The Samsung Galaxy Note7 (S820) Review
by Joshua Ho on August 16, 2016 9:00 AM ESTIC Design Wins
While we normally allude to the various things that we find in a phone in the interest of providing some extra depth for posterity I went ahead and dug through the software to find all the various peripherals that are present in the Galaxy Note7. For example, the Wacom digitizer identifies itself as the W9010 over i2c, which is interesting considering that this digitizer is the same one found in the Galaxy Note 3. In various briefings it was explicitly said that the digitizer supports double the number of pressure levels, so I’m not sure how this is achieved or if it really has any changes at all besides the smaller tip.
Moving past the Wacom digitizer we can see that there are a number of supporting ICs for power management and things like the battery charger. I’m not going to spend a ton of time talking about this but a huge number of these are Maxim Integrated ICs such as the MAX77838 switching regulator/PMIC, although I’m not clear on exactly what this PMIC supplies. There’s also the MAX77854 which functions as a PMIC, as well as a MAX98506 class D audio amplifier for the codec, which is likely used to drive things like the earpiece, speaker, and 3.5mm jack. This is shared with the Galaxy S7 and S7 edge and it looks like it uses the same WCD9335 audio codec so I wouldn’t get my hopes up about improved audio quality for the Snapdragon variants. If you want better audio you’re going to have to look towards the Exynos variant or the HTC 10.
Moving to slightly more boring but critical parts of the Note7 there are ICs like Cypress CapSense PSoC which enables the capacitive buttons and a TI BQ25898S battery charger IC which supports 9V and 12V charging voltages for adaptive fast charge. There’s also an NXP PN547 NFC controller and an NXP P61 secure microcontroller that seems to be for payments and similar applications. It should also probably surprise no one that there’s a Validity/Synaptics VFS7xxx fingerprint scanner here, although I found some mention of an Egis Technologies ET320 fingerprint scanner which makes me wonder whether Samsung is dual sourcing here.
The more esoteric ICs here include a Richwave RTC6213N FM radio tuner and a CEVA DBMD4 DSP which seems to be for always-on voice commands which are visible on i2c and SPI respectively. The only IC that I can’t identify at all is something called the SX9320 over i2c, which officially has zero mentions on the internet unless you count a Shacman trailer that is manufactured by Shaanxi Automobile Group in China or NGK spark plugs. At any rate, looking at these kinds of details it’s much more apparent just how critical economies of scale are as these are parts that seem to be shared across the Galaxy S7 and S7 edge, which surely helps to drive down cost due to the sheer volume of these devices. There are also things like FM tuners which aren’t necessarily going to be a point of advertising for a phone but are neat to have anyways.
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erikiksaz - Friday, August 19, 2016 - link
How did you guys manage to monitor for frame drops? Is it a separate app?Belard - Sunday, August 21, 2016 - link
Still rather blah- design. I'm surprised they continue the glass backing from the S6, like as if they have not learned anything from Apple? A family member has the S6 and yes, her back has a spider crack on it with a long one from top to bottom.amdwilliam1985 - Tuesday, August 23, 2016 - link
they need the glass back for the wireless charging.Glass and plastic works with Qi-charging, metal does not(at least for now).
thek - Sunday, August 21, 2016 - link
so no one is going to bring up the facts that this 850$ phone has a smaller battery then the Xiaomi redmi note 3 (a 150$ phone) and it's bootloader is locked in the US which literally makes it just the same as an Iphone. (All of us here came to Android because it was an open garden). Closing android is making Samsung not a legit Apple vendor IMO, and should too for the rest of you.Don't be kids and be fooled by gimmicks and high specs. You can't even get CM13 on this phone.
And a really bad job by the reviewer for not bringing this up. As usual in Anandtech they only cares about numbers and not whats behind them.
thek - Sunday, August 21, 2016 - link
not a legit Android* vendorCSMR - Sunday, August 21, 2016 - link
Great review and phone.I wonder if it would be possible to check the compass in future?
All the phones I have owned have had terrible magnetometers which stop working, require shaking the phone, or are off by a large angle.
Having compass inaccuracies pointed out in reviews would really shake things up.
Pipperox - Sunday, August 21, 2016 - link
So you're slamming an excellent phone (like the S7 as well) because of your non-sensical review of its camera?The most reputable camera review website - Dxomark - puts the S7 at the top for still image quality, on par with the HTC10, and the Samsung is even better in the video score.
What problems do you see with video stabilization?
Dxo Labs talks about "excellent video stabilization", i have an S7 edge and can only confirm what they say.
Diet - Monday, August 22, 2016 - link
This the only review on the internet that addreses the weak points of this overpriced phone.Kudos To Anandtech!
KoolAidMan1 - Monday, August 22, 2016 - link
More performance tests: https://youtu.be/3-61FFoJFy0tldw - The flagship GN7 is slower than a year-old iPhone 6S.
jlabelle2 - Tuesday, August 23, 2016 - link
- The flagship GN7 is slower than a year-old iPhone 6Syes and a Porsche 911 from last year is faster than an Audi RS6. The question is what do you need in your day to day life. Is the speed of the RS6 enough? Do you need space? 5 seats? Comfort? Good equipments?
People have short memory. The iPhone was a success because it was the 1st phone with a big touchscreen, easy to use, with a great experience. Now, people consider that a phone should be choosen only based on the speed difference of launching 30 different applications within 2mn. Even if new phone are twice as quick as the previous one that was twice as quick as the previous previous one that was twice... Well, you see the point. Phones are fast enough.
I do not know anybody that is using an iPhone 6 or Samsung S6 and that is saying: "my phone is too slow and the only thing I would wish is to that a phone twice as quick".
I am certain that if Apple would sell at the same price:
1/ iPhone 7 = CPU of the 6S, AMOLED screen, quick and wireless charging, waterproof, 5,7" screen but 5mm narrower than current 6S+, camera hardware button, pen support.
2/ iPhone 6SS = iPhone 6S with a CPU 50% quicker
you can be absolutely assure that NOBODY would choose an iPhone 6SS versus this hypothetical iPhone 7.
We can be all fair of what Apple is achieving with its iPhone, which is great. But some minimal common sense would be good in this forum.