Samsung Galaxy Fold Hands-on: Amazing, But Concerning
Samsung Galaxy Fold Hands-on: Amazing, But Concerning
2019-04-17
hey guys it is finally here we finally
got our hands on it this is the Samsung
Galaxy pull which is the first
commercially available foldable phone
from Samsung and let me just tell you
that front it's pretty amazing when
you've got it closed you've got this
relatively small display on the front
but when you open it up it becomes this
enormous display which is almost pretty
much the size of a tablet it's very
squared off you've got a snap tracking
an 855 processor in here 12 gigabytes of
RAM and 512 gigabytes of the storage
which is one of the most highest spec
phones that we've seen so far and you
can almost think of it kind of like a
laptop in a way because if you could
connect a bluetooth keyboard and mouse
to this that would be pretty insane now
the concept of this device is that
you're gonna be able to have this
relatively thin and tall phone in your
pocket when you're making calls when
you're doing other things but if you
want to have that big display for like
media consumption or maybe like watching
YouTube or something like that you can
open it up and it just becomes this
enormous display and yes there is a
visible crease down the center but
honestly if you're looking at it spot-on
you really don't notice it you only
notice it if you're looking from the
side or if it's the daytime and there's
glare as Samsung's designed this special
hinged mechanism that makes this work so
it actually folds open instead of closed
like the Huawei mate X and it's supposed
to be rated for an insane number of
closes and there's this really really
nice audible when you close it and when
you open it as well now since I wanted
to make sure that you can use this phone
from pretty much any orientation so
there's a selfie camera on the front
there are three cameras on the back
pretty much the same array is the
Samsung Galaxy S 10 and if you open up
the phone
you've got more cameras inside of the
phone so you've got a total of six
cameras on this phone which is pretty
insane for a device we haven't really
seen that before
but Samsung wants to make sure that
you're able to shoot pictures in pretty
much any orientation and shooting when
the phone is open is actually a pretty
good experience you're able to see this
enormous frame while you're taking the
photo and it doesn't look quite as bad
as someone that's holding up an eye
to take a picture now another really
nice aspect of the ability to be able to
open this phone into this giant display
is gaming we played some asphalt on this
phone and it's just insane how nice of
an experience it is to be able to play
on that immersive giant display a big
reason that people buy tablets in the
first place is to have a more immersive
media experience and if you can have
that in your phone that's kind of a
double whammy
now something special that Samsung works
specifically with Google on here is
something called app continuity and it's
something that's going to be available
in pretty much every foldable device
here on out now if you have something
open on the main display on the front
and then you open the phone up you'll be
able to see that same app in a huge full
screen mode so for example if you open
up Google Maps on the small display in
the front or even a YouTube video and
you opened up the phone you unfolded it
it would become an immersive giant
experience that you'd be able to use on
the big display now this phone is a lot
more narrow and taller than most phones
that you're gonna be using nowadays but
I actually kind of like it it's kind of
like a candy bar style like you would
have used on an old lg chocolate or
something like that although it is quite
a bit thicker if you look at it from the
bottom it's pretty much two phones
slapped together so if you don't have
thick pockets then you might need to
find somewhere else to store this the
screen is made of a plastic material
currently which is not the most ideal
situation but right now you can't really
bend glass to be able to put in the
phone so it's kind of a necessary evil
on the side of the phone you've got
volume rockers a power button and a
sight mounted fingerprint reader which
is really interesting for Samsung but
this also doubles as a big speed button
instead of putting the big speed button
on the other side like we've
traditionally seen on the Galaxy S tank
on the top and bottom you've got these
big speakers and when are you using this
phone in the immersive tablet mode they
actually get really loud the media
experience here was really really nice
and we were playing YouTube videos or
playing things like asphalt it was a
really loud experience now currently
it's running Android 9pi at launch but
we're assuming this will be upgraded to
Android cue because Android cue actually
has native integration for foldable
devices we should probably make this
work a little bit better with every app
that's not specifically tailored by
Google or Sam
now such a big display you might be a
little bit worried about battery life
but it does have a pretty big 4380
million power cell or should I say two
cells because this is effectively two
phones slapped together that share a
similar screen so there's two big
batteries in here and we don't know
exactly how long that battery will last
quite yet but we will be sure to let you
know in our full review coming very soon
so that's about it for the samsung
galaxy pulled so far we're going to have
a ton more content on this when we get
advice and we're just going to be using
it and putting it through its paces over
time let us know if you think ask us
your questions we'll be sure to answer
them in the comment section below and
head over to the website where we've got
a full gallery with a ton of images and
a lot more product information and until
the next video I will catch you later
alright guys so I just left my briefing
and then boom all of a sudden there's a
complete media blitz on Twitter about
the Samsung Galaxy fold so effectively
if you've been on Twitter have you seen
the articles there's a few kind of weird
things happening with this phone right
now one is that they have this special
adhesive coating that goes over the
screen that is part of the screen and
people were peeling them off and the
phone basically won't work if you peel
them off and Samsung does have a couple
messages that say please don't peel this
off and apparently in the retail
packaging it also has some more direct
messaging this says please do not peel
this off because the phone will not work
but in the review units that we were
given apparently they did not say don't
peel it off and so a few people did and
these screens cease to work so I feel
like that's a kind of a messaging issue
from Samsung they really needed to be a
little more direct and clear about that
so that's problem one the the second
problem is a problem that's not really
fixable it's some people's displays are
just breaking dieter over at the verge
his phone started bulging and then he
thinks that maybe something got inside
of it but it basically broke the display
and it caused this line in the O LEDs
and that's just not good and so it's
pretty much completely broken they're
setting him in a replacement
and then someone else's screen just also
stopped working it just had this line
going down the center and then the
entire left side of the display just
started flashing white and it's totally
broken so that's a little bit concerning
now two phones I don't know if I would
say that this phone is completely
unusable at this point but it is a
little bit concerning especially since
there weren't that many people that
actually got these devices so I would be
on the lookout we're gonna have a lot
more information about this as the story
unfolds we're still waiting from a note
from Samsung so stay tuned for that in
the near future all right guys so in a
shocking turn of events I just got back
to my office and now Samsung actually
did issue a statement regarding these
issues so I'm gonna read it to you real
quick it says any limited number of
early Galaxy fold samples were provided
for media to review we have received a
few reports regarding the main display
of the samples provided we will
thoroughly inspect these units in person
to determine the cause of the matter so
I'll let you interpret that as you will
but it seems like Samsung is going to be
checking these units themselves they
also said separately a few reporters
reported having removed the top layer of
the display causing damage to the screen
the main display of the Galaxy fold
features a top protective layer which is
part of the display structure designed
to protect the screen from unintended
scratches removing the protective layer
or adding adhesives to the main display
may cause damage we will ensure the
information is clearly delivered to our
customers so I assuming maybe that's
meaning they're going to be adding it
into their packaging or something I
think they probably already sent it out
to like people like t-mobile but they're
saying that they're going to make sure
that they tell the customers that so
we'll just have to wait and see but that
is the latest information I think the
video will probably up in like 20
minutes from me recording this so I hope
you enjoyed the hands-on video and I'll
catch you in the next one
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