The Samsung Galaxy Fold's display seems to have problems
qz.com
qz.com
The absolutely most important aspect of this $2000 device is failing within days. The only way this could be worse is if they started exploding, too.
I'm exciting for neat ambitious devices also, but they have to be more than paper weights. If these are all failing so soon, either there was no QA whatsoever, or some QA manager within Samsung was ignored...
Give it a few months.
This is like a 1980s plastic lunch box. The moulded hinge always snapped in half after about 3 months regardless of what you did. Cue optimus prime letting your lunch out all over the floor.
I think they are failing because it was a fucking stupid idea.
Edit: If anything I want NO mechanical components on any handheld device I own because in the last 40 years of my life everything has broken mechanically eventually. Home buttons, volume controls, connectors, battery holders everything.
Yes, but how have the electronic components fared over that time? I've definitely had devices where the mechanical components failed, but never a reasonable-quality device where the mechanical components failed first. For example, compare the times you've tried to input something on a dodgy public touchscreen versus the times you've tried to input something on a public physical keypad—I'll bet there're way more failures on the first than on the second; certainly that's been my experience.
Well, anything with glass is prone to vandalism. A metal keyboard is hard to vandalize, a touchscreen needs only a piece of random rock or other debris to shatter.
I can’t count the number of times I’ve used some big impressive digital map kind of thing at a mall or airport only to find it completely frozen (software), insanely laggy (potentially both, but likely software if a RPi could run it), and/or infuriating to use because I have to touch very hard exactly on the center of the icon, taking into account what I think the angle of the display is so that I’m hitting it exactly where the screen thinks it is, not where I see it through a layer of glass as being (most definitely software).
All of those complaints have applied to one degree or another to stupid tableside ordering apps that are running on an iPad or my own phone too, so I don’t think the hardware was ever to blame.
your anecdote seems to suffer from cognitive bias. screens are non-mechanical (except in this galaxy fold) and yet they're still the most broken component in a phone.
Breaking the glass (a superficial and expected eventuality) is very different than the screen no longer functioning or responding to input (a mechanical failure).
The review period has lasted nearly four days and despite the boldness in design and ambition, the folding phone situation has developed not necessarily to Samsung's advantage.
Let's be honest, this isn't "some problems", this is easily one of the two worst smartphone launches of all time, the other one being a phone that fucking exploded.
Personally I prefer the Apple approach with new products e.g. iPhone, iPad, Watch which is to have largely perfected the hardware before shipping but release it with MVP software which they aggressively improve.
About half of Apple products have serious hardware design flaws.
It's probably one of the few remaining ones that just keep humming along.
Imagine just how incredibly reliable Samsungs are considering the fact I still have a single running S1!
It's reported Apple will be adding that into the iPhone 11; wirelessly charge your watch or another phone with a charged or charging iPhone.
I’m sure someone will chime in about the butterfly keyboard or something else, but the number of those issues is small compared to all the devices they create.
And Samsung isn't innovating faster they are releasing faster. Big difference.
I hope Apple adds that Wireless PowerShare feature as the ability to use my iPhone as a charging mat to charge other devices would be handy!
Whether they’re well thought out and will be supported on the next generation appears to be beside the point: they attract attention and serve as a differentiator.
Apple has neither the desire nor the luxury of throwing half-baked ideas into their phones.
Samsung’s $2000 phone breaks in two days? Kudos to them for being bold and brave.
Smh.
When it quit working after 2 days they'd tell you you shouldn't have held it that way.
Samsung: phone breaks two days after use. Kudos to them, bravo.
See?
IIRC Samsung also had its own antennagate, nobody batted an eye.
There is no "innovation" whatsoever if the technology doesn't work. Apple and other makers have been playing with the technology and understood the risks of putting this device out there. Samsung ignored these risks for the sake of press, and now the customer pays the price.
Same with buying a Tesla back when they started. You invest in these kind of things only with the f..k-you money and for fun purposes, not with the money you need to survive or as the car you need to get to work.
Once again, imagine Apple releasing this.
So tired of this in both politics and tech. Yes. There is always uproar from the haters. Both sides.
Anyway, Genesis does what Nintendon't.
- Apple would have NDA'd the problems out.
