When Samsung first announced their 8 core Exynos 5 Octa processor we were quite enthusiastic. Imagine, a more powerful processor that combines best of class performance with great power efficiency. The fact that Samsung have used both this processor and the Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 in their Samsung Galaxy S4 means that we can make a more focused comparison between the two processors. On one hand, the Exynos 5 Octa has already proven that it is more powerful, however, does it achieve what it initially claimed, as in better power efficiency? Check out the graphs below:

The Samsung Galaxy S4 is currently one of the best smartphones in the world. One would think that makes it easy to choose, however, the Samsung Galaxy S4 also comes in 3 different versions. Malaysia has two of these versions to choose from, the Samsung Galaxy S4 I9500 and the Samsung Galaxy S4 I9505. Recently we only had access to the I9500 but soon vendors will be releasing the I9505 as well. Which one should you pick? Read on and find out.

Samsung recently came out with another promo ad, this time in the form of a feature-length short music video about a boy wanting to meet a girl and doing it with his Samsung Galaxy S4. The usual S features are available including Air View, Dual Shot, Sound + Shot, Drama Shot and Group Play, but it also reveals a bunch of new colours that will come out for the Samsung Galaxy S4. This includes pastel Blue, Brown and Red.

Space has been a major issue with the Samsung Galaxy S4 since day 1 of it's release. This is mainly because while the smartphone technically comes with 16GB worth of storage users only get access to about 8.8GB. Samsung have since announced that they may release an update clearing up more space on the internal storage but have not specified how or when they might do so. In any case it could be something to watch for in the next firmware update of the Samsung Galaxy S4.

In a move which came as a surprise to everyone, Google announced that it would provide a Nexus experience on the Samsung Galaxy S4 at the recent Google I/O event. While many were expecting the announcement of a new Nexus device (most likely for LG to do a Google Nexus 5 smartphone) Google are instead offering the Samsung Galaxy S4 minus the Samsung TouchWiz interface. Instead it will feature stock Android Nexus and have an unlocked bootloader (so you can root it easier).

The Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV has a ton of S features in it, almost too much to list. You've already seen many of these features already in action and it seems that Samsung wants to show you even more. These next few ads showcase a number of S features including S Beam, Air View, Air Gesture, Drama Shot and even the IR Blaster for HDTV remote control.

It is always interesting to see behind-the-scene shots of how the people who made something truly excellent came to those decisions. That being said, the Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV creators and designers supposedly got their inspiration for it from the stars in the night sky. The HTC One design team on the other hand were aiming for zero-gap construction which resulted in the beautifully elegant aluminum unibody design available from the HTC One. The Apple iPhone 5 was also designed with the idea of making a much better phone than before.

The Samsung Galaxy S4 brings with many new additional features and functions. While NFC isn't new and has been available on the Samsung Galaxy SIII, Samsung recently revealed that the previous programmable NFC sticker TecTiles doesn't work with the Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV. So if you've been using this a lot (and have TecTile stickers all over the place) don't be surprised if your new Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV doesn't seem to work with them. This is because Samsung have released a new TecTiles 2 version. This news isn't such a big thing for Malaysia where not many people actually use it but for the tech savvy it could be the explanation for why your new smartphone isn't working as you well as the previous one.

Watching expensive smartphones fall is usually a nightmare most people don't want to see, but with the recent release of the Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV we now have it in not one but two drop tests against the Apple iPhone 5 and the Samsung Galaxy SIII. Samsung have defended and stood by their decision to continue using a plastic polycarbonate body for the Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV but have upped the protection for the display with a Corning Gorilla Glass 3 screen which recently proved it was as scratch proof as it could possibly be.

What they found out

The folks at iFixit just love tearing down smartphones and this was no different for the Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV when it officially came out. After a brief tear down they discovered that the Samsung Galaxy S4 / S IV:

• has a removable battery
• has an iFixit score of 8 out of 10
• uses IR sensors near the screen to enable Air View and Air Gesture
• has one of the most sensitive screens around (can even use with gloves)
• has the same 4G LTE chip as Google Nexus 4