This video is sponsored by 1 Password It’s been three months using the S23 Ultra,
and exactly two months since I sold my iPhone 14 Pro Max… and COMPLETELY switched to this
beauty here.
Spoiler alert. I have zero regrets.
There’s a lot of questions I’m gonna cover in this video. One of them is:
Do I miss the iPhone 14 Pro Max? But let’s be honest… with so many Apple
devices still in my life, how is my ecosystem holding up?
But I appreciate that it’s not all about Apple. How is the S23 Ultra itself holding
up after 3 months?
What features have I discovered that really impressed me?
And also, what are the things that are not quite perfect with this phone?
You know, actually one of the funniest comments I get these days is. I give this guy 2 months
before he switches to his iPhone or…
Wait until the iPhone 15 and he will switch back.
I find that funny.
In fact, give me the microphone. Where is the microphone? Where?
This one?
I am not leaving
Joking aside…. Let’s focus on the S23 Ultra for a bit.
When I said in my previous reviews that the S23 Ultra has been a DEFINING moment for smartphones,
I wasn’t exaggerating!
At the time you could say that I was still in some sort of honeymoon period, but you
know, 3 months later, I still think this is such an incredible phone. And yeah I do believe
this raised the bar in the industry.
You know, there is the before the S23 Ultra and After for me.
Can you fix this?
And to put it into perspective, right? This is coming from someone who’s used iPhones
since the very first one. That’s right, don’t let the cap fool you!
I still have lots of Apple products, and will probably try iPhones in future - that’s
my job right?
But I have no issues in saying this, Samsung absolutely nailed it with this device.
It’s not perfect and I will share some of the issues I have with it in a bit… but
it’s just the best out there in my opinion, when it comes to smartphones…
It does suck though if you’re an Apple user, because the centrepiece of you ecosystem but
that is the reality. I totally understand that.
There’s totally a team of people here by the way!
As an iPhone user, you might be tempted by this phone, but I know how you feel! And I
can speak from experience, it’s painful to introduce an Android device into an Apple
ecosystem.
And hey, no matter how happy I am with this phone and how easy it seems to switch…I
do appreciate that SWITCHING is a pain in the backside.
It’s not straightforward!
You know, I can’t lie about that. It’s a shame it’s like that, one day I hope we
have a universal ecosystem where things just work, regardless of the device or brand that
you choose, but it’s not like that today.
There are workarounds, and I’ve discussed for example… you know, the compromise that
I came up with to keep my Apple Watch Ultra… and still get my notifications and my exercise
and health tracking.
There’s an entire video on this subject but the bottom line is…
There are no shortcuts. For me… I just value the experience on my main device… way more
than I value the experience or the features of Apple ecosystem. I use the S23 Ultra for
everything. And I mean that.
But let me level with you here..
Not gonna lie, I do miss Airdrop. And sometimes the Apple keyboard…
This one sounds silly but I miss the emoji predictions on the iPhone is just better.
Samsung or Google haven’t really mastered this yet. It works fine on Android, but there
are times when I type a word, fully expecting the emoji to come up.
Either it comes up with the wrong emoji or nothing comes up.
And it’s not there. It’s a minor thing, but Apple seem to be better at that.
Something else - and a bit more important than silly emojis - is something that I kinda
took for granted.
Which was Find My. But I have a workaround for that which is similar to the workaround
that I found for my watch.
But I do miss it. It’s not something you notice straight away, but after three months,
you do realise that this is something you took for granted.
Having said that… I don’t miss much else. I thought I would.
And I think it’s because I was really forced to switch this time. Previously when I tried
this, with the S21 Ultra and the S22 Ultra, and the PIxels I hadn’t really sold my iPhone
11 or iPhone 12.
And even though the main SIM card was on an Android device for a long time, it was always
easy to just go back to the iPhone whenever I faced a challenge or something like that.
Actually getting rid of the iPhone has been great as it made me discover so many cool
features on the S23 Ultra!
