Review: Samsung Galaxy S4

Gadget Review - After the success of the Galaxy S3, Samsung didn't stop there. Currently, Samsung has released their new smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S4. Samsung pinning eight-core processor, plus a variety of interesting features. Samsung seems optimistic to remain the king of smartphones in the world.

Design
Physically, Galaxy S4 does look very similar to its predecessor. However, S4 body it is slimmer, thinner and lighter. With the margin between the screen and the metal bezel is so thin that makes it quite comfortable to hold with one hand.

Covered with glossy white color, S4 still using plastic materials. This makes a lot of criticism. Moreover, many competitors already used a more solid materials like aluminum material on the iPhone 5 and HTC One, also scratch resistant glass material almost all parts of the body such as the Sony Xperia Z. With these materials makes S4 looks cheaper than other competitors.

Display
Samsung slightly expand the display screen from the previous versions. if the S3 using 4.8-inch screen, in S4 already using a 5-inch screen. Not only that, Samsung also upgraded the screen resolution to 1080x1820 pixels.

Thanks to the AMOLED technology, Samsung Galaxy S4 has an impressive contrast characteristics, and better color saturation than LCD panels. S4 also has a wide viewing angle, the color does not seem deterioration even at fairly extreme angles though.

To protect from scratches, Samsung attached Gorilla Glass 3 on S4. Number of dots that are supported in a single tap is a maximum of ten points. The screen reacts very responsive when used to navigate. Playing games, such as Temple Run 2 Best Quality, Need For Speed​​: Most Wanted, Subway Surfer, and other HD games were also feels smooth. Gesture and pressure point can be done without any lag.

Samsung Galaxy S4 also has supporting Daydream features that introduced on Google I/O. Same function as the screensaver on Windows operating systems. It will be very interesting when S4 is in a docking or while charging.

Interface & UI
Samsung equipped S4 with the most recent Android Jellybean version. Not only that, the interface is also wrapped with TouchWiz. Additionally S4 also includes many new features. Newer features on Android 4.2 such as lockscreen widget can be enjoyed on the S4. In fact, not only that, lockscreen also can serve as a panel, just like homescreen.

The interesting thing is Samsung Galaxy S4 is able to use two windows in one screen. So, you can run two applications at once on this device. You just need to set multiple windows on screen notification in the notification panel.

Still rely on the 3 buttons under the screen, but these 3 buttons are also have double functions. When you hold one of these buttons, it will have an additional function. such, the menu button will take the user to the features of Google Now, the Home button will display a task switcher and bring back the Side Bar for Multi Windows feature.

Hardware & Benchmark
Actually S4 is available in 4 variants which are distinguished by chipset and processor clockspeed, as well as dual SIM and 4G capabilities. And the products we reviewed is the GT-i9500 series. This type of chipset is the first to apply the big.LITTLE processing architecture developed by ARM Holdings. big.LITTLE processing is designed to deliver the vision of the right processor for the right job.

Simply put, this architecture pairing two different quadcore processor, one is powerful processor performance (Cortex A15) called "big", and the other is processor that work slower but more power efficient (Cortex A7) called "LITTLE". S4 allows it to work as needed, whether by performance or maximum power efficiency.

The following picture shows how superior this smartphone are..

Technical Details

• Capacitive Super AMOLED touchscreen, 16M colors, 1080 x 1920 pixels, 5.0 inches (~441 ppi pixel density), multi touch, Corning Gorilla Glass 3
• Octa Core processor (Quad-core 1.6 GHz Cortex-A15 + Quad-core 1.2 GHz Cortex-A7), Exynos 5 Octa 5410 chipset, PowerVR SGX 544MP3 GPU, 2 GB of RAM
• Android OS, v4.2.2 (Jelly Bean), TouchWiz UI
• Internal Storage: 16/32/64GB, external: up to 64GB
• Main camera: 13 MP, 4128 x 3096 pixels, Secondary camera: 2MP, 1080p@30fps, dual video call 
• click for more details..
  

S4 Features
The latest feature from S4 is the Air View. Actually, this feature is already been introduced on the Galaxy Note 2. The difference is, you need the S Pen on Galaxy Note 2, while the S4 only need your finger to use this feature.

Air View allows users to perform certain functions simply by putting a finger in front of the screen without touching it (hovering). Available functions include displaying information on the event held at the S Planner, peek at the contents of the album in the gallery menu, video preview by hovering on the line of the video timeline, or enlarge the view of the site pages. Air View can detect your finger when it is at a distance of 1cm in front of the screen.

Another feature is the Air Gesture, this feature also allows users to control the S4 without touching it. This special feature uses sensors located above the screen precisely beside the earpiece.

With this feature the user can scroll when opening a web page or email read simply by moving hands in front of the sensor up or down, or switching between images when displaying the collection in the gallery by waving to the right or the left. There is also a motion feature and palm motion that has existed since the Galaxy S3.

Turning to Smart Screen feature, this feature is divided into 4 function that two include have been found in previous Samsung products. Stay Smart from Galaxy S3, Galaxy and Smart Rotation from Note2.

2 additional functions are Smart Pause, that when activated can temporarily stop (pause) the video that is playing when the user's eyes are not staring into the screen. And Smart Scrolling, S4 will detect the user's eyes and make scrolling in the direction of sight. Unfortunately when tested, this function does not go as smoothly as expected. S4 takes a while to detect the user's eyes.

Connectivity
In Samsung Galaxy S4 type GT-i9500 is indeed does not support 4G LTE connectivity, it is associated with limited 4G service in several countries. But beyond that, all the necessary connectivity options available on this phone.

MicroUSB port on the bottom side of the phone can be used as a data connection and charging. Not only supports USB OTG Technology, this port also supports the new version of MHL - 2.0, which means you can connect the S4 to a TV with 3D 1080p output without the help of external power resources. Earlier in version 1.0 the user must connect the adapter charger.

Other connectivity that is almost forgotten now available on the S4, the infrared transmitter. Infrared is also supported by a remote control application, so that the S4 can function as a remote control for a variety of electronic devices at home.

Camera
You no longer need to switch between camera mode and video recorder on S4 because the camera interface already contains both. Like on S3, you can also record video and take pictures at the same time.

S4 not only has features like Burst Shot and Best shot that has been available since the S3. S4 also has a new feature on the camera, such as:

1. Dual shot, allows the user to use the main camera and front camera simultaneously, so that not only the taking pictures, users can also capture the expression on his face when shooting. Dual shot features also works while recording video and can be used on video call too.
2. Best face, much like the time shift function on the BlackBerry Z10.
3. Sound and shot that adds background sound to the captured image. 
4. Drama, that combines multiple pictures of a moving object and merge them into one dramatic pictures.
5. Animated photo, allows users to make a picture that contain selected moving objects by animating parts of the picture . 
6. In addition, there is also the Auto, Eraser, Panorama, Sports, Night, Beauty Face and Rich tone (HDR) option.

Conclusion
Samsung brings the successor of Galaxy S3 with improvement from every aspect, from the shape, performance, features, dimension, and so forth. Samsung brings the new way of using a smartphone.

Not just better than its predecessor, Samsung Galaxy S4 performance even able to perform as superior in "quad core processor superphone" level that we've tested before. Performance S4 is describing the power of quad core Cortex A15 processor. The fastest processor from ARM bring the S4 to be one of the fastest Android smartphone ever. Even in power saving mode, quad-core Cortex A7 is enough to run all the applications without any hindrance.

With a premium price, this smartphone is suitable for use as your best friend in work, playing games, listening to music, watching videos, and so on. Therefore, this smartphone is suitable for you that require high mobility of a smartphone.