Samsung Galaxy Note nine review. It's a big, expensive phone, but you get it all. What's going on? I'm Rich Demiro. This is Rich on Tech. The Samsung Galaxy Note nine is in stores right now and it sells for one
thousand dollars. That gets you a six point four in screen, one of the best I've ever seen on a phone, plus one hundred and twenty eight gigabytes of storage, dual cameras on the back, an s Penn Stylus with Bluetooth, and one of the biggest, baddest batteries you can pack into a phone that still feels pretty darn good in your hand. How's that for an intro. Well, I've been using this device for the past two weeks and I can tell you it is one of my favorite phones ever.
It is a pleasure to use. It's fast, it has every feature you can think of, a fun camera, the stylus makes a great addition to Instagram Stories in general navigation when you remember to use it. Plus, it's big, but it's not on wield. And although I still prefer the clean software and faster camera on the pixel, the Note nine offers so many more features. Let's talk about some of them for starters. The battery in this thing
is just a rock star. It's four thousand million hours, which is a lot, about a third more than other big smartphones, and the battery is going to be the least of your concerns on this device. It charges super fast with the cable or wirelessly, and if you drive for a bit during the day and have it plugged in your car, like I often do in Los Angeles, realistically,
battery life is not a concern at all. There are even some nights I didn't even bother to plug it in because it was still so full by the time I went to bed. The storage is also great. It's one hundred and twenty eight gigabyte standard. You just won't worry about anything taking tons of pictures, videos, downloading Spotify music and Netflix shows and YouTube videos. I didn't even consider how much storage everything was taking up because it
doesn't matter. And if you get close to filling up that one hundred and twenty eight gigs, you can just add a memory card. Two hundred and fifty six gigs on Amazon right now is just about eighty dollars, and you can go all the way up to a five hundred and twelve gigabyte memory car when that's available. Performance
on the Note nine has been great. Samsung software gets a bad rap and there are little things I don't like about it, like the way it handles notifications and the always on screen, but I can live with that, and for ninety nine percent of people, you're probably not gonna care. The phone hasn't gotten hot even once, which is a departure from other Samsung phones which have eate
it up in the past. Maybe it's because Samsung added some sort of new liquid cooling inside, but I can't be sure, but this thing stays pretty cool throughout the day. The Spen with Bluetooth is really cool, but you have to remember to use it otherwise it's useless, and that's one of the big features of this device. You have to remember to pull it out. When I did, it would come in handy for various creative situations like Instagram
stories and writing on pictures. You'll figure out what you need it for, but it's a useful thing to have. And yes, I am the weirdo that sets up my phone on a tripod to take group pictures at family and friend gathering, so I'll definitely be using the Spen in the future versus the typical timer. I would normally set the Spen lasts for thirty minutes on Bluetooth use. Then you pop it back into the phone and it
takes forty seconds to recharge it. But it always works to write on the screen no matter whether it's charged or dead. Now let's talk about the camera, because this is one of the biggest parts of any smartphone, and on the Note nine, it is good. It borders on great. It's a very capable camera and you will have lots of fun with it. I really love having the two times lens so I can zoom into things optically versus digitally. And the camera performs good, but I'd like to see
it perform great. It can be a little slow to react and focus sometimes, and things like zoom and movements can look a little jittery in the preview window. But overall, the photos you take on this device are very, very good and many times excellent. It does a great job in low light, one of the best performers in low light, and I'm very impressed with the detail on pictures compared to the iPhones photos. I think those look nice, but they always look kind of flat. The Galaxy Note nine
has much more depth and detail. Of course, not as much as a pixel, which has like crazy computer processing going on to make any shot look good. But Samsung definitely makes one of the top cameras on the market. Now, they did add some sort of scene detection artificial intelligence, but I can't really tell if that's helping my photos look better or just boosting things like color and other
stuff depending on the situation. It can recognize scenes including food, portraits, flowers, animals, landscape, sky, sunrise, sunset, text, and more. The camera also tells you when someone blinks, or the shot is blurry, or there's some bad backlight. I found this feature nice to have, but not entirely useful, because look, if it's an important shot, I'm gonna be reviewing it anyway. Now. The front facing camera is a totally different story. If there's a source spot to this device,
this is it. In a word, I'm unimpressed. It's very hit or missed. Sometimes you get such a good shot it looks like a pro took it. Other Times you get something that looks kind of muddled and blurry. The front facing camera is not a deal breaker, but it's definitely the biggest disappointment on this device. Low light is
especially challenging for it. It will take a noticeable amount of time to snap a front facing photo and the result is often not very good, so you're gonna have to take a couple of front facing photos to get a good one. As for the rest of the Galaxy Note nine, it is a very complete package. The screen just simply amazing. It puts other smartphone screens to shame.
