Gadgetory

FC Barcelona may have lost this week but the mobile world has one live from our last day at Mobile World Congress it's another very special episode of the pocket not weekly the once-a-week podcast from pocket now calm where we discuss smartphones and tablets just like all those that just landed at theatre Europa just down the road I'm you're very tired host Michael Fisher and i'm joined by similarly tired managing editor and pounding Naja both of us very full of tapas good afternoon to you good afternoon everybody and we are joined long distance once again by editor in chief Brandon minimun where the Sun is up good afternoon to you good morning to you good and whatever what up yes what up we don't have there are things that are different about this show today first just everything's difference intimately thing is so oh my god even though the show didn't pack nearly the amount of surprises and excitement we hoped it was still very exhausting and we got a lot of stuff covered actually we're uploading videos as we speak there the last of our videos are going up in the internet right now so by the time this lands all of our videos from mwc will be up except one except for one except our wrap-up right yes and then and then we'll probably have the occasional bloopers because everybody knows me and camera don't mix well together haha that's not true i thank you i think you did the best hosts have a posting job of your career at this year oh thank you sir yes and we will also say get you guys yeah yo good all right son of again I was gonna say you guys you guys really got around and I wanted to ask you I wanted to start off by saying after going to Mobile World Congress there must be at least one device that you guys are excited to buy and I was just one I'm just wondering what that device might be for for for each of you well i will let i will let Tony go first but I will ask you before it does fine to just one because I have to choose good all right Johnny so I would most definitely as usual every year would like to buy the bat phone but on the interesting note i will most definitely not end up buying bison sad because of the huge thirteen hundred dollar price tag on that or the 1000 euro price tag so yeah that's a want but probably won't you don't want to sell your car to get a pass on three mMmmm I haven't thought about that maybe me now that you mentioned maybe and if I was to choose a number two I would be going for the LG optimus g pro right I'm having a strange bout of deja vu it seems like we sat on these very these very big beds talking about this not not 24 hours ago and not for one time only right he we just had the pocket our live hangout last night everyone and we talked about a lot of the stuff and we were glad to be bringing in to the weekly so I'll answer the question on the tablet side this should be no surprise to anyone who watched my hands on with the Sony Xperia tablet Z Brandon though has not been here he wasn't at the Hangout so he doesn't know that this is the first time in my life I've ever wanted a sony mobile product so my god yeah it's beautiful it's then it's light is waterproof it's basically everything I want in a tablet with the exception of not having an app ecosystem it's it's one it's one step closer to this future where tablets will be like these just surfaces you just pick up the surface and it has virtually no wait and they're virtually no depth and and the Xperia tablet Z is so close to that but there's one big problem which is that I think I think a lot of the world is kind of over this 10 inch tablet form factor and they can't and it's good to have choice but if they did this tablet in a 7-inch I would have children with the tablet you know I agree that I agree that I would love to see it a 7-inch form factor as well but having held it and I don't know if you can tell this from the video but when I pick it up and I pick it up with like the last inch of the side of the device in my fingertips and even then it is so light it is unbelievable leave how light it is also brought to light for me I mean it's a matter of things I I would find that to be too light it's just what I thought of the s2 when I first saw it I it felt on consistency well you know me yeah you know I hate the galaxy I hate of the galaxy s3 when I first picked it up because I felt was to light it fell yeah substantial but the Sony devices built so well there it's light without feeling like blood crap and that's why it's so great to say it's really tough to get that balance light and high quality it's one of the few times I think we've seen that in the mobile world from from from me at least yeah yeah but but you're right don't when you said it was too late for you I just pictured you like reaching for it and like picking up and it like rocketing into the stratosphere I think there was a feather but the unform a less impressive or or less established brand perspective the thing I was excited most by is something else that Tony couldn't care less about is the the yotaphone out of Moscow see that video Brennan the one with the e-reader on the back yeah an ereader it's it's a second display that happens to be powered by e ink but it can be an e-reader if you want it to be can be whatever you want it'll display anything that's the beauty of it and so I was like it when I first rolled up in their booth which by the way would look like a jail cell so is that that the picture is a futuristic jelsa yes yeah that's the one that I tweeted yeah it's the bazaar booth but we rolled up in booth and it's packed right and it was packed that booth was always back yeah everyone wanted to see the yotaphone because everyone's so starved for something that's new right after we saw the note 8 we were like okay even though then this is something we have discussed I mean it's not that I don't like the yotaphone it's it's a good concept I wouldn't find it useful in my day-to-day usage I don't really that ebooks on a phone I don't use airplane tickets or boarding passes on my phone so it dont map I don't need navigation at all times on my phone so it probably depends on on that person it does and this is why you and I are a pretty good pair that our show like this because you and I you do all the things I don't exactly we're the exhibit finest example of opposite use cases ever cuz i do everything you just mentioned so yeah probably the most compelling thing about that was to me is if you throw a map up on the on the e-ink display and of course if the phone dies on your way to your destination I just a got your medicine that that's good cool and that's awesome but the device something that's full of compromises I mean the size and the weight and I think it's you know we still dream about this this dual mode screen and we always think the new iPhones going to have it or something where you can like flip it into eating commode and it's not on the other side it's on the same side but it's a two-mode screen that would be really cool I think I media that would be a very versatile very useful thing for someone who either reads a lot or likes apple adding another side switch the mute switch joined by the new East oh yeah yeah but ya know it was very refreshing to have that comes what would you purchase right now good question you've got an angry commuter in the background there or your ride is here that was actually an ambulance oh yeah you might have seen this last week but if you didn't this is special effects coming to you live from Barcelona yeah so you have to put up with that and when it's not the ambulance it's our neighbor banging on the friggin wall so Brendan Brendan if if you could buy something from what it was announced here only hear what would you buy well i was i was first gonna say the optimus g pro just because I've been impressed with what LG has done recently and the 1080p screen on that larger larger display it seems like a note too but the way it should be with a higher res display but then but then Michael said the tablet Z and I was reminded of it and I would get one but then we have the same problem with Android tablets you're gonna get the Xperia tablet Z it's gonna have a crazy good screen it's gonna be so light that if you pick it up too quickly it'll go into the stratosphere it's got the really good build quality but then you start downloading apps and you're like cheese this Twitter act is massive you know this um Facebook use the Facebook app is just