- People would excuse the pre-production state of these devices.
Mostly we don't care because it's not something people are seriously considering buying. It's a flashy thing that's crazy overpriced. It's like reading about Bugatti reliability problems. Boo hoo.
If this was Apple, I wonder what your comment would be?
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/30/tech/samsung-china-tech-t...
- 4 review units have failed (a day or two in)
- 2 failed due to a removal of a "polymer coating" that essentially looks like a screen protector. This is not supposed to be removed, but several reviewers did (or tried)
- 1 failed due to supposed ingress into the hinge mechanism. I'm sure failure analysis is currently going on at Samsung
- 1 screen failed with no apparent causes.
I bought a LG TV a year and a half ago, and last week saw some spots on it that looked like a film coating which had air bubbles in it. At the edge of the screen there is a gap where you can fit a nail, and it does feel as if something can be removed.
I tried for a few minutes to peel it (carefully, wondering how I'd possibly missed that for a year and a half). Then I gave up and got a wet cloth, and it turned out it was just a mark on the screen.
It reminds me of shops and bars that have TVs, but leave all the marketing stickers on that are just for when it's displayed in a showroom. Manufacturers should do a better job of marking what should (and shouldn't) be removed.
And this is a replaceable part!
Marques Brownlee remove the protective cover, and Mark Gurman had his first unit where he removed the protective cover.
I remember thinking they’d have issues with material fatigue, what with the screen being on the small side of the bend radius. Then their demo showed a visible line of different brightness along the fold and figured it’d be a low-volume launch.
(Hope they figure it out eventually, though. Far be it from me to chastise someone for taking the stuff of R&D labs and selling it in an actual product.)
Then if the hinge is little more than two screens held together by a screen protector then you could replace the screen protector bit every year or so depending on use.
One side could be that large battery a lot of people still want and the other side could be the normal phone gubbins with SD card slot, plastic cover and a lame but capable processor.
For people who just want a big screen and don't care for having it 4K it would be great. It could even be at a $250 price point and be affordable in countries that don't have reliable electricity.
In posh countries it could be 'disposed' after three years and be engineered for that type of lifespan, in more resourceful places it could work with the hinge screen protector missing or if one side does not work.
Yes, but that would be rubbish. Big black bar across the video you're trying to watch. What Samsung actually built was the genuinely folding screen with pixels all the way across, which would be amazing if it works and didn't cost $2,000.
> even be at a $250 price point and be affordable in countries that don't have reliable electricity.
That seems rather high compared to the $50 tablet market.
I do like that accidental damage is covered, though.
Two separate screens would still allow great multitasking when necessary. When not used perhaps it can completely fold behind the device for a traditional smartphone experience.
I don’t think most people want to multitask - the want one big app or video.
Honestly I don't know why it exists. You could just buy a case and then buy two phones.
A two-screen smartphone is something I'd love to have, if bendable screen smartphones end up tanking. Multi-tasking is something that would be so much more convenient (say, writing notes while looking at a certain website, or discussing something with a friend while referencing a website, or ... etc). These are things that I already do with my smartphone, but it's just a huge pain in the ass because of the single screen.
https://www.engadget.com/2011/02/07/sprints-kyocera-echo-dua...
...I wonder if a triptych of three screens would work better...
By most accounts its a brilliant device. If it came with a stylus like the Note or the old Psion 5, I would probably have bought one already.
I'd never buy one because they just aren't going to be as good at security as Google or Apple, but the design is good.
Would love to be proven wrong but I think it's going to be a monumental flop in regards to sales.
For me, the biggest barrier right now is price. Having it all in one device is convenient, but for me it would easily be cheaper to just have a year-old phone and a year-or-two old tablet. Hell, given that I paid $400 for my Galaxy S8+, $200 or so for my Nexus 7 (like five years ago), and about $800 for my laptop, I could have all three for less than the cost of this thing.
Again, I'd be happy to be proven wrong - and I do appreciate the engineering involved in making a consumer grade foldable screen.
Even if that's the case I think that's fine. It should help push innovation at Samsung and its competitors. Sure, they should be more consumer focused _in general_ but I think moon-shots like this have their place.
I'm not interested in a fold-able phone. But I'd love to see them get really good.