I watched the original Jurassic Park movie on a plane and I just can't tell you how good it looked on that big, bright, six point four inch screen, and that's an old movie. If you look at some of the new stuff on Netflix with HDR, that's unbelievable. You also get Dolby at most. Video on this thing is just amazing, and plus you get all the features you need, like a headphone jack and the fingerprint reader. Although it's a tad small, it's in a dream spot compared to
last year's model. You can actually reach it without looking, and it's properly placed under the camera instead of to the side of the camera. Now, the Note nine is expensive and I'm not thrilled about either color combo. You can choose from blue or lavender. In the US right now, there is a black and copper model available, just not in the US just yet, but I expect them to make their way here eventually. And one thing I don't like.
You no longer have the option to turn off the Bixby button now unless I'm missing it in the Bixby settings. They seem to have gotten rid of this entirely, which is unfortunate because you do press that dedicated button a lot and it activates Bixby, which I don't think is bad, but I just don't need another assistant in my life
right now. So let's compare against some other phones. Against the iPhone ten, well, at number one, we're coming out with the new iPhone very soon, so if you're comparing those two and deciding, you probably want to wait to see what Apple does. But against the iPhone ten, you're
definitely getting more for your money with the Note nine. Now, I rarely compare Android to iPhone anymore, because, let's face it, I've realized most people don't care through either Apple or Android for life, and they don't want to switch, And that's kind of fine with me. It's personal preference, and I understand how Apple folks will miss I Message, FaceTime and other niceties of the Apple ecosystem, So I'm not
trying to convince you to switch here now. If you don't need the stylus or the large battery, you'll be perfectly happy with the Samsung Galaxy S nine plus. This is nearly the same phone, just slightly smaller, with less bells and whistles, but it's a very similar camera setup, and it has that gorgeous screen again just a bit smaller. And if you don't want to spend one thousand dollars, the one plus six is a really nice Android device.
It has amazing software, it's super fast, it charges fast although there's no wirel charging, and the software is updated way more often. The only downside of the one plus really is you don't get as good of a camera. But I will tell you the one plus six is doing some amazing pictures for that five hundred and thirty dollars price. One plus you're doing a great job. Now against the Pixel. That's a tough one, because that is
my favorite phone ever. And rumor has it that the new Pixel is gonna add wireless charging in wired headphones, which are two chief complaints I had against the last one, and the Pixel camera is just a monster. It's the absolute best in the world on a smartphone and one of the reasons I keep going back to that device. And also, the Pixel is going to be cheaper than the Samsung Note nine, but it won't come with as many software bells and whistles. Some will like that, others won't.
Samsung versus Pixel is a tough one. If you're a true Android hardcore, that's a tough decision. All right. There you have it at my review of the Samsung Galaxy Note nine. Bottom line, this is a beast, but in a good way. Samsung has managed to cram just about every feature known to man in a smartphone that actually looks, feels, and performs great. The price tag and large size are basically the two biggest downsides, along with infrequent software updates,
but that's about it. You're really getting one of the best phones on the market. Thanks so much for listening. If you want photo samples, video samples, plus my TV review, check the show notes, or just go to richontech dot tv and let me know if you have any questions. You can find me on Facebook, on Instagram, on Twitter, I will be listening and answering. Amrich Demiro, I'll talk to you real soon