Is it worth getting the Samsung Galaxy S4 now or should I wait for Samsung galaxy S5? Details below.

[Daemous]

I currently have an iPhone 4(I'm on AT&T) and I am eligible to get a smartphone upgrade. I have done some heavy research on the Internet to make sure I don't end up buying the smartphone I will later regret or not be "fully" satisfied with. from the gratuitous research I have done, I have come to the conclusion that the Samsung Galaxy S4 is the phone that is right for me. One thing though is very troubling(on my mind regarding this subject) and that has to deal with the soon to be released Samsung Galaxy S5(Well the majority of the internet says it will be out really soon this year, don't know if that IS true or not).

I am eligible to get the SGS4 around $50-$60(I believe from what I've searched and from going to an AT&T store). There are a few questions that have risen ever since my knowledge of the SGS5's release date, which are as following:

1. If the SGS5 will be released soon, will I be eligible to get the SGS5 at roughly the same "upgrade" price as the SGS4, or will I be forced to pay a "premium" upgrade price just because the SGS5 will be a newly released phone?

2. I have heard on one site that apple roughly keeps the price of their new released phones roughly the same price as their older ones and I was wondering if Samsung does the same for their "Samsung Galaxy" line of phones? If so will they do the same for the SGS5?

3. Will the upgrades/new features of the SGS5 be worth waiting for the SGS5(even if I can get the SGS4 at my upgrade price), or would it be better to just go ahead and get the SGS4 even if the SGS5 is "to be released soon"? For the people who already have a SGS4, would you warrant the upgrades/new features of the SGS5 enough or at least "revolutionary" enough to upgrade your SGS4 to the SGS5?

Edit: Yes, I have had time to mess with the SGS4 at the AT&T store and so far, I really like it from what I have seen with it.

 

[draconianchaos]

To my knowledge the S5 comes out April 11th. On contract it will most likely be ~$200 for 16gb. The major features I see in the S5 are the heart rate monitor, fingerprint scanner, and the much more valuable water resistance. Now you can get the water resistance in the s4 active on AT&T if you'd rather not pay a "premium" upgrade price for the S5...

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

[UJ95x]

I'd go for the S5. The S4 is "old" in the tech world and will likely only get updates for a year or so more.

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running SlimKat 4.4.2

 

[dpham00]

The standard price would probably be $200 but there can be sales, for example I bought my Verizon Samsung Galaxy Note 3 for $90 on contract on release day. I got another Verizon Samsung Galaxy Note 3 for free after visa prepaid card on Black Friday weekend.

dpham00, Android Central Moderator
Sent from my Verizon Samsung Galaxy Note 3 via Tapatalk Pro

 

[Robert Delaporte1]

The difference is minimal for the price you will pay. You will probably be able to get the s4 for nothing or very cheap on contract. The s5 has very few real world usable improvements other than the water proof. I love my s4. The only phone I would trade for is the note 3.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[Tsepz_GP]

You may want to either get a Note 3 if you can handle the size or wait for the GS5 32GB, the 16GB is going to have less than 8GB of actual storage to work with, so if you plan on loading many apps and games, wait for the S5 32GB. The GS4 is old now, I'm loving mine, but am waiting for the Note 4.

 

[garublador]

1. If the SGS5 will be released soon, will I be eligible to get the SGS5 at roughly the same "upgrade" price as the SGS4, or will I be forced to pay a "premium" upgrade price just because the SGS5 will be a newly released phone?

2. I have heard on one site that apple roughly keeps the price of their new released phones roughly the same price as their older ones and I was wondering if Samsung does the same for their "Samsung Galaxy" line of phones? If so will they do the same for the SGS5?

3. Will the upgrades/new features of the SGS5 be worth waiting for the SGS5(even if I can get the SGS4 at my upgrade price), or would it be better to just go ahead and get the SGS4 even if the SGS5 is "to be released soon"? For the people who already have a SGS4, would you warrant the upgrades/new features of the SGS5 enough or at least "revolutionary" enough to upgrade your SGS4 to the SGS5?

1. I bought the Galaxy S4 the day it was released (pre-ordered, actually) and it was $250 with a $50 rebate. The S3 was, IIRC, free at the time. I'd expect something similar with the S4 and S5.

