[Review] Samsung Galaxy A7 (2017) – The Premium Midrange Performer

Performance 
In terms of hardware, the Galaxy A7 has an Exynos 7880 1.9GHz octacore running the show paired with 3GB RAM and 32GB of expandable storage via a dedicated microSD card slot. Unlike many other phones that simply provision a hybrid SIM card slot, the A7 actually offers a dedicated dual SIM card slot and a microSD card slot too. You’re able to simultaneously cram in two SIM cards and expand the onboard storage too. Compared to last year’s model the Galaxy A7 has quite a few upgrades all around – a slightly larger screen, a slightly nippier processor, a jump up  from Android Lollipop to Marshmallow and a better front and rear camera combined with a larger battery and more storage too.

 

The phone runs Android Marshmallow 6.0.1 overlaid with the latest version of their revamped Grace UX that culls elements from their high-end Galaxy S7’s user interface. Among them is the ‘Always On’ display that gives you live notifications from your apps including non-native ones and tells you the time without you having to turn the phone on. While it does sup juice from the battery, the drain is negligible with less than 5% usage if you leave it on for the whole day. The biggest draw that makes the A7 so attractive though is that it includes Samsung’s vaunted Knox security platform. This is, in essence, a separate  encrypted milspec-grade partition for enterprise use and, of late, a requirement to use the Samsung Pay service on the phone.

The A7 is one of the few phones in current service from Samsung that support Samsung Pay which lets you register your credit card securely on the A7 and then use the phone to pay for stuff. Short of the Galaxy S7,  Note 5, the smaller A5 or last year’s S6 edge+, this is one of the few ways to get in on Samsung Pay without chunking out a ton of cash.

Other handy mod-cons include a ‘Blue light’ mode that gives the screen a yellowish cast to make it easier on the eyes to read stuff along with a pragmatically efficient Ultra Data Saving mode that makes use of Opera Max to minimise data usage when web browsing and watching videos online. It’s a feature common to their midrange Galaxy A-series phones though alas not present on their high end Galaxy S-series phones so you’re getting the best of both worlds, so to speak here on the Galaxy A7’s UI. The phone also supports a rather basic version of split screen view like that seen on the Galaxy S7 though the apps it works with are drawn from a more select pool of stock apps that came with the phone. You can, at a stretch, pop open a browser and Samsung notes or watch a Youtube video at the same time but that’s the extent of it.

 

The Galaxy A7’s 5.7-inch Super AMOLED display offered a viewing experience befitting a flagship phone with excellent viewing angles and the customary vibrant hues and deep blacks of a Super AMOLED panel along with excellent visibility under direct sunlight. If the colours onscreen don’t quite appeal, you can opt to tweak the colour display with three other different modes – AMOLED Cinema, AMOLED photo and a basic mode. Should the default modes lack appeal, you can manually tweak red, green and blue colour balance yourself onscreen.

In use the A7 was swift and breezy with the revamped UI proving to be relatively free of bloatware. There’s a folder of Microsoft apps along with some Samsung essentials like their S Health app, their mySamsung loyalty app and an installer for Samsung Pay but it is otherwise the slimmest UI they’ve offered in a while.

The Exynos 7880 1.9GHz octacore under benchmark tests  served up a score of 807 on 3D Mark’s Sling Shot Extreme while GeekBench 4 offered a single core score of 757 and a multi-core score of 3760, placing it behind the more powerful Galaxy S7 on both fronts. On Epic Citadel, the phone served up an average of 54.7 frames per second on Ultra High Quality levels and Full 1080P resolution. In Antutu Benchmark, the A7 (2017) had a very modest score 57,532 which is somewhat behind even the Galaxy Note 5’s score of 80,644.

While benchmark scores give a rough indicator of performance, the acid test is still how it fares under actual field conditions. Apps opened in a swift fashion with little lag and games like Asphalt 8, Warhammer 40,000: Freeblade and Star Wars: Force Arena loaded and ran smoothly albeit with a few seconds of loading time. YouTube videos and multiple open Chrome browser windows all ran without a hitch. Of note was the judicious placement of the mono speaker.

Unlike most other phones that plonk it at the base of the phone only for it to end up muffled when you hold it in your palm or landscape-style, the side-mounted speaker remained audible and served to deliver decent  audio quality for music, videos and especially gaming. Bar power users with very specific needs, the A7 should be able to handle most tasks required of it without undue difficulty.

Camera
The rear of the Galaxy A7 (2017) is equipped with a 16-MP camera with an LED flash, optical image stablisation and an F/1.9 aperture. The rear camera is also capable of capturing up to 1080P video.

The front is similarly equipped though in lieu of an LED flash it uses the front display as an ersatz flash for illumination and lacks OIS. It is also capable of capturing 1080P video.

 

The rear camera’s combination of OIS and an F/1.9 aperture made it a highly capable snapper under daylight and all but the most dimly light conditions. While it won’t outgun an S7 by any means, it served up good levels of detail in snaps with pretty accurate colours and images captured in indoor conditions under harsh neon lighting came out very well.  Videos at 1080P were captured at 30fps and offered pretty good colours and detail as well.

 

The variety of filters and modes available are pared down to the basics but cover =the essentials including a Pro mode that lets you tweak exposure, ISO and white balance, a panorama mode, a hyperlapse mode, HDR mode, a food mode and a Night mode for low light snaps. The pro mode features have been pared down from what you’d get on a flagship S7 but it’s understandable to differentiate both devices in the market. Still, more modes would have been nice though most users will likely simply resort to HDR or auto mode for most snaps..

The front selfie camera is slightly overkill, seeing as most shots would be within arm’s length with the F/1.9 aperture and similarly sized sensor as the rear delivering excellent selfies; more so seeing the array of beautification options available including making your eyes bigger and your skin tone more pleasing. The front-facing screen flash also helps make the obligatory dim indoor shots a lot better. Narcissists will be quite chuffed with the results on offer with the A7’s front camera.

Page 1	Introduction & Design
Page 2	Performance & Camera
Page 3	Battery Life, Price & Conclusion