Hi everyone, Scott Lewis here for Wirefly.
Today, Iím here to bring you a cellphone smackdown between Motorolaís Droid RAZR Maxx
HD and Samsungís Galaxy S III.
Before we get started on our smackdown I wanted to point out, thereís a couple different
versions of both of these phones.
The Droid RAZR HD comes in the Droid RAZR HD and the HD Maxx and the Galaxy S III comes
for all the major carriers and thereís even an internation version of the Galaxy S III.
The biggest difference between the internation and the US version is the processor, it is
a quad-core processor on the international version where this model here for T-Mobile
is the US version obviously and it has a dual-core processor.
The main differences between the RAZR HD and the HD Maxx would be battery life.
The three thousand three hundred million amp hour batteries here in the RAZR Maxx HD, where
the regular RAZR HD has a two thousand five hundred and thirty million amp hour battery.
Besides the battery difference thereís a slight difference in the thickness of the
phone, because of the battery and thereís a difference in the amount of storage that
you get.
The RAZR Maxx HD comes with 32 gigabytes of onboard storage, where the regular RAZR HD
comes with 16 gigabytes of onboard storage.
With the Maxx you get a little longer battery life and more onboard storage.
With the differences out of the way, letís go ahead and get our smackdown started.
Now itís going to be three rounds today.
Round oneís going to be about design; round twoís going to be about the cameras on the
phones and round threeís going to be about specs and benchmarks.
Letís go ahead and dig into round one the design round.
Now youíll notice that the displays on the phones are very similar in size and clarity
and thatís because theyíre almost identical.
The RAZR Maxx HD had a 4.7 inch diagonal Super AMOLED display with screen resolution of 720
x 1280, which gives it an overall pixel density of 312 pixels per inch.
The Galaxy S III has a 4.7, so itís .1 inches bigger than the RAZR Maxx HD and itís also
a Super AMOLED display with screen resolution of 720 x 1280.
Because it has the same screen resolution, but itís slightly larger, itís going to
have a slightly smaller pixel density, its 306 pixels per inch.
The difference in the screen resolution now in the clarity isnít noticeable.
Both of these screens are very vibrant and very crisp Super AMOLED displays and you come
to expect that from a Super AMOLED display.
One of my favorite design aspects of the RAZR Maxx HD is the fact that it has an internal
nano coating over all the internal pieces and components inside that makes it splash
resistant and I think thatís something that should be in all smartphones today given the
price that people are expected to pay and how long theyíre expected to last.
Now you can get some different cases for the Galaxy S III to make it splash proof or waterproof,
but the RAZR HD Maxx is coming right out of the box with a splash proof design.
I also like the design on the RAZR HD Maxx, because of the metal bezel and also the Kevlar
back.
The Kevlar back doesnít scratch, itís very nice and it feels very good in your hand.
Now it also has NFC technology built in or Near Field Communication technology, which
allows you to use it to make purchases at retailers by entering your pin into your phone
and tapping it at the register.
Now the Galaxy S III also has NFC technology, but as far as the physical design, it has
a plastic outside case and had kind of a plastic or metal looking brush on the plastic, so
it looks kind of metal, but it is still a plastic.
It is not quite as durable as the Kevlar back on the RAZR Maxx HD.
One thing I will say about the Galaxy S III is that, the plastic outside doesnít have
a cheap feel, itís a very solid feel.
Just because it has the plastic outside cover doesnít mean that the Galaxy S III doesnít
feel like a very high quality phone.
Next up I want to talk about thickness.
The overall thickness of the Droid RAZR Maxx HD is 9.3 millimeters where the Galaxy S III
is only 8.6 millimeters.
The overall weight of the RAZR Maxx HD is 5.5 ounces, while the Galaxy S III is only
4.7 ounces, so thereís not a huge difference of total weight.
Now both phones have a very solid feel, because of that weight.
Theyíre not necessarily too heavy or too thin, they have a very good feel and feel
very solid and sturdy in your hand.
We talked a little bit about battery earlier when we were talking about the differences,
but the RAZR HD Maxx is a three thousand three hundred million amp hour battery, while the
Galaxy S III has a two thousand and one hundred million amp hour battery.
While the extra battery life on the RAZR Maxx HD is a good benefit, Iím not sure how big
of a benefit it is.
If Iím still going to have to plug it in at the end of the night, because it wonít
make it through an additional day, Iím not sure that Iím really that far ahead.
While it is a benefit, Iím not sure how big of a benefit it really is.
After looking at everything in the design round, round one, our winner is going to be
the Droid RAZR Maxx HD.
With the displays being very similar in thickness, total weight and battery life not being a
huge difference between the phones, I think the overall feel of the Kevlar back and the
metal bezel and the splash proof nano coating, outweighs the benefits to the Galaxy S III
and having that slightly smaller profile.
Letís go ahead and move on to round two.
Round twoís going to be about the camera in the Maxx HD and the Galaxy S III.
Both phones have very similar cameras.
They both have eight megapixel rear facing cameras.