a and and that's still such a big problem and we talked about this all the time and it's there's no end in sight to the the crappy apps on Android tablets problem and when you have a 7-inch tablet it's not as bad it's like a big phone at so I was printing for a comment to a conversation at a major manufacturer recently this manufacturer makes Android devices and that was brought up right this this app problem on 10-inch tablets on Android and this manufacturers attitude seemed to be if we continue building 10-inch tablets if we flood the market with these things developers will have no choice that seemed to be the attitude that did so and they are right up to a certain point yeah I cannot go into details as spur how much effort the developers need to support several resolutions on several form factors on several display modes but obviously too much because at the moment aside from a couple of handful of applications it doesn't seem to look good yeah but there was other stuff we saw a whole bunch of other stuff at the show and what I was going to bring up about 15 minutes ago with our unconventional podcast discussion was that we're going sounds outline today listeners because we are we're just so done because we're cool and we're improving we're hip and worked out with but we are also we are also the end of the show and there's so much to choose from it's just a wonderful glut of product Brendan on a scale of 1 to 0 from from 0 to 10 how disappointed were you about the Nokia heaven yeah um you know I was watching that interview with Stephen Elop on on the verge and they clearly have a strategy they want to I you know we don't really as consumers are like high-end stuff and enthusiasts we like like really high-end awesome hardware but the truth is a lot of people cannot afford that and so if you can get some of that nokia nokia lumia 920 goodness in a product that's half the price it's compelling to millions and millions of people so they're they're kind of doing what's right and they're gonna have a kick-ass Lumia 920 successor in the near future will be happy but we're a little bit disappointed right now because they're doing something to make sure that their business grows I think tactically it was probably wise that we were talking to somebody from another publication about this I don't remember who about how we were somewhat disappointed but at the same time I think the Lumia 920 still has some legs on it it still has a ways to go whereas a twerp if Lumia had an if if Nokia had announced this super PureView device I think they would have shot themselves in the foot not necessarily the Lumia 920 is a six month old device going seven so it's it's about the time they updated of course I understand that probably there will be a major windows phone 8 update sometime this summer towards ottoman and if if they do something that's gonna be the moment well it's not a six-month-old way so I got three months older boy no yeah was launched in November November December January February that's no it was lunch in October oh hey Brandon can you figure this out for us no no okay regardless I think I think the night went I think that would have cannibalized 920 sales if they announced it now I think the 920 is still moving but we'll see i don't know all i know is we were very disappointed all right in the moment i was very disappointed i think everybody was yeah when we stuck around a little tired that's i'm a little tired of the not alphabet soup but the number soup i mean you know i officially cannot keep track of the 900 the 920 the 720 the 610 25 he can you can you do it in one breath there's like five of them nelson of all the US carrier has to the 820 day 22 the 810 and then we've got then the laser for verizon as another number which is totally not related any of those yeah it's crazy yeah but anyway you know it was still a fun nokia event i found it to be a good time it was announced in September it was released in November of 2012 yeah thank you Tony felissa we were both right can we talk about can we talk about the asus fonepad i think you know then the question would be which is of course the 7-inch tablet that can make calls which tony has gone on record by saying that he would use yes and now that you've seen it Tony of the this device that we always you know hypothesize about would you still you hat or the better question is how would you use it like would you put it in your pocket yes so so the main reason why at the moment I'm carrying both a tablet on the phone is that I'm more productive on the tablet but of course I need the phone to make phone calls so it's double the bulk double the devices if I had the device which offers me more productivity which is in this case the tablet and also had the opportunity to have phone calls not by a speaker or bluetooth headset but as a bit an earpiece then I would cut it down to one device only now i'm not sure if it will be the asus fonepad or the note 8.0 the form factor in the concept this is the way I use it Wow yeah it like I think what we came down to last night and that in the pocket on live discussion was basically like why not have the feature I mean in the US I think Samsung told us that more likely than not that earpiece is gonna be removed from the note 8.0 and in their version of years probably yeah yeah but so why the same reason why you couldn't make a phone call on the Galaxy Tab 7.7 which also have an air base but but why do they take that away because you probably you probably need a you will consume both data and voice on that and the carrier probably only wants you to consume data right the carrier probably doesn't want to because they don't acknowledge that as a phone right yeah it's a bit secara man there the thing that probably has to do with their preferences one way to the other book so it doesn't hurt to have it that just besides the earpiece my problem with the phone pet is I don't understand how it I don't understand why I anyone's excited about it it's a nexus 7 with removable memory and a backhand am an aluminum back and they slower processor because it's the until 24 whatever which is the Lexington relationship yeah yeah and so it's cheap so right but it's still not as cheap as the nexus and it doesn't run it's not an exit device you don't get definitely ask Google experience and the Nexus 7 has already made by a suit so is this is this as soon as trying to stay competitive as ok this is this is what the nexus 7 should have been really with the slower process nothing with the processor but with the earpiece and the design and the looks of it oh i did i see i should say i don't agree i like i like the nexus 7 much better than this device aesthetically I don't ya see what we did this in our comparison video you can throw around the next 27 a little bit and not worry about that thing I think you said you're talking about the PadFone put the with the Lumina back you were like and this can probably get strapped scratched easily I don't know Brandon what would you would you consider the asus fonepad Frank you put that I can't put that in my pocket I sit down and like my pocket bust open yeah so you wouldn't use it as your daily driver is your phone no I don't I don't see how it could ever work where I mean you have your one phone number and it's on your phone and that's what you carry a lot and it's unless you could like duplicate your SIM card and have calls coming on your tablet if you happen to be using it you go they daddy cool you're thinking of it's wrong you need to remove your sim from your daily driver phone and make your phone pad your daily driver that is supposed to be and just think of it it's basically a supergiant phone and imagine the battery life on that phone I mean you have a phone with a bet with a tablet battery alright for me the minute I put that thing up to my head and had a conversation on it i think i would i would immediately put it on ebay because i couldn't i would not be able to deal with holding that lunch tray up to my face that's my only thing i think it's the least ergonomic situation possible and it doesn't really feel good against your face now did you do it do we take a picture of you with the with the thing up again i'm no i'm showing it all for that on every hangout possible anyways yeah you know what I'm excited about and I was hoping that this would be the case and Emma World Congress is definitely happening is that this year thanks to a certain Apple