Its incredible how everyone becomes bedazzled and loses their minds over decreased screen bezels. Samsung did barely anything, they literally got the S7 and lopped off the side bezels. This somehow amazes people and they think its something brand new and revolutionary, and they used to call Apple customers brainless sheep. I don't even care about bezels that much, but that's just me. If you're going to go for this aesthetic, do it right and find a way to make the phone look like Jony Ive's dream of 1 single piece of glass, all sensors behind the display, sleeker than anything ever made.
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Consumer Reports Rates Galaxy S8 Over iPhone 7 as 'iPhone 8' Rumored to Address Most Shortcomings
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A thumbs up isn't enough here.
A co-worker just got one yesterday. Damnnnnnn that hardware is sweet. Really incredible. The screen looks amazing and is coated with some magic stuff that makes it feel SO buttery smooth. Amazing. The virtual home button with haptic feedback is super legit.
The software is best described as Windows 95 on a phone. The anti-aliasing looks like crap. Every software feels simultaneously unrefined and overly complicated. It's really really ugly. I don't want to spend all day looking at that. My 1999 palm pilot was honestly more intuitive.
Consumer Reports equates to the proverbial 'taken with a grain of salt' (on a 10 mile beach).
One sign that Consumer Reports does it well: It stirs up fandom on both sides. When they inevitably do it again this fall and the iPhone Next is better than Samsung then there will be riots in Samsungdom and cheers here. What people want is partisanship and for their brand to always "win" at all costs.
It's kind of sad that at this point the "design" is a leading selling point of a phone rather than usability. That's not only a sure sign of a market that has reached the peak but a sign of the coming fall. And I still don't get why a black slab is considered good design.
It's kind of sad that at this point the "design" is a leading selling point of a phone rather than usability. That's not only a sure sign of a market that has reached the peak but a sign of the coming fall. And I still don't get why a black slab is considered good design.
"Design is not how it looks. Design is how it works." – Steve Jobs
In other words: The S8 is all form over function and hence, in a deep design sense, ugly.
The newsworthy takeaway from this article is Apple isn't the leader in smartphone hardware design. The current flagship is firmly rooted in the iPhone 6 design from 2014. The phones were released about six months apart, and unless my calendar has an extra couple of months in it the updated iPhone 8 isn't expected to be released for another four months in October. Excepting the under display fingerprint sensor, the iPhone 8 is simply fighting for parity with what Samsung has done. Android is still a hot mess with the carriers forcing their various apps onto the phones. If Samsung can ever get their act together and produce a "signature" phone with a polished version of Android then they could really give Apple a run for their money in the top-tier device segment.
Well I do agree that the iP7+ is really ugly in comparison. I love my phone, but it's just a big slippery slab of metal that I don't trust myself to hold without a case. Maybe the non-matte black colors are more attractive.
The only thing that changed in the S8 was the screen in terms of aesthetics, with same the sides and the back design as the S6, which in the standards that you state are outdated. Are we trying to objective here or is the comment purely subjective, applies only to one person?
S8 is a good looking phone, but it evolutionary rather than revolutionary, while retaining some old design elements. And that is being objective.
And the ergonomics of the phone has yet to prove itself of the form factor that Samsung chose. Its definitely not ideal for consuming media.
I'd say it's fair to compare any phone that comes out to the existing landscape at the time the phone came out. As long as publications do such comparisons several times in the same year, it's fair. The only time it would be unfair would be to an annual review of cell phones and always time it after one competitor just released a new phone and always before another competitor releases theirs. Otherwise, the balance happens naturally.
Having said that, in reality, the iPhone 7 compares quite well against the Samsung S8 overall. Screen quality is similar, camera quality is similar. However, in terms of performance, the iPhone 7 handily beats the S8 overall. While there are some multi-core benchmarks that will stand out as exceptions, most workloads are only optimized for single cores and the S8 has single core performance that isn't even up to iPhone 6 standards. It's a similar story with storage I/O performance as well. There are also performance issues with Android and Samsung's touchwiz that cause random stutters, etc. It's for reasons like these that iPhones feel much faster and smoother in person. Android fans always attempt to downplay this fact and pretend that something on the iPhone is only a second faster, etc. Unfortunately, they don't realize that all of those seconds add up and impact the overall user experience.
Consumer Reports will be back in everyone's good graces in the fall when they again proclaim the iPhone (whatever its eventually called) best. Everyone on this, my favorite fan site, will be able to quote CR's praise of the phone they never need to read a review about anyway. Because it's always best.
I don't know. Unlocking the phone is probably going to be the most frequent activity done on the phone, so if that is already annoying with the fingerprint scanner placement, I don't see using this phone to be a joy.
The Galaxy S8 came out back in April so it's already coming up on two months old. And the next iPhone is coming out in August now?
I don't know about other people... but I buy the ecosystem... and Apple has the best ecosystem hands down.
That said... I have three Amazon Echo Dots (total price $120). Alexa is surprisingly good and useful... except when she can't answer a simple question. At the moment, Amazon has the best home automation.
That said... I have three Amazon Echo Dots (total price $120). Alexa is surprisingly good and useful... except when she can't answer a simple question. At the moment, Amazon has the best home automation.
Except for the curved screen edges, I now like Samsung's take on 'bezel-less' a bit more than what Apple purportedly has planned for the iPhone 8. The S8 looks balanced, even if it has a small top and bottom bezel.
Not so much a fan of the jut out for the front camera module etc, even if it ends up being a 'black bar' or dead space for the phone indicators.
Not so much a fan of the jut out for the front camera module etc, even if it ends up being a 'black bar' or dead space for the phone indicators.
Forehead and chin look dumb. Just extend the screen and make that area unusable except for wallpaper.
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I think that goes away with iPhone 8.
I agree so much. Samsung phones have been looking better than iPhones in the last couple of years. But I know I would regret switching because of the way my Macbook, iPhone, and iPad work so well together.
Maybe because the iPhone 8 will probably not be available for many until December or Jan ... then there will only be 3 months before Samsung unveil the 9.
For the life of me, I just don't understand how Apple can take so long to bring a product to market. Its not like they don't have the money. Cook needs a rocket up his arze.