Gadgetory

and we're live so is Samsung losing market share to Apple Galaxy sales are solid but competition is fierce blackberry is done updating the Prive Amazon finally brings back chromecast's and Apple TVs and TK Bay dropped by the gadget lab to discuss the future of the Internet after the FCC's net neutrality vote we've got a lot to talk about so make sure you're charged and ready for episode two eight three of the pocket now weekly recorded December 15th at around 11:30 hmm this is the weekly podcast where we dissect and discuss those gadgets that make our lives mobile smartphones tablets wearables it's all the stuff you wished existed when you were a kid and you would just binge watch all of your favorite cheesy sci-fi shows over the holidays and for me it was usually like a Babylon 5 marathon Stargate ok I'm kind of debating like what what is it that I'm gonna do I think the wife is probably going to be down for next gen ok yeah I think we'll probably do like you know maybe seasons 5 through 7 just on in the background constantly definitely I gotta get it got to be selective maybe some Star Trek for action just to shake it up with some little comedy yeah so as you may have noticed mr. TK Bay a gadget aficionado here to share his thoughts all the top news stories of the week and we've got a lot like I said we've got a lot to talk about so I think we should just jump right in oh and for those of you watching a live stream you can jump into the conversation using the p-n weekly hashtag on twitter that's where we're gonna be pulling comments and questions from and then if you're one of those audio listeners after the fact you're not catching us live definitely send in those questions and comments to the forgot our email address no it's a pot it's podcast podcast at pocketnow.com there we go and we'll be wrapping up everyone's everyone's questions in our month May back at the end of the mailbag episode at the end of the month you'll pardon I usually have Jules here as a producer to help me out so a lot of a lot of new parts here some I shows go because I'm Jules the producer but he's actually covering an event for us on the East Coast so he couldn't join us this week which I'm again thank you for joining us so we can chat about this stuff I want to jump right in on a story that because because we're gonna be talking about Samsung we're gonna be talking about market share yeah but one of the things I think is impacting that on the global stage is the intense competition coming from companies like Huawei Oppo Xiaomi and this is something that we've we've been getting little hints of for a while now but again this isn't full confirmation we don't have an official statement from any of the carrier's or Huawei but the continued notion that Huawei is going to be making a bigger play in North America especially in the United States and that we can see evidence of that negotiating coming from 18t and from Verizon no no definitely I mean we've had the the last couple of CES right we've had events from them they actually do come to the US release they brought in like the mate 8 a couple years ago the mate 9 it was a mate I started they were they were getting a radar yeah actual like the hardware and how it actually kind of gets tailored to the US you got actually US hardware with a u.s. charger you get the technology and last year we had one of the first devices that had Alexa built in and they truly did that they did deliver on that on that promise a few months later we got the update we have the LexA built into their phone and they're still to this day I think like one of two devices maybe two or three devices other than the HTC I think it's just HTC and why wait yeah wait that habit so they've been in the market Oh Motorola if you count their dock okay so if you buy a phone and then like a $200 speaker then you can also have the end result of what we're seeing now is obviously they're seen is that there is there is interest in the market yeah and if we don't want to forget also the fact that you know they're here also in another brand which you know the honor brand we've had the honor think six the 5x the 6x and then you know we just heard about the 7x I just got released and I think those guys are already and you know been introduced into the US and then 7x is coming here this this is I think the interesting play right now is we keep talking like what can a brand do how can you build up some market share you obviously can't right out of the gate out advertise Apple no right you can't out advertise am some Samsung yeah the advertising question probably eclipses a lot of other manufacturers own making budget exactly but what we've seen from folly is they've made a concerted effort to start playing in the unlocked space the mate nine was a great addition to the North American lineup at the end of it was the beginning of this year actually it took a while for a solid performer massive battery oh yeah one of the very few places have like a four thousand milliamp battery all the performance you know the screen is very nice great audio on it still had a three and a half and one of your headphone jack you still have those yeah it's a feature now it's not a requirement yeah and I think that's really why and then of course if you've had any chance to play what they may tend to make them Pro I had an opportunity when I was writing a few weeks ago and yeah because I wanted to I'm going to talk about that yeah definitely so looking forward to it makes perfect sense and I think people will be very surprised because they don't know the bird