Samsung Galaxy Note 9 vs Galaxy Note 8 By SuperSaf

- What's up guys, Saf here on SuperSaf TV and in this video we're going to be lookin' at the key differences between the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 and the Samsung Galaxy Note 8. So this is probably been the most requested video on the channel recently. Looks like a lot of people are interested to see whether it's worth upgrading from the Note 8 to the Note 9, or whether it's worth picking up the Note 8 right now which will be at a cheaper price. So of course, we'll be breaking everything down SuperSaf style and hopefully, at the end of this video, you'd have made a decision. So let's start off with the sizes. Both are very, very similar in size.

When you've got both in your hand you're probably not going to be able to tell much of a difference, but the Note 9 is slightly shorter and it's slightly wider as well as slightly thicker. Now, this is because it has a slightly larger display, 6.4 inches versus 6.3 inches on the Note 8, but we do have super AMOLED technology on both devices as well as a Quad HD+ resolution. Now honestly speaking, both are some of the best displays out right now; we've got great viewing angles, really vibrant colors, and details are very, very sharp. They're also infinity displays, so we've got small bezels on the top and the bottom, although the Note 9 does have a slightly smaller chin compared to the Note 8. One thing, you're probably not going to notice this unless you compare them side by side.

In terms of brightness, I've tested both of these out in direct sunlight and they perform really well. It was very difficult for me to tell much of a difference. I'd say the Note 9 is maybe a tad brighter, but once again I don't think you can go wrong with either of these displays. Now if you look at the build and design you can clearly see that the Note 9 is an incremental update to the Note 8 because everything is very similar. We've got Samsung's traditional metal and glass sandwich.

The glass on the front and the back is Gorilla Glass 5 and it is curved in on both sides. It's symmetrical. It feels really nice. The Note 9, this here, however, does have a slight chamfer around the metal frame which does look really slick. Both devices are also IP68 water and dust resistant, which is great so you won't have a problem if you get a bit of a splash on either of these.

And we got some different color options available on both devices, and the Note 9 has a bit of a two-tone look I would say, whereas it's got much more of a flat look on the Note 8. I'm definitely digging this new style color on the Note 9. Now you probably have noticed that I've already got lots of fingerprints on both devices and that is something that you're going to get and because they're made of metal and glass if you do drop these then they're likely to have some damage and for that reason I'd definitely recommend picking up a case from our video sponsor Tech21. Tech21 have just launched their new range of cases for the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 which guarantee the most effective protection drop after drop. This is thanks to their impact absorbing materials, FlexShock and BulletShield, which protects from drops of up to 3.6 meters and the fact that Tech21 drop test their cases 20 times to ensure durable, long lasting protection, and if you want to pick up a case from Tech21, then I'll be leaving some links in the description below. Right, now moving on to the internals, we've got some big improvements.

So, on the Note 8, we've got either the Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor or Samsung's 8895. Now this will depend on your region which one you get. The Note 9 being the new device does come with the latest and greatest, so we've got either the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor or Samsung's Exynos 9810. So You are going to be getting improved performance on the Note 9 compared to the Note 8. It's roughly about 30% faster and 30% more efficient, and what's really cool about the Note 9, pun intended, is that it's got a built-in, water, carbon-cooling system.

This is really cool because if you're gaming for long sessions and things, it's going to ensure that your device doesn't overheat. Now although both devices come with 6GB of ram as a base, there is also an 8GB of ram version available on the Note 9 so that is also an option that you have there if you are somebody who does lots and lots of tasking and really makes the most of your device. Now moving on to storage, the Note 8 comes with a base of 64GB. The Note 9 now comes with double that as a base, 128GB, but you can also get a 512GB version, which is absolutely insane. I still can't get over how awesome that is.

However, both of these do come with a micro sd cards slot so you can expand the storage on both of these, which is absolutely great. Now for the operating systems, we do have Android Oreo on both devices. We've got 8.0 currently on the Note 8. On the Note 9, we've got version 8.1. Both devices do come with the Samsung experience skin on top, so we are going to be getting overall a very similar experience on both of these.

Moving on to the camera, as we do have lots of improvements with the rear-facing cameras, however, the front facing camera is very similar on both. We've got 8MP with an f/1.7 aperture on autofocus. The Note 9, however, does have selfie focus. This is where it's going to blur the background of your shots. It works ok, it still doesn't work as well as something like the Pixel in my experience.

Now for the rear-facing cameras, we do have quite a few differences. So we've got dual camera setups on both. On the Note 8, we've got dual 12MP cameras with optilink stabilization. The primary camera has an f/1.7 aperture and the secondary camera has an f/2.4 aperture, this is a telephoto camera and it's going to give you two times optical zoom. Now in my experience the Note 8 has performed really well, it's got great cameras, we've also got live focus which is going to blur the background and you can edit the blur after the fact too.

Now although the Note 9 still has dual 12MP cameras with optilink stabilization, it does improve from the Note 8 and that is because the primary camera now has a dual aperture, so it's going to switch between f/1.5 and f/2.4 depending on the amount of light that you see. The second new camera is once again telephoto camera, with optical zoom and an f/2.4 aperture Now the main improvements I've noticed in my testing have to be in low light where the f/1.5 aperture on the Note 9 really comes into play and also in terms of dynamic range. I've noticed that the Note 9 does have better software processing and it does give you better dynamic range over whitening your shots. This is also something called forward detection on the Note 9 and this is basically going to try to tell you if the shot hasn't come out properly, maybe somebody's got their eyes closed or maybe if it's a bit of a blurry shot so this is something that's improved and you've also got AI built into the software of the Note 9 so it's going to try to improve your images slightly depending on what it sees. This is something that we don't have on the Note 8.