device will be the year of the metal phone the metal device aluminum so you're thinking one your thinking bat phone you're thinking uh what else did we had aluminum only Oh God and when yeah I should see one do you think that okay let me follow up with a question right now do you think the s4 will be anything but plastic or would it be aluminum let's be fight it that's funny um if they if they do aluminum I think they will be chastised for that because um that's not their style I think that's gonna be plastic what do you guys think yeah I think they got well we've been talking about this all week and like with the release of the note 8 looking a whole lot like the existing you know design language but we don't see them changing that for the god of all of that but don't forget the no date is a phone which is a gap filler for a family which is more characterized by last year so that family starts with the S free continues with the note 10.1 the s3 mini 102 and then the note a point when I'm guessing that starting March 14 there will be a new cycle and I'm hoping for a new design cycle which will end up with the s4 note 3 s4 mini added if so on if we're talking hopes I'm right without right there with you if we're talking expectations I think Samsung has grown I think Samsung is going to be timid this year i think the galaxy s4 is going to be underwhelming physically speaking that's a very good point and public service announcement Michael and I will be in New York on March 14th to bring you galaxy s4 coverage that's you know that's that's such a good point about having to be safe this year because Samsung is in a very very comfortable spot in fact Google thinks it's so comfortable that they need to do something about it oh you know this and and so like Samsung doesn't have to come out with all guns firing with some innovative crazy new stuff they just need to iterate because the galaxy s3 is still really good phone it's got awesome brand recognition everyone still wants it and they just need to make it a little bit better they're in every they're kind of in an apple position right like with the 4s and probably with the 5s you know yeah I think that's what I'm worried about River here is that yeah I'm worried too yeah I think that the I liked the direction that Samsung went with the s3 even though it was kind of it was a little schizophrenic and they they didn't really pull off the polished riverstone thing but it was something different i found it to be refreshing because it was different I don't even doing that though Michael and I have been discussing or debating exactly this well while on the show floor yesterday by the way I got the chance to take a look at the HTC One and yeah with the thing i like the phone that it's no doubt about it it's a great phone and i took a test picture in the usual badly illuminated HTC booth of Michael and I know he's good but Zoe's a gimmicky you either love it or hate her you probably use it for like a weekend disabled if that's that's something different but the picture I took I wasn't sold on it I mean I've seen lots lots lots of pixels and it was jagged so so it wasn't it wasn't clear it was excellent it was not it was not that dim I mean at that at that light level I was expecting more of course I cannot draw a conclusion based on that so this was the leading Michael and I were just talking if the rumors are true and the galaxy s4 will not have an accident sir but the same Snapdragon 600 running on the HTC One then the resolution will be a 1080p resolution just like on the one and the specs will be approximately the same it will all come down to two things one the camera which will probably be a 13 megapixel camera on the s4 vs the four megapixel ultrapixel camera on the HTC One and the dizziness is gonna be a that's just going to be a dagger in the face of HTC who is trying to do this megapixels don't matter crap I think that I completely agree with you Tony it's going to come down to largely in large parts of the camera but also importantly how the how each company positions the device in the market and how they advertise if HTC is not if HTC brings the same lackluster push they did with the 1-series compared to Samsung's all-out assault it won't be very good and by the way better shooting cut leaf right listen I will tell you this i will take a million group parachuting commercials over anything that samsung has put on my TV recently these stupid commercials with like the guys with the unicorn game and then like they even managed to make Seth Rogen and what and what's his face on funny Paul Rudd I mean I like those guys and I hate them in these commercials like the Samsung commercials are horrible but they're always around there are so many of them that you can't help but they spend so much on advertising exactly and HTC can't match that I mean right I haven't looked at their both I can't say that with any I think I think that they're going to I mean that that was the difference between previous year successes and and and last year where they were so quietly and they had you know some ads for the for the One X and they just weren't good don't forget also guys that the s4 is probably going to have this octa-core processor it depends on who who you listen to or who you read there are several rumors some some of them say there's going to be the octopus octopus esser son sa is going to be faster iteration of a quad-core processor from from Samsung and XE nose and some say they're going to go with a Snapdragon 600 so no I don't think they're gonna do that they're gonna stay with their own silicon and once again this is going to take this is going to come down to messaging as well if Samsung can make an octa-core processor meaningful to the common to the public that's going to be a real women but then again let's and let's just speculate on that what does octa-core mean for the masses right now I think it means exactly what quad core meant back in the day when it was not supported by Android octa-core is not supported by Android as my speed just one sentence and I'm going to end it up on this adding to the two differentiating things the design on the camera Michael mentioned yesterday and he was right that we have sense 5.000% she a shin between the two devices and what do you think they're gonna do is touch wiz I think that they have no choice but to pretty it up I mean it's really cartoonish right and we didn't mind that when nature UX first came out because it was so response one year ago and it was eat but it was a year ago and now it's just it hasn't aged well in my opinion do you agree Brandon or do gluten I never really elected to begin with they had this whole nature theme you know as you alluded to with the you know it feels like a pebble in your head the device itself and then they introduced TouchWiz which had or nature UX which tried to make you feel I don't really remember they they tried to say that it would make you feel relaxed during Huey's yeah of course humans q / mem that remember that they had that advertising campaign in the beginning then they pulled it because I don't think anyone knew what the hell they were talking about I agree i think that is entirely but i think i think they will change the theme that they have a one year cycle in which they shut the shop every device its design and touch with and i think we're looking ahead forward to the March fourteenth event as a news cycle with a new design and the new TouchWiz and the theme will be not designed for humans but for monkeys out into something else if it's a sensor if it doesn't happen with the galaxy s4 unveiled and we're going to have to wait for another year because it is the smartphone group within samsung that pushes TouchWiz for and it's basically the s4 which starts it off yeah it's the SD ice yeah yeah yeah so it's not going to be like the galaxy camera two is not going to be what's gonna find ya but yeah well love to see it was amazing though to walk past Samsung's like a cur sized booth and realized i was i was actually walking up to a samsung representative and just to be on the safe side i was asking them is there any other device any new device which you are showing off here which is not the note 8.9 ace free ago5 something and she was like no and that super huge samsung booth was still full and they only had the nailed a point out as a new device on display they had lots of devices but only the note 8 point wasn't yet fascinating