Samsung Galaxy S6 (Trusted Review)

If you want to see the price of this Samsung Galaxy S6 click here


See other product :

 * Samsung Galaxy S6                                     * Amazon Fire Phone 
 * Sony Xperia Z3 Compact D5803             * Motorola Moto G (2nd Generation) 
 * Samsung Galaxy A5                                     * Samsung Galaxy Young 2 
 * Samsung Galaxy S3 mini                             * Samsung Galaxy J1
 * LG Realm                                           * Nokia Lumia 635
 * Nokia Lumia 520                                          * BLU Advance 4.0 A270A
 * HTC Desire 510 (A11) white                       * HTC one M9  


See other Review :

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Trusted Reviews says :

Samsung Galaxy S6 review by Jon Devo

 

Pros

• Excellent camera
• Quality look and feel
• Wireless and fast charging
• Superb screen
• Powerful performance

Cons

• So-so battery life
• Some App crashing issues

Key Features: 

5.1-inch 1440 x 2560 resolution screen; Octa-core Exynos 7420 chipset; Wireless Charging; 3GB RAM; 2,550mAh non-removable battery; Android 5.0 L with TouchWiz; Samsung Pay; IR Blaster

What is the Samsung Galaxy S6?

Does the Samsung Galaxy S6 need an introduction? This is Samsung’s latest flagship smartphone. 

It’s a statement of intent from the world’s biggest smartphone brand. It’s Samsung’s most powerful phone ever, too. But, vitally, it actually looks and feels like a premium phone now. Samsung has gone upmarket.

It lacks the wow factor earned by the curved edges of its near-identical sibling, the Galaxy S6 Edge, but the S6 has strong legs to stand on all the same. 

A sumptuous 5.1-inch QHD screen, a ridiculously powerful processor and a highly capable 16-megapixel main camera all shine. The glass and metal trimmed design, meanwhile, is a huge step up from last year’s Galaxy S5.

Some diehard Samsung fans may dislike the S6, though. Upmarket design comes with upmarket compromises – you can’t change the battery or expand the phone’s storage with a microSD card.

Both have been sacrificed for design and wireless charging functionality, as has water resistance – one thing I’m particularly miffed about.

But its easier to forgive those compromises given the Galaxy S6 isn’t just one of the most attractive phones available, but one of the most capable we’ve ever seen. The best from Samsung, just got better.

Design

Metal edge; Gorilla Glass 4 rear; 142 x 70 x 7mm; 132g; Home button; Soft keys

Just to be clear, the S6 is a great looking phone. We love the Galaxy S6 Edge, too, but you only need to spend more for it if you really want to. 

Smooth Gorilla Glass 4 front and rear, and aluminium alloy bands on the sides, means looks and feels like flagship phone. Unlike last year’s S5, the S6 feels like it’s worth over £500 / $684.99 USD. That’s important.

We’re less keen on some of the colour options, though. The "jewel tones" – as Samsung calls them – include White Pearl, Gold Platinum, Black Sapphire, Blue Topaz and Green Emerald.

Some have a slight dual tonality to them, so they appear to change depending on how the light shines on them. The effect is more subtle than the tragic pink/gold combo on the HTC M9, but it can look a little tacky, particularly in Blue Topaz and Gold Platinum.

The phone is light but still feels solid for its size, and it’s slimmer than the Galaxy S5. In fact, despite its large 5.1-inch screen, it doesn’t feel that much chunkier or clumsier than the dinky, 4-inch iPhone 5S. 

Thin metal volume and power keys live on opposite sides, which helps avoid accidentally pressing power key as we experienced with the HTC One M9.

One move that doesn’t work so well is the speaker placement. It now sits awkwardly at the base of the phone, rather than the back as it did on the Galaxy S5. Neither placement is particularly helpful, as they’re easy to block when held normally.

The S6 and S5 look very similar from the front

Some people may be bothered by the protrusion of the phone’s main camera, but it’s only 2mm and is barely noticeable. The SIM-tray sits flush with the side and if you can keep hold of the annoyingly illusive SIM-ejector tool or use a paperclip, the tray pops out firmly without too much difficulty.

There are a couple more genuine drawbacks to the spanking new Galaxy S6’s design, though. Glass may be easy to grip but it’s so super smooth that the S6 dives off many surfaces like Michael Phelps at the first hint of a starting whistle – I’ve caught my S6 on the edge of possible destruction multiple times.

Using a case or resting the phone on a textured surface reduces the frequency of these suicide dives, but a less slippy finish might have been better – I liked the dimpled rear of the S5, so it’s a shame Samsung’s ditched that.

