iPhone 5 vs Samsung Galaxy S2 Review – Intro
What’s amazing when you do an iPhone 5 vs Samsung Galaxy S2 Review is just how relevant the comparison still is. Remember, we’re comparing the latest smart mobile phone from the world’s leading provider of mobiles – the Apple iPhone 5 – with a device which has been out for the better part of a year and a half – the Samsung Galaxy S2. And they are still worthy of comparison.
The truth is that people are almost certainly divided between these devices not based on their specifications or capabilities, but on lines of brand and price. Some people just have to have the latest Apple iPhone so they’ll choose the iPhone 5. Some people love Android and are on a budget so they’ll go for the Galaxy S2.
In the opinion of Whatphone, however, our responsibility is to provide you the information you need in order to be able to make the choice about what phone is right for you. Let’s put these flagship models from the greatest mobile phone manufacturers in the world next to each other and see which iconic product warrants your hard earned cash.
iPhone 5 vs Samsung Galaxy S2 Review – What’s Different ?
iPhone 5 feels much smaller to hold
Putting them side by side, the first thing which jumps out about the differences between them is the size of the device. If you went just by the dimensions on paper, you’d say that the iPhone 5 was only marginally smaller than the Samsung Galaxy S2. In real life it seems like much more.
The S2 is 1 mm thicker than the iPhone 5, it’s almost exactly the same height. It’s only very slightly wider when I put one on top of the other. But it feels like more.
The design of the iPhone 5 is sleeker, more elegant, more modern. The all plastic black and grey of the Galaxy S2 looks out dated in a world of Galaxy S3 shininess. Without doubt, it’s a less good looking cousin of the iPhone 5’s metallic, black and grey.
Galaxy S2’s Screen Is Better
Turning the screen on, on both devices, the new iPhone 5 Retina display is an obvious improvement on it’s predecessor, the iPhone 4S. The colors in the icons are warmer and brighter ( techies call this ‘colour saturation’ ) and the whites are bright. The new iPhone 5 has a 4 inch screen.
But they’re still no comparison for the eye popping screen on the Galaxy S2. Samsung use their Super AMOLED display for the S2’s 4.3 inch screen. Blacks are genuinely black. Colors are beautiful – more colorful than ‘real’ ( I love them but you need to form your own view on how important it is to have ‘real’ colors. )
The iPhone 5 screen has 1136 x 640 resolution. They call it Retina which is marketing, apparently designed to make it impossible to compare the iPhone directly against another product. The iPhone 5 screen is pretty strange because :
- It’s not the best screen specification possible. Compared to high end, true High Definition mobile phone screens which are resolution of 1280 x 720, it falls short on both dimensions
- It’s also an unusual ratio which means films have to be ‘stretched’ to fit. Most films are shot in 25 : 9 for the cinema and adapted to 16:9 – which is the ratio used in 1280 x 720.
The scientists involved in reviewing mobiles will tell you that what matters is pixel density. The greater the pixel density, the better the quality of the image on the screen. In my view, most people don’t get to that level of detail when they’re looking at the screens. They’re interested in how colors look and how fast the screen reacts to what they want to do.
All in all, I can honestly say that I prefer the Samsung Galaxy S2’s screen. It’s size and color is more engaging and, as usual, I’ll mention that I watch a lot of movies and TV when I’m on the ferry or bus going to work. The iPhone 4’s 4 inch screen is just too small these days.
It’s not an unqualified success for the Galaxy S2, however. There are some situation Apple’s iPhone 5 comes out on top. Notably, in direct sunlight, the iPhone 5’s screen is more visible and easier to use. There are some circumstances where I’ve had the Galaxy S2 outside and have barely been able to see what was on the screen in bright sunlight. Also, what they say in the adverts is true. You can operate an iPhone 5 with one hand. It’s toying with a phone drop to try and do the same with the Galaxy S2.
iPhone 5 is faster and more usable
The iPhone 5 is one of the new generation of mobiles to use LTE or 4G network access technology. It’s possible to talk for days about what that means but for the average user, this single fact makes the iPhone 5 the better device.
LTE speeds and mind blowing. Put together with the faster processing power of the iPhone 5, content comes down much quicker, web pages load and format more quickly. The whole experience is seamless and fun. I forgot all about the quality of the screen when I was playing with the iPhone 5. It’s so much quicker to use in every regard than the Samsung Galaxy S2 that this feature sets it apart.
Applications open more quickly on the iPhone 5 than the S2. It’s far more noticeable when you have them both side by side and you open, say, Facebook with a finger hitting both devices’ icons at the same time. But once you’ve experienced the iPhone 5’s speed, and you go back to another device, the delay between opening an app and it loading seems like years.
In addition to all this, we’re confronted with the Android / IOS question. The Galaxy S2 I have is running Gingerbread, Android 2.3 which is a couple of versions old now. IOS 6.0 is the latest Apple software. I prefer the configurability of Android but I must confess that IOS does ‘just work’. There are glitches in the Android software. Every now and again it stops to think for no reason that’s ever explained.
iPhone 5 – Facetime
Although, as I say, the Galaxy S2 is more than a year old now, it STILL comes with a front facing camera which is better than the iPhone 5’s ! The S2 has a 2MP camera. The iPhone 5 has a 1.2 MP front facing camera.
The reality of usage though is that this is Apple’s core strength. It’s never just the hardware functionality which makes a product work. It’s the combination of hardware and software which creates an experience. Apple’s Facetime app is just so easy to initiate and the number of people who have iPhones is so large that I’d rather have the Apple implementation – even if the front facing camera quality isn’t quite as good.
iPhone 5 vs Samsung Galaxy S2 Review – What’s The Same
Both the iPhone 5 and Samsung Galaxy S2 have 8 MP cameras which do a fine job. Apple’s recent software improvements mean that the iPhone 5 fares better in some different light conditions.
I have the 16GB iPhone 5 ( because it’s cheaper ! ) The Samsung Galaxy S2 comes with 16GB of storage installed. I have to put both devices on an equal footing over memory allocation given that in the Galaxy S2, there is an extendable memory slot in to which users can put micro SD cards. The iPhone 5 of course comes in variants up to 64 GB where, essentially you pay them to put the Micro SD card in.
More broadly, the closed chassis of the iPhone 5 is something that has to be accepted with the device. It’s almost like Apple don’t want you messing with their creation. I think this is to the detriment of the product though. Batteries wear out and need replacing. People like to have different memory cards which they can add and take out themselves so that they can move them between devices and to transfer things more easily from their computers. The Galaxy S2 provides for all this flexibility.
iPhone 5 vs Samsung Galaxy S2 Review – Summing Up
As I said in the introduction, this discussion is probably more to do with brand and price than functionality.
LTE, integrated software and better processing speed sets the iPhone 5 apart – by a substantial margin – from the Samsung Galaxy S2. They’re in totally different classes.
That’s not to say the S2 is a slouch. If you’re on a budget, the S2 is available for around half the price of the iPhone 5 and it’s certainly not half the phone. You get a lot for your money at the low end of the Android market and the Galaxy S2 is the best example of a great phone for not much money.
Dec ’12