Samsung had a huge hit on their hands last year with the Galaxy S III. With that device, they single handedly dominated the Android market by a wide margin, and the words “Samsung” and “Galaxy” became household names. Building a follow-up to such a massively popular device is a tall order, but one that Samsung has filled with the Galaxy S4.

There’s a lot of hype surrounding the Galaxy S4, and despite mixed reviews, most agree that this will once again be the top selling Android smartphone of the year. But to be quite frank, after spending time with two different review units, I’m just not feeling it.

Perhaps I should say that I don’t want to feel it, because the Galaxy S4 hardware feels flimsy and cheap. I completely understand what other reviewers meant when they described the S4 as “slimy”, because that’s exactly how it feels in your hand. The glossy plastic back is a fingerprint and oil magnet, and the phone has literally slipped out of my hands on more than one occasion.

The entire device is made of plastic, even though parts of it are meant to look like chrome or aluminum. Even the glass panel on the front feels more plastic-y than other high-end smartphones. I just can’t excuse Samsung’s use of shiny plastic for their top-of-the-line, premium device when every other smartphone maker is using materials like aluminum, metal, glass, and polycarbonate. The back panel - a thin, flimsy plastic sheet - is particularly egregious. I can’t help but think about how much nicer it would feel made of aluminum, or even a textured rubberized plastic like the BlackBerry Z10 (I love that back!)

Bottom line though is that I found myself not wanting to use the phone simply because it feels like a toy. Granted, I understand that some people like the durability of plastic, and with the Galaxy S4, you won’t have to be a paranoid loser who has to use a case or won’t set their phone down without something soft underneath it - like me. But for their flagship device, I’m disappointed that Samsung still insists on using cheap, glossy plastic.

The only upside on the hardware front is the gorgeous 1080p display. Yes, it is 5-inches, which does make it difficult or awkward to use in some situations, but the 1080p resolution means everything looks crystal clear and bright. I’m starting to come around to larger screen sizes, however I have to warn smartphone makers not to push it much farther. Devices like the 5.5-inch Galaxy Note or 6.3-inch Galaxy Mega are way too big to be considered smartphones, and I think 5-inches should be the limit for a while.

Another plus of the Galaxy S4 is the fantastic 13-megapixel camera. Back when I reviewed the HTC One, I knocked the 4-megapixel “Ultrapixel” camera for under delivering on its lofty promise, and thankfully Samsung made the right decision going for more megapixels with the Galaxy S4. The S4′s camera takes absolutely brilliant shots, with crisp, clear detail, accurate colours, and high quality. This is definitely one of, if not the best, smartphone camera I have ever used.

(Galaxy S4 camera sample shot)

On the software side, I have more complaints than praise. I still find Samsung’s TouchWiz/Nature UX/whatever it’s called to be a catastrophe for the senses. From the obnoxious drip drop noises at every tap, to the out-of-place cartoonish icons, to the horrid mixture of blue and navy gradients and neon green highlights, this skin is an absolute nightmare.

Luckily, software performance is really good. Everything moves fast, responds fluidly, and I encountered no hiccups or stutters while using the phone. All of my favourite apps - Falcon Pro, Robin, Instagram, Hangouts, and Pocket, among others - performed much faster than they do on my Nexus 4 thanks to the S4′s quad-core processor.

LTE data speeds were fantastic on Rogers’s LTE network here in Toronto, although I did notice that the S4 took a little longer to re-connect to the network after being out-of-range for a while (on the subway, specifically). Oh, and it also makes phone calls and sends text messages.

As for those crazy Samsung software enhancements, they’ve packed almost everything you can imagine into this device. I’ll be honest: I didn’t get to try all of them. I figure taking a photo with both camera’s picture-in-picture style, or recording a voice memo as you take a shot, work and feel exactly as I imagine them too. I did try out some of the more interesting features, like Air Gesture, Smart Pause, and Smart Scroll, though in general I was left unimpressed. Air Gesture works best out of the bunch, though is limited in where you can use it. I couldn’t get it to scroll up or down a webpage (frankly I’m not even sure if that is a supported feature), but flipping back and forth through a photo album worked perfectly as I waved my hand in front of the S4. Smart Pause also worked pretty well, and is actually one of the more real-world useful features of the S4. There’s a short lag between when you take your eyes off the screen and when the video pauses, but it’s not detrimental to the experience, and it likely won’t cause you to miss anything important happening on-screen. As for the eye-tracking Smart Scroll feature, I could never actually get it to work. No matter how wide I opened my eyes, how much light I placed on my face, how wildly I thrashed my head up and down, the S4 just wouldn’t scroll. Bust. Same goes for the Smart Hover feature, or whatever it’s called. Turned it on, hovered my finger over every possible UI element I could find (photo albums, S Planner events, emails), but nada. These issues are probably a case of user error, but if I - a hardcore gadget nerd - can’t figure this shit out, how is a regular consumer going to do it?

While a select few of these S Features (or “sfeatures”) are actually useful, I found most of them to be gimmicky one-offs that you’ll play with for a minute or two, and never use again.

At the end of the day I’m left with mixed feelings about the Galaxy S4. It’s got a gorgeous display, a fantastic camera, and the software performs well. On the other hand, the hardware is garbage, the UI looks terrible, and the added features don’t really add all that much to the user experience.

If you are dead-set on the Galaxy S4, I would at least recommend the stock Android “Google Experience” version, which is coming to Google Play in the U.S. (and hopefully Canada at some point) for $649 on June 26th. But if you are looking for the best Android phone, I feel confident now in saying that the S4 isn’t it. Despite it’s lacklustre camera, I much prefer the HTC One for it’s beautiful hardware and tolerable Sense UI skin - more so now that a stock Android version is also coming to Google Play, for just $599 on June 26th.

Plain and simple: the S4 is a very powerful, feature-rich phone, but thanks to its cheap hardware and bloated software, I won’t recommend it.

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