Neither is the S6 waterproof like the Galaxy S5, which is unfortunate. Mind you, we’ll be surprised if Samsung doesn’t release an IP-rated Galaxy S6 ‘Active‘ variant in the coming weeks or months.

Screen

5.1-inch; 1440 x 2560 pixels (QHD or 2K); 577ppi; Super AMOLED; Gorilla Glass 4

The 5.1-inch screen on the Samsung Galaxy S6 is truly brilliant and definitely one of the best screens we’ve seen on a mobile phone. Only the LG G3 can match it for sharpness, but the Super AMOLED panel on the S6 is cut above in other respects.

Compared to the HTC One M9, the Galaxy S6’s screen is much brighter and more vibrant, though the M9’s lower, Full HD (1080p) screen looks almost as sharp. The S5’s screen is just as vibrant as the S6, but the S6 produces cleaner, more natural whites. Whites look slightly blue on the S5, while the S6 looks closer to the iPhone 6, which is the best in this department.

 

The S6 vs the S5 pixel density

But there’s no doubting which has the best contrast. AMOLED screens don’t have a traditional backlight, which means blacks appear perfectly black. This means videos and photos look fantastic, while the punchier colours outshine the iPhone 6 as well. It looks great indoors and holds up decently even in direct sunlight.

Samsung’s TouchWiz UI allows you to adjust the display colours to fit the user’s preferences, and we found that the AMOLED Photo setting produced the most colour faithful results without heavily sacrificing vibrancy. Apple’s iPhone 6 is the benchmark for colour accuracy but the Galaxy S6 is closer to the iPhone than any other phone we've seen.

The screen looks good from every viewing angle, too, making it perfect for sharing videos and photos on. There really isn’t any department where this screen doesn’t excel. It’s brilliant.

Software and Performance

Octa-core Exynos 7420 big.LITTLE Processor; Mali T760 GPU; 3GB RAM

The Galaxy S6 runs Android 5.0 Lollipop integrated with a newly streamlined version of TouchWiz and it’s incredibly snappy to use. One of the best features is the multi-window functionality – I used it frequently.

Multi-window lets you open and use two apps simultaneously by holding down the option button or dragging from the top left corner of the screen. It’s great for writing an email while checking details online, or sharing posts from social media while talking about them with a friend on WhatsApp, for example.

Overall, the streamlined look and feel of the TouchWiz is a winner. We did experience a couple of instances where downloaded and native applications would randomly stop working, but we imagine this will be smoothed out fairly easily with updates.

TouchWiz gets a huge helping hand by the fact this is the most powerful smartphone on the market right now. Only the HTC One M9, with its Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor, gets close to matching its performance.

The S6 has some great themes, we especially liked the Space theme on the right

The credit goes to the 64-bit Samsung Exynos 7420 octa-core processor and 3GB RAM – it’s the first time Samsung has used this chip in a phone. It seems that switching away from Qualcomm’s top-end Snapdragon processor in its flagship phone has paid off handsomely.

The Exynos 7420 processor has an advantage over the powerful Snapdragon 810 processor used by the HTC One M9 because the chip is smaller and more energy efficient. You can read the software and performance sections of our Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge review for a more detailed breakdown of how it compares to the competition, but needless to say the S6 impresses.

One of the best demonstrations of the Galaxy S6’s power is how smoothly it handles graphically intensive games like Real Racing 3 or Asphalt 8. There are no dropped frames whatsoever and the games are rendered better than we’ve seen on any other phone.

 

Speaker

The speaker is at the base of the phone, next to the microphone. On the Galaxy S5, the speaker was on the lower back of the phone, which meant it nestled in the palm of your hand when using the phone upright – not helpful.

It seems Samsung has tried to address that by moving it again, but placing it on the base isn’t the most sensible alternative as it puts the speaker in the palm of your hand (again) if you view videos or play games in landscape.

To get around this you either have to use headphones, hold the phone carefully or have some method for propping it up so you don’t have to hold it. It’s a frustrating niggle.

When unblocked, the audio quality is much improved over previous Samsung phones. The speaker placement works well for taking calls, and renders voices clearly. It has a better range, too, though it’s still ‘top heavy’ with high pitched sounds dominating.

On a more positive note, the Galaxy S6 does a half decent job with bass. You won’t get much joy trying to use the Galaxy S6 to entertain a small group of friends in an open space, but it’s definitely good enough for watching videos or playing games in private.

Clearly the Galaxy S6 can’t touch the HTC One M9‘s BoomSound Dolby audio stereo speakers, but it’s definitely an improvement over the Galaxy S5 – I just wish the speaker faced forwards.

Call Quality and WiFi Calling

We didn’t experience any dropped calls during our time with the Galaxy S6 – a problem we did occasionally suffer with the S6 Edge.