yeah they have a huge blood buzz buzz around them and that's good it is good for them and you know and I don't mean to say we weren't interested in somebody because their product I mr. and they just we just didn't wanna stop by because if they didn't have anything we have already covered yeah and before we could jump off a samsung and I do want to talk about this very briefly we we we can talk about this right look like the microsoft thing look yeah yeah yeah you guys talk they didn't offer any official comment on this but we're at a microsoft event last night it was not during announcements or anything like that we're just makes it a trick sir yes it was lovely they hosted us for some cocktails and we got to talk to some Microsoft folks and it was very nice but they had about 40 windows phone devices on the floor yeah that you could just play with it see only by HTC not yes and oh yeah and then they even had a huawei there while we w one on the floor and I'm looking around I want to show Tony the deity bez an innate there and not only is the ateam Odyssey not there which is an American device man i don't understand if that's not there but the ativa said samsung is not represented at all on the floor to the point where heck yeah yeah and when we asked about it he said let there's no particular reason why it is not here so if you want to see if maybe i can find a colleague who can show you his personal one but it's it's not it's not here but we it's not it's nothing we can tell you about that it's bad and you know what I just realized even on the windows 8 side there were no Samsung products there was no it's yeah yeah yeah you see ya so why what are you guys trying to say I'm just like I don't know if it actually says anything or not I'm sure it doesn't say anything significant but it is i think it's interesting that there were no Samsung products on the floor of this Windows Phone and Windows focused I'm going to say something but not directly I'm going to read the rate what I said previously that some samsung samsung doesn't doesn't really care about windows film because the majority of their products and their income comes from android so this might be a passing back of the bowl that Microsoft is slowly trying to not push them out but let's say build the buzz around nakia which is their child and HTC they're using every lever that they have to to to control the market um can we talk oh just a little bit more about this the the note 8.2 who this device is for you guys have felt it you put it up to your face you put it in your pants or whatever you've done with it and and like you know I'm sitting there thinking the you know you got the nexus 7 which is like a such an all-around great tablet and then you've got devices like the you know the the suitable set foot per phone head yeah you've got the phone pattern then you've got you know the heavyweight the Asus Transformer infinity and then yeah you know what is what is this 8 8 inch thing like what is it who would buy that let me let me tell you before Michael Johnson the note 8 point is for me and for people like me who want to have a unified device all at all times now you can throw in or take away the S Pen thing you might use it all the time like Michael does or you might never get it out of the phone like I do it's not about the S Pen it's about the fact that it's made by samsung it's running smoothly it has some additional features and it has an earpiece now the S Pen for me doesn't really matter but for Michael it's it's a must yeah you know I think the note aid is for people who wanted the note 10.1 to be something that felt a little more finished and it's just who don't want to carry on a 10-inch now they want a smaller more portable tablet that still retains the S Pen and all that additional functionality and as a matter of fact and doesn't just kind of throw it on there the S Pen on the note 8 also function it offers additional functionality in that it actually works the buttons on finally right which is finally a first place yeah and that seems like a minor thing but Samsung is really paying attention the S Pen there there according developers to build apps to take advantage of the S Pen there any is there are there any third party apps that are noteworthy universe ml headboard footboard hacia if you can so what is foot oh I thought you you hover and it sure use your information use the interview aside from built-in applications and the developers will be able to use api's to implement air view in their applications whenever you hover over with your S Pen then it will either expand or show you something so you'll be able to action without touch and we chat but every time you hover in the calendar it's a pain doing I will be honest some of these features really suck when you hover ever view is not good for everything but I use interview so much to scroll in a page you just hover the S Pen over the bottom of your page and your browser just scrolls for you and I mean it's it's so nice and I i think that there's a reason why this is the galaxy note 8.0 and not the seven point 0 or the seven point whatever I think that since the iPad Mini is a 7.9 inch device there must be some marketing thought back thought here so we got a slightly larger but still higher PPI screen than you do and of course they got the S Pen I said that resolution I mean I don't know what it is i guess i guess consumers don't really it doesn't really matter to them because like when I see this 1280 x 800 thing happen over and over and over again it's like let's push things forward a little bit like let's not see pixels yeah but aside from you and I on the geeks who are listening to this show nobody seems to care I mean I people buying ipad yes absolutely so e tu definitely it burns your eyes and I can understand where you're coming from I can also see them but I can neglect them and I can learn to live with them but your average Joe and Jane don't really care about that I mean it's but it's it's kind of like a broadband internet like when you have 56 kg like oh this was fast enough or maybe you didn't and then you got broadband and then you like I can't live without this kind of like you know when you and you're using a retina iPad you're like I would never want to use a non retina iPad again I think people just need to have a taste of amazing clarity and then they would want and and because of what we do we constantly see new stuff and we switch our devices off now if we wouldn't work in this domain and we would be stopped probably with a tablet for like one and a half years you don't get the chance to play with another competitor and see that there is a better option and then again all the rest is just numbers yeah yeah um well I have another mark on samsung they don't talk about something else um did the cool thing in my mind what the 8 inch form factor is that it's getting closer but it's still far away from this like idea of a digital notebook for people that like to write stuff down because cuz cuz the note the note the note 2 in the note 1 it's just slow too small because you're the size of your palm is like the size of the screen and then the 10.1 is not portable but the eight like is almost there did you guys find that to be the case like was it very comfortable writing or all right here here's the thing I can't speak to writing because we didn't have a time to do a lot of writing on the know date when we were filming our demos but holding the thing they made a big deal about saying that holding it they wanted it to feel like you were holding your notepad your journalist know about your diary or whatever and it felt great to me Brendan you have an iPad Mini if you hold the ipad mini in your left hand and the note 8.0 right hand you can't tell the difference is that light yeah Wow good yeah yeah absolutely and and it's the the field the look did do not inspire me this size and weight yeah that that's for the bank your psychological because you probably are fed up with this design I mean you've seen the s3 you've seen the no.2 and probably you as you reach the point where you say this is enough but let's say that's your first Samsung device your first contact with this with you this your first sensor devices something so library yeah I mean yeah it'll it'll sell more than absolute times a little bit but it doesn't it i would not i would say it'll sell i would say it will satisfy will it inspire people no only not in