Samsung India just launched its flagship, the Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus and the Galaxy S9 in the Indian market earlier this week.
The dual-aperture camera is the S9's most exciting feature
The company sent us a review device for the Galaxy S9 Plus and I have been using the device for more than 48 hours. In this brief amount of time, I have used this smartphone as my main device to see how it performs and how the features fare in the real-world scenario.
One thing to note here is that this is not a detailed review and that will arrive in the coming week. Now, diving into my experience with the Galaxy S9 Plus in last two days, the device can be summed in two words, ‘Mind-blowing’. Even though the exterior of the device is similar to the previous generation of the S series, the Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus. It is almost indistinguishable from the front if I am holding the S8 or the S9 while the back of the device makes it easier for users to notice the difference because of the changed position of the fingerprint scanner to be situated below the camera module.
However, I feel that the similar design with small yet extremely useful tweaks such as the changed position of the fingerprint scanner is a good decision on part of Samsung engineers as the Galaxy S8, S8 Plus and the Note 8 were really good in terms of the design. The Galaxy S9 Plus 256 GB that I am using is priced at a price of Rs 72,900. It is the top of the line model that the company offers which means that you will not have to spend over Rs 1 lakh to buy the best device from Samsung, yet. There are a number of cash-back offers and additional benefits that were announced during the launch of the device ensuring that the price is comfortably below Rs 70,000 for people who want to buy the device early.
The Samsung Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus. Image: Samsung Newsroom
There offers will ensure that users who are looking at the mid-premium range of device and also think of the possibility of buying the Galaxy S9 series with the existing cash back offers and exchange offers. With these offers, I feel like the device is worth buying for users looking to get the top of the line flagship in the year 2018. Moving to the features of the device, the key highlight of the Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus is its camera where it packs the first dual-aperture camera on the back of the device along with a dual camera setup where both the lenses pack OIS.
The dual-aperture lens of the back of the camera gives users the option to choose either the widest aperture possible on camera smartphones at the time of writing, f/1.5 or the more conservative f/2.4 in manual mode. Otherwise, the camera automatically chooses which aperture to shoot the images at. I did notice that Samsung is over processing the images a bit but the images are overall ‘very pleasing’ to look at. The second most significant feature of the device is to shoot video with 720p resolution at a staggering 960 FPS.
A slide from Samsung's Galaxy S9 camera presentation. Image: YouTube/Samsung
The resolution is not as high as one would expect and the quality takes a hit when it comes to the dimly-lit environment. But in broad daylight, the quality is significantly better. Galaxy S9 Plus is not the first device to introduce as it is already present of the Sony devices and the software offers two modes to invoke this mode. An auto mode where the camera tries to guess the motion in the frame and then capture the super slow video or the manual mode where users have to specify a box and the software will look for motion in that box. The device can show at 240 fps in 1080p and at 60 fps in 4K mode (previously only available in Apple iPhone X). If you want stabilised video in 4K then you will have to settle with 30 fps video recording as 60 fps does not come with OIS.
The speakers have been tuned with AKG and are considerably louder in comparison to the previous generation. Other changes in the hardware are evolutionary than revolutionary and we have already highlighted the differences in the detailed comparison of the device with its competition. It may not make sense for Samsung Galaxy S8, S8 Plus or even Note 8 users then it may not make much sense for you to upgrade but if you have anything older then the S8 line-up then the upgrade to this overall impressive package will be worth it.
Published Date: Mar 10, 2018 00:12 AM | Updated Date: Mar 10, 2018 00:15 AM
