Galaxy S8 & S8 Plus Thread

[dawheat]

It's not just my noggin, but the question is what actually caused it. Restarts haven't seemed to help, and I've uninstalled a few apps but we'll see what happens.

I assume it just shows something generic like Android OS eating up battery in your stats? The one time this has happened to me once, using Device Maintenance to "optimize" and then restarting solved it.

 

[Raduque]

Picked up an S8 yesterday because my S7e developed the pink line. Gonna send in my S7e for a warranty replacement, but I'm not sure what I will do with the S8. I may keep it, I may return it.

It's fast, the screen is beautiful, and I love the "bezel-less" display, but other than the 64gb internal storage, it really doesn't do anything better than my S7e or do things my S7e can't do.

I'm very slightly leaning towards sending it back and waiting for the Note 8.

 

[gorcorps]

I assume it just shows something generic like Android OS eating up battery in your stats? The one time this has happened to me once, using Device Maintenance to "optimize" and then restarting solved it.

There was one point where the built in weather app was chewing through battery, and the optimizer caught it and fixed it. This time there wasn't anything caught, but my battery has been better this weekend so it might have been a fluke with that app

 

[you2]

Could also be low signal. Phones chew up power when the tower goes down.

 

[lsd]

Picked up an S8 yesterday because my S7e developed the pink line. Gonna send in my S7e for a warranty replacement, but I'm not sure what I will do with the S8. I may keep it, I may return it.

It's fast, the screen is beautiful, and I love the "bezel-less" display, but other than the 64gb internal storage, it really doesn't do anything better than my S7e or do things my S7e can't do.

I'm very slightly leaning towards sending it back and waiting for the Note 8.

Aren't you seeing vastly better battery life? I had an att s7e and went to a t-mobile s8+ and the battery life improved tremendously. I used the s8+ for an hour and a half last night just browsing with wifi and only used 10%. LTE battery life also improved but harder to quantify due to different networks.
I don't know about your usage but that's enough for me to upgrade.

 

[dawheat]

So a lot of us are a month in with the phone - would be interesting to hear some fuller follow-up comments. For me, I'm very happy with the phone. Much more than my prior S7 Edge and Note 5.

- The design has made my S7 Edge feel outdated. I played around with it a couple days ago and the bezels, physical home button - all honestly felt low tech. It's amazing how quickly you move on but I do much prefer the haptic feedback I get for the S8+ home button (after setting it to the most sensitive and for hard press to bring up home).
- The extra screen for the phone size is a constant plus for what I do most - browsing, reading, FB, etc. I have everything set to the most condensed + extra condensed via developer settings which improves the amount of content per screen.
- Battery life is amazingly good for me. Days which would kill my S7 Edge by the afternoon get me to the end of the day with plenty in reserve (30-50%).
- The phone has remained fluid and more responsive than prior Samsung phones. However it's only been a month so I'm keeping an eye on this.
- I haven't really noticed any false touches due to the curves which is considerably improved over the S7 Edge
- Camera seems about the same as my S7 Edge which is good. A little less artificial at night which is a plus though my wife's iPhone 7 still makes more pleasing low light photos, albeit much darker.

2 cons really:
- I've learned to live with the fingerprint scanner as I really only need to use it for Samsung Pass. However if I didn't have a Gear S3 which let's me use Samsung Pay and keeps the phone unlocked when I'm nearby, this would likely be a bigger annoyance. I use two hands now which is not actually unusual considering the size of the S8+, but this is IMO the one improvement the Note 8 can bring with an embedded fingerprint scanner.
- Glass screen protectors are usable but continue to either creak or provide rainbow areas. I *know* you shouldn't have to use one, but I'm super anal about screens. If I get a scratch I can see, it would make me sell it and buy a new one.

 

[Qbah]

I might have been a bit too generous on the battery life... I left home with 100% battery at 10AM. I had 2h30min of calls (screen was on roughly 1/2 of that time), 1h45min of screen-on time (mostly from the calls), 15min of Fallout Shelter and I'm at 60% battery now (6PM). So 40% down in 8 hours of little use, that's not that good actually... 5% per hour. There's really nothing unusual being reported in the details, the % just keeps dropping.

I'm using the LED wallet case (which is constantly powered by the phone's NFC I think?), but come on... that won't last me a day when I'm using it more and going out in the evening...

