samsung, based on my opinion,
good:
~unlocked bootloader
~mainstream, easy root and more custom rom
~mainstream, easy to buy accesories
~removable batter, micro sd slot
but it does have some serious cons too.
bad:
~amoled screen, make me paranoid keep using dark wallpaper, and uneasy feeling when screen is displaying white
~although the screen is super nice, amoled screen have burn in issue, its inevitable :-(
~"time bomb" inside phone, s3 has sds issue, s2 have internal battery leak issue. no idea note 1 and 2 have similar issue or not.
~exynos close source, wont be getting stable aosp rom, and hdmi wont ever work
among all the brands, this brand is the one that suck less, so i'm currently using it, and doubt i'll move to other brand unless they really come up with something awesome.
Agree the exynos source issue is a bad thing but it hasn't stopped creative devs from coming up with roms even aosp.
And yes samsung sucks less coz u get to control your own device instead of having so many locks on it and even parts are comparatively speaking not exorbitant unlike the other company whose name also begins with S.