A word of caution though.. Those first few days or couple of weeks even…
when I was setting things up like banking apps, and password managers… Yeah that was
tough. But when I was over that bump…
I could then just enjoy this device for what it is. And boy… what a beast this is.
Before I talk about the stuff that I really like about this phone. One of things that
made the switch less painful…was the fact I was using a password manager. I’ve used
1Password for about 5 years if not more.
For full transparency, they are sponsoring today’s video which is great because I find
it really easy to recommend them.
Now, wouldn’t it be great if we didn’t have to use passwords at all?
Well, 1Password is bringing passkeys. What that means is that in the near future we are
not gonna need any passwords!
Passkeys uses our biometrics as a way of signing in to online services. So wherever you use
1Password, you’re gonna be able to use biometrics authenticators. That’s awesome!
Imagine not having to type a password ever again right!
Passkeys will be amazing.
1Password is already super convenient but it’s great to hear that they continue to
innovate and make our lives even easier with passkeys.
And the best feature for me is how I can keep my family accounts protected as well, under
the same subscription.
And when it comes to cyber security, I do get quite paranoid with this sort of stuff,
having worked in the IT industry all my life, I’ve seen on a daily basis how the attacks
are constantly happening. It’s non-stop!
Right now, there are thousands of bots out there, just trying to break into systems…
Our password is just one point of entry, but personally I’d like to make that as secure
as possible for anyone to break into anything.
And the best part for me is: They track cyberattacks globally, so that
if they detect that for example Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or whatever was hacked, they will
let you know that you should change your password, before you get hacked as well.
So even though the company you used got attacked and there’s nothing to do with you, you
can still remain protected
I can’t recommend them enough, they are always having some great deals too, so check
out he link in the description afterwards.
And thank you so much 1Password for sponsoring this video.
As I was saying, once you get past the first couple of weeks of transition, and really
start to enjoy this phone, the experience is just the best right now.
I haven’t tried every single Android out there, but I think you’d find it really
hard to find another device out there, as a whole package, that can beat this device
right now.
Take the cameras for example.
It really doesn’t matter what I’ve thrown at this phone, it’s been able to cope.
From standard, point and shoot photos, to using one of my favourite modes ever, which
his EXPERT RAW.
It’s been amazing!
When you go here to EXPERT RAW, what you get is something quite special. I am not a photographer
and still learning how to frame shots, how to deal with lighting, and things like that,
But even for someone like me who is an amateur at taking photos, you are able to produce
the most stunning results using Expert RAW.
You get 50 megapixels to play with, which is great even if you overblown parts of the
photo, you can crop in quite a bit and still retain a lot of the detail.
You know, I get lighting wrong all the time, my framing is all over the place…
You also can edit the phone in Lightroom straight on the phone. And you could say, well you
could this on any phone. But not many phones will allow you to edit like, fine details
of a photo using a stylus like the S-Pen.
Honestly, this really sets you apart, especially if you are quite busy on social media and
things like that.
Using these unique editing features here and applying your own style to photos, will make
you stand out, without ever using a computer.
Massively underrated feature. You have to download the app to make it show up, which
is fine. But I think Samsung should really just include that as part of the main camera
software.
There are some hiccups with it though, it’s doing quite a lot of processing so if you
are trying to take lots of pictures really quickly, you may find it a little slow.
But remember you’re jamming in so much information into this mode photo, so this little wait
between shots for me, is actually quite acceptable.
Now what about call quality?
No one talks about this on YouTube right?
I’m good, I’m good. I’m just look at erm.. Oh they are so good this Riverside.
It’s been so easy!
Have you uploaded already or are you doin that later?
No. I am working on it this afternoon so… I’ve jus finished writing.
Brilliant
What’s the name of the podcast anyway?
I just called you because I am actually recording a video right now! That did it for me, that
conversation was all I needed.
But since you’re here, what’s the name of the podcast?
It slips my mind… Oh, minus something.
Is it Minus fifteen? Minus Sixteen right?
15 or 16 one of the two. I forget now, I don’t really spend much time looking at it to be
honest with you.