 

[gorcorps]

Has anybody else noticed their phone doesn't charge correctly after using Gear VR? I'm not entirely sure if that's what triggers it yet, but two times now I've had my phone plugged in overnight and when I unplugged it in the morning the 45%ish that I started at when plugged in is still there. When I check the power settings and look at the power consumption graph, you can see it's stayed flatlined the whole time... almost like the phone refused to charge above that point for some reason.

The only thing I remember doing last night was using the Gear VR while it was attached to a charger. It was also not the samsung charger that came with the phone, if that matters. I've read reports that the older Gear VR wouldn't support other chargers, but you usually get a notification if it detects a different charger and I don't get that... so I didn't know if the current Gear VR has the same hang-ups. I'm not sure if I'm sending the phone into some kind of power hold mode, where it won't charge because it thinks I'm still hooked up to the Gear VR.

I turned the phone off and let it charge while off, which worked fine but I'm still wondering what's causing it. I'll try to use the "official" samsung charger with the Gear VR from now on, but it still seems odd.

 

[gorcorps]

So a lot of us are a month in with the phone - would be interesting to hear some fuller follow-up comments. For me, I'm very happy with the phone. Much more than my prior S7 Edge and Note 5.

- The design has made my S7 Edge feel outdated. I played around with it a couple days ago and the bezels, physical home button - all honestly felt low tech. It's amazing how quickly you move on but I do much prefer the haptic feedback I get for the S8+ home button (after setting it to the most sensitive and for hard press to bring up home).
- The extra screen for the phone size is a constant plus for what I do most - browsing, reading, FB, etc. I have everything set to the most condensed + extra condensed via developer settings which improves the amount of content per screen.
- Battery life is amazingly good for me. Days which would kill my S7 Edge by the afternoon get me to the end of the day with plenty in reserve (30-50%).
- The phone has remained fluid and more responsive than prior Samsung phones. However it's only been a month so I'm keeping an eye on this.
- I haven't really noticed any false touches due to the curves which is considerably improved over the S7 Edge
- Camera seems about the same as my S7 Edge which is good. A little less artificial at night which is a plus though my wife's iPhone 7 still makes more pleasing low light photos, albeit much darker.

2 cons really:
- I've learned to live with the fingerprint scanner as I really only need to use it for Samsung Pass. However if I didn't have a Gear S3 which let's me use Samsung Pay and keeps the phone unlocked when I'm nearby, this would likely be a bigger annoyance. I use two hands now which is not actually unusual considering the size of the S8+, but this is IMO the one improvement the Note 8 can bring with an embedded fingerprint scanner.
- Glass screen protectors are usable but continue to either creak or provide rainbow areas. I *know* you shouldn't have to use one, but I'm super anal about screens. If I get a scratch I can see, it would make me sell it and buy a new one.

I love it. I upgraded from a 6P and prefer the S8 in nearly every way. The only thing better on the 6P is the location of the fingerprint sensor, but I've gotten used to the S8 enough to get by and it's not as bad as I thought it would be.

The thin case that I'm using doesn't affect the size of the phone much, which makes it feel fantastic. My very first case was a typical rubber w/ plastic shell hybrid and it was boring in comparison. More protected, but ultimately boring. The thin case I have on now makes a huge difference in usability. I will say that if I used a thin case on any of my other phones it also would probably have been an improvement, but the design of the S8 really shines.

Apart from the few days of battery issues I've had which seem like something is wrong (outliers basically) the battery life is solid. Not only is it good, it's good without having to disable a bunch of features like I used to do. I leave everything on push, my weather app is up to date with my location, bluetooth stays on for the most part for my Garmin band, and I'm still in much better shape than my previous device.

Plus, and I know there's a lot of people who will scoff at such a claim, but modern day Samsung gives a better experience than the vanilla Android you get from a Nexus. You can argue that the only reason it's this smooth is because of brute force... that phones are fast enough to keep up with the bloat, but whatever the reason may be it still works.
There is nothing I need to root for at this point, as it's already covered by either Android or Samsung. This is a big deal, as there were still a couple things I wanted to root for on the 6P which caused problems with Android Pay, but now I use Samsung Pay and it works great. Just used it yesterday and I liked it. The way it's integrated into the phone so I can pull it up anywhere is also nice.

As you mentioned, the only thing holding it off from being perfect is how it will hold up over time. How will the battery life fair, and clunky will things be two years down the road? I'm pretty optimistic though.

