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Hands-On With Samsung's New S20 Ultra: Is It Worth $1400?
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Most don’t. And I think there’s that ‘top-of-the-line’ smart phone that manufactures offer, but that’s why they have to have middle grade phones (iPhone 11 for example) that are cheaper, because they realize that not every consumer is going to buy the top-of-the-line smart phone fully specd’ out.
The ones that we are aware of that purchase the top-of-the-line iPhone/Samsung devices, are enthusiasts on sites like this. But there’s a reason why the $700 iPhone 11 is so vastly popular because of the price point.
The cameras are pretty important here. A viable 30x optical zoom is a pretty usable feature. I so often see people zooming in way past the 2x that is available optically on iPhone.
It seems to me that this is precisely the device you get when your primary focus is marketing the specs. Since the 90s and desktop CPU megahertz this has always been the non-Apple strategy.
If something useful had been done with the 108 megapixel wide-angle lens, I would have been very impressed: theoretically, you could generate a fantastic, undistorted pan panorama with this amount of data (not these striped panoramas). But since the computing power for this is not yet available, again, hastily useless stuff is being hawked out to the customers. Fortunately, Apple would never do that.
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This can't be a surprise to you. Apple moves the needle cuz Apple. Apple share's the "stage" with no one but Apple. Android handset makers always share the stage and the stage is always full year round. Multiple Android phones come out in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th quarter every year. There's a deluge of devices competing for attention. Kinda hard to get excited for one Android device when you know another is going to introduced days after the one that just debuted. You only get Apple's primary phone once a year. Stage unto itself.
Huawei introduced that ugly squared camera bump. We heard no peep cuz other Android makers were introducing big ass circles, horizontal rectangles, vertical rectangles, pop-up cameras, flip up cameras, and a whole host of other camera module shapes. Overloaded stage was overloaded. Beyond cursory mentions, no one really paid attention. Honestly who could? Apple on the other hand, intro'd their ugly squared camera bump on a stage shared with no one. To their credit, they made that design acceptable to a large swath of the public. So other Android makers followed suit, and nobody noticed (or cared) because we've all seen that design on it's own stage so we're immune.
That squared camera bump is ugly to me. Regardless of the phone maker, that looks terrible to me. Others might not care. To each.
None of these ridiculously priced phones are worth the money. $1K+ consumer phones and rising prices are just silly considering what smartphones are capable of doing has barely changed in the last decade. A $150 phone can do everything a $1500 can, and we’re getting closer and closer to the point where I don’t even need to add a comment like “but slower” as the normal person wouldn’t even notice the difference between the two because even bad hardware is decent enough. Software really needs to catch up now.
It might be worth it if it had Windows 10 on ARM or ChromeOS for DeX so you're basically getting a Surface Pro X or Chromebook integrated otherwise the specs like 16GB DRAM are just extreme future proofing but not put to full use. At least it won't frequently reload apps like on flagship iPhones with deficient 4GB DRAM for about the same price.
Come on macrumors!! You have a 100 megapixel camera Of course the images are going to be large. “Lack of space” arguments are silly in this day and age.
The same with “we can’t compare” as the samsung is newer. Lawwwwwddddddd Fight what they have vs what iphone had.
2020 prob won’t have 100 megapixel camera due to supply chain issues
but 2021 certainty needs to step it up
I know Tim Cook will rock it out. Also android OS is so janky even tho they have Tasker but still janky Don’t force me to switch
The same with “we can’t compare” as the samsung is newer. Lawwwwwddddddd Fight what they have vs what iphone had.
2020 prob won’t have 100 megapixel camera due to supply chain issues
but 2021 certainty needs to step it up
I know Tim Cook will rock it out. Also android OS is so janky even tho they have Tasker but still janky Don’t force me to switch
The screen refresh rate, lack of bezels and the lack of the horrible notch shows how iPhone is outdated in terms of screen quality and design comparing it to any flagship Android phone out there. The only think that keeps my in Apple is the ecosystem and OS. Tim’s Apple is a follower, not a pioneer. The iPhone design is much dated in comparison to this.
A penny for every time I hear that one.
No phone is worth that, sure. If making/receiving calls is all it does.
A personal computer, with great cameras, sat nav, music and media player that fits in your pocket.
$1400 is the price of a computer with less.
The definition of the word phone needs re-defining since people won't stop calling them phones and continuing to do so won't drop their price either.
MacBooks, iMacs, iPhones - all have this huge tick and outdated bezels and phones have notches while the competitions laptops, all in one PCs and flagship smartphones have significantly thinner bezels and much more modern design, not to mention nobody uses notches as you can’t watch YouTube or videos in general without being frustrated.
Samsung, Xiomi, Huawei, OnePlus, Sony, LG and much more other flagships are significantly more modern in terms of their look and video experience.
Laptops from Dell, we are talking Dell here...have much thinner bezels on their displays. Lenovo, HP, Microsoft, and other as well.
All in Ones from HP, Lenovo and practically every all in one computer out there other than Apple have significantly thinner bezels.
What’s this thick outdated bezels obsession by Tim? What’s this outdated design obsession by him?
