Samsung Galaxy Note 9 Full Review By StateofTech

Hey, what's up, this is Jerald with state of tech, and this is my note.9 review my Samsung Galaxy Note 9 I got a couple of days early from the typical date that most people receive their pre-orders. I did pre-order this version. The 512 gigabyte version with 8 gigabytes of RAM I wanted to see what it was like to live and that 8 gigabyte ram world with an Android phone these days and of course it cost me a pretty penny over $1,300 to purchase this phone. It's expensive. So does it live up to the hype? I wanted to talk about some of the standout features that I think this phone has that some other phones definitely don't perform up to par with, because it's really it's really easy to talk about specs and, of course, this phone right now at the time that I'm recording this is the specs' leader. It has the latest technology inside it, it has the biggest battery, it has the most Ram it has the biggest processor.

It has one of the biggest displays and, of course, Samsung displays are amazing. So there's no point in beating those into the ground. If you want, you can go watch any other reviewers video and that's what they're gonna talk about. What I wanted to talk about is some of the features that I think make this device stand aside from every other device. That's out there right now and why I think Samsung is gonna, be able to get that premium price that they listed for this device.

So the first thing is we'll start from easiest, and we'll kind of work. Our way up, the four thousand William battery definitely is huge improvement over previous batteries. They've been with the note, 9 kinds of rebuilding trust with people, and the note 8 was a very safe phone. You know people were burned literally I, guess that was a bad pun. People were frustrated over the note 7, which I thought was a fantastic phone.

Despite its problems, the note 8 was a very safe phone and so with the note 9 they're far enough removed that they can get back to business and start putting some cool things in their phone that might otherwise make people nervous. Given that track record, so the four thousand William battery has given me extremely I mean the battery life. It just lasts forever. You know I've always been used to iPhones. You know lasting for quite a while pretty well optimized devices, those iPhones, but this note 9 with the four thousand William battery and just how well they've optimized Android and their system here, I'm getting extremely long usage out of this device.

A lot of screens on time, a lot of time playing games such as fortnight and, of course, shooting 4k video and taking lots of photos. Now those are the types of things that I find important in a phone I'm carrying a phone and I want to use it for photography and for shooting video. Those are big, important factors for me, and so a camera like this on this phone is amazing, but so with the battery life lasting as long as it has I'm not having to sacrifice I'm not having to kind of watch the battery and like oh I, can't shoot as much video as I want, because I'm going to run out of battery, or I'm going to run out of storage. I have 512 gigs of internal storage and I put a 256 gig SD card in it. That's three-quarters of a terabyte of storage, I'm not gonna, run out, and then, of course, you could put up to 512 gigabyte SD card in this, giving your phone near a TER about a terabyte of storage space, but the the fact that they are, including so much internal storage, because even and not I haven't seen anybody talk about this yet.

But when you record 4k 60 frames per second with this phone, it won't record to an SD card, because the micro SD card, the read and write speed to that card is not fast enough. So you're going to need that extra internal storage, if you're gonna, want to shoot 4k and I, don't think you necessarily need 512 gigs, but the other version which still comes I believe with a decent amount of storage.128 gigs is plenty for most people. So with that said, the larger storage is nice. I went with the 512, because I wanted that 8 gigabytes of RAM. That 8 gigabytes of RAM is more than enough memory to keep anything going on your phone.

Now, if you jump between games, and you go, do some productivity stuff, and you use your camera and your, and you don't worry about closing out apps or even managing your memory usage on your phone you're going to be fine, because a gigabyte of memory is a ton. Six gigabytes is even a lot by today's standards, with a lot of phones still coming with four. So even the smaller storage version of the note 9 coming with six gigs of RAM is still going to get you there. But if you want to future-proof yourself a little, I would say: go for the 512 so that you can get that 8 gigabytes of RAM. That's going to get you a couple of years of use out of this phone without even seeing any slowdown and performance.