 

[pauldun170]

Took it off charge at around 6PM friday, went camping Friday evening through Sunday morning taking lots of pics and videos.
Then after getting home went for a bike ride followed up by a run (runtastic and Roadbike pro) (1.5 hours worth)
Finally put it on the charger Sunday night with 28% remaining.
Note: I have not installed and social media apps and have been using web versions for each.

Fingerprint sensor and placement rocks.
Iris scanner is lightning quick most of the time (I wear glasses).
No issues with VR nor have I experienced any issues with charging after using it.

Not liking the heat produced using Samsung's fast wireless charger. I've been using the cable more often than not.

 

[Raduque]

Aren't you seeing vastly better battery life?

Honestly, no. But I have marginal signal at home (regularly drops from LTE to 3G, not sure how that's gonna play out when Verizon kills the 3g network), so that negatively affects battery life. I've only had it 4 days, though.

 

[Qbah]

So.... my first gripe. When the screen is locked and turned off, putting the finger on the sensor unlocks the phone. Is there any way to disable that "convenience" which just causes me to accidentally unlock the phone when putting it in my pocket? Obviously I still want to be allowed to use the fingerprint scanner to unlock the phone - but only once the screen is on. When the screen is off, the fingerprint scanner shouldn't be usable.

I tried googling, but it's a hard question to ask in the engine... I need the fingerprint scanner to not react to my finger when the screen is off. Right now it does and unlocks the phone.

 

[Yakk]

Honestly, no. But I have marginal signal at home (regularly drops from LTE to 3G, not sure how that's gonna play out when Verizon kills the 3g network), so that negatively affects battery life. I've only had it 4 days, though.

Can you use wifi calling? I use it all the time now as fallback in large buildings or poor signal areas, works fantastic.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

Picked up the S8+ yesterday and love it so far. Came from an S6 Edge. The one thing I've been trying to figure out is how to move the edge tab on the home screen from the right to the left, where I had it previously. Is this not an option? I didn't see it in the edge settings. Otherwise, love the phone so far.

 

[clamum]

I've had my S8+ for a week and I am loving it. Wayyyy better battery life than my S7 Edge; it's just awesome. I've only taken a couple pictures but from what I gather the camera is about equal to the S7's which is fine since that is an excellent camera. I dig the bigger screen. I haven't gamed on it yet but don't see why that won't be also excellent. I'm definitely not messing with Gear VR on it since I now have the HTC Vive and was never a fan of the shitty VR software/apps on my S7. Anything that auto updates when auto update is turned off is shit in my book (not to mention its problem with battery drain before).

 

[IamDavid]

Crazy how it seems each person is having totally different battery life results. So far after 1 week mine is absolute trash. I might get 8 hours if I'm lucky. I am a heavy user but come on, this isn't 2005.

 

[Ackmed]

Has anybody else noticed their phone doesn't charge correctly after using Gear VR? I'm not entirely sure if that's what triggers it yet, but two times now I've had my phone plugged in overnight and when I unplugged it in the morning the 45%ish that I started at when plugged in is still there. When I check the power settings and look at the power consumption graph, you can see it's stayed flatlined the whole time... almost like the phone refused to charge above that point for some reason.

The only thing I remember doing last night was using the Gear VR while it was attached to a charger. It was also not the samsung charger that came with the phone, if that matters. I've read reports that the older Gear VR wouldn't support other chargers, but you usually get a notification if it detects a different charger and I don't get that... so I didn't know if the current Gear VR has the same hang-ups. I'm not sure if I'm sending the phone into some kind of power hold mode, where it won't charge because it thinks I'm still hooked up to the Gear VR.

I turned the phone off and let it charge while off, which worked fine but I'm still wondering what's causing it. I'll try to use the "official" samsung charger with the Gear VR from now on, but it still seems odd.

I have not noticed any charge problems, I use wireless though. I have used my VR about a dozen times so far, no problems that I have noticed. I will try to time it if I can remember.

So a lot of us are a month in with the phone - would be interesting to hear some fuller follow-up comments. For me, I'm very happy with the phone. Much more than my prior S7 Edge and Note 5.

