Alright, my stint with S4 has grown 40 days old so thought the time is apt for an update. One thing I like the most about my phone is that the more I use it, deeper I fall in love with it. I read user reviews revealing those unfortunate experiences but then, I think they are very rare instances happening probably to one in 100k. Agreed, there were heating issues with the very first batch of S4 released back in last week of April however, company’s software patch has mitigated that problem, I believe.
Coming to my stint with S4, my initial incline towards this piece of gadget has graduated from infatuation to love (hope my wife doesn’t read this!). Gist of my 40 day experience with S4 goes as under:
Battery life:
In my previous review on Mouthshut.com, I had mentioned that battery life depends on user’s usage patterns (what the phone is being used for, e.g. calling, texting, satellite positioning, video playback, gaming, surfing etc). Since then, I have experimented with the device and here are my findings:
On one full charge, the phone delivers me upto-
> 48+ hours on standby
> 8 hours of talktime
> 6-7 hours of uninterrupted gaming
> 6-7 hours of continuous browsing
> 6-7 hours of non-stop texting
> 3-4 hours of satellite positioning
The above figures are only indicative and are based on my experimentation. Figures may vary contingent upon various other factors such as inter-cell movement, type of network (wi-fi, 3G, 2G). Among other things, you could also try following to cut on battery drain:
> Keep your screen brightness and timeout on lower rungs and keep power saving mode on.
> Keep GPS, Wi-Fi, Mobile data, Air gestures, air view, etc. disabled. These are power-mongers.
> Use a black wallpaper - your screen will actually save on power by not lighting up the tiny LEDs beneath dark portions of the wall paper image.
Heating up issues:
The device indeed gets warmed up while charging just like any other mobile phone but this is not abnormal. Even prolonged use of the device will get it warmed up. I have heard people complaning about their devices getting overheated without any apparent reason - it could be due to some software problem. In most of the cases, over-heating issue can be resolved with software updates so, keep your phone updated through over the air updates. Still you feel the handset is heating up unnecessarily, unfortunately, there are chances that it has some hardware issues - get it inspected at the authorized service center.
More, later. Stay tuned, will keep updating this section.
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wrote a month ago:
S4 is much hyped product released by Samsung in the iPhone era and it definitely beats the latest product line up of its arch-rival Apple. I have been using S4 for a week now and here is my experience with it:
Display:
Full HD Super AMOLED screen touted by Samsung is capable of producing sharp, crystal clear graphics - This is the first thing that one would notice. I recommend 10 on 10.
Speed/Lag:
There is no apparent lag in response to any of the commands (touch input, i.e.) - Thanks to its 2X quad core processors coupled with 2 GB of RAM. However, you will find half of it i.e., 1GB always pre-occupied probably because of system processes running continuously. Coming to its effect on the performance - I played one of the graphics intensive game ‘Iron man 3’ and it performed flawlessly - rendering was smooth and no lag was experienced during gameplay. I have seen people often complaining about Samsung devices getting hanged – I’d like to mention that even Dell Alienware could eventually hang if the system resources are not managed properly. In case of Samsung devices, apps running in background tend to consume all system resources and the device gets hanged subsequently. If one knows how to manage the resources (i.e. kill the threads not being used), there shouldn’t be any hanging issue.
Battery backup:
This factor depends on variety of factors: Display consumes a lot of power so the number of times you are unlocking the phone (i.e. awakening the display) will affect the battery. Finding location through satellite positioning is most power hungry function in any GPS enabled device. Then, graphics intensive apps that get the processors all too worked up considerably add up to battery drain. For an average user who uses the phone for texting and making calls, the battery is likely to last over 24 hours on one full charge (on 2G).
Other features:
Camera is capable of clicking pics upto 13 m pixel resolution and it comes with loaded with features such as drama shot, shot with sound, etc. They are all good features to play around with. Smart scroll, smart pause, air gesture, group play etc are all good lineaments and captivate user’s attention.
Pros:
Voice call quality is good.
Interface is intuitive
Touch is fluidic & responsive
Speech recognition is better than iPhone
Voice command works flawlessly (though heavily depends on accent)
Impeccable graphics rendering with heavy games
Cons:
Internal memory: of the publicized 16 GB, user has access only to 8GB.
Most apps are network dependent – cause battery to drain faster and incur costs (will be menacing for prepaid users).
Verdict:
Nice piece of gadget, comparable to no other probably except HTC one. If price is not a limiting factor, it can be bought blindfolded.