Apple needs a new leader, one that look again making products that are leading and not following. Tim Cook needs to be replaced with someone that’s looking at consumers first like what Steve was!
It’s a shame for Apple to sell phones, laptops and all-in-ones with such outdated design and such outdated thick bezels and other crap!
Samsung, Xiomi, Huawei, OnePlus, Sony, LG and much more other flagships are significantly more modern in terms of their look and video experience.
Laptops from Dell, we are talking Dell here...have much thinner bezels on their displays. Lenovo, HP, Microsoft, and other as well.
All in Ones from HP, Lenovo and practically every all in one computer out there other than Apple have significantly thinner bezels.
What’s this thick outdated bezels obsession by Tim? What’s this outdated design obsession by him?
Apple needs a new leader, one that look again making products that are leading and not following. Tim Cook needs to be replaced with someone that’s looking at consumers first like what Steve was!
It’s a shame for Apple to sell phones, laptops and all-in-ones with such outdated design and such outdated thick bezels and other crap!
If you re-read what Citysnaps was saying, it’s nothing to do with neither of what you mentioned, Apple doesn’t Need to care about Samsung’s focus with smart phones in general, The focus isn’t always about the hardware, it’s the continual improvement of software.
They do care but they don’t react straight away. They take their time and think about whether the feature would be beneficial or even profitable. So I don’t think it’s fair to say they don’t care at all. They don’t exist in a vacuum. They do watch what the industry is doing and they do respond but they take their time.
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I think when you consider everything that a smartphone can do then yes it is worth £1,400/$1,400 (which is the same to Apple).
However I think the issue is when you’re upgrading from a phone that can already do all of these things very well. Is it worth paying £1,400 to get a phone that does the same as your existing phone just slightly better?
If you’ve never owned a smartphone or don’t have one (lost, stolen, given away) then £1,400 probably isn’t too much to ask for. The only problem is that there are phones out there that are considerably cheaper that do 95% of the same things about 80% as well. However that’s why it’s great that there are a broad range of smartphones at various price points.
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Looks like Samsung are copying Apple by sacrificing QA to ship on their annual schedule. Basically doing what every software house does these days, ship it and patch it later.
I think that they should just delay the phones or move to a lengthier release schedule. I’m sure that the networks and consumers pockets would be thankful for it.
I think that they should just delay the phones or move to a lengthier release schedule. I’m sure that the networks and consumers pockets would be thankful for it.
I tried Android for a year after 8 years with iOS, but went back to iPhone as its hard to change OS. However this phone looks very good, I like it.
The notch? Until Samsung can offer the same FaceID tech, that's not even a comparison. The notch has a purpose on the iPhone. The punch hole is just a notch for the sake of copying a notched design. I mean even the Chinese copied it right away, meaning it's trivial to do.
The screen refresh rate? The one that Samsung keep at 60Hz 1080p by default out of the box? It's merely to get great specs on paper, without thinking real life implications.
iPhone design is still the trend setter, to the point that Samsung now copied the huge double camera bump on the back of the camera.
There are great things on the Samsung S20. I love the Single take feature. But criticizing iPhone over old arguments (bezel, notch), is pathetic. Instead, I'd rather point out things that Samsung did great. The "Single take" feels like what Apple should've done with their advance Ax chip (imo instead of deep fusion, which nobody knows whether it's on or not).
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LOL. Steve? Are you serious? Steve Jobs had a great eye for design, that's for sure, but looking at consumers? Like blaming people for holding the iPhone 4 wrong? Sure, looking at consumers first...
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The pin hole is for the front facing camera. The only other viable alternative at the moment is a pop up camera. Under display cameras are not ready yet. Samsung didn’t want a notch at all. They spent 2 years with small bezels on the top and the bottom (whilst Apple were doing the notch). The pin hole is a compromise for them. They would rather the front of the phone be 100% screen.
I agree that Apple deserve a pass for the notch due to Face ID however Samsung have chosen not to implement Face ID in favour of an in display FPS. So I think it’s a choice of In display FPS or secure facial recognition. Well in Huawei’s case you don’t even have to choose you get both. Also google have a similar facial recognition set up to Apple but they chose bezels at the top and the bottom of the display instead of a notch.
The camera bump on the back was first done by Huawei. Samsung didn’t copy Apple.
If I was not mistaken, Huawei's design have the camera symmetrical on the back of the phone, not on the corner. Samsung could've done a symmetrical design like the S10 did. But no, let's put a huge rectangle on the corner. If not for copying Apple, why else would they do that for?
In fairness, android has actually improved significantly over the last four years in terms of stability/fluidity with their OS, but in the end, is the consumer really converting over to a different platform Just for the sake of change? No, they’re not. What they are choosing, is their continued loyalty in terms of who provides the most Stringent form of [security, ecosystem integration with their other devices, and overall stability] in terms of continual updates, which is where Apple really shines in all three of those segments, which from my experience, android falls short in at least one of those categories.
Remember Huawei have two flagships, the pro line and the mate line. The pro line has the symmetrical camera design. The mate line has the square camera lay out.
The mate 20 came out in 2018 and had the square design which was later seen on the iPhone and Samsung phones.