Android is getting better and more optimized for a wider range of devices, and so it's its just gonna even see great performance come next year early next year, when they probably push out the next version of Android 2. This phone, of course that's always a bummer about Samsung devices. Is that they're not the quickest to roll out new versions of Android? You usually end up having to wait almost a full year to get those updates, but most people don't notice I've in videos that I put out in the past on Samsung devices. Most people have no idea what version of Android that they're running on their galaxy device on their Samsung device. So I, don't think it really matters so much as long as you're keeping those software updates up to date.

The software updates that they push through usually a month to month, but full new versions of Android like going from Android, seven to eight or eight to nine. Those are big jumps, and usually it does take Samsung a little of time to get those rolled out. They usually save those for the next version of their phone that comes out so, for example, Android phones coming out in the fall of 2018, such as the Google Pixel three is gonna, have Android or EO or Android the latest version of Android, whereas this note 9 probably won't get that until springtime 2019, not really that big of a deal in my opinion, because Samsung has done such a great job at optimizing this device, so this device, I, mean I've, been using it a lot more today, because I wanted to finalize this review. I've played two full games of fortnight on this phone I've shot a bunch of 4k video. A lot of photos, I've had the screen on the majority of the day, because I've been doing various tasks, I recorded some videos where I was using this as my device.

For my notes, and so the screen was on for like 20 minutes, 30 minutes as I recorded each of those videos and I have 49% of my battery life left, and it is 1:40 p. m. which some of you would say: okay. Well, that might not last you through the rest of the day, but this is a heavy usage day. For me, this is hundreds of percent over the typical usage for me on this particular device or on any device for that matter.

Normally I would get out of a phone say, for example, my s9 plus, which is the phone that I've used the majority of this year in 28 in 2018. That phone typically gets me a full day of battery life with about 20 or so percent left. My note 9 has been averaging me 50 to 60 percent battery life left at the end of the day, and that, of course, does vary based on usage. If I'm playing more video games on the phone, those are intense, processor, intense and graphic intense. Those are going to suck down the battery a little faster.

But the note 9 has insane battery life, so the next thing for me really is the camera. The camera is improved, most people will say: oh well, how could you really improve the camera over? What's out there right now? Well, the low-light performance on the camera on the note 9 is amazing, so shooting in those evening situations indoors when the lighting is lessened and not having to rely so much on the flash is fantastic. The camera just does great. It does perfect in low-light for a smartphone. The front-facing cameras also improved over previous versions.

Samsung just has not done very well with their front-facing camera over the last few years. Even the s9 plus doesn't have that great of a front-facing camera and leave your photos. Very soft with the edges not being very defined. They've definitely updated that, in the note, nine and kind of fix some of those problems, the note nine does a much better job with the front-facing camera. Having the dual cameras on the back one for zoom and one for more of wide shots definitely helps I.

Think you know the trend is going to be going back to a single camera. That's at least what it looks like you can't. Zoom in these cameras are fixed. They don't have apertures. Well, this one kind of does, and I'll talk about that.

Briefly, these don't have variable apertures. They don't have Zoom lenses that can zoom in and out any other way than electronically, and so, if you have to rely on electronic zoom, the more zoom that goes in electronically, the, or digitally I would say the more degradation to your image. So having more lenses with different focal length options gives you the better option for a higher quality image and Samsung's holding on to the dual cameras here with this phone. For that now, the wider camera does have two different apertures at its widest, and so that allows a little more extra light to come in. It doesn't have a typical aperture that if you look in like a higher-end camera- and you can see the iris in there that opens, and it encloses as the camera lets in or blocks more light, it doesn't have that type of iris.

It just has something that kind of shifts between two different apertures, so you could shoot at a really wide aperture which really helps out in those low-light situations, or you can close that down a little to block some light so that you don't have to raise your shutter speed so high. Now these typically are going to be more important if you're going to go into your pro mode on the camera. One of the things that Samsung has been perfect at is giving you a lot of pro controls over your camera. So for those of you with some photography experience, you know a little more than the average person as far as taking photos go. Those pro features are going to shine for you and the note 9, and you may even want to learn some of those if you're not much of a pro shooter you're, more of just like a point-and-click type or point and tap type of photographer when it comes to smartphones learning.

