Samsung Galaxy Note 4
vs
iPhone 6 plus comparison
Samsung is known for its
feature-rich (some would say "overflowing"), utilitarian designs but
it's slowly coming around to metal designs with the Alpha and now the Galaxy
Note 4. It's just a metal rim, so the user-replaceable battery and microSD card
slot are intact.
The screen size also remained
unchanged (5.7") to keep the device manageable single-handedly, but
resolution increased to QHD. The defining feature of the Note series, the S
Pen, was also improved and Samsung included optical image stabilization (OIS)
to the list of camera specs.
The biggest change for Apple is
the screen - after years of keeping just about the same size and sharpness, the
company took the plunge. The design language changed more than it did for the
Galaxy and is now smooth and rounded like an iPod Touch, it's impressively slim
too. It's the OIS-enabled camera that is the other advantage over the vanilla
iPhone 6.
With bigger screens, both phones
and their respective platforms (iOS and Android + TouchWiz) have their ways of
boosting usability.
Pros
· iPhone 6
Plus has great specs and build quality
· Like a
smaller more connected iPad
Cons
· Galaxy
Note 4 has more raw power
· Samsung's
phone has better display specs
iPhone
6 Plus vs Galaxy Note 4 comparison review
UK price
The
Galaxy Note 4 is a premium high-end smartphone so it's no surprise to see it
with a price tag of around £550 inc VAT for the 32GB edition. The iPhone 6 Plus
costs a bit more. There are three models which start at £619 for the 16GB
model. This scales up to £699 for 64GB, and £789 for 128GB. You will pay a premium
for the iPhone phablet just as you pay extra for any iPhone. We think that is a
worthwhile expense, but the Galaxy Note 4 is a tremendous handset. So let's see
what you get for the money with the iPhone 6 Plus.
Key specs and performance
With the
Galaxy Note 4 you get a 2.7 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 805 processor or
Exynos 5433 octa-core processor, and 3GB of RAM. We found it to be extremely
smooth and snappy when launching and switching apps.
The iPhone
6 Plus comes with a new processor, known as the A8. This is a 20-nanometer
64-bit CPU with 2 billion transistors. It is a dual core chip with a frequency
of 1.2 GHz. It's paired with 1GB RAM. The iPhone 6 Plus is consummately slick
and zippy in use.
Some Android manufacturers -
Samsung included - have been accused of gaming benchmarks. You should know that
both of these handsets are super-fast, responsive, and powerful.
Screen
The screen on the Samsung Galaxy
Note 4 is stunning. It's a 5.7in Quad-HD Super AMOLED display. That's a
resolution of 2560 x 1440, which means a whopping 515ppi pixel density. The
iPhone 6 Plus has a 5.5-inch Retina HD screen, which means in this case a
resolution of 1920 x 1080 and a pixel density of 401 ppi. So again lagging
behind in terms of pure specs, but will you notice the difference? Apple says
it offers wider viewing angles because of its dual-domain pixels, after all.
While using the Note 4, we found
that the screen had an incredible sense of depth, and we can imagine that it'll
be difficult to go back to full-HD once you've used a smartphone or tablet with
a Quad HD screen like this one. Which is not to say the the iPhone 6 Plus
display is in any way a bad screen, just that the Note 4's is quantifiably
better.
Storage
The 32GB Galaxy Note 4 comes with
a microSD card slot which can take up to 128GB cards. The iPhone 6 Plus comes
in 16GB, 64GB and 128GB flavors, but has no expandable storage. Onboard storage
is always better for performance, but it is reflected in the price. None the
less, with the exception of the next to useless 16GB model, we prefer the
iPhone's storage options. Onboard is always better.
Software
Android vs iOS is a conundrum.
Android isn't like it used to be: if you are new to the smartphone game there's
no obvious winner. These are the two most popular and best mobile operating
systems around so it's about picking which one is right for you.
In essence, if you are a
long-term iOS user you are probably best off sticking with what you know. You
have after all almost certainly spent a lot of cash on apps that you'll have to
spend again in Android. But it is worth considering that your iTunes music
files will work in Android, and Android offers the opportunity of shopping
around for music, movies, books and TV shows.
Cameras
The iPhone 6 Plus has the same
top-line megapixel numbers as the iPhone 5s: 8Mp on the rear, and 1.2Mp on the
front. But some things are more important than megapixel count. Apple assures
us that the new iSight camera is better than its predecessor in many ways:
optical image stabilization, is an impressive addition; as is
continuous-autofocus when shooting video. We like the option of 240fps slow-mo
video as well as 120fps. Improved panorama shots, face detection and low-light
performance, round out Apple's claimed improvements. And burst mode has been
added to the front-facing camera as well the rear one.
Samsung has improved the camera
in the Galaxy Note 4, and we found the results to be quite impressive. The
rear-facing camera is 16 Mp, with auto focus and Smart OIS (optical image stabilization).
HDR on the Galaxy Note 4 offers a live preview, so you can see exactly what
your image will look like before you capture it which is a neat trick. As you
would expect, it can still record 4K video like its predecessor.