- The design has made my S7 Edge feel outdated. I played around with it a couple days ago and the bezels, physical home button - all honestly felt low tech. It's amazing how quickly you move on but I do much prefer the haptic feedback I get for the S8+ home button (after setting it to the most sensitive and for hard press to bring up home).
- The extra screen for the phone size is a constant plus for what I do most - browsing, reading, FB, etc. I have everything set to the most condensed + extra condensed via developer settings which improves the amount of content per screen.
- Battery life is amazingly good for me. Days which would kill my S7 Edge by the afternoon get me to the end of the day with plenty in reserve (30-50%).
- The phone has remained fluid and more responsive than prior Samsung phones. However it's only been a month so I'm keeping an eye on this.
- I haven't really noticed any false touches due to the curves which is considerably improved over the S7 Edge
- Camera seems about the same as my S7 Edge which is good. A little less artificial at night which is a plus though my wife's iPhone 7 still makes more pleasing low light photos, albeit much darker.

2 cons really:
- I've learned to live with the fingerprint scanner as I really only need to use it for Samsung Pass. However if I didn't have a Gear S3 which let's me use Samsung Pay and keeps the phone unlocked when I'm nearby, this would likely be a bigger annoyance. I use two hands now which is not actually unusual considering the size of the S8+, but this is IMO the one improvement the Note 8 can bring with an embedded fingerprint scanner.
- Glass screen protectors are usable but continue to either creak or provide rainbow areas. I *know* you shouldn't have to use one, but I'm super anal about screens. If I get a scratch I can see, it would make me sell it and buy a new one.

As for your first negative point, you can set it to stay unlocked at a certain location, or when in your pocket on your person.

I still have no real issues with it, I thought the fingerprint placement would be annoying, but it is not. On Samsung Pay is last for 15 seconds, so doing it and then putting the phone up the to card slot to pay is no biggie.

 

[gorcorps]

Crazy how it seems each person is having totally different battery life results. So far after 1 week mine is absolute trash. I might get 8 hours if I'm lucky. I am a heavy user but come on, this isn't 2005.

Really? That seems really out of the norm for this phone. If it's consistent, you might have a hardware issue and could it replaced fairly easily before you get too far down the road

 

[dawheat]

Crazy how it seems each person is having totally different battery life results. So far after 1 week mine is absolute trash. I might get 8 hours if I'm lucky. I am a heavy user but come on, this isn't 2005.

What does your battery stats page say is using the battery?

 

[Raduque]

My battery life was significantly better tonight. 9 and a half hours off the charger, 60% left. 1.5hr sot. Playing music over wired connection for ~7 hours, and a game for 30. The difference tonight? I set the wifi to sleep with the device unless it's charging.

 

[IamDavid]

Battery was under 10% after 12hours today.

42% screen. - Auto dimming settings used.
29% Android System.
21% Android OS.
11% idle????
10% email.
Bunch of 5-7%

Not sure why everything wouldn't add up to 100%... Guess I'm too used to WP.

I'm taking it back to BB tomorrow. Its gotta be a defective battery or something.

 

[XavierMace]

My email still wasn't syncing in a timely manner so based off a thread on Reddit, I uninstalled the Gmail app which reverted it back to an old version. Email looks to be syncing perfectly now, time will tell if that holds up.

 

[lsd]

Battery was under 10% after 12hours today.

42% screen. - Auto dimming settings used.
29% Android System.
21% Android OS.
11% idle????
10% email.
Bunch of 5-7%

Not sure why everything wouldn't add up to 100%... Guess I'm too used to WP.

I'm taking it back to BB tomorrow. Its gotta be a defective battery or something.

Which phone it and what is the screen on time?

 

[IamDavid]

Which phone it and what is the screen on time?

S8+
Swapped out the device this afternoon hoping its a defective battery. The BB guy tried telling me it was probably due too using it with the Samsung S3??? If that's true I'll be moving on from Samsung. I can't find anything that backs up his claim so I'm guessing he was just guessing.

 

[gorcorps]

S8+
Swapped out the device this afternoon hoping its a defective battery. The BB guy tried telling me it was probably due too using it with the Samsung S3??? If that's true I'll be moving on from Samsung. I can't find anything that backs up his claim so I'm guessing he was just guessing.

Might be, but it's not a Samsung thing. Battery life on my Nexus 6p was awful when I was using a smart watch. In my case it was a Sony watch, but it wouldn't surprise me if you get much better battery life without a constantly active Bluetooth connection. Don't blame Samsung for something that's going to happen to everyone