2. I'm not positive about what you're asking, but I'd expect the S5 to cost $200 to $250 when it's released. My bet would be that it will be closer to $200, but that's just based on past experience with flagship phones.

3. IMO, you'll have to wait for more reviews to come in. Here's my take on what it would require for me to pick one over the other.

Size - the S5 will be a bit larger than the S4, and I'm finding the S4 to be about as big as I would want a phone to be. Check out an S4 in person, if you have't yet and then imagine it being slightly larger. See how well you can access the entire screen with one hand. I'd consider the larger screen to be a down side to the S5, but I can see how some would consider it an improvement.

Screen - there are supposedly some improvements in the display, but this is one of those things we'll have to wait to see just how big of a deal it is. There have been some objective, and measurable tests done to show the S4's screen is better than the S3:

Galaxy S4 Display Technology Shoot-Out

But we'll have to wait to see just how much better the screen on the S5 actually is.

IP67 - how much dust will you be around and what are the chances of your phone getting wet? If you have a 4S that's survived this long my guess is that it might not be a big deal, but that's a decisions you'll have to make. Being much better protected from dust and water could be a very big deal.

Processor - my S4 is fast enough for everything I do. It could be faster, but I wouldn't pay $200 for it. The S4 is already on an OS that has TRIM, which many believe will help prevent "Android Rot" that you used to see with older phones. I've had the phone since May and haven't noticed the type of slow down that I saw with my previous phones (Motorola Droid and Motorola Droid X2).

Camera - the camera is one of the reasons I picked the S4 over the S3. I have small kids and like taking pictures of them, so the camera was important to me. While the camera is very good for a smartphone, there are many places it can be improved. IMO, this is the one place with the largest chance to make the S5 "worth" buying over the S4. Again, we'll have to see what the actual performance is like to really know, though.

Updates - Android has stabilized quite a a bit in the past couple years and Samsung has gotten pretty good at updating their phones. The S3 will get KitKat and probably nothing else, so UJ95x's prediction that the S4 will get updates for another year is probably a good one. However, I disagree that it matters. While there are some nice improvement in each OS update, they're getting smaller and smaller. Going from 2.3 (GB) to 4.2 (JB) was a gigantic jump in every single area, IMO. 4.2 to 4.3 had some minor improvements and 4.3 to 4.4 (KitKat) appears to be the same. They've solved most of the major issues they had in GB (how bad GB was is the reason my wife and several friends moved from Android to iOS), so now it's just extra features and slight performance improvements.

TouchWiz improvements - IMO, you're best off just using a third party launcher. I find they're better than any of the OEM skins (including Google) and they're free. The look and feel of Android is so customizeable that this doesn't seem like an issue to me. Here's some examples of what you can do regardless of what OEM launcher you have:

Beautiful Android Themes, Wallpapers, and Homescreens

Battery - I'd only consider this a tie breaker between the two, but YMMV, and potentially by a lot. With the way I use my phone I can get just over 2 hours of screen time and 25 total hours out of a full battery charge according to GSam Battery Monitor. I usually go to bed with 20-40% battery remaining and have everything I want turned on. For a reference, it's about the same as what my wife gets on her iPhone 5, but I also have location based Google Now cards and several location based Tasker profiles active (e.g. my phone changes ringer volume at work and displays my grocery list on my lock screen when I'm at the grocery store). So I don't need any more battery capacity. Someone who uses their phone more may see this as a much bigger deal.

Case - the S4 is super slick, and IMO, that's bad. The S5 looks to be a better, but you can solve the slickness issue with the S4 using a TPU case that's <$5 and still have a phone that's smaller than the S5, if you're worried about the bulk a case adds.

So, the way I see it, how "revolutionary" it is depends on how much you value the screen, camera, dust and water protection and battery performance. If you plan on doing some heavy processing (i.e. games), then the increase in processing will likely be nice as well. I'd wait to see what many reviewers end up saying about all of those enhancements before making a decision.

 

[Daemous]

Okay, some of you have now spiked some new question that I am interested in getting answered:

1. "I bought the Galaxy S4 the day it was released (pre-ordered, actually) and it was $250 with a $50 rebate. The S3 was, IIRC, free at the time. I'd expect something similar with the S4 and S5."

