why do i still daily drive a two
generation old note 9
well thing is when i switched to the
note 10 for a few weeks for my review
my complaints were as follows it lost
features over the previous gen
like the headphone jack and iris scanner
pinhole cameras are obnoxious
the side bezels were too small and
because of that last one
there wasn't enough space at the top of
it making the note 10 work
better as a vibrator than it did as a
speaker when you turned up the music so
i jumped ship immediately back to my
note 9 after handing the 10 off to our
camera guys for b-roll
fortunately though the time has come
again i have samsung's
next iteration of their flagship of
flagships the note
20 ultra let's see if it's gonna end up
in my pocket or back in the box
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before we get into my experience we need
to talk about positioning because this
phone
is in a bit of a confusing spot
and it's funny because samsung's lineup
hasn't always been this messy
even just a few short years ago it was a
lot simpler
if we ignore the mid-range mess the s
series was the daily driver with top
tier specs in a
reasonably sized chassis at a high but
not exorbitant price
then for those who wanted the biggest
and best of what samsung had to offer
there was the note sure it cost a pretty
penny
but as you'd expect it was a mostly zero
compromises
experience until the note 10 started
shedding features compared to the
previous gen
and launched alongside a confusing
smaller note 10 with a
lower pixel density display and no
expandable storage
so no longer was the plus model simply a
larger version of the same phone there
was this weird feature disparity
sure enough when the s20 launched it got
even more confusing
there was the s20 the s20 plus
oh that's the ultra whatever the point
is they're three different phones
so the ultra ended up with a completely
different camera array
different ram and storage options and a
mammoth price tag at the very least
at least the s20 ultra looked like the
other devices in its family
which is more than i can say today this
is the note 20 ultra and this
is the note 20 really very not
ultra not only does this look like a
completely different device
but it's actually plastic instead of
glass
has a 60 hertz screen compared to 120
hertz on the ultra
not to mention that all the s20s also
have 120hz displays
it's got less memory than all the s20s
and the ultra no expandable storage no
ultra wideband connectivity
more on that later and it's got a
thousand dollar price tag so
here's my quick review of the note 29
ultra buy an s20 or s20 plus
unless you need a pen in which case you
should just save yourself a bunch of
that hard-earned bunny and buy a used
note 10 or note 10 plus
or pony up for the note 20 ultra
honestly
it kind of feels like the note 20's only
reason to exist
is to make samsung's other phones look
better by comparison
like this one because on paper the note
20 ultra is looking
pretty fine improving on the note 10
lineup in practically every way
while managing to actually cost less
than the s20
ultra now as before i am not a huge fan
of the hole punch display
see look at it but to samsung's credit
the hole
is way smaller to the point where it's
in line with the notification shade
icons and
all right i'll allow it don't get me
wrong i still can't wait for these to be
replaced with
under screen cameras but if the punch is
this
small it's probably worth the slight
aesthetic hit over the durability
concerns
of a motorized camera at least for
clumsy people
now the actual screen itself though is
visually stunning
the bezels are still tiny but samsung
seems to have tweaked their edge
rejection enough that
accidentally opening the notification
shade during a movie or
accidentally bumping letters when you're
reaching across the keyboard is
practically a non-issue
i also noticed what appears to be a
proper earpiece speaker grill up top
unlike the note 10 meaning that it
doesn't vibrate when you turn up your
movie like a cheap toy
but man back to the screen if you guys
thought samsung's industry-leading
displays
couldn't get any better you obviously
haven't been paying attention because
they just keep doing it
not only is the note 20 ultra around 20
brighter than last gen but samsung
continues to set the standard for color
accuracy
and outdoor readability believe me if
there's one thing this phone is amazing
at
it is content consumption it will
probably be
the best looking display in your
household and
it'll probably look closer to brand new
for longer than you'd expect
corning's brand new gorilla glass victus
is on both the front
and the back of this device with corning
claiming that for the first time
they've made significant improvements to
both drop
and scratch resistance within a single
generation this new version can
apparently withstand a drop of six and a
half feet compared to five and a quarter
for their previous gen
and they've also improved drop endurance
with victus typically surviving 21 meter
high drops
while gorilla glass 6 could only handle
about 15.
