Hello everyone
OK
so
today we're going to be taking a look at
the problems the Galaxy S4 has.
Now at one time or another I've been accused of being a Samsung fanboy and
all of that kind of stuff,
and in truth,
I'm really a technologist. It doesn't matter to me who makes the product
as long as the product
is cutting edge.
As long as it's well made, well manufactured,
not been rushed to market.
So you can see where I'm probably going to be going with this overview of the issues that we have
with the Samsung Galaxy S4.
In essence there are so many
little problems
which add up to create the device that unfortunately
fails in its primary objective.
When you compare it to the Galaxy S3 and the Note 2, the devices that came before it,
the Galaxy S4 looks like a hurried product,
a beta product in many respects.
So let's have a look shall we at some of the issues that we've got here?
Now a lot of the problems are things that you can't necessarily demonstrate too easily
so we'll run through them. Now yesterday
Android Police did a nice write-up on one of the key problems that people are having at the moment.
which is the headphone jack.
Now it seems that
for whatever reason we have a headphone jack on here
which causes problems when with certain headphones when the volume is turned up to
11.
Yes it's a little bit of a spinal tap moment.
Effectively, the audio starts to distort to a point where it ruins your audio.
And it's effectively going kit, kit, kit, kit kit,
all the time. I've got the
problem on my headphones,
it does seem to be affecting the more expensive headphones on the market
in some respects but
it's just
a strange, strange thing. Why would Samsung release a device
which doesn't work with a large cross-section of headphones including
it doesn't matter whether the headphones are from eight years ago
or if they're headphones you bought yesterday.
Unfortunately this isn't like the wifi issue some people are having with the S4 where the S4
won't connect to certain wifi networks.
You can't flash an upgrade
on your headphones to fix this issue.
The technical guys at XDA have had a look at the problem, they've got their oscilloscopes
and various other
technical gubbins out and actually monitored the audio coming out of the headphone jack
and what they've discovered
is that effectively
there is a fault.
Now what is still up to a lot of debate is where the fault lies. Is this something
that can be corrected in software,
is this an actual problem with the headphone jack that's physical and so will
require revision of the hardware?
We're still waiting for Samsung to actually respond and tell us where the
issues are
and what they're going to be doing about them but right now if you like listening to music if you're
going to be using your Galaxy S4
headphone jack. Beware,
because it could be that your very nice headphones simply will not work well
you'll have to either have the volume turned down
or you'll have to have the volume turned up past 11.
So the issue tends to be, if you try and use the audio at 11, as a volume
horrible problems.
But again,depending on the headphones you've got the issues can vary.
You've got the wifi issue
where the Galaxy S4 won't connect to certain wifi networks.
As I've discussed in previous videos that can be something you can fix yourself
with a firmware update or, at worst,
replacing your router.
Given the way that wireless routing equipment works
and all manufacturers' phones have this
problem at one time or another when they're released on new standards,
it's something we do come to expect. But even so a warning from Samsung might have been
useful likewise a warning that they've got a headphone jack problem.
Would have been useful.
The next major problem
the device gets too hot,
literally.
It's too hot to actually use after about 20 minutes
so if you're playing games on this and bearing in mine I'm in the UK and it's not like we've got
the best weather ever here, in fact it's been
freezing for the last two weeks.
It's absolutely incredible that Samsung would put out the
Qualcomm 600 Snapdragon processor
clocked it as high as they have
and then found after 20 minutes of gaming on this you have to put the device down because it starts
to burn your hands.
Why Samsung did you
allow that to happen?
It appears
that's really all we can kind of look at, is say,well hang on, if HTC and LG have released the
Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 chip
down clocked, or
clocked down as it were
why did Samsung choose to go for a megahertz race
and clock it faster
and thus cause a heat problem?
It just strikes me that the whole problem with the Samsung Galaxy S4 is a
rush to market.
This thing has been rushed
in order to compete with HTC and the others,
to get these 1080p screens out there.
This device probably needed another two months on the work benches
with a combination of software and hardware fixes
to make sure it was ready for market.
Another substantial problem that we have here
some people myself included
have noticed that the band
that effectively is part of the screen and keeps the screen to the body housing
has a tendency to arrive
with the band not quite snugly fitted. You can see hopefully
just there
that my finger round by the power button can actually luck in,
latch on
to part of that metal. If I do it down here you can see
my finger just kind of rolls straight off it. There's actually indentation
where the
metal band has lifted away slightly
from the fascia.
Now again, a manufacturing defect like that,
and believe me mine's minor in comparison to some of the guys out there who found that
the band has actually peeled back completely and split.
That shouldn't happen and it shouldn't have passed quality control.
Someone at Samsung, the quality control guys, have let their customers down badly here.
We expect there to be the occasional problem
although what I'm seeing on the various forums is this isn't an occasional problem
there's quite a lot of units that have gone out like this.
Again, if you've got this band that's not quite as well
fitted as it could be
is this going to allow moisture in?
Is the band going to now be weaker
than it would have been and so it's going to peel away over time, or split,
am I going to start cutting my finger on it because it's a sharp piece of metal?
All of these are issues that Samsung should have spotted long before this product hit the marketplace.
Right now,
I'm finding it very difficult to give the Galaxy S4 a buy rating.
I'm actually thinking that you need to wait
and if you are in the market right now for a smartphone,
look at the other products on the market, look at the HTCs, look at the LGs etcetera.
The Galaxy S4
is not inspiring confidence and it's not inspiring confidence in the retail chain either.
I spoke to
one manager at one of the largest independent carphone retail companies
in the country
who was actively telling people not to buy the S4 because of all the problems that
were coming out with it.
They were steering people towards the HTC1.
And this is bearing in mind that Samsung have dropped a substantial amount of
marketing money on these companies for instore displays.
HTC just has a phone mixed in with all the other devices
Yet the staff there are saying, yes, the S4 has too many problems
take a look at the HTC1 instead.
I mean if that isn't the worst possible outcome for Samsung, and if that is the verdict
at the end of the day
If the retail staff say your phone is no good
then you've got problems and you need to fix them quickly.
Samsung built up a massive amount of goodwill
with the Galaxy S3 and the Note 2
and it appears the S4 is throwing it all away
in a rush to market.
In a rush to compete when actually they should have taken their time, perfected the product,
got their manufacturing in order, tested every single part of this
component
in as many ways as they could
to make sure that these kind of problems were minimized. You're not going to eliminate them
completely
but the headphone jack issue
the heat issue
that is inexcusable.
Those are things that would have been picked up at QA
but probably were ignored.
Overall it is a good device, the technology here
is well executed
but the way it's been brought together at
manufacture, the way the software has been finished off and polished
leaves a lot to be desired.
There's a great product here
somewhere
but I think
maybe we can put this down to first batch problems
and maybe a hardware revision will solve these issues
maybe a software patch will resolve these issues
But right now if you're in the market. If you want to know whether the Galaxy S4 is worth buying or not,
I would have to say beware.
Take a bit of extra time
consider whether
the heat is a problem
consider whether
the potential headphone jack issue is a problem
consider whether
a manufacturing defect like that and the
hassle you would have to go to to take it back to the shop or if you don't notice
immediately having to send it back to Samsung for a supposedly repair.
You know, a repair on something that came out like that. Sorry, new unit please.
Consider whether that
outweighs your desire to buy the Galaxy S4
because right now
I'm quite looking forward to getting hold of a HTC1 and we'll see how the competition stacks up.
And I don't recall I've ever said that about HTC before.