[Galaxy S 5 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] justintime001:
I suggest the following:

- Research Samsung's AMOLED display technology SPECIFICALLY on the S5. As in, go to Samsung.com and find a pdf or listing of the display's granular details for it's specifications.

- As a result of Samsung's implementation of their AMOLED displays (this can only have been improved for the S5), PenTile screens contain twice as many green subpixels as reds and blues, and since it’s the blue subpixels that degrade most quickly, PenTile displays are less susceptible to screen burn than the RGB type of AMOLED screens. HOWEVER, they are still susceptible to burn-in, although there are ways to prevent it from becoming permanent.

Burn-In Risks

Charging - Android phones have the option of keeping the screen on while charging. Don't do that, it's silly.

Developing (Stay Awake option) - I use Stay Awake when I'm debugging apps on my devices, but I also manually turn off the screen during periods of time when I'm not sending an ANT build to the phone or debugging on a device from any IDE rather than an emulator.

Navigation apps - these apps are probably the ones that people are least likely to realize can be burn-in culprits.

Other apps that remain on during docked use (internet radio, anything that will keep the screen on)

Lessening degradation

So, when I get my hands on the detailed specifications sheet of the AMOLED display on the S5 and presumably purchase the S5 when I know for a fact I can unlock the bootloader permanently, I am going to see if they are using PenTile screens (or whatever technology they are using) so that I can manually create a screensaver/app that runs and displays every color on each pixel for the corresponding amount of time relative to each color's known degradation. The "O" in AMOLED represents "Organic" and that's why the chemicals/materials they use degrade over time.

You can bet that Samsung will continue to improve the way their display operates in each of their future software updates. I'll tell you this: A LOT OF people own the Samsung S3 - I believe more use the S3 than the S4 or at the very least, similar in # being used. AND the S5 is already available.

I listed most of that to inform people that aren't otherwise informed, but Samsung has become a Behemoth in smartphone hardware and I guarantee they will do everything possible to compete with Apple and surpass them. Will they? I hope they do. Then I hope Apple surpasses Samsung, and have them go back and forth so that the consumer ends up benefiting the most. Competition in business is often (not always) what forces business to retain customers and acquire new ones, especially anyone switching from iOS to Android and vice versa.

If you're really that worried (rightfully so, given the price of the phone), look at your warranty documentation and call Samsung and ask them directly; though, unless you get a confident response backed by verifiable facts, call again at a different time. I always do this whenever I call any company because you never know where your call will get routed, who is picking up, how competent they are, etc.

Also, see if there's an extended warranty program you can get within whatever purchase window they have (LG for example, offers it for some phones 30 days within purchasing/registering the phone). Motorola offers it during checkout on their website. I have yet to check Samsung because I'm mainly focused on the status of the 32GB model and the bootloader's status in terms of remaining unlocked or not. Hope that helps even a little.

Cheers,

Justin