The screen was nearly as big as the Nexus 7 and fine to read on, in a much smaller overall form factor thanks to the smaller bezels. The Note 3 served all the same needs as the Nexus 7, and it still fit in a front pants pocket like my old phone (which the 7 didn't).
I went from there to a Note 4 and Note 8 and never used another 7" tablet.
What seems weird to me about the Note Fold is that the folding display isn't all that much bigger than the Note 8 - 7.3" diagonal vs. 6.3", albeit in a more square aspect ratio.
OTOH, if anyone on the SF Peninsula buys a Note Fold, let me know and I will buy you lunch at some very nice place just so I can play with the phone. I promise I will try not to break it!
In that sometimes you only have your phone with you. Outside of the normal status-y nature of high end phones, I could see this being valuable to an exec/management as this would allow them to review Excel documents and PDFs on the fly when in situations where booting up a work laptop isn't ideal or possible (laying in bed, at an airport waiting on flights, etc.). In that particular scenario it is putting a gun to the head of work/life balance, but it is a scenario I could see it used.
I'm interested in the form factor mostly for consolidation: with eGPU, I've consolidated my laptop and gaming desktop into just a laptop that plugs into the eGPU when at home and this form factor would negate a real need for a tablet for reading, video consumption, or what have you.
I personally prefer the Chinese ones where the bend is on the outside (mostly because the Galaxy Fold closed seems like an absurd waste of real estate), but I'm glad Samsung and others are working on this. It isn't a problem really, but it eliminates the need for so many different types of electronics if 2 bigger ones are consolidated into one device.
I think the latter is easy to see a market for, anyone who currently uses both a phone and a tablet or e-reader who would prefer a single device that fits in a pocket.
The numbers aren't public yet, but it's probably low. I don't think they are dumb enough to expect this device to sell anywhere near the Galaxy S10 or an iPhone.
It may not be a huge sales success, but apparently it's above Samsung expectations.
My suspicion is that it's people interested in the engineering of the screen rather than consumers who've identified a personal use case for it.
Whether or not it ends up truly being practical, it's a phone that looks and does things that are radically different from most mainstream phones.
People will think their fancy future folding phone is cool, and other people will probably see it and think it's interesting and want to talk about it or see it work.
Kind of like paying $600 plus a 2-year contract for an iPhone in 2007 with a slow processor, no 3G, no MMS, no copy-and-paste, etc.
My guess is that it's for people who want "phablet" to be a realistic description of their phone instead of a hyperbolic one.
Belt clips. Cargo pockets. Purses. Bras. Sufficiently deep front pants pockets. Jacket pockets. Etc.
Is this a higher failure rate than average phones? Or is there a extremely large focus on all of these devices because of what they are, and therefor problems are more "visible" (there's probably an English word for the phenomenon)
At this point these are just review models—the phone itself hasn't been release yet.
> Or is there a extremely large focus on all of these devices because of what they are, and therefor problems are more "visible"
There's a large focus on these devices, because the people who got them were given them for that purpose.
Sounds like a lot of people are wishful thinking this isn't going to be a release disaster. My bet is Samsung will pull the plug and not release it at all (this year).
The main grip could hold the actual battery, and the screen part would only need to be the screen. It could be like a micro tablet.. when used as a phone, it could be collapsed to something reasonable to hold against your head... open for video/chat etc.
I wasn't expecting these screens to hold up very well over time, but that number seems shockingly low to me. I don't like the idea that the screen is expected to fail under normal use conditions well before the other hardware in the phone will be considered outdated. I also imagine that it will start showing some signs of damage as you approach the rated 200k folds.
https://www.businessinsider.com/huawei-prototyped-folding-ph...
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/30/tech/samsung-china-tech-t...
How do you even?
I bet the engineers even warned internal testers NOT to remove the coating. And I further bet someone in QA told them they were a pack of idiots and they didn't listen.
If a non-removable coating has air gaps or loose edges that invite peeling, that's a manufacturing defect.
This will 100% be a problem for consumers. It's easily recognizable as a screen protector, but it isn't = instant problems. Especially on a 2000$ device.
(Pulls the fucking screen off) I think this may have contributed to my screen not working