I’m a long time iPhone user and the last time I was intrigued enough to personally
buy a Samsung device was the S7 edge but when the S10 devices were announced, like many
of you I was intrigued.
Now we obviously have a tech channel here on Youtube so we were going to pick one up
but I wanted to give this beautiful device a chance to win over a permanent spot in my
pocket.
Its been a month now and I’ll be honest, yes I did switch back to iPhone XS Max.
I’ll let you know why soon, but first let me tell you everything I love about the S10+
and the things that really annoyed me.
Let me start out with the best thing that no one is talking about, the LTE speeds.
I don’t know if it's just my network, my city, or what but wow what a difference.
I tested it around town and the S10+ routinely gets twice the LTE speed than my XS Max and
at least 1 extra bar in tough areas.
This isn’t just in benchmarks, but I noticed it every day.
Everything loads faster, buffering is minimized, and I can reliably stream 1440P video where
my iPhone would hang up at 1080P.
If you’re an iPhone user struggling with reception, this alone may be a reason to switch.
The S10+ is an amazing device and a big step ahead of the Pixel 3, One Plus 6T and other
Androids.
Comparing the hardware with the iPhone flagships, it’s definitely the more impressive device.
Samsung has made great strides over the S9 and Note 9.
I didn’t think they could make the display any better but they did.
Battery life was good, now it's better.
We didn’t have a notch before, and we still don’t.
The cutout is much less intrusive even from day one, even the pill shaped one.
When you put this thing up to the iPhone it looks like the future, and it puts the Pixel
3 to shame.
I do wish it didn’t have the depth sensor and retained the s10’s circular cutout,
but that's a minor complaint.
On the back, we now have three cameras.
I LOVE that we have a wide angle lens.
The quality isn’t as good as the main shooter, but the perspective it provides is very unique.
The distortion is surprisingly minimal due to software correction and for most people
even those who have actual cameras, this will be wider than other lenses they own.
I own 7 cameras and dozens of lenses but use my phone more often because it's always there
so camera quality matters a lot to me.
This means I always try to own the best smartphone camera available and through the years that's
been the iPhone.
Switching to the Samsung, I wasn’t giving up quality like in the past.
In our own blind comparison, The S10+ beat out the iPhone overall, and watching Zone
of Techs comparison, I chose the iPhone as my preference but the S10+ was very close,
and comparing it to the note 9 you can see how huge of an improvement was made in just
6 months.
There are three things that bugged me, first, Panoramas are now shot using the wide angle.
This gives you a different perspective but can really mess up your images.
Second, for portraits, you have to use the standard lens.
This is great to show more of your science and helps in low light, but Samsung is the
king of giving us options.
Why not let us choose which lens is better for a particular situation, both for Portraits
and Panoramas.
The third is the shutter lag.
Apple was able to fix this since its a12 processor is constantly taking a bunch of images which
does introduce more noise but you never miss a shot.
The S10+ at times can have close to a second of delay so I did miss some shots of my kids
that I wouldn’t have with the iPhone.
As far as the video and mic quality, they have also made great strides but from my pro
videographer perspective, the overall quality is still behind Apple.
Stabilization is great, and the super smooth video is really cool but it's limited to 1080P.
Almost no reviewer mentioned the HDR10+ feature and that's because it's not really usable
for most if you want to edit and upload HDR, mostly only good if you want to rewatch on
the phone itself.
One features I miss is 24FPS recording on the iPhone which helps in low light and is
great if you want to match with other camera footage.
Speakers have always been a weak point for Samsung, but not anymore.
The S10+ doesn’t sound as good as the iPhone, and yes I did enable Dolby Atmos, but it's
close and much louder.
I would choose the S10’s speakers any day since the extra volume comes in really handy
when listening to a podcast or video that's too quiet.
Speaking of watching videos, oh man, the experience is fantastic.
Not only is the HDR both brighter and more contrasty, but the higher rez display with
the ability to stream 1440P instead of 1080P really makes the image pop.
Not only that, but the small cutout is way less noticeable, and I flip the phone so it's
at the bottom right.
With the iPhone, I almost never went full screen because of the notch, but here that's
a non-issue.
That better video viewing experience also drains more of the battery, but since the
S10+ has a larger battery, I still got 30min to an hour more screen on time each day.
Now lets touch on the ultrasonic fingerprint reader.
The tech is super cool, and we couldn’t fool it in our fingerprint hacking video.
Actually using it was a hit or miss.
I tried different pressures, angles, lengths to leave my finger on, it just wasn’t consistent.
I then thought to try and add my print again and it worked much better!
The next day Lew put out a video on this and I was glad it wasn’t just me.
I added a third print and it got even better.
It’s still not perfect, but better than before.
I think Samsung can tweak this over time and I know the tech will improve in the future
but for now it's definitely not as easy as face ID.
Other than face ID, the only other hardware feature I missed is the physical silent switch.
I love being able to change this quickly even if the phone is in my pocket and knowing if
the phone is silent by feeling the switch or looking at it.
Come on Samsung, replace your Bixby button for this.
I also don't love the curved edges.
Yes, it looks great for product shots and makes the phone slimmer so its more comfortable
to use in the hand but I would often accidentally change youtube videos and like random Instagram
photos.
Personally, I prefer the standard flat design of the S10e.
So we talked a lot about hardware, now lets touch on software.
The new OneUI is an improvement from the past but Samsung still has a way to go with speed
and reliability compared to One Plus.
I ended up changing my icons and keyboard when everything one my 6T is great out of
the box, and that's the beauty of Android, but iOS has fewer app crashes, glitches, and
bloatware.
Notifications on the S10 were annoying with games trying to get me to play, apps wanting
to be downloaded, and Amazon wanting me to shop.
All of this can be fixed, but with the iPhone, you don’t have to.
On the plus side, I’m always surprised by the extra features I noticed in apps I used
most often.
I love facebook messengers overlay, and youtubes picture in picture.
So why did I end up changing back?
It's basically the whole Apple ecosystem holding me in.
If it wasn’t, I would switch, but I love my apple watch and having continuity with
my Macs.
I use airdrop almost daily, and Force touch really speeds things up for me.
Along with that, I didn’t realize how much losing iMessage would affect me.
Apple is great at making their products work seamlessly which is nice but it also sucks
because it locks you in.
If I didn't need MacOS every day for work, and didn’t own and love the Apple watch,
I would not have switched back to the iPhone.
The S10+ is, in my opinion, the best phone on the market.
It's not perfect but its the closest you can get to it.
If you’re an iPhone user that's not locked in and thinking of switching, do it, and if
you’re using Android already and want to upgrade, it’s a no brainer.
Thanks for watching, if you want to see more video like this one, including our Galaxy
S10e review click the circle to subscribe and check out our other S10+ vids including
these ones.
This has been Max and I’ll see you in the next video.