I think that's what it right the US we haven't seen a single commercial or an ad for while we but you land in the UK the first thing you get to after customs is a massive billboard while we found a mate I wrote I was you know like I mean I know I wasn't in the US but I was totally shocked like cab drive my first cab drive in Germany for Aoife yeah drivers turn-by-turn navigation and he pulls out of May 9 I love that phone I know you know he became that like that nod so in in addition to them making that play for the unlocked market we saw with the I have you here on the table the six eggs actually making it into target for example so we know this is a company that's really trying to push those boundaries but it seems to me that Kwame is backing off this mole the tiered strategy and focusing more of their resources on the carrier partnership the carrier relationship oh can you scoot the mic just a little closer to you I know you were kind of cropping your no no problem I mean actually right there you go but with um with that shift cuz because I feel like the honor nine became the phone in transition mm-hmm we didn't see as cohesive a release strategy with that phone making it into different markets it really never made it to the United States though I think it is available in Canada it's available on Amazon but not in the same way that we saw with the owner II like the on rate they made like a replay for its for it to be this was a this was a North American exactly they San Francisco event he presented it they provided everybody the information then he was available I Amazon of course right after that people could buy it and use it the honor and I never made it although the honor nine is extremely well built of a device I would have loved to see more of the that line of devices because they're small but they're perfect in the sense of screen to body ratio camera performance where I had a really good hardware there but yeah I think the the tenets getting it into the carriers obviously for any brand for any OEM is always gonna be the best way because you get that mass distribution it's kind of like getting Amazon to accept your Walmart totally you get that you know Cosco yeah you get that market penetration you get you get people to be able to see your device in the store in front of plate your hands on till you hold a mate ten or a Maine tonight or even an honor eight you don't know how good quality is because that honor eight that displayed the backup you've ever said the site we met there in the the glass the 5d glass on the bag and blue shimmer really nice phone and I still have that device and I still like pulling it out on occasion too because you you get responses from people shiny blue you know is the pixel it was last year's pixel and it was the the honoree where the two most publicly asked about phones that I would walk around with now often it would be hey what's the case on your iPhone but people were still curious they would still ask about that we've got a question here from Andrew Wallace using the ple hash tag what does while we need to do in the US market in 2018 in order to successfully go head-to-head with Samsung and Apple so carrier carrier launch strategy I think makes a lot of sense for people if it follows the mate nine strategy we're probably gonna be seeing a May 10 announcement early first quarter 2018 something like that hopefully to undercut some of the the pre buzz on LG G 7s and Galaxy S nines and exactly I think it's I think that would be a good step to start if they're able to work out their negotiations as the rooms that we're hearing right you know with either you know ATT Verizon I think those would be really good markets the fact that they have unlocked that means they already kind of work on t-mobile and some of the other carrier the GSM so you could technically just pick up your own device I honestly think it's it's gonna take time I don't think it may not be 2018 where they become oh my god this is the best brand but it's gonna be where people start saying oh I know what while we is I know what the mate 10 is yeah and I think it's we could just get that name recognition and seen in more front of people dining areas over yeah do you think that there could be a marketing strategy where they talked about how worldwide they're the number three and they're just not as recognized in the United States do you think that would resonate with North Americans it's hard to say I think it's tough right I was trying to wrap my brain around that is hard to say because you make too big a play they're like whoa I've never heard of you exactly why if you don't bring it to the discussion then you're missing out on an opportunity to say like hey we're not just some new startup exact we're an established mega brand worldwide years of experience years of performance of devices and many lineup and I think I think it may be a good thing to say but I don't think it's gonna be a selling point especially not in the u.s. we were typical yeah we you know and we always want the best and we always think that we are you know discerning consumers technology starts here always and it's not always that way I mean there are a lot more than just Apple and Samsung which is what we think is the top number one while we makes amazing hardware and I swear to God I mean eight nine Porsche Edition so that was the reason with that one but they had that on the show floor as he has yeah and that was the closest resemblance that we got at that whole curve glass on the side where every you know really had that really nice as I never