The Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 edge Review: Part 2
by Joshua Ho on July 5, 2016 8:00 AM ESTCharge Time
While charge time is no longer much of a concern in light of how OEMs have made it a major priority in the last few product cycles, I still wanted to go ahead and verify its effects. Testing this is done with the usual method of monitoring until power draw at the outlet reaches a value approaching 0 to try and eliminate inaccurate battery percent reporting as a problem.
Interestingly enough, the Galaxy S7 charges faster than the HTC 10 here even though both have similar power output on their AC adapters. I suspect that we’re actually seeing the differences between QC 2.0 and QC 3.0 here as the environment in San Jose recently has never gone below 80F when testing. At any rate, the delta between the Galaxy S6 and S7 in charge rate is effectively not worth talking about, which isn’t really a huge surprise.
Miscellaneous
The miscellaneous section of each review is really just a list of comments that are too short to justify a separate section, but something worth discussing regardless. The first of these subjects is sound quality. While I don’t really have the ability to test 3.5mm output properly, I can say that the speaker output of the Galaxy S7 is weak without question. Maximum volume is quite low, and even ignoring that the quality of the output is nothing special with emphasis on higher frequencies. I suspect this is just the cost of waterproofing at work here.
The fingerprint scanner remains a Synaptics design win, and it generally works quite well. I like it a lot but it isn’t particularly fast or reliable the way the iPhone 6s’ TouchID is. I would say that it’s better than the iPhone 6’s fingerprint scanner, and is comparable with the HTC 10’s fingerprint scanner. However I do favor the HTC 10 fingerprint scanner design as it’s faster to just place a finger to the fingerprint scanner rather than pressing a button and waiting to scan, but the delta here is basically not worth talking about.
Samsung Pay is actually, finally available. Weirdly enough the magstripe transmission still has applications as places like Safeway seem to have completely ignored the liability transfer and continued using magstripe-only readers. Places like Walmart don’t seem to have NFC enabled despite moving to EMV which is strange to say the least. For the US, Samsung Pay actually does provide value, and turns paying from your phone from an occasional experience to a common one. For now at least, Samsung Pay has some real value which is good to see.
I haven't seen any real issues with GPS on the Galaxy S7, as OEMs have been taking this sort of thing seriously for a while. I don't think anyone is really going to face issues with GPS at this point, but it's worth mentioning just to confirm that this is the case.
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LuoSKraD - Tuesday, July 5, 2016 - link
So you agree because they are bad mouthing a company and a phone you don't like? They didn't cover macro shots or anything at all it was preference. It just seemed like another iPhone biased review, undersaturation poor depth of field, bad low light quality. These are just a few examples where Iphones fail at, this was not a thorough review at all it was just focused on being biased towards making a phone look worse than it actually is. There are much better wrote and explained camera reviews out there for instance.victorson - Tuesday, July 5, 2016 - link
Don't know about AnandTech, but sure seems like you have a certain bias.retrospooty - Tuesday, July 5, 2016 - link
I have been coming to Anandtech since 1998, and have always enjoyed it's great reviews... But for the past 3-4 years, they have become very Apple-centric. The comment from LuoSKraD above is pretty correct. It all made sense when Anand himself left the site to go work for Apple, but the clear bias exists, and this review shows it. That is OK, it's not like there aren't other Apple-centric sites out there and it is perfectly withing the sites rights to run thigns the way they want to... But if you are looking for unbiased reviews on any products that compete with Apple, this site is no longer one of them, so browse accordingly.The Garden Variety - Tuesday, July 5, 2016 - link
Action, man! You're uncovering a great truth here, but we need action! Our opinion matters more than others—how do we make sure our anecdotes and opinions are enforced in all future reviews? We must keep visiting here, so how do we make sure this community only reflects our opinions? I think this is essential and I need your guidance here.retrospooty - Tuesday, July 5, 2016 - link
I dont know if we can. The site was sold to "Purch" in 2014. The same parten company that owns Toms hardware. LOL. suffice to say they arent interested in the tech, but the clicks.retrospooty - Tuesday, July 5, 2016 - link
damn typeslexia... Same "parent" company.Meteor2 - Wednesday, July 6, 2016 - link
You're being trolled :)victorson - Wednesday, July 6, 2016 - link
AT is one of very few websites that tests phones and bases its opinion on rigorous testing than most reviewers. You are entitled to your opinion about bias (as always, without any factual backing), but it's extremely irritating how all of the popular blogs praised the Galaxy S7's camera without mentioning any of its obvious flaws. That's what I call bias: ignoring the objective reality, so that an opinion of the 'best camera ever' can be manufactured and repeated to infinity. The truth, however, is different: the Galaxy S7 has a very fast camera with amazing auto-focus, but the quality of its images suffers as a result.lilmoe - Wednesday, July 6, 2016 - link
The dual pixel focusing system alone makes the GS7's camera leaps and bounds better than the competition. If a reviewer ever so slightly undermines this aspect about the GS7's camera (or any camera in that regard), or believes it's just "OK" needs to work more on their photography skills and overall knowledge.There are DSLR and mirrorless manufacturers out there that release sequels to their "pro" line cameras with the only significant upgrade being the focusing system, and pro photographers actually upgrade to that new product.
The focusing system, in short, either makes you take the image, or end up with a blurry shot where no post processing can ever help.
If you're THAT worried about post processing, then you need to be shooting RAW. I'm perfectly happy with the post processing on my GS7, and when I KNOW I need all the detail I can get (portraits, landscape, sports) then I simply launch pro mode.
jospoortvliet - Wednesday, July 6, 2016 - link
Well, I am fascinated by how different people rate the extreme sharpening Samsung employs. I find it horribly ugly and I keep hoping for either a fix or a setting to disable it on my S7. the HTC one I owned before (m7) made it configurable... please Sammy, copy that.I was surprised how undersaturated that night pic was, mine look nice and I agree the fast focus is super important.
But I do appreciate the test of the radio, that is interesting.