How some of those features work, I think, would be important. So you can head on over to another channel that we have that I run called, ditch, Auto or I teach photography and how to use some of those features. There are some courses on smartphones over there. Some videos on smartphones and I think they'd be cool for you to check out if you're looking to kind of take your photography to the next level with a smartphone, because smartphones are there, they are to the point where you can get. Some amazing photos out of them and there's I mean unless you go and buy a nicer camera like a DSLR or one of those new mirrorless cameras.

There's no point anymore in buying some little point-and-shoot camera and carrying that around with your smartphone. The smartphones are on par with most point-and-shoot cameras unless you're going to spend you know over $600 or $800 on your camera. So with that said, the cameras are fantastic. On the note 9, they are the best cameras that are out on the market right now, better than the iPhone 10 better than the pixel 2 from last year. So it'll be interesting to me to see how the cameras compare when the new version of the iPhone comes out next month and the new version of the Google Pixel come out because those are going to be the big competitors to the note 9 is the next version of the iPhone and the next version of the pixel I like carrying the least amount of things with me, and the note 9 helps me do that by having amazing cameras and also Samsung pay.

So let me talk briefly a little more about the cameras. The focus when you're, shooting video or even photos is amazing on this phone now, a lot of times when you're shooting video, it's easy for a phone to not focus on what you want it. So your subject or your point of interest, sometimes ends up being out of focus because the phone decides to focus somewhere else. This phone is so fast at focusing you can switch between foreground and background and focus on different areas of whatever you're trying to capture, and it's so smooth and fast at finding those focus points. It does a great job at determining what you're intending to focus on, so you don't have to spend too much time tapping around or trying to figure it out.

The phone just does a great job and with photos too, it does a great job of figuring out. What your actual subject is so that you can take the picture quick and move, not spending so much time trying to make sure that you get the shot, because it doesn't right. The first time now, Samsung really hit it out of the park with Samsung pay, because the only way for them to differentiate themselves or make themselves better than Apple Pay or Android pay is to do what they did with Samsung pay. Now, with Samsung pay, you can use your phone to pay on pretty much any terminal, even older terminals that don't have Apple Pay or Android pay integrated I've been at so many places where I've pulled out my phone to pay. The cashier tells me to stop because they don't take Apple Pay because they just call it Apple Pay, because there's nothing else right, but then I tap my phone to the reader, and it actually accepts, and they wonder how in the heck I did it, so I explained to them to the technology within the phone.

It's different. It's its not like Apple Pay where it uses NFC. Of course, it will use NFC when it can, because I think that's probably more of a secure payment, but it uses the technology inside the phone to be able to make a payment even at older terminals. That means that I don't have to carry as many cards on me. If there are cards that I, don't use that often and I.

Just don't want to have to carry them on me. I can keep them within this phone and use them when I need to so Samsung pay makes it so that I carry less with me. My wallet is getting smaller and smaller than our world changes to the point where we can make more mobile payments with our devices and Samsung is the only manufacturer right now making a phone that can make payments on some of those older terminals now Samsung upgraded the s-pen and made it even better than before. I have always struggled to try and figure out how to implement the s-pen into my life. I love the idea of being able to make notes and write and use the s-pen as an input device, but I just I.

Don't integrate that too much into my life because I'm so used to typing into things. You know: I, don't carry a pen with me, hardly at all, so I'm, not writing. I'm, usually typing, but they've made the s-pen work in other ways such as being able to use it to trigger your camera. I mean that's one of the biggest things I think is being able to set up your phone and trigger the camera when you're taking a group photo or something like that. But you can go into the settings, and you can actually use the S a lot of different ways and a lot of other applications which makes it extremely useful because it's yet another way for you to interact with the content.

That's on your phone now I recently have kind of gotten addicted to color pages on so like adult coloring books. On the note, because when you're sitting there, you don't want to play a game because it's kind of loud and obnoxious, or maybe you have to turn the sound off. And then you can't hear anything. You don't want to be that guy sitting, there listen play a game, but you can be sitting there with the s-pen and actually doing some digital color coloring, which I find almost therapeutic, and my kids definitely love it as well. So there's lots of different reasons why I think the s-pen is even more useful than it ever was before, because of these added features that they've, given it, of course, they've improved upon the technology of the pin itself.

