8 reasons why Windows PCs and Samsung phones are the ultimate combo
Apple always displays how iPhones work with Macs. Well, if you are a Windows user, there is a telephone link application that offers many features that iPhone users can get on Mac! Although the telephone link also works with iPhones, most of its features require an Android phone.
But not all Android phones are equal. If you use a pixel phone with a Windows PC, you miss some of the cooler features.
Do you want the type of integration that iPhone users get with their Mac? Then you will need a Samsung Galaxy phone, not a pixel phone – and certainly not an iPhone. (Some other brands, such as OnePlus and Asus Rog, also offer these additional features. But Google Pixel phones are not doing it.) Here’s why.
All androids obtain these telephone connection features
If you have an iPhone and a Windows PC, the telephone link can only do a few things and not much more. You can see telephone notifications arrive on your desktop, make phone calls via your PC and send / receive SMS SMS.
Microsoft
Android phones – I mean any The Android phone, from Google Pixel to a Samsung galaxy and everything else – can do more. You can send SMS from your PC and see the full history of messages, see notifications on your phone and reject them so that you will not see them again on your phone and browse the photo library of your phone.
With any Android device, you can launch a phone link in Windows 11 or Windows 10 to link your phone and see what is available.
Do not forget the connected devices also
There are also a variety of additional Android integration controlled from Windows via the “Connected devices” window.
With connected devices, you can see your Android phone files in File Explorer and transfer files in both directions, or even use your Android phone as wireless webcam. On Windows 11, you can go to Settings> Bluetooth and devices> Mobile devices and use it Manage devices Button to link your phone for this type of experience.
It is clear that for PC phone integrations, Android phones are better than iPhones. But beyond that, Samsung’s devices quickly advanced.
Samsung’s secret weapon? Preinstallation “Link to Windows” on phones
So many PC geeks on the Android side use Pixel phones, which means that some of the most powerful features of the telephone link are rarely discussed and generally neglected. It’s all about something called Link to Windows (preinstalled)which is missing on Pixel phones.
Many most powerful features of the telephone link require that the manufacturer of your phone install Microsoft software at a low level. Google does not include this on Pixel phones. Motorola either.
Chris Hoffman / Foundry
Samsung do Include the link to Windows software on your phones, and they are not the only ones. Microsoft’s Windows integration software is also installed on OnePlus and Asus Rog phones. Microsoft offers a full list of phones with it preinstalled.
The main thing is as follows: if your Android phone comes with the preinstalled Microsoft connection software, Windows PCs can do much more. Let’s talk about these additional things! The surprisingly impressive features you get when you associate a Samsung Galaxy phone with a Windows PC.
Instant inter-appaper copy
Cross -copying station may well be my favorite feature. I can copy and paste something – text or image – on my phone or pc, then paste it on one of the two devices. The phone link automatically synchronizes the contents of the clipboard of each device!
Chris Hoffman / Foundry
To activate this, first associate your phone with your PC with a phone link. Then, in the interface of the telephone link, click on the equipment icon in the upper right corner, select FeaturesAnd light “the crossed copy and dough”.
After that, there is no additional contribution or violin required. Just copy to one device and stick it to another. It just works.
Reflect your whole phone in a window
Microsoft has built an extremely powerful system to reflect your phone on your PC. You can do a lot with that! Consider it as the Windows PC answer to Apple’s iPhone function on Mac.
First of all, if you open the phone link application and click on the sticker of your Samsung Galaxy phone in the upper left corner of the window, it will reflect the display of your phone – you will see the entire phone display in a window on your PC’s desktop. You can interact with him using your mouse and even type on your phone with your keyboard.
Mirror and control Android applications via PC
The telephone link also provides mirror in terms of application. You can open the application of the telephone link and click Applications Above to see each application installed on your phone. Click on the application icon to start it in a window on your desktop – it will work on your phone but reflecting wirelessly on your PC.
But there is more than that. These applications also get their own taskbar icons, and you can right -click their shortcuts to add them to your Start menu. That’s right! The telephone link allows you to add Android mirror applications to your taskbar and start the menu and treat them like Windows applications. You can have up to five mirror applications under execution both in separate windows.
Chris Hoffman / Foundry
Microsoft has gone far beyond with this feature, providing management of more Android applications that most people will never need. As a PC user, I like extreme flexibility here.
Some people could ask, what is the point of reflecting Android applications? Like all PC features, it’s really up to you. I like to be able to use intelligent house control applications – to check my safety cameras or modify my smart thermostat settings, for example – of my PC. Most intelligent domestic devices do not have Windows PC integration at all.
Easy instant hopspot connections
The configuration of a hotspot is generally boring. You must first activate the hotspot on your phone, then connect from the Wi-Fi menu of your PC. Apple has an instant hotspot function to quickly activate a hotspot from a Mac without even touching your iPhone, and you can do something similar on a Windows PC if you have a Samsung phone.
Chris Hoffman / Foundry
After having associated your phone with a telephone link, go to the phone link settings screen, select FeaturesAnd turn on “Instant Hotspot” to configure it. Then, when you open the Wi-Fi menu of your PC, you will see your phone alongside other Wi-Fi networks available. Click on Connect The button and the windows will automatically activate the telephone hotspot and connect to it.
Do! No entry of your phone from your pocket.
Other useful features to use
What can you do with a Samsung phone that has a preinstalled Windows? You can redirect the audio output from your smartphone to the speakers of your PC via the telephone link app for better audio quality. You can also slide the drain-free-edim files between the Android mirror phone window and your PC.
The telephone link application will even allow you to participate in conversations with RCS, assuming that you use the Samsung Messages application on your phone and not The Google Messages application. This feature is exclusive to Galaxy phones and not other phones that bring together Microsoft software.
Overall, yes, Samsung Galaxy phones really offer the most integration features. Do you need all of these features? Probably not. You can have a great experience using any phone with your PC. But if you want the type of deep integration that iPhone users get with Macs, you don’t have to go to a Mac – you just need a galaxy phone with your PC.
A more stable telephone connection
There is one last thing I want to mention – something that this is not an explicit feature, but no more an observation that I made.
I noticed that the telephone connection is much more stable between my Windows 11 PCs and my Samsung Galaxy Z Fold6 than with my Google Pixel 8 Pro. It is disconnected less frequently and it is more reliable overall. This makes sense, since the software runs in the background (on the galaxy) and not as an installed application (on the pixel). The PC phone link process is also more diet and faster.
It may seem a minor point. But, for me, it takes the experience of the telephone link of “a little unreliable” to “almost always works”. I can trust him to work, and it’s a big problem.
With all these advantages, I think the answer is obvious: if you want to transparently use your Android phone and your Windows PC, and if you want the most complete integration you can get, you really need a Samsung Galaxy phone. The others do not cut it.
Read more in -depth: The best way to transfer data between Android phones and Windows PCs