saw it in the US never made it into the US market but they never even talked about it but the Porsche design was really a very nicely designed phone that kind of even came ahead of the si si si plus totally so they have the hardware you just need to see it and I think this is the right move is it gonna be sold on you know we're number three in the world I think what we need to see is more value for the dollar and performance and as time goes on and people use their devices especially with the honor brand because that's that's doing also much better penetration in the market here yeah let's let's shift gears on that because that as a two-prong strategy I worried that there could be a little confusion with Huawei and honor in North America as you're kind of launching both you know the honor is a little bit more established you can find them and target but you know Huawei only about a year behind and make the same kind of plays with unlocked retailers but you know I don't think they have an expectation that consumers are going to understand that they're the same umbrella corporation and but that's still you're sort of dividing your resources in trying to market products here but um you got to spend some time we've got it here on the table um the honor 7x I have my 6x next to it just so we can compare immediately when when you pop is the case off of off of it it does have that kind of HTC meets Apple curved antenna banding exactly and what I really liked that they're finally getting rid of these panels exactly they got rid of the panels on the mate nine for the May 10 and now honor is finally following suit where we have the 18 by 9 aspect ratio NAD+ but the the tech for the price I mean this is $199 yeah you cannot beat it that's where honors really succeeding it's getting you really good hardware at a very affordable price you go to pick it up for 200 bucks and not have to worry about it SD card support screen a half a millimeter headphone jack you know a lot of good things some things we still need to see improved I mean it's almost what 15 days to 2018 right little cranky yeah but that's me but but they seem to be making a really smart play with the honor brand opposite say like a Moto G 5 but I feel like Motorola got a little confusing with their strategy there's the g5 the g5 plus five s too many g5s too many G fives and G fives that started encroaching on like moto Z plays exactly when you're talking similar chipsets and battery capacities and and it's just I think the the marketing strategy at that point it is just almost like yeah we just need to create so many variants so people can find what they want and reality is you just need to find the right ferry in just calories yeah give it is that balance give us a good decent size battery good display and a good camera people will buy that at 250 or 200 was the price one will even that much difference right they were going 150 dollar increments increments and I think Motorola just I think I just trying to bring bring something back of the old days yeah reality is we just have just too many devices at this point yeah and I think the sea force of the that line is very very well established is very good top-notch hardware is slim design latest specs great cameras yeah and then the motor mods and all of that stuff so those are really nice I like the gaming lot on the motor sea force but it's one of those things that you gotta realize you know why we needs to really just work on providing the great hardware the great price I think the way their approaches going into it I feel like it's almost like similar to the way Apple does it's not animal has the high-end site and then they all set the seaside you know the lower end side oh yeah yeah and they realize that people want both right they want that small form-factor the nostalgia factors right there the the best built iPhone exactly from the five mile ban all around you can throw that thing in the land and straight into you want to do that it's perfect perfect one thumb navigation perfect and then but they realize that people still eat meat that so their name you know take that away and they provide you of course with new designs and new things they just approach it differently they did honor take care of all the budget great online retail and you know budget phones and they're doing well and I think as time goes on then they can draw that line so you look at them you love our brand you love our budget side but if you ever want that little extra Wow is right there and we can we can exist up you up in with the view 10 if you look at the view 10 some of the specs from the you 10 are very close to the may 10th yeah they took the Karen 9 70s in there that's that's you that's their best chipset today yeah so we're talking best chipset you know camera set up really really nice you're getting some of the best stuff out of Huawei into their honor devices at a great budget price that's what I like them and they're doing really good like it just takes time mm-hmm and we're seeing some of the stuff so you've spent about a week with it what is the chip chipset that they're using in the seminary 659 security light it's a small bump from last year we had the 650 year that's being on the yum so 659 in the European model we had the 464 and then the US models 332 as far as the internal storage and ok ramen rim so yeah there's always gonna be slight variation between the US and the European which there shouldn't be sorry I can understand that can only link to the price point though because we when we look at the price difference between the two