You can't satisfy everyone. 74.5 million iPhone users last quarter seemed to not care at all for lack of microSD slot and removable battery. I am sure Samsung did market research to gauge the % of users who actually bought a spare battery/microSD for their Galaxy line before they made this decision. Despite Samsung having swappable battery and microSD and water-proofing, millions of consumers abandoned Samsung in favour of the iPhone 6/6 Plus. Therefore, it doesn't sound like those features are actually that important for the overall market. That's why Samsung needed to act. I think they brought a lot to the table in terms of features this time and the premium build that puts the hardware well above iPhone 6 -- a phone that's its primary competitive and has dominated sales and profits.
The decision to leave out the microSD slot probably has a lot do with profits. If Samsung can't sustain profitability, well we won't even see Samsung S7/8, etc. That's not good for the industry. 32GB of memory is still better than 16GB of its primary competitor. iOS took
88.7% of the industry's profits. Android might have high market share but the manufacturers are hardly making $ selling Android devices. That's an unsustainable business model.
On the hardware side, the S6 basically beats the iPhone 6 in almost everything. Single core CPU performance is nearly at iPhone 6 level but multi-core is up to 70% faster based on GeekBench multi-core scores (
5004 vs. 2918 for iPhone 6 Plus). The Exynos chip will likely have the Wolfson DAC making this a good base to start with for audio listening. The screen seems to be the world's best for a smartphone with insanely high PPI and all the advantages of AMOLED over LCD. It also looks like the world's fastest rechargeable phone (4H in 10 min or 1/2 the time of Iphone 6 to 100%). I've used the Samsung S5/Note 4 cameras and they blew iPhone 5S/6/6Plus out of the water in both daytime and low light but the iPhone is practically worthless for night shots (or in poorly lit places like nightclubs).
Note 4 already blew iPhone 6 Plus' camera away and the S6 is even better. The selfie is also at 5MP, miles away from iPhone's 1.2 MP.
The iPhone 6 also has just an 1810mAh battery life, which is mediocre in the real world. In PhoneArena's testing the iPhone 6's battery was
even worse than the LG G3, and way behind Samsung S5's. GSM Arena confirms the same.
The iPhone's talk time has been very mediocre for years.
It's not going to be that hard for the S6 to beat iPhone 6's battery performance in the real world, not to mention Samsung has a power saving mode. You can send SMS and access basic functions for days with this function.
Samsung is unlikely to get many existing iPhone owners to upgrade due to the eco-system (some people prefer the simplicity of iOS and if you spent a lot of $ at the app store, you are unlikely to switch). However, for new customers such as younger kids growing up, this will give them a second thought instead of just getting the iPhone automatically. Plus, there is wireless charging out of the box and what looks like a smartphone with the world's fastest NAND.
"The AndroBench memory speed test result shows a mind-boggling improvement in read and write speeds over the Galaxy S5! We'll let the numbers speak for themselves. Where last year's flagship scored 24.2MB/s (sequential write_, the Galaxy S6 edge scored 139.08MB/s! Where the Galaxy S5 scored 176.5Mb/s (sequential read), the Galaxy S6 Edge scored 314.87MB/s! And where the Galaxy S5 scored 13.7MB/s (random read), the Galaxy S6 edge scored 77.2MB/s! All that in just a year! We're extremely impressed with what the new UFS 2.0 storage has to show so far."
http://www.phonearena.com/news/Firs...n-AnTuTu-and-outrageous-memory-speeds_id66653
The actual hardware is so far ahead of iPhone 6 that even iPhone 6S is unlikely to beat the S6 in many key areas besides single core CPU performance. What Samsung needs to do though is market all these advantages well because the average person isn't just going to be sold by the metal body alone since the iPhone 6 is a well-built phone. Samsung needs to drive the point home that iPhone 6 takes twice as long to charge, that S6 has the world's best screen, and fastest flash memory for accessing photos/videos, as well as a camera that well actually works in low light and at night with a flash without looking like total usable garbage!
I like how some random X guy on the Internets says his battery lasts forever means a removable battery is a useless feature for the rest of us plebs will never have batteries dying at the one year mark or so. (Which my own Note 3 did FFS)
I've been using my iPhone 5S for nearly 1.5 years now and I charge it 1-2 times a day due to heavy usage and iPhone 5S's rather mediocre battery life when using it for internet browsing + phone calls. The battery is still going strong and holds charge pretty well. For the US/Canada/European smartphone model of 2-year-contracts the dying battery towards the end of the contract isn't that big of a concern.
I think you guys need to understand that Samsung has been losing market share to the low cost Chinese alternatives in Asia, while it's getting killed in the developed world by the iPhone.
Taking eco-system aside, I have to ask myself why would I get an iPhone 6 over a Samsung S6 when it comes to upgrading this year? I can't think of many reasons. That's why I think Samsung has done a very good job. The HTC M9 looks OK but it's way too thick imo considering the S6 is just 6.8mm and S6's screen will be better in IQ and sharper than HTC's.
The only big positives are the 14nm cpu and that they apparently greatly improved the fingerprint sensor.
Really? You missed a ton of others:
- Speaker is 50% louder than on the Samsung S5
- UFS 2.0 storage with superb read and write speeds
- The best camera out of any Android/iOS device
- 4 hours of battery life after just 10 min of charging and 1/2 the charge time of iPhone 6 to 100%
- Wireless charging built in out of the box
- 5MP selfie with 120* viewing angle which is huge for females and teens/Instagram crowd
- Way thinner and lighter than most competing Android phones. The thinness and lightness puts HTC M9 to shame.
- Will have the world's best smartphone screen taking over from Note 4 as the current champ
If none of these matter to you, it doesn't mean they are not big improvements in a span of 1 year. Also, a lot of smartphone users who have used a metal phone for years wouldn't touch a plastic phone like LG G4 no matter the specs. If someone wants a well-rounded
premium phone that's not too thick, the current choices are very limited to iPhone 6/6+ and Samsung S6. For those who really care for the removable battery and microSD slot, the Note 4 is still a great phone.
HTC M9 is a flop -- too thick at 9.6 mm (!), worse screen, and
mediocre camera and has none of the cool features of S6. It's like they didn't even try.