Nice one, thanks for that.
Have a good weekend fella!
I know i’t just a short call, but that’s my experience every time. It just works flawlessly.
I’ve actually just got two bards of 4G here. You know, not the best, in the middle of a
field. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant!
I still use my phone — a lot…as PHONE! I call people on it and receive a lot of calls
still.
I also use it a lot of online meetings like Zoom and Microsoft Teams.
Regardless of the app I’m using, the experience has been faultless.
I can’t tell you - as a user - how much I think this is underrated.
And sometimes it drives me mad that I see these videos of people just draining the battery,
in a controlled environment.
I mean there is some point in that but I don’ know… That’s not how people use their
phones, right?
Honestly, I know it’ s just a short sample there, but it’s been solid. And it’s hard
not make a comparison here, but the 14 Pro Max, on the exact same network… was horrible
to use for me.
Every now and then I’d lose connection. People would say to me that they can’t get
hold of me and I was like, I have full signal!
iOS16 updates made no difference to me and in the end.. it was just another reason for
me to switch to this phone.
By the way, before I continue, this YouTube stuff is really really hard.
I am here in my lunch break, trying to record this segment. So if you’re enjoying this
video, a thumbs up will go a long way.
Even if you think it doesn’t, it really helps me get the channel discovered out there.
I am here at least once a week with a new down-to-earth tech video for you.
So yeah, if you like my stuff make sure you subscribe as well.
But, there are a couple of issues on the S23 that I did find in the last three months.
One is the camera speed. It’s not something I notice all the time, but there have been
a few occasions when I went to take a photo and there was that… hesitance you know?
Hard to explain and hard to show you because it doesn’t happen all the time. In
its defense, I never restart my phone so I think sometimes it’s probably just memory
clogging up.
Closing the apps, chrome tabs… and doing a fresh restart is always good from time to
time anyway.
The other one is screenshot speed. If it’s just like a static image, then it’s fine.
But sometimes, you might want a screenshot from a video, and I don’t know, it takes…
I wanna say 2 seconds. It’s long enough to be noticeable.
And if you’r not careful, you may think you took the screenshot, and then hours later
you go back and you go.. hang on.. .that’s not it.
Another issue I found, and this one REALLY annoys me which is accessing the quick menu.
If I forget to touch the screen before swiping down, the video auto-rotates.
I see this a lot on the YouTube app. Sometimes you want to to quickly change the brightness
or turn on Bluetooth or whatever, and the video goes to vertical mode.
That swipe down only works if you tap on the content first then swipe, not once but twice
down.
3 months, and I still haven’t got used to that. It’s just not very intuitive.
Right, what about the pain points of switching?
The main one for me is not so much to do with me. It’s to do with the people around me.
My family, my friends, a lot of whom are on iPhones.
FaceTiming my family now requires my laptop or my iPad. Not the end of the world, really…
And to be fair… for the people I care about the most, they’ve been quite happy to use
other means like Telegram or WhatsApp to do a video call.
The default video calling on Samsung is Google Meet, and to be honest with you I’ve only
used it once with someone at work.
It feels very fast in comparison with Zoom and Microsoft Teams for example. But not as
sleek as FaceTime. I gotta be honest.
The other pain point is to do with the ecosystem. Some of these features I have found a workaround
for, some of them… I just to accept it for now… that they are unique to Apple.
And that’s fine.
I mentioned Airdrop earlier and I know there are many alternative apps that I can use…
And if you are on Windows - this is not gonna be a problem for you.
I do have a Windows machine.. but I am mostly on a Mac, so things get a bit complicated.
But you know the most convenient way I found for me to transfer images between my S23 Ultra
and my MacBook, was using Google Photos.
It’s a little bit annoying because Google packages the images into a zip file before
you download them, but… because I am on a fast internet connection, it’s fairly
straightforward to upload and download, so I am… kind of ok with that.
On the days I am using my windows Machine, I get a nice taste of Airdrop there. Either
via Bluetooth or Link to Windows… That works really well.