the way that samsung wants them to be inspired with their whole like creative talk i like that thought process cell satisfy inspire it's like a checkbox you know yeah right because i think i think that the Third Point inspiration depend heavily factors into repeat purchases right I'm much more likely to buy again from a company that has inspired me than I am from a company that I've said yeah their product is good and before I wrap up the Samsung talk I have just an adjacent question to you guys or an announcement to make with the galaxy note 8.0 the line between phones phablets and tablets has officially disappeared did you notice that we got four or five inches 6 inches seven inches eight inches nine inches 10 inches 11 inches there's no line anymore it's I mean you can still categorize them but yeah there's no like well I out to the line is still there the gap is not yeah yeah well you have phones then you have phablets and then you have tablets with phone functionality and then there's there's a huge blur what do we call these that phone blitz oh oh God waiting is this is this that no well I've wrote about the phone book I remember what it was that was that media yeah but it's it's a phone book yeah we have a phablet in a phone booth no but a fumble that or no there's got to be a better name for it well I'm excited to umm to import one of these from from Europe and maybe one of us can do an experiment to see I will be the experiment because I will definitely keep it as my data driver because I'm the earpiece fanboy on a 7 / 8 inch form factor if anybody to if anybody if Tony doesn't get a hands-on with this thing is going to be a crime because this is exactly as product we are gonna but listeners we are definitely going to get a review device so much watch for that yeah let's let's move on from Samsung did you have a preference because we got a whole list of things we've seen right not much fight go on I do it Oh what was it no I my London grants I do have a preference I want to know what the heck is going on with HP and after we get done making fun of their tablet their first tablet I want to know if there if you guys got ND any indication that like this is just them dipping their toe in the pond and they're gonna come out with some badass awesome tablets soon I must I must be completely honest when we were at the event where the HP was showing this off we did not get an opportunity to talk in depth because we were still we were rushing to film a number of videos in a very short amount of time because we didn't have much time at this event so we weren't able to get any any insights except for the fact that in my view the people representing HP at this event were very nice and very knowledgeable there was very little excitement on the team there to show this thing off also we have to mention that this was not a dedicated HP event that it was a get-together yeah companies so that probably could have added to this stuff I would like to say that I am probably the only one on the team who is not disappointed or not have a sour taste in his mouth about this HP android tablet I mean you got I know what you guys think it's it's like last year specifications and it just doesn't sound right I mean I'm giving them first of all the benefit of the doubt because it's their first try and their first attempt at something and they are trying to keep the costs down while and this was emphasized bringing better quality materials than the competitors now we've got to get aggressive good what's the bezel made of and the frame is stainless steel yeah and the back is is that the such thing is they emphasize on this that this feels better and of course for me it feels better than the nexus 7 but if you come to think of it the specifications are not that good but it's not just that they're not that good let me let me speak to this row k I mean I you know if you're going to put a 5 megapixel camera on the back of the tablet fine it's a 3 megapixel camera it is something from two years ago or three right and tablet cameras useless but the thing is I'm not willing to give HP the benefit of the doubt because I've done that right and it's not their first attempt at a tablet they tried with something that had far more potential and which was released in a completely unfinished condition and then that the tablet that the android tablet it is Rachel yeah so behind so if it is going to be the first tried an Android tablet why wouldn't they let me tell you why because they are nothing amazed because they are not Google who can sign a contract with a sous to deliver super super low priced devices and about the only way you can cut prices down and be competitive against the asuste Nexus 7 is to cut down on the specifications replace your 5 megapixel with the free megapixel replace a Tegra with a Lexington and make that that move and whether the market likes it or not it's going to be that's another question but they try to via Slee they have the price point in mind right and they cut every single corner they possibly could to get to that point and I in my opinion they released a tablet that is more forgettable than almost anything else I saw at the show when this was a company first of all that like helped found the computer revolution and second of all which which had something in its hands that will truly could have been amazing you could ask for it's just funny because it's coming out in April yeah that's not even the thing is a joke on so many levels that I am Bob it boggles my mind that this is the same company that creates a beautiful product as the envy x2 you wanna hear something funny I went to their website because I wanted to see the message you know these companies have gotten really good at setting up these like micro sites with nice graphics and big pictures and they always have a message at the top of like why should I care and their message for the slate 7 is two words experience amazing but the thing that the cool thing is that right under that they put the price starting at 169 which is really cheap and then there's a little paragraph about why it's interesting but like they're there I kind of agree with Tony a little bit I kind of agree with you too Michael but I agree with Tony that you know they're entering they're doing something that they there's an opportunity here at this price point because right now people that want a cheap Android tablet they go with Kobe they go with our coast they go with those cheap like $99 tablets that you see your grandma using and struggling with and they all are they're not even terrible their unusable they're so slow there so bad and maybe like this slate 7 is gonna be crappy an April when it comes out but are 169 bucks if you only have a hundred and seventy bucks to spend like maybe this is a good option but but but the Nexus 7 is so close thirty dollars more right for thirty dollars more you get the nexus 7 with like community laid Vantage's that Google can communicate to you right which is like fast software updates a better display to my eye but to be fairly don't know how HP will do that will deal with the software updates I mean we don't have any history at full we know it won't be as fast as a nexus 7 the Nexus 7 is sometimes slow my Nexus 7 is still not updated to 4.1 point2 and it's an ex 7 and it's a white one at that so that's my nexus 7 buddy there that's yours and I wanted to give it back to you I didn't miss said it back with Mike Nahan skin I kind of want to back years I've had four point two four months oh my nexus 4 point 2 point 2 220 the four point to point to a method will use the latest on one I'm sorry all the latest so we don't have any history of android history with HP maybe they'll be I mean maybe they'll be the first ones to update who knows maybe they will suck I will say I will say that the company has absolutely no history of following through in mobile I don't see that changing and when I saw said that somebody else on the team had written an editorial about HP sucking i think was Hymie right with this photo yeah of course was Hymie I was disappointed because I wanted to be the one to write the editorial you guys are just slashing myself I'm rushing down the drowning men back in the pool today the end they've done for themselves I just don't I you know I've done it themselves and I have no no sympathy for them let's talk about a company that actually means something and I want to talk about the LG optimus