The video as well we've got some improvements on the Note 9. Firstly you do have 4k up to 60 frames a second versus 30 frames a second on the Note 8 and then we've also got improvements in slow motion. You've got 1080p at up to 240 frames a second on the Note 9. We've also got super slow mo which is 960 frames a second at 720p. This is a short burst but it does produce some external results if you get it right.

You've only got up to 720p at 240 frames a second on the Note 8 in comparison. We do have further improvements on the Note 9. The fingerprint scanner is now placed in a much more accessible position. So it is, still a little bit high, but it's a lot more reachable here than it was on the Note 9 where it's right next to the cameras. This is something that I complained about last year as well.

It's a very awkward position to have the fingerprint scanner and you know, you can't really reach it especially on this larger device and I usually find myself having to use my left hand to unlock the device using the fingerprint scanner. On the Note 9, it is definitely more accessible but I still think it's a little bit too high. Now you don't have to use the fingerprint scanner on either device if you don't want to and that is because we do have an iris scanner as well as facial recognition on both devices. The Note 9, however, does have intelligence scan and this is where it uses a combination of the iris scanner as well as facial recognition. This is something that's not available on the Note 8.

When it comes to audio we do have a 3.5 mm headphone jack on both devices which is great but on the Note 8 we only have a single bottom firing speaker, which is okay but it's easier to cover, and it's not great and we've got a big, big improvement here on the Note 9 and this time we have stereo speakers so one is in the earpiece and one is bottom firing. They tuned by AKG and they also have Dolby Atmos and they sound absolutely great it's a big, big improvement and I'm glad that we finally got stereo speakers on the Note series. Moving on to the S-Pens, now, these are what really separate the Note devices from many other devices out there. Both the Note 8 and the Note 9 have an S-Pen but there's some big differences between these two. So with the Note 8, it's a very useful S-Pen.

You can do off-screen memos. You can hover over currencies and text and it's going to translate it and things. There's lots of cool features here with the S-Pen on the Note 8 but the Note 9 has Bluetooth built into the S-Pen. This is a first on the Note series. This means that the S-Pen is slightly thicker and slightly heavier.

It's really nothing that you are going to notice but it does allow some really cool, remote control features on the Note 9. So you can launch apps by just pressing and holding. You can customize which app you want it to launch. If you wanted the camera, for example, you can press twice and it's going to switch between the front and rear facing cameras and pressing once is going to take a picture. You can use the S-Pen to slide through the gallery or slideshows.

You've also got Samsung Dex built into the Note 9 so you're going to be able to connect this on to a big screen just with a dongle. You're not going to need a dock like you need on the Note 8 and because of this new S-Pen you're going to be able to have maybe a presentation on the big screen and you're going to be able to control that presentation and kind of go through slides and things using just the S-Pen at up to 10 meters distance because of Bluetooth. Now that's very, very cool. This does mean that we now have a battery inside the S-Pen, this is something that we didn't previously have on the Note 8. However, this battery lasts up to 30 minutes and to charge it you simply pop it back in and it's going to charge fully within 40 seconds and even if the battery's all the way down you're still going to be able to use it like you can use it on the Note 8.

You just won't have the remote control functionality. Now let's talk about the battery. The Note 8 has the 3300mAh battery which is not too big considering the size of this device and it does seem that Samsung did this because of all the controversy around the Note 7. They tried to pack in a big battery in a compact body and that did cause some issues. So to kind of get past that and give the consumers confidence, it looks like they did put a smaller battery inside the Note 8, because of this, and it was okay but it wasn't great in my experience.

Good news is, on the Note 9 we have a massive 4000mAh battery, and already I'm seeing a big improvement in terms of battery life in my usage with the Note 9. So that is a big, big plus that you've got here on the Note 9. Both devices, however, do support fast charging as well as fast wireless charging. So that is also nice to get a quick top off whenever you need. Finally looking at the price, so the Note 8 on release was around £870 in the UK and in the US it was roughly about $950.

This price has come down quite significantly and you can pick up the Note 8 at roughly around $700 from the last time I saw. The Note 9 comes in slightly higher compared to what the Note 8 came in at so you're looking at £900 or $1000. Now to me, this is pretty good because this is for double the storage compared to what you had on the Note 8 and of course you've got all of the additional features. Having said that, however, the Note 8 is now a year old so of course, it has dropped quite a bit in price and you may even be able to pick up something second hand for quite a bit cheaper. So to answer the question, "is it worth upgrading from the Note 8 to the Note 9?" Well, if you're currently on the Note 8 you still have a really good device and I think it's still last you a little bit more time but if you are after the new features on the Note 9, the bigger battery, more storage, the performance improvements, as well as that all special S-Pen with the remote control functionality, then the Note 9 seems like a great option and currently is something that ticks all the boxes and is probably one of the best all-around devices that you can buy right now.

That's what I think anyway. What do you guys think? Definitely drop me a comment below and let me know. I hope you enjoyed this video and found it useful. If you did then do hit that thumbs up for me and if you haven't already then be sure to subscribe and switch on notifications. We've got lots more no man coverage coming here on the channel as well as lots of other tech content.

Thanks for watching, this is Saf, SuperSaf TV and I'll see you next time.

Source : SuperSaf