as for in the real world well i did drop
it a few times without a case
and it didn't break so um mission
success
now you might remember that i bashed
samsung when the note 10 launched for
sticking to 60hz when competitors were
shipping with 90
and even 120hz displays this time around
though the note 20 ultra features a full
fat qhd plus 6.9 inch amoled display
with the option for crispy 120
hertz smoothness really does look great
but
like the s20 series it's limited to full
hd resolution
when it's running in 120 hertz mode
something that samsung
still has not offered an explanation for
although
like i said last time i don't personally
find much of a difference in daily use
at this size it's more just that it's
like kind of a tease right
to not allow both the full refresh rate
and the full resolution at the same time
especially given that the exynos and
snapdragon processor versions of this
could technically support it and
competitors like oneplus
already do on the subject of processors
inside our note 20 ultra we have the
latest snapdragon 865 plus
it's lightning fast um i don't really
know what else there is to say about
that
phone processors have gotten to the
point where honestly they were fast
enough that
you're not really going to notice slow
downs a couple of years ago
but power management was also excellent
which is definitely a plus and i even
survived an
overnight lakes day without a charger
that's a win in my book now there are
some reported issues with heat
and power draw on the exynos variant but
unfortunately we weren't able to
validate that
so if you live in those regions hey
you'd best do some more
digging underneath the screen what has
become a staple for samsung
is a characteristically samsung
ultrasonic fingerprint sensor
it's not the fastest in the world but it
does work well and consistently so
good job and then alternatively there is
face unlock but
with the current situation in the world
i imagine most people are going to be
sticking with
the uh fingerprint sensor by the way can
i actually just take a moment to say uh
iris scanner master race love you note 9
thanks anyway the rest of the device
will be pretty familiar to note 10
series owners save for the side buttons
which have been swapped to the right
hand side
like the s20 series something that most
people will probably find
easier to reach on a device this size
the iconic node s pen
is virtually identical save for the
vastly lower latency
9 milliseconds down from 45 now i mostly
use my s pen for taking quick notes
or annotating screenshots so for me
that wasn't exactly a game changer but
it definitely felt
more fluid while i was sending late
night memos to my staff like
hey why this you know writing on things
could just be a placebo effect though
back to size around back we've got sweet
honey barbecue
the largest camera bump that i have ever
seen
i mean do you remember when people
complained about the bump on like
do you remember when people complain
about the iphone 6 bump like
a camera bump this is disgusting or the
one on the pixel 4 or the s20
they got nothing on this how did samsung
think this was at all reasonable like
like if you put the phone down on a
table and touch pretty much
anywhere on the screen it's gonna wobble
around
now fortunately if you rock something
like a dbrand grip
it takes up the space where the camera
bump isn't
but i usually don't run a case so
it's a little awkward for me in fairness
though there's at least a solid
technical reason for the massive bump
under it is the periscope super zoom
camera
this time with lower resolution but
larger pixels and locked to
50x compared to the maximum of 100x on
the s20 ultra
as usual i tried it once said wow
that's pretty cool and then promptly
never touched it again
i mean at least samsung realized that
100x was a joke because of all the
post-processing required
and they limited it to assume that they
can somewhat with a straight face say is
usable
like i don't know maybe if you're into
wildlife photography
but on your smartphone because i really
don't know what else that 50x zoom would
actually be useful for that's not
illegal
you can of course shoot and edit 8k
video again just like the s20 series but
again it's mostly just a marketing
gimmick yes
there is slightly more detail in the 8k
footage
but when i say slightly i mean slightly
the overall image on the 4k still feels
better and if you shoot a lot of video
well quite frankly you're probably gonna
want an iphone anyway
photos off the note 20 ultra
consistently have samsung's usual
cooler white balance but hold plenty of
detail their automatic hdr was not as
good at balancing the highlights in the
sky to the darkness by the wheels in
this shot here compared to the pixel 4
and the amount of detail was definitely
less but
if you're not pixel peeping the note 20
ultra like the rest of samsung's lineup
it's
eons ahead of where they were just a few
short years ago and they even cleaned up
the focus issues from the s20 ultra with
the addition of a laser autofocus so
kudos to samsung for the camera here as
for the rest of the changes this time
around
the note 20 ultra got something brand
new which is ultra wideband
uwb is a short-range wireless
communication protocol a lot like
bluetooth or
wi-fi but what makes it special is that
it operates at very high frequencies
allowing equipped devices
to accurately track the relative
position and motion of each other
now it doesn't really have a use case
yet
aside from speeding up google's airdrop
competitor nearby share
but in the future we could see devices
like
a smart door lock that could sense
exactly where you are in relation to the
door allowing it to proximity unlock
only when you're right outside it
instead of unlocking
you know when you're approaching from
the inside for example
that that'd be cool right and then
samsung's desktop replacement dex
is also now wireless on the note 20
series so you can cast to a compatible
samsung tv
it works fine but it's just not
something that i've ever really had a
use for
so your mileage is gonna vary there
so that's it then the pinhole is smaller
cool
and the edge rejection issues are solved
awesome it doesn't shake like my old
lambo when you turn up the volume
so you should buy one or should you
well the unfortunate truth is that
regular smartphones
like samsung's s series have gone up so
much in price
and feature set that they've actually
taken over a lot of what used to make a
note
a note it's 1300 us dollars for the base
version and that's a pretty penny
i mean i guess if you want a phone that
does pretty well everything
really well with a gorgeous big 120
hertz screen a
chungus of a battery and a massive
camera bump then
hey maybe the note 20 ultra is for you
but
the pixel still takes better photos an
iphone still takes better video
and if you don't want to spend that much
the regular s20 is
really only missing the pen and a fancy
zoom camera that
i think most people probably don't need
to spend
300 on as for me the note 20 ultra is
going back in the box
right next to its older brother you know
what dbrand had enough of your bullsh
what's up with these awesome textured
vinyl skins that are available for
laptops phones tablets consoles
controllers and more
i'm sick of it they're made from such
high quality 3m vinyl that it just
it makes all your competitors look bad
okay
the patented adhesive it leaves no
residue on my devices
what's my excuse for replacing my phone
all the time
if it doesn't have an ugly gross you
know residue on it when i change out my
skin to another color and the
and the precision it's uncompromising
it's like a factory fit for my device
it even keeps it protected when i
accidentally drop it all the time i mean
look at this i don't have my
phone on me so i'm gonna pick up my
prompt remote see we all know that i do
that
and your customer service i mean i've
never used it because i'm an influencer
so i just talk
directly to the the higher-ups but like
i heard it's
pretty good too so you can well it's
pretty rude but but other than that it's
good
so check them out at the link in the
video description d brand
they're bad people but with good
stickers thanks for watching guys if you
enjoyed this video then maybe check out
the
actually go check out our short circuit
channel where i checked out
a xiaomi phone with a 120x zoom
predictably the zoom is bad but the
phone was really cool
so go watch that