g pro just for a second can I yes yes and we should mention we should mention that the optimus g pro is not the successor to the optimus G no it's not the optimus g pro is the answer to the galaxy note 2 and in many respects is LG is upping the ante silly g pro at the moment is a better option for a phablet than the note 2 is but but there's the S Pen so I've been recently using my mother the note 2 as my daily driver and the g pro is better in almost every aspect if you count the higher megapixel camera the better screen I even think it feels better and it appeals more to me if I stop here then it's a no brainer it's the LG optimus g pro you talk about the spec sheet yeah but if i take into the equation the s pen which I don't care about really but Michael doesn't probably many others then then there's that because on the g pro you can just use your finger as a stylist and that you know what that means and if you're used to using the s pen and the entire package with which it comes the old s applications then the tunnel to is still still still there there let me speak to that for one second but after Brian I feel like trying to go ahead well I was I was gonna ask I was going to ask the house the the back has that that glass thing I know the back is blasting exact so if you rub your finger against the back of the S free or the note to you got the exact same feeling when you rub your finger against the back of the Jeep bro it's the same plastic it's probably even the same technology but they have the same texture which you'll see on the Nexus 4 it just plays nicely in lights and it reflects and it's squares in itself and michael says it's like good like I've like a cheap tile bathroom floor in a motel you never want to go to oh my gosh that's my worst no longer on the white one oh yeah but we haven't seen the bloody haven't seen the black one the black one might be beautiful I just think the white one looks like we're and this this we have also we have to say this that these devices which were on the show floor at LG were the South Korean devices which also had the antenna for TV and radio reception they probably might bring the global version and other colors or other colors too and I will say on the software so it's not just that the S it's not just the s-pen that the note to bring to the game that makes it a better phablet in my opinion it's it's Samsung's optimization of TouchWiz to suit the larger form factor you know the multi screen is a better way of multitasking in my opinion than the resizable window approach that LG does there are more customizations look there's a limitation and the Galaxy Note 2 if you have the multi window update which I'm currently not running you can only stack up two applications at one time as with the cube slide on the LG you can have like five or six applications like back in the day of Windows 3.1 when they were attacked what about the other with different transparencies and you can just move them around like it was a windows pc so you can do more on on a screen with not enough real estate to make that experience worthwhile so yeah you can run six things at once and show your friends but it's not a good you'd be like workflow well it depends you can have a small calculator and left you can have a small note but on the right and then your Twitter largely on the bid it all depends on how you planning on using it yeah and on something like a tablet that makes sense to me but like not on 5.5 inches and huge I think here's the thing and we've you know what after this is great because after we talked about this here in the podcast we can take like a whole weekend of not arguing about the optimus g pro i think it is the finest example of copycatting without understanding why you're copycatting and i think it is a product that has no reason to exist well there's one thing here that we're forgetting which is that if Samsung is sticking to its yearly release cycle we're not going to see the note 3 until the summer so now LG hasn't as I'm through uncle autumn even Mountain diva beginning of September hmm yeah so LG has this huge window of time and and Samsung's not going to accelerate their their note 3 development just because of the g pro so LG has this huge window of time to convince people that this thing is better and what are they gonna do they're probably gonna say that the screen is much better they're gonna say I memorized better the processor is faster yeah well harp on those and by the way we didn't take any shots with the optimus g protein on it might be a total POS it's just for my resolution because the note 2 as you said earlier the note 2 cameras quite good is among the best camera I've ever used but it says it's as good as the gaps as a same cameras calcium happy iphone 4s n dat bass and the 4s yeah so what I what I want to say is that the optimus g pro is by no means an iteration of the optimus G but i think that the optimus g pro is what what resulted after the LG optimus view and view to evolved oh please don't say a curse word now i will say remember we're on the floor at LG and the guys like we were asking about the fidelity like oh we've got the optimist did you see that yet last year and the view to get also lets you we got the view no we don't want to see that so I think that this the the g pro is the view evolved and probably what the view should have been and if you get so much better this this finger I don't know noting or writing more so that that was introduced with the view and the software side of it hasn't changed maybe it has been upgraded to a better experience but I don't see it as copycatting the samsung now they just brought up and just one sentence and I'm gonna end this they just brought up a large screen size phone which happens to be able to get some melt input from your finger like every other phone in their lineup at MVC yeah which is it yeah which is a horrible feature when you use it with your finger yeah especially on a three-inch something device how I wish we did I'm sorry Brendan yeah I was just gonna say the the g pro screen besides being super high resolution from the pictures and videos I've seen looks very good quality good viewing angles good color and saturation like is it I can justify that yes it's one of the best greens yes which holds true with our experience in the LG optimus G which has a wonderful screen yeah yeah yeah playing with my right now yeah um so if we if we can I would like to talk about what we saw today yes please which is brand of the video is probably live on another the last time you looked at our at our site but we don't screen the Sailfish the Sailfish yeah so we got our opportunity to to play with yoga's sailfish OS which is still running on a developer device it's a nokia m 950 yep and actually CTO newly-promoted CTO Stefano Moscone you gave us a nice interview told us a little bit about the direction they're going talk a little bit about the sdk they just released but we got to see this always running in person for the first time and i think we can say it's a very beautiful OS yeah i am excited too so if like I just said this to Michael if i am to choose right now between any platform which is a recent startup I'd use yola over kubuntu maybe ela over-seasoned so yeah I think they're heading into a right direction they are doing things come legally differently from everybody else and it's either the novelty of things or it's probably the beauty of the things which is appealing but it is appealing I've got a few questions about about selfish I've been watching you bunt to bunt to very closely and that is easily easily ported to legacy hardware and not that you would want to do that right now because it's so early and so have thinked but does this is like what is this is this the linux-based yes yes its limits and it will it will run native Android applications it will run native android apps yes what yeah it's kind of a situation like that like the blackberry or the emulator hope foot well it's but it's not quite an emulator it's more like a when I did it right and when I said in the interview like oh okay so people will be able to port android apps he was like no there's no porting record you just run the android apps right on through is how do you do that you got to get google play on there you'd probably find a way around to get the apks yeah so what is their plan to to get this since the world so when we eliminated like launching it they're going