When you put it into the phone it does charge, if Is found that it gets about 15 or so minutes of battery life outside the phone, but it continues to work. Even though the battery is dead, the battery is just to be used for the triggering of the button and those Bluetooth related functions. The pin still works, just as it always has without a charge on it at all and just like before. Of course, the phone is super waterproof. So even when water gets in there, it's not going to hurt your phone.

The phone is IP 68, certified, and I found that Samsung phones that are IP 68 certified actually can go under the water and not die such as phones like the iPhone 10, which is ip67 certified, but dies if you even breathe on it wrong. So with that said, the note 9 is built for being used in all different situations. So, even if you don't find yourself needing the pen, you know you're, not necessarily writing, notes and stuff all the time. There's added functionality for the pen and Samsung really did a good job of figuring out ways to make the pin more useful to people who might not be writing notes all the time, though, the note 9 is a huge phone they've improved upon how well it feels and how good it is to use this phone. The rounded edges on the sides are less than they've been in the past.

You know, they've had the edge display and all that stuff, the rounded edges off the phone that has become kind of their signature thing on their higher-end phones, that's getting less and less. It still provides a nice immersive experience with the content kind of wrapping around the device a little without it being extremely distracting. The bezels and the kind of rounded edges around the corners of the display is lessened as well giving you more screen than they've ever given before. Of course, there's still a bit of a bezel on the top and the bottom of the phone, which I welcome I like having a bezel there and instead of having a notch, keep all the sensors put them all up there. That's fine I, don't need a notch intruding into my device and then on the base of the phone, though they could have gotten away with going a little deeper into the phone and bringing the screen down, leaving a little of bezel.

There makes it easier for you to reach the bottom of the phone. It is a larger phone, so you're constantly kind of shifting your hand around the phone depending on what it is that you're doing and when I need to go down and swipe down, so that I could bring up my cards for Samsung pay. I don't have to reach as far as, for example, if the screen went all the way down to the bottom, like it does on an iPhone 10 that took some getting used to all the bottom swiping on an iPhone 10 being so far down at the bottom of the device. So the screen is just absolutely great, as I mentioned before, on this device, it's the best yet on a Samsung device or probably on any device for that matter gives you a ton of screen real estate and a great immersive experience, despite the fact that this is one of the largest phones out there right now, it still feels manageable. It feels good in the hand, as far as the size of the phone, when you say, oh the screen size, is that large, you think wow I'm not going to be able to hold on to that phone, and you absolutely can with the note 9 now the fingerprint reader being placed below the camera is great.

I like that, because reaching up into the corner next to the camera was kind of a pain. I would only find it if I had a case that had Bessel's around it, so that I can kind of reach for it. Now that it's down below the camera, it makes it much easier to find that fingerprint reader and, of course, having the fingerprint reader on the back. There's no replacement for that face. I'd face unlock whatever IRI Scan all that stuff, there's no replacement for having it right there.

When you pull the phone out of your pocket. Put your finger there by the time you get the phone up to your face. It's already unlocked you don't have to wait for the iris scan. You have to wait for anything, it's just there and ready for you to go so with that said, the note 9 is an amazing phone it. Yes, it is super expensive, it's one of the most expensive phones ever sold, but with that Samsung has never given us more reasons to pay that kind of money.

So it is a premium phone for a premium user. For somebody who wants higher-end technology in their pocket, they want more storage, they want more performance, they want more features. That's what you're going to get with the note 9. So if you're interested in the note 9, you want to know more about it, there are links down in the description below, including links to a couple of cases that I've tried with the phone and a couple accessories that I found extremely useful, so make sure to check those out clicking on them. Help support our channel here and, of course, those products help the experience of this phone as well.

In my opinion. So with that said, that's all I've got for you for the note 9 for now make sure to subscribe to our channel, because we will have note 9, specific tips and tutorials, as we've done with previous Android devices and iPhones, to help you get the most out of your mobile experience with your mobile devices, thanks. So much, and I hope to see you back here soon on state of tech.

Source : StateofTech