It's been a tumultuous year for Samsung. Buoyant and complacent with being the world's most successful Android smartphone vendor for ages, the Korean giant was perhaps not prepared for its Galaxy S5 flagship last year to be so roundly criticised for not breaking any new ground. The heart rate sensor was pretty much mostly a gimmick, and the glossy plastic body did it no favours when seen next to its competition. Chinese brands have started having an impact on its low-end and mid-range sales, and Lollipop updates for older devices have been coming too slowly, if at all.
Samsung's image has lost a lot of its former sheen; even more so when it comes to the top-end Galaxy S range. Under more pressure than ever before, the company is betting on a major reinvention. Gone is the cheap plastic, in favour of slick aluminium. Gone is the heavy TouchWiz skin with dozens of settings and features that no one ever used - the software is more restrained than ever.
We first saw the new Samsung Galaxy S6 (and its eclectic curved-glass twin, theGalaxy S6 Edge) shortly after its launch at the 2015 Mobile World Congress show, but now we've had enough time to conduct a full, thorough review. The device is launching in India just over a month after its global debut, making it the first of this year's flagship models to make it here. Should you rush out and buy one?
Look and feel
Samsung has been experimenting with metal bodies up and down its product lineup, so it's no surprise that the new flagship model comes in full aluminium trim. Samsung's phones have been difficult to tell apart in the past because of the company's very set template, and the Galaxy S6 feels like something of a missed opportunity in terms of a breakout design. With new materials and new priorities, Samsung could have gone in exciting directions but the Galaxy S6 not only carries forward most of its predecessors' style, it somehow simultaneously manages to look like it has borrowed cues from Sony and Apple.
While the influence of the iPhone 6 and its predecessors is apparent in details such as the machined speaker grille and chamfered rim edges, we find that the overall shape and style feel more derivative of the Sony Xperia Z3. Other touches, such as the silver-rimmed physical Home button are pure Samsung.
The front and back are flat glass, and the metal rim has a slight curve that fits nicely in a hand. Thankfully, the Galaxy S5 rim's ugly ridges were smoothened out. The power button and Nano-SIM tray are on the right, and two separate volume buttons are on the left. The only things on top are an IR emitter and secondary mic, while the speaker, Micro-USB port and headset socket are all on the bottom. Flaps over the ports and slots for waterproofing are conspicuously absent. The home button has an integrated fingerprint reader and there's also a heart rate sensor right beneath the flash on the rear.
Samsung has clearly shifted its priorities as far as design is concerned, and this is the first Galaxy S model not to have an accessible battery. Also as a consequence, there's no room for a microSD card slot - you'll have to choose a storage capacity at the time of purchase and then live with that much.
The biggest problem with the design is that this phone is extremely slippery. We often found ourselves uncertain of our grip on it; holding it extra tight to compensate. The camera module sticks out quite a bit from the rear - it's larger and more obtrusive than the infamous one on the iPhone 6, and the Galaxy S6 wobbles when you try to use it lying face up on a table.
The fact that Samsung has gone with its in-house Exynos processor for all global versions of the Galaxy S6 signals the company's growing confidence in its ability to compete with top-tier technology firms such as Qualcomm. The Exynos 7420 SoC has four 1.5GHz ARM Cortex A53 cores and four 2.1GHz Cortex A57 cores, allowing the phone to strike a balance between performance and power consumption for all kinds of tasks. There's 3GB of RAM, which is standard for top-end phones now.
With no microSD card slot, Samsung has made the Galaxy S6 available in multiple storage configurations. The strategy and pricing follow Apple's precedents, but the base model comes with 32GB rather than 16GB, which seems like a direct shot across the bow.
Software
Samsung has famously reduced a lot of the software clutter that defined its Galaxy S4 and Galaxy S5 devices. TouchWiz has tried to mimic some of Google's Lollipop-era Material Design aesthetic and it is a marked improvement over previous Samsung attempts at UI design. Responsiveness isn't a problem, and we never got the feeling that any of the customisations were a step backwards from stock Android.
There are some things that you might never use, but are fairly unobtrusive and can be disabled, such as the Fliboard-style news reader to the left of the primary home screen, and the ability to run two apps simultaneously in a split-screen mode. The quick settings and notifications shade is handy - for example, grabbing the brightness slider makes all other controls temporarily disappear from the screen, letting you see how your adjustment will affect the underlying app or content.
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