to launch it with they are going to have a device they are designing a piece of hardware that will carry forth the visual language of the OS into into the hard one roll so they are going to release hardware of their own they are also planning on licensing it to other manufacturers I don't know who they're talking to if anybody and they are they have not ruled out the possibility I think of offering this for download for existing hardware so so they would would they talk about like providing instructions and and knowledge base resources on doing that they didn't go to that you know I think there's the company we have to keep in mind yola is is 60 people strong this is a very small very very small company and I think they have to stay razor focused on one thing at a time and right now that seems to be from the impressions that I got that seems to be the piece of hardware they haven't announced yet the smartphone so I think we'll have to wait to see that before we can cure concrete responses hung on the few and of course would like with every other company they have the separate divisions one of which is working on the user experience one just working on the aspect and looks of the platform itself one of them is working probably at a hardware support and whenever these separate divisions reach their final target their final point of development then we'll join everything together and probably will see the end result interesting now having seen it in person and used it and and erasing the fact that there's some novelty involved here is this an operating system that you guys could use as it on a daily driver today no I mean its current in Wells pre-production do yet today no you know once its once it polished and it's working I could give it a try like I gave symbian a try Symbian Belle or or nokia n9 running on me go so I don't see why not especially if you'll be able to run a native Android applications even if it's going to be emulated do you have access to the world's largest or second largest App Store so that's not going to be a problem so it's just like a new interface you have to learn it and it depends on the learning curve the more I think about it now and having seen it in person the more I think that sailfish looks like an OS that if you put it on a virtue if you put it on a really high-end piece of hardware it would look beautiful because so much of selfish is focused on the aesthetic the visual appeal to the point Brandon where it you know the ambiance thing where you can select a a wallpaper and like if it's like a wallpaper with all the leaves on it it'll change the entire OS palette to greens so it's really pretty it's gorgeous and if you take it actually we took a picture of me in the video and then we made a Michael Fisher ambience so the whole thing was this kind of ridiculous for the sweating flesh tone so just adjusting how this works if those of you who are running itunes 11 know this with the iTunes does it with the album covers the software itself is checking for a color which is mostly present or omnipresent within the picture which you are setting as an ambience and then it changes your text accordingly just to make a contrast or readable but still keeping it in sync with the visual guide line yes not just text with like highlight color yes yes the theme so that's cool so yes I think it's very pretty and just answer your question Brenna day if the app situation is that by the way they're offering a native SDK to and which they announce today so yes you can code sailfish apps and I think 20 minutes after they released the sdk that for the 40 line code yeah oh yeah it's like a gallery app is like 40 40 lines of code that's it does that mean it's okay apparently is very elegant yeah yeah it doesn't take very long to code apps for this place and and the camera app is also nice 20 minutes after they released the sdk they have their first app which was a podcast app like it wasn't like pong or something you know so that's pretty cool I mean you start asking questions about this though and you start thinking it's like is there room now for what for a fourth platform for a fifth left arm well there certainly is room and we are always supporting newcomers the question is that as we said it yesterday on a podcast unfortunately windows film is still struggling for that third spot and it's not at all secure so at one point when you don't even reach five percent you cannot consider yourself a solid third competitor so i think that the game is on for the third option we said yesterday on the hanger on the hanger i'm sorry so anyway yeah that's way it was i think overall it was really good fund it was fun absolutely and watching this new platform run on a piece of hardware that was three years old he runs smoothly that that that that piece of hardware is standing at the base of Nokia's current smartphone design language that's the predecessor of the nokia n9 and the n9 was basically the final final version of the nokia lumia 800 and then SOR why don't we talk a little bit about Kwame and the ascend p2 sure good I like that phone you did I mean aside from the fact that it doesn't have a 1080p screen I'm trying to remember it's I don't need a 1080p screen on a four-point something inch screen the 30 megapixel camera we took the samples I shot you with the huawei p 2 and you shot me with right we established that it's it's a mediocre camera right at first glance the the images looked good but when we blow up the entire size of the image on the computer you could see some noise even in well-lit situations and then there's the emotion UI which I find to be good but it's a strange combination of other competitors options pretty much defines cartoony yeah but all in all the piece the piece of hardware feels good in the hand and the the software experience is fluid it is it is fluid where I'm sorry I don't I remember the day I remember covering in I don't remember what it feels like I don't remember what it looks like I have to look at us that's that's that's because it was one of those videos when Michael Fisher was behind the camera and not tell me behind a camera so I'm excited about the hoo-ha the S&P too and I think they might manage to uh to do something with that but we had a little bit of dilemma we wanted to shoot a comparison video and we didn't really know what to shoot it against ya because of the specs I mean shooted against the s3 I mean that's a almost a one-year felt old phone shooting against other competitors i'm not sure what do you think Brandon about the Ascend p2 I I can't think of anything that would make me want to use one or buy one yeah boom sorry boom sorry Charlie yeah yeah I was thoroughly underwhelmed it was hoping to see their w-2 smartphone but they did this mid-range android phone is like sweet as a mid-range android phone i bet you're excited about the LG optimus l3 too oh yeah a little palm size box of Congress yeah you know there was actually another another brand I wanted to talk to you before we left and Brandon of course we'll ask for your thing but we also did just get back from the CTE thing the know that NEC thing the the kyocera echo resurrection the the medias W and I think that video is up now to or should be it should be idea anyway so that thing um filme probably looks like total garbage for babies yeah but if when you hold it you it's not until you hold of that you realize that it's not it's not the case here echo at all it's a much thinner much lighter much more modern device that folds differently it doesn't have a hinge that requires 39 patents because it's so convoluted the thing actually can't close like a book with the displays on the outs each display in the outside front back which it has a whole bunch of disadvantages to it but one of the advantages it does is if you fold it at 90 degrees and put it on a table you can throw the same video on both screens so if you're sitting across the table for each other you can be watching the same thing which is uh yeah i mean that's cool but ultimately it's still got a big old bezel running down the center of the screen yeah yeah so until they manage to do something with that bezel and join them okay I can live with one or two millimeters but not two or three millimeters on each side which adds up to six and I see a picture and there's a huge bar in the middle and that's a deal-breaker for me yeah yeah but you know that was I think our last video shutter or second