But most days I am on the Mac so Airdrop is dearly missed, for sure.
And there’s the two main features of the ecosystem for me which… I had to find a
workaround for. One was my Apple Watch Ultra.
The other is Find My… stuff. I really took it for granted and this feature will be even
more important, if you have lots of AirTags and other Apple devices.
And even worse if you have a family account with Apple, with multiple iPads and whatnot.
So the workaround I found was to get cheaper iPhone. There is a cheaper route that I could
have used… But in my case I went with a 13 Mini, which is far from perfect - but
it’s doing exactly what I needed it to do… which is to keep my watch in sync and my AirTags
and all my devices still sending notifications to my watch.
I did learn some lessons there some of which I shared in my previous video… but the two
most important things I’ve learned here were:
One, I should have gone for an even cheaper iPhone. Maybe one with a bit more battery.
I have fixed my battery issue on the 13 Mini. Initially I had restored it from a backup,
which was really stupid of me. All my 14 Pro Max apps were restored, and obviously
they’re all updating in the background which meant the battery was getting destroyed.
And two… The other lesson I learned here was, I underestimated how much my iPhone was
doing from a general housekeeping perspective. All the banking apps, and my passwords…My
reminders… and my even my notes app!
Honestly, they are all very mundane apps and very basic in what they do, and you know…
they are not fun to use. But those housekeeping type apps are so important. But setting
them up again from scratch, finding alternatives… and finding backup codes and things like that…
Luckily I use a password manager like I mentioned previously, and a lot of those
things were protected, but I can only imagine how difficult it would be if I didn’t have
that.
What about the things that… I don’t miss? There are many features in the Apple ecosystem
that I don’t miss at all! Like the music handoff between devices, that never
worked properly for me anyway. It was very inconsistent.
My Apple AirPods works beautifully with the S23 Ultra, for what I do… and so does the
AirPods Max, so nothing to complain about there.
But yeah, like moving music from the iPhone to my HomePod felt like lottery. It was 50/50
every time.
Wait, That’s way better than lottery. Never mind, you get what I am saying though right?
I am really really happy with the S23 Ultra, I love how this device is now… fully integrated
into my day to day, whether I am working, creating content or relaxing. It’s truly
my EVERYTHING DEVICE.
You may say, Alex… all of the things you mentioned here, I can still do on my iPhone
and that works really well for me.
And to that I say, that’s brilliant. Remember I am only sharing my own experience here and
what works for me. Right now.
And I get you… This switch may work for a lot of people but I do appreciate that sometimes
all we need is a change.
I’ve met a lot of people here… who are on the other side of this switch as well.
You know, they’ve been using Android for a long time and want something different,
so iOS may fell very refreshing for them.
In fact, there’s been some research and the number of people moving FROM Android to
Apple is increasing. I need to dig into that data a little bit more but… People do go
both ways.
I mean they will be bored very quickly , but you know, I think it’s important to keep
an open mind with this stuff and… find a setup that works for you.
Doesn’t matter what I say, or anyone on Youtube says because… your situation will
be different. I just hope sharing my experience here helps you…if you’re going through
the same thing.
Will I ever go back to the iPhone? As a tech reviewer, I will definitely be reviewing the
iPhone 15 for example, but… As a consumer, unless they do something very drastic I find
it unlikely.
And this may surprise you…
The main reason I don’t see myself going back to an iPhone, is not even because of
Samsung or any Android device, actually
I think having a smartphone will become a thing of the past VERY soon.
It will depend heavily on how much technology changes in the next few years.
And Apple whether we like it or not, might be on the front foot on that aspect.
Until then, I am really happy here with my S23 Ultra, I am really looking forward to
the Galaxy Z Fold 5. Not that excited about the Pixel Fold, if I am really honest… although
I might take a look at it…
As you’ve see in this video today, there aren’t that many issues in switching. It’s
definitely a tricky process to go through, but this device made that switch worthwhile.
I cover a lot more of the nitty gritty of switching…in this video over here and if
you’ve seen that one already, I have these other options here for you.
See you soon!