Samsung Galaxy S 5 Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Joshua Ho on April 8, 2014 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Samsung
- Mobile
- Galaxy S 5
The Galaxy S5 is another phone to join the list of phones that ship with a fingerprint scanner for unlocking the device. While the Motorola Atrix 4G was the first to have a fingerprint scanner, it was mostly forgotten as a feature until Apple reintroduced it to the market in the form of TouchID. HTC also released the One max with a fingerprint scanner, which was generally viewed with mixed reactions due to the swipe sensor. Overall, it seems that while no one has a perfect implementation, Apple has the best implementation on the market today.
I do think it's important to give Samsung some credit, as the Synaptics-provided capacitive fingerprint scanner does work. Although not perfect, the GS5 is definitely better with its fingerprint scanner than had it shipped without it.
Samsung integrated Paypal and Samsung Account verification into the fingerprint scanner software as seen below, which is neat and shows the direction that fingerprint scanners could take in terms of identification and verification.
The fingerprint scanner is a high-DPI capacitive one based upon the Chipworks teardown, and in effect, is identical to the fingerprint scanner in the One max. The big difference is that it's integrated into the home button on the front of the phone as seen above, although based upon my experiences the home button is the only area with high precision capacitive sensing. The sensor detects features of the finger by measuring the effect that the dermis of the skin has on the electrostatic field that is generated by the touchscreen, and at sufficiently high resolution, the sensor can interpret the effect accurately enough that a map of the finger can be generated.
What is different from the One max is that it is much more difficult to use. The enrollment process is simple enough, and is accomplished by swiping eight times over the sensor as seen above (just like with TouchID, you can enroll multiple fingers in place of one by switching the digits you swipe with during the 8 swipe training process). After that, the fingerprint scanner can be used as a unlock method, along with the Paypal and Samsung Account login as previously stated. Where things get difficult is actually unlocking the phone. The sensor is simply too low to reasonably use with one hand, especially because the fingerprint scanner requires straight swipes with very little diagonal deviation. The scanner is also quite sensitive to swiping either too slow/fast or swiping at an inconsistent rate, and will often fail if the user is not consistent in swiping from enrollment to unlock. Enrolling the finger at multiple angles does help a bit with the issue, but it doesn't fundamentally change the experience.
It's pretty easy to adjust to the GS5's fingerprint sensor if you give up on the hope of a one hand unlock. If you're ok with swiping with another hand, the sensor works pretty well and is a great alternative to a long password.
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Human Bass - Tuesday, April 8, 2014 - link
Lol, quite easy to have large pixels when going with a ridiculous 4mp. It is like bragging about doing a hundred push-ups on your knees instead of legs extended.TheSailorMan - Wednesday, April 9, 2014 - link
Never trust tech reviewer who speaks about "premium aluminum"NEVER.
doobydoo - Friday, April 11, 2014 - link
Why? People prefer it visually.TheSailorMan - Monday, April 14, 2014 - link
Which people??? iBoys?Which people? How many?
If people prefer ALUMINUM visually then HTC One would sell. Right???
And don't give me the iphone argument, because there are other things
TheSailorMan - Tuesday, April 8, 2014 - link
"Although Samsung was the first major OEM to be caught cheating in Android benchmarks,"Wow.
What a hypocrisy!!!!!
May I ask you WHY Samsung was the first major OEM to be caught "cheating"??? When all the OEM did it? And WHO found it? And when found it????
Yes, it was Anand who found that Samsung is "cheating". And it was just when Note 3 come. What a coincidence?? LOL!!! Not before that, not after that . Just to bash Samsung. And later to wash his hands he wrote- "But all of them are cheating". Then again- "But why Samsung was "cheating" when anyhow Note 3 beat all of them?"
Well he may thing that his hand are clear now. But he hope that still some smell could stay around Samsung. Happy?
Now again in this "review" very active with hidden bashing Samsung and promoting the mediocre HTC M8 and covering the HTC flop, with misty sentences.
So: Is it Display Mate lying about the greatest Display Ever Yet on S5?
Is it the battery life of S5 better than M8 or not?
Is it the S5 camera better than M8 and iPhone5s , or not?
Is it the FingerPrintScaner , worse than iPhone5 , or not?
Is it TW lagging or not?
and so on.
Is it S5 the best device yet? Or it's HTC M8? Or iphone-Apple?(your mentors and sponsors may be?)
Please give clear answers.
TheSailorMan - Tuesday, April 8, 2014 - link
Is it S5 version of S801 better than the M8 version?Brian Z - Wednesday, April 9, 2014 - link
I cant believe I am even responding to this but this stupid uninformed samsung fanboy crap cant go undressed.The Note 3 was not the first device caught. The gs4 international version was. It was kind of a big deal since it was the only device every caught to actually overclocking the gpu for the apps in the white list.
And the rest of your post is just useless fanboy nonsense. The data is there, but of course you wouldnt care to look at it. Objectively doesnt matter when you got a love affair with a brand .
TheSailorMan - Wednesday, April 9, 2014 - link
I cant believe I am even responding to this but - WHY SHOULD ONLY SAMSUNG take the negatives of this iAnand campaign ?? Because this campaign WAS INVENTED FOR THAT REASON.Even now in this review Anand mention it to slyly bash Samsung again?
When I read this review , I'm not sure if this is S5 review or HTC M8 ad. LOL
HTC was doing it before, and M8 did it too now. Where is Anand's article about it???
P.S.
When some "tech guru" start to speak about "premium aluminum" smartphone(like Anand did it here)- how could we trust him??? How?
Brian Z - Wednesday, April 9, 2014 - link
Yeah because in ever single review after the gs4 they have included a chart with all the oems are cheating and in which test. And of course it wasn't mentioned at all in reviews of said devices either! And of course there wasn't long talks about it on the podcastYou're a delusional fanboy that thinks everything revolves around bashing Samsung. Simple because you have a man crush on them.
TheSailorMan - Wednesday, April 9, 2014 - link
I'm not a fanboy to any brand.And you are desperate liar if you say that Samsung was not the only one, that was bashed because of Anand and Co . Besides it's still not clear if this was "cheating", and even HTC lately explained that. But Anand didn't complain. LOL He thinks that ALUMINUM is so great material(lol), and that's why HTC are free to go. And even advertise M8 in S5 article, making fool of himself.
If Samsung didn't do it, Anand would NEVER "discover" this "cheating". Period.
Tell me about the "Regional Lock" organized attack against Samsung?
Tell me about "View Cover" attack:)
What about those organized "rumors" about "premium S5" , just before S5 to come on the market?(insinuating that S5 "is not premium").LOL:)
So? Who is pathetic here?