last video we shot here at mwc and it was nice to sort of end on a product that wasn't just another iterative slab rectangle you know somebody doing something different we always love to see that what about the ZTE phablet I don't remember it either yeah everyone with the 3d esque the dual-mode home screen with the 3d or the flats yeah right the one where you could be high will be repulsed by the UI or fully repulse but you have you have gave it to it that it had a great display the split was wonderful as an end and that's bad that's just about it yeah no I don't want to give this thing too much bunk this is the ZTE memo grand memo right ma'am yeah you know Brendon remembers handling the Grand not the ground king ass but the grandes at CES probably right yep yep and I think I mean Brandon you were you were kind of halfsies on it I think you were excited about it in the moment then afterwards you were like who's gonna buy this right it's rough friend yeah just yeah that's kind of what I felt about the grand memo you know if it was another for me if you're going to bring a phablet to market I need to know why you're why you're doing it and I need to know what you did edit utility it brings me besides a huge screen I didn't see it with this one well the phablet concept by itself is not about the s-pen I think you're associating the phablet with the S Pen I'm not I'm associating the phablet with I'm saying if you're going to build something the size of a phablet you have to have items like the S Pen but not the S Pen by itself though you need to build more in the way I see it the phablet is just a device between a tablet and and the phone it's just a larger screen device that's what i call the phablet no then it's just as fun that's the droid DNA I mean to me that a 5-inch you know screen yeah we're talking close to six now 5.5 or seventh and that so I think that that's the phablet I think if you put a six inch screen on something or 5.5 inch screen on something if you want to get just if you want to get me to buy it makes a phablet the phablet it functionality that I cannot find on a smartphone I disagree well then what's the need for another category I mean what was it why are you have minivans and then large cars like why don't you just that analogy doesn't live here i think that the phablet is that exact segment of the market which is filling in which was at that point filling in the blanks between the four inches of the time and the 10 inches or the seven inches at the time and that category was named phablets 4.8 plus but seven minus what do you think Brendan I don't know yeah it's it's it's it's an archetypal topical argument that is at its core boring I'm so times unless let's sing seeing huge phones for no reason let's say I remember there's no reason to exist go ahead Brenda Leigh we should end on an interesting note let's look can we please dear let's let's talk about something that's not I mean aside from the fact that i'm flying out like in a couple of minutes yeah we gotta run what do you have something in mind rent no ok let me i'm looking at my thing here what I look at my notes here and Brenda would you buy a phone purely because the screen is not protected by a gorilla glass but a sapphire glass which is more expensive than the gorilla glass but it's basically indestructible um I think that would be a nice nice feature because you know yeah i'm looking at my iphone screen which has a girl a glass and some Space Age stuff going on and it's scratched up and any phone that I use on a daily basis or even worse than cases I you ever see someone with it with a phone and they have a screen protector and like the edges are peeling up using Dustin yeah you're like you you like this is the worst experience you could possibly have just take it off take off the screen protector and be a little more careful um but why is their phone coming out with a sapphire crystal yesterday there's another video it should be up by the end of this podcast where we have visited a company which is located in Boston which is currently producing some neat zaphire screens or glass well Zephyr is not glass so's Empire slabs of protection for certain electronics and they are very much liking the idea or would like the idea of entering the smart phone / tablet world in approximately two or three years right and just to be clear this is not a protective screen protected they said this would replace Gorilla Glass yes in the house line yeah and we saw we saw a cool demo on the video but yeah involved scratching up a lot of glass with some concrete and then trying to do the same thing on sapphire and it's a little harder to tell in the video because our lighting wasn't wasn't the best but I'm standing like three inches away from the thing I'm like wow you're really like putting his weight on this concrete go ahead to the sapphire and Sapphire just wouldn't refuse to scratch and Gorilla Glass 2 it was not the third iteration than you Muslim but the second one got scratched really easily yeah yeah and it's informative so everybody should check it out you should check out the video yet it is really cool and we talked to this gentleman about maybe visiting is a company considering I live literally 30 minutes away in Boston at me awesome they would but anyway so that was interesting and there was so much interesting stuff here at mwc even though the device Avalanche that we didn't really expect ultimately never materialized so there a lot to see I think we got to put a lot of it on film for our listeners for our readers for our Watchers and you know it was a really really fun time and it was there's a lot of stuff that was shown off Tony and I by the way and and I should have said this what we were talking about Samsung have been a walking samsung commercial yes at a time for show because when we're not like beaming photos to each other on our galaxy notes we are we were like oh what's your apartment look like so we're like talking about our home life we're like drum using S Memo to draw doodles of our like hometowns and hahahahaha layouts and stuff yeah but usually in the subway when we were traveling were just sharing images by a quote of myself bumping our phones together usually SS game every time I envision every time we sent a picture a plus I could change yeah yeah it was like we have more and more sense than money going in our pockets of course esm some fans celebrate one yeah so it was a good time we hope that it was it appeared to be a good 10 an exciting time from your perspective Brandon yeah it was very interesting to see lots and lots of videos and um I think it's it's it's becoming more clear and more clear and more clear than the big guys are holding off on announcements until they can control the situation more and do a new york city event or London event mwc will not die but I've been covering mwc for quite some time now but I'm seeing it going slowly slowly south I mean the HTC was missing this year Samsung was missing this year who knows maybe even LG will be missing next year and then that will leave us with pave ZTE and the startups right and dozen HTM Samsung present but there was nothing crazy coming yeah I expected HTC to bring something woke me didn't ya uh we'll see happy but as you said you have to get on a plane Brandon your business to attend to and I need to go buy souvenirs for my loved ones oh yeah SAS execute I think yeah I think we should we should wrap it up listener mail sorry guys we haven't even looked at the list message yeah yeah but this is a special edition podcast so I hope you'll forgive us and I think Brandon if you do not have any closing thoughts then I will take us right out do not have closing thoughts grateful it was lovely to hear your voice but that is that is going to do it for this episode special episode of the pocket out weekly hey everyone find us on Twitter because we finally got Tony active on it Anton is okay Ondine Naja amto and DNA dy Brandon is that Brandon minimun as always you can find me at captain two phones you can also follow pocket now officially at pocket now tweets on Twitter as pocket now on facebook which Anton managers with a plum and google+ at pocket now again you can leave us a review on iTunes or Xbox music if you like the podcast and if you have a topic question or suggestion for the podcast we just want to say hi you can email us at podcast I pocketnow.com thanks for listening see you next time I'll use you