Second Opinion

Second Opinion is a reviews show about anything and everything under the sun. If we can experience it, we can review it.

Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Review

Episode #86

Ryan reviews the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra: the most expensive mainline phone ever from Samsung and a merely OK camera -- why not!
  • Listen to the Note 10+ review from roughly 6 months ago!
  • Pricing
    • $1399 base price, there’s another config for another $200
    • Preorder trade-in with an S10+ brought that down to $799 (-$600)
  • Specs
    • For full specs, read GSM Arena
    • CPU
      • SD 865
      • Allegedly the Snapdragon 865 is tied together with the 5G modem, so the cost of the entire device is increased
    • RAM
      • 12GB; matching Note 10+
      • Higher config has 16GB total though
    • Storage
      • 128GB base
      • Higher config has 512GB though
      • A real shame this “Ultra” tier didn’t have 256GB to match the Note 10+ out of box experience
      • SD Card slot still present though
  • Display
    • Size
      • 6.9’’ !
      • 20:9 aspect ratio
        • It’s really tall
        • Unlike the old Nexus 6 Moto, it’s not too wide
    • Special features
      • 2020 screen process
      • 120hz refresh rate. 240hz input rate
      • 1440p is exclusive of 120hz at release time though
        • aybe a future update enables it at battery life loss
  • Physicals
    • Look and feel, build quality
      • Footprint
      • Weight
    • Battery
      • 5000 mah; the biggest ever!
    • Charging
      • Allegedly 45w compatible again, but not included, and who cares
    • Ports
    • Speakers
      • Initially impressions would say they’re worse than the Note 10+’s speakers
    • Buttons
      • Alas, the Note 10+ had perfect button placement on the leftside, S20U moved to the right
      • No bixby button - Samsung has learned
    • 5G
      • Of no consequence to me at this time
      • It’s identical to LTE in everyday experience
      • S20U has the mmWave modem so if T-Mobile somehow pulled a Verizon it could be ultra fast in the park with line of sight
  • Camera
    • 3 real back cameras (time of flight / depth sensor also but not a real camera)
    • How is it
      • It’s remarkably average
      • Initial impressions were concerning
        • Any subject movement (a dog, for example) would cause blur
        • The depth of field of the primary camera made taking typical shots difficult
        • The default settings leave a lot to be desired (scene optimization)
        • JPEG
    • Special modes
      • 100X zoom!
      • 108mp
        • The pixel binning (can you say HTC ULTRA PIXELS?) is back and it’s still mediocre sometimes
      • Night Mode
        • Night Mode has been available on previous Samsung phones, but it’s still remarkably good
      • 40mp selfie camera
        • Cool, I guess? 
    • Verdict
      • Don’t buy this for the camera, I’d say
      • The S10+ or the Note 10+ had sometimes better cameras
        • The S10+/Note10+ lines shared cameras and the camera “modules” line had been used in other Samsung devices over time; you could think that this is a first gen-use of a module-line and the software hasn’t caught up yet
      • The ultra-wide camera module is 12mp - give me more on that one - I love ultra-wide shots and I rarely zoom
      • I find predicting which of the cameras the phone will use in a given mode too confusing to even try to understand
      • Physical camera bump, alignment is weird and an ergonomic disaster
  • Software
    • OS
      • We’ll get Android 11 on this phone next February or so when the next S-model comes out
        • Kind of Samsung’s fault, kind of Google’s fault
      • The thirdparty launcher support for the new gestures is still forthcoming allegedly in One UI 2.5 - unfortunately
    • Updates
      • A camera update came 3-weeks into ownership
      • It fixed some camera issues but there’s still work to be done
        • Hoping there are many more meaningful updates
    • Performance
      • No jitter or lag for me
  • Final thoughts
    • Don’t buy this at full price
    • It’s a big, heavy phone, consider the S20+ instead
    • Let’s conclude with a funny story
      • I’ve been buying phones YoY since 2016 and I bought the Pixel XL 1 with extra-storage at the time, and somehow it came out to ~$950
      • S20U is $1399 but with a trade-in, it was still cheaper

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