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Samsung Galaxy S5 Review

I’ve been using my Samsung Galaxy S5 on AT&T since Monday, and so far, while I like some things more than the iPhone 4S, there are a few simple changes I wish that I could change.

Likes

I have been a fan of Google more than Microsoft or Apple. I’ve loved GMail since I started using it, I like Picasa (though not perfect, it’s free). They have a big footprint in the open-source world, and so I love the integration that an Android has with Google products. I’m using Google Voice for my voicemail, which provides some really cool features, such as speech-to-text, which lets me get the gist without having to listen to it. It’s not 100% accurate, not even 75% accurate sometimes, but I can usually figure out what it’s about. I use Chrome everywhere, and the ability to set the default applications (for everything, not just web browser) is a plus that Apple doesn’t allow. I’ve been using Google Play Music to manage my collection, and I’m definitely a fan (but I wish they would do better at detecting duplicate uploads).

It seems to have a good camera on it, so that’s a plus. I haven’t had much need for it, but I’m sure it will work really well for my needs. The weather built-in weather widget/app looks great, and is functional.

Dislikes

The biggest problem I have with this phone is lock screen notifications. Samsung did a horrible job at designing the lock screen. They either need to allow the notification tray drop-down while locked, or show notifications from all my apps, not just Samsung. I want to use Hangouts for messages, but they don’t show up on my lock screen like Samsung’s messages application does. Emails don’t show up at all. My other option is to just take off the lock, and use the notification tray to view my messages/emails. I could root the phone, and put Google’s lock screen back on, but sounds like a risk I don’t want to take with a new $800 phone.

 

The battery doesn’t last as long as I’d like, but I’m also pulling it out more often because it’s my new toy. Maybe it won’t be bad when it’s not so new.

Overall

This is a good phone, but the lock screen is lacking majorly. Samsung, remove or improve TouchWiz, and I’ll bump this to 5/5.

Rating: 4/5 (due to lock screen)

Fix (Added 10:32 PM)

After posting, I’ve found a fix. While it’s not pretty or intuitive, it will work for me. Install NiLS Notification Lock Screen, and NiLS Floating Panel.

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