Signal strength was as high and consistent in various locations as the HTC One M9 and iPhone 6. 

Moreover, the iPhone 6 and the S6 are the first phones optimised for Wireless Calling from EE. 

This means phone calls and texts can be made even when there is no network signal, as long as you’re connected to a good WiFi network.

It’ll be great for anyone who has black spots in their home or who live in areas where network signal is notoriously poor. It also means you can make calls or send texts on a WiFi enabled London underground platform, which is great for emergencies and productivity.

Using EE’s Wi-Fi Calling is seamless and requires no additional app or login. The phone operates as normal when connected to Wi-Fi, using the same phone dialler, same contacts and messaging app.

Call quality is good provided you have a solid connection, although even on its loudest setting it didn’t feel quite loud enough when using the phone on a busy street. 

The noise cancelling mic does a good job of keeping out ambient noise, though, and the person on the other end of the phone will hear you clearly.

Camera

One of the main selling points of the Samsung Galaxy S6 is its main camera. It uses the 16-megapixel Sony Exmor RS IMX240 sensor, which is the same sensor used in the Galaxy Note 4. 

But Samsung has made some improvements to the camera’s algorithms and lens. The benefits of the tweaks are most notable in low light and in the amount of raw detail the camera can capture.

Launching the camera takes less than a second and its autofocusing speed is impressive in good light, comparable to the iPhone 6, but not as fast as the LG G3. 

The Galaxy S6’s camera is so easy to use and so consistently good that it encourages you to take pictures of absolutely everything – I’ve taken more pictures in seven days with the Galaxy S6 than I have with the last three phones I’ve reviewed over the past six weeks combined.

The S6 really shines when you look at the detail it can capture

The camera has an f/1.9 lens, which is great for low light and shallow depth of field and it does do a good job of capturing a wide variety of subjects in all lighting conditions. 

On high contrast sunny days, blue skies are brilliant without being over saturated, with detail still clearly visible in the shadow areas.

Optical image stabilisation (OIS) helps the camera do a superb job of capturing nightscapes and parties, even without the flash. 

But if you do use the flash indoors when it’s dark, the results are impressive – people’s faces are evenly lit and well exposed.

In the 100% crop above you can see how little noise the S6 camera

produces in low light

OIS also makes it easier to take pot shots while walking – I did this whenever I was out and about during the day and didn’t want to stop in my tracks to capture an interesting sight. 

As long as the phone managed to focus fast enough, I'd get good results. I did get the odd out of focus shot if I pressed the shutter too fast though. 

Taking pot shots with most other phones would result in regularly crap or blurred images - I had a better success rate with this one.

The Galaxy S6 shows it’s also a perfect phone for taking selfies. Modes like wide selfie, which helps you capture large group shots, and beauty shot that smooths skin, help you take self-portraits. The quality is excellent for a 5-megapixel unit.

If you’re a fan of video, the S6 can capture 2160p at 30fps, 1080p at 60fps and 720p in awesome ‘slomo’ at 120fps. The quality is, again, among the best any smartphone can produce at the moment.

Battery life and Charging

The Samsung Galaxy S6 has a smaller battery than its predecessor – down from 2,800mAh to 2,550mAh. It's also smaller than the battery in the S6 Edge by about 2% because Samsung used a slightly different circuit board structure in each phone. The SIM-tray on the S6 Edge had to be placed at the top of the phone, which allowed Samsung to include a slightly larger battery, but the difference is minimal.

In the mornings, the phone is off the charger by about 6am and then it’s used to check the news and weather, looking through social media feeds and getting transport updates. During a 45-minute morning commute to work the S6 is connected to public WiFi and is being used to read or for viewing media.

By the time I arrive at work, the battery can drop by as much as 20%. The battery depleted about 10% an hour when used actively, sharply declining during extended periods of game playing or video watching.

The battery can lose up to 20% from when you wake up to 

when you arrive at work

If you use the phone regularly and don’t take advantage of any power saving measures or actually activate one of the two power saving modes, it very hard to get a full day out of this phone. There’s no escaping that the S6’s battery life is inferior to the S5’s. Some people can manage with this, but if you’re a particularly heavy user then you might struggle to go a full day without a top up charge.

Alternatively, you can resort to the two power saving modes. The standard Power Saving Mode restricts background data and app usage, and Ultra Power Saving Mode replaces the phone’s colours with grayscale and limits functionality up to six selected core apps.

Used heavily, it often approaches critical by 8pm. Moreover, if you have a very early start. you’ll need both the power saving modes, or a top up charge, to make it home. But one of the phone’s other superb features really goes someway to negating its reduced staying power, and that’s the fast charging.