Now the Galaxy S III is a 1.9 megapixel front facing camera, while the RAZR Maxx HD had
a 1.3 megapixel front facing camera.
Slight advantage to the Galaxy S III, but unless youíre really into video chatting
or Skyping, thatís not a huge difference.
Letís go ahead and take a look at some sample photos and weíll tell the winner for this
round though those.
Letís go ahead and take a look at our sample photo.
This first photo is just outside of our Wirefly campus here and we used the regular standard
single shot mode and as we can see them compared side-by-side, personally I like the Galaxy
S IIIís picture a little bit better.
I think itís brighter and I think the colors are more accurate.
In picture twoís going to be a sample photo taken from the same location, but in HDR mode.
Now HDR mode stands for, High Dynamic Range and it should take a crisper and clearer picture
in low light settings.
Out of the pictures that we took in the HDR mode, I like the Droid RAZR Maxx photo a little
bit better.
I think the colors came out brighter.
I think the colors are more accurate and I think it shows better definition in some of
the objects in the photo.
Those were our sample photos from the Galaxy S III and the Droid RAZR Maxx HD.
I think with the camera specs being so similar and the fact that I like picture one from
the Galaxy S III and picture two from the Droid RAZR Maxx HD, Iím going to go ahead
and call round two the camera on a draw.
Letís go ahead and setup round three real quick with a recap.
Round one went to the Droid RAZR Maxx HD for design.
The camera round was a draw, so the Galaxy S III really needs to step it up in round
three, which is going to be about specs and benchmarks.
Letís go ahead and start with specs.
Theyíre both running a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor thatís a Snapdragon S4 processor.
The RAZR Maxx HD has one gigabyte of processor RAM, while the Galaxy S III has two gigabytes
of processor RAM.
The both have versions that are available in 32 gigabytes of onboard storage or 16 gigabytes
of onboard storage.
They both have a spot to expand memory with micro SD card.
Through the specs, the Galaxy S III has a slight advantage with two gigabytes of onboard
storage versus the one gigabyte of onboard storage that the RAZR Maxx HD has.
Letís go ahead and run our benchmarks to see if the two gigabytes of RAM actually gives
the Galaxy S III an advantage.
Weíre actually going to run a Quadrant Standard benchmark and AnTuTu benchmark, so weíre
going to go ahead and find those real quick.
Letís run our Quadrant Standard benchmark first and weíre going to run a full benchmark.
Iím going to go ahead and turn the camera off now, so I donít waste your time and weíll
pick it up at the end of the Quadrant Standard benchmark.
It looks like our Galaxy S III is wrapping up with the Quadrant Standard benchmark and
it is Ö letís go ahead and pull up the score.
Now the Galaxy S III did start just a second ahead of the Droid RAZR Maxx HD, so itís
okay that it finished first.
The Galaxy S III had a score of 6164, while the Droid RAZR Maxx HD had a score of 5456.
Just a quick reminder that, the Quadrant Standard benchmark and AnTuTu benchmark are going to
test the same things.
Thereís four categories and itís testing the CPU, the GPU or graphics processor in
the phone, the memory in the phone and also the read write speed to the onboard storage
of the phone.
It does make sense that the Galaxy S III has a slight advantage, because of the two gigabytes
of onboard storage versus one gigabyte on the Droid RAZR Maxx HD.
Letís go ahead and run through the AnTuTu benchmark real quick.
Now Iím going to go ahead and turn the camera off and Iíll pick it up at the end of the
AnTuTu benchmark.
Both phones just finished up the AnTuTu benchmark.
The Droid RAZR Maxx HD has an overall score of 10,561, while the Galaxy S III has a slightly
higher score at 11,087.
Similar to the camera round with both of the specs being very similar, we had to default
to the test in the Quadrant Standard benchmark and the AnTuTu benchmark went to the Galaxy
S III.
Our overall winner for round three is the Samsung Galaxy S III.
Overall that makes our smackdown today a draw.
The Droid RAZR Maxx won the design round.
Round two the camera round was a draw and round three went to the Galax S III.
If youíre trying to decide between these two great phones, Iíd say it comes down to
personal preference and you really need to ask yourself two questions.
Do you like the design better of the RAZR HD Maxx or do you like the design of the Samsung
Galaxy S III?
The next question comes down to software.
Theyíre both running the Android 4.1.1, but the user interface thatís overlayed on top
of that is quite different.
The RAZR Maxx HD has a very stock and basic user interface thatís very similar to the
true Google experience you get on like a Galaxy Nexus.
The Samsung Galaxy S III has TouchWiz user interface, which is highly customizable and
Samsungís doing a lot of nice things to make that particular user interface very valuable.
If youíre trying to decide between the RAZR Maxx HD or the Galaxy S III, make sure to
ask yourself those two questions, design and software.
Both of the phones are available on Wirefly.com and make sure to check out our great price
and that wraps up our smackdown for today.
My nameís Scott Lewis for Wirefly.
Thanks for watching.