Define that "free" in your sentence. Is that free as in no upfront price but later payments still, or free as in absolutely no $$$ involved at all????

2. Just finished looking up the features of the SGS5 and it appears to be really nothing more(other than the slightly bigger screen(5.1) and phone size and the preforated(dimpled) battery cover back of the phone and the added dust protection) than just improved Internal hardware and more what most people have dubbed it "gimmicky" new features. Would it be better to get the SGS4 at the "upgrade" price I can get it at now and roughly get the same Samsung Galaxy experience with the SGS4 and save some $$$ and just wait for the SGS5 for the next time I am eligable to upgrade my phone again or is it better to just get the SGS5?

2. Correct me if I am wrong, I think I have heard before that some people bought ___ phone(It's been so long since I've heard about it, I don't know what it was, that's why I may be wrong) and were given a discount or a "refund" because they bought it so close to the release date of the new phone of that line of phone. If I end up coming to the decision of getting the SGS4 so close to the release date of the SGS5, could I be eligible to get a refund or a discount if I end up buying the phone so close to the release date(similar to that of which if you return something to a store after purchase)?

3. If I buy the SGS4 could I technically "turn it in" and get a huge discount on the SGS5 later on? Or would the price of the SGS4(my upgrade discount price) + the discount of the SGS5(if I can get a discount) end up being more $$$ than just buying the SGS5 upfront with the "upgrade" price alone?

Sorry if It sounds like I am asking a lot of picky questions, I just want to cover very possibility I have swimming in my head so I don't end up wasting $$$ when I don't have to(or have the extra $$$ to spend).

 

[Rim85]

wait for the S5 for sure...the only way I would not is if you just had to have a smartphone today...just get the 32gb the 16gb S4 that i got had around 7-8 gb left for me to use, and i'am now down to 3.8gb free, quite the PITA.:'(

 

[garublador]

Okay, some of you have now spiked some new question that I am interested in getting answered:

1. "I bought the Galaxy S4 the day it was released (pre-ordered, actually) and it was $250 with a $50 rebate. The S3 was, IIRC, free at the time. I'd expect something similar with the S4 and S5."

Define that "free" in your sentence. Is that free as in no upfront price but later payments still, or free as in absolutely no $$$ involved at all????

I'm talking about the price of a carrier subsidized phone. We paid for our phones up front. The S3 had no up front cost, the S4 was $250 and I got a $50 mail in rebate. There will probably be other fees, but they'll be the same no matter what phone you get.

 

[monsieurms]

As a general principle, I don't like buying older tech and always am willing to go one step further than necessary, as opposed to trading down. So, I wouldn't buy the S4 now. But that's me. Others may not be as picky or not as willing to invest lots of bucks. Or just not care as much!

The S5 changes are incremental and you may not care as much. They all seem nice to have, but not essential. The market has matured. If you save a lot of bucks and that's important to you---I don't think you'll be unhappy in any way with the S4. It's a pretty good, economical solution. It isn't that old. It's not like you're buying something from 3 to 4 years ago. It does everything and does it well.

So I guess it comes down to: how important is the money savings to you versus getting the latest and greatest.

 

[Daemous]

Could someone post the pros and cons of getting:

A. The SGS4
or
B. The SGS5

Also, would the price I can get the SGS4 at right now be a better "deal" or would paying the extra price for the New SGS5 be a better deal? What I mean is, would the new hardware/software features be worth the extra price of the new SGS5?

 

[monsieurms]

Could someone post the pros and cons of getting:

A. The SGS4
or
B. The SGS5

GS5?

This has been discussed at length in many threads at this point. Despite the title, you can read both points of view here:

http://forums.androidcentral.com/sa...appointment-samsung-totally-dropped-ball.html

What's a better deal depends on how much you want the new features and how much money you have. There is no way to really answer that.

 

[garublador]

Could someone post the pros and cons of getting:

A. The SGS4
or
B. The SGS5

Also, would the price I can get the SGS4 at right now be a better "deal" or would paying the extra price for the New SGS5 be a better deal? What I mean is, would the new hardware/software features be worth the extra price of the new SGS5?

Isn't that what I did above? So yes, someone clearly can do that.