 

The steep peaks show how rapidly the phone charges, but you can also see how steadily and fast the battery can deplete

The Galaxy S6 charges exceedingly fast. When used with a compatible fast charger (one is supplied in the box), the S6 can charge up to around 35% in 10/15 minutes. That will give you about three-to-four hours of juice, which is really impressive. From 0% the phone will reach 100% in about an hour and 20 minutes – much faster than any of its competitors.

It’s unfortunate that the phone is so power hungry, especially given that Samsung no longer allows you to switch out batteries and is using a relatively average capacity cell in the Galaxy S6. Used sensibly most people won’t have issues with the battery, but people could rightly ask what good is it having bells and whistles of the most advanced phone on the market if you have to take them off?

This graph shows the wireless charging performance, it's much slower

The Galaxy S6 can charge wirelessly as well, which is part of the reason why the battery is no longer removable. Samsung has partnered with furniture giants Ikea to a release a range of home and office ware that has wireless charging spots built into them to compliment this new feature. While we don't have any snazzy electromagnetic furniture, we did get one of Samsung’s own branded wireless chargers made for the Galaxy S6.

It’s a stylish looking round pad, with a ring of rubber in its centre to try and keep the slippery S6 in place, but it doesn’t fast charge the phone – wireless charging technology isn’t that good yet. The charging efficiency is sluggish in comparison to using the supplied charger. Two hours of wireless charging will get the S6 to about 70% from critical.

The wireless charger can be purchased for around £39.99 and is best used as a battery maintenance accessory, left on your desk at home or at work. It allows you to use the phone freely while being productive and keeps it charging steadily throughout the day. This also helps you avoid having to revert to power saving modes if you are sat at a desk and out of your house for more than 10 to 12 hours a day.

The battery is probably the only weakness of the Galaxy S6 and for some it may prove to be its achilles heel. But fast charging and the wireless charging capabilities go far enough to make the battery less of an issue, even if it’s a disappointing step backward compared to the Galaxy S5.

Other things to consider

The S6 also hails the launch of Samsung Pay, an advanced mobile payment system that allows you to make purchases with or without NFC enabled pay points. This is because it uses Magnetic Secure Transmission, so unlike mobile payment options from rivals like Apple, Samsung Pay can be used in 90% of stores in the US compared to Apple Pay's 10%.

The IR Blaster and Peel Smart Remote on the S6 gives you control over a wide variety of tellevisions and set top boxes. The app makes it is easy to take over control of TVs and comes complete with local and personalised show guides. The S5 also had this functionality as does the HTC One M9, so it's good to see this featured on the S6.

The fingerprint scanner is an improvement over last year's model and allows you to store multiple prints to unlock the phone. Last year's Samsung flagship required a precise finger swipe to read a finger print, this year a tap will do. It works as well as Touch ID from Apple. For a detailed breakdown of the S6's additional features, 

Should I buy the Samsung Galaxy S6?

 

For its all-round performance, astonishingly good camera and stunning screen, absolutely. Along with its premium look and feel, future proof features like Samsung Pay and Wireless charging, the S6 feels like a phone that will age well.

It’s a step above the HTC One M9 and bests the iPhone 6 at present. The HTC One M9 is a little cheaper and has a microSD slot, but on specs and performance it simply cannot compete. Perhaps the One M9+ will change that, but the S6 wins that battle easily now.

The only reason not to is if you’re concerned about battery life. The S6’s battery life is good enough rather than great, and S5 owners will find it isn’t as good. Fast charging and wireless charging compensate somewhat, but you’ll have to make peace with this weakness. If you can’t then the Galaxy Note 4, which has better battery life and a microSD slot, might be better for you.

 

Scores In Detail

 

Battery life is the only chink in this awesome phone’s armour, but it can be managed and isn’t a deal breaker for us. If you want the best smartphone money that can buy right now and don’t care about fancy pants curved edges, the Galaxy S6 is a top phone that shouldn't disappoint.

If you want to see the price of this Samsung Galaxy S6 click here

See other product :

 * Samsung Galaxy S6                              * Amazon Fire Phone 
 * Sony Xperia Z3 Compact D5803             * Motorola Moto G (2nd Generation) 
 * Samsung Galaxy A5                              * Samsung Galaxy Young 2 
 * Samsung Galaxy S3 mini                       * Samsung Galaxy J1
 * LG Realm                                           * Nokia Lumia 635
 * Nokia Lumia 520                                 * BLU Advance 4.0 A270A
 * HTC Desire 510 (A11) white                  * HTC one M9  

See other Review :

PCAdvisor 
TechRadar