. If only AT&T will get those updates rolling.

 

[beetlejuicegr]

If you are comparing S5 with similar release date mobile phones its fine to be honest.

 

[lonechicken]

Anyone know how to keep the setting at Smooth all the time? It keeps reverting back to Normal when you turn off the phone or exit out of the camera.