DRP model runs closer to 300 bucks where the US model is 100 bucks yeah and again super super premium feel the display is very very nice it's 1080p plus you're not gonna lose anything 18 by 9 aspect ratio great for me a consumption and I've actually gotten couple updates on it since I've had it so it's really really nice I like the fact that it works very well and I think the US market would love to display because again they finally matched what you were having to pay you know so much more money to get totally because even with one plus your $500 phone yeah yeah so again less than half that price did they just because I'm gonna pick your brain real quick I cuz I know sort of thinking Qualcomm land if we're talking like 625 Snapdragon 630 that started to enable things like 4k video recording has hallway managed to make that transition for the 7x unfortunately no so okay so okay and the front-facing camera it doesn't do 1080p so you get yeah you got you have that is a compromise there there's a compromise yeah you could definitely see how the line goes from where they went and what they took out right but again it keeps it within a certain you know price point you realize you're not buying something that's gonna do 4k but you're gonna be getting that really good quality picture on it but not gonna get you know the dual sensors in the bag that their book gave is it's good it's not bad I'm gonna say it's yeah you have to get the right lighting and as long as you get you get your subject centered correctly to be able to get a good picture nice yeah alright let's shift gears um we've got a couple other news stories coming in and one of the biggies that I think just from sort of a media and entertainment standpoint is Amazon so Amazon is bringing back is finally bringing back chromecast and Apple TV so you can buy those apparently it's not that confusing for consumers if they have multiple options for buying streaming devices because I thought it was strange that like David sell Roku's yeah and fire TVs and fire sticks but it was too confusing to have chromecast's an apple and Apple TV so apparently we're smart enough now to figure that out in Amazon I just like got you don't want to rush don't want to rush and it maybe has something to do with the fact that Google pulled the plug on YouTube Amazon devices they're supposed to be according to some sources at least they're supposed to be working some details to see if they can keep it or bring it back yeah they had a stay of execution on a couple devices yeah that was well especially one of their main ones right the show yeah we need you to be came on that was from YouTube on video does not have that library access on their selection of all the content that people would ask of you know Alexa Earth sorry yeah I'm not gonna call the Amazon assistant anything I've been practicing not to call out the the keywords hey Alexa how much is hemorrhoid cream sorry that's terrible oh I don't have any L X's and my Google home Mini isn't even plugged in right now so it's it's amazing that well I think it's great that we finally had the the luxury with ultra be able to purchase those and you know we have a great lineup and you know Amazon makes great fires you know yeah it's nothing against the individual ecosystems it just kind of feels like this is an alien vs. predator you know choice you know whoever wins we lose it's like two major forces economic forces like Amazon sort of dominating retail Google dominating sort of trafficking and personal information clashing with us as the poker chips on the table and it feels a little unseemly I'm always gonna be happy when we have better interoperability and better service penetration between these different ecosystems I don't like when like the early days of having a box under your TV and like well the PlayStation 3 II can do Netflix but the Xbox can you're like well no it's a computer yeah it's a computer I should be able to choose what goes on there and so for the longest time I just ran a Windows XP computer under my ttae pcs yeah it wasn't even made oh man it was just it was an old ATX build like I don't need this motherboard anymore and it still got a chip in there I I can put 16 gig of ram in our hard drive and just have it run up there and collect dodge mouse it worked so so now it's like I feel like we still haven't quite Crested we still haven't quite learned from those mistakes of early like exclusive features or exclusive lockdown resources a Romanian entertainer the exclusivity for a certain amount of months before people can see it somewhere else yeah yeah we remember the Apple the AT&T Apple love relationship for so many years exactly yeah and and I want these companies to do better in part because I feel like the more we kind of let a Google or an Amazon dictate what because this also kind of ties into like the net neutrality yeah stuff a little bit yeah what what I'm worried about from those companies perspectives the Amazon in the Google perspective is more FTC involvement not FCC involvement but this this becomes like if you can arbitrarily decide one service gets your content and another service doesn't and you can use that as leverage for favorable retail space on on an organization like Amazon that starts to crest into any trust territory and that's not where I want to see a Google go because then the government needs to get involved same thing like I don't want the government involved in gaming but if they're gonna teach my kids about gambling mechanics in a Star Wars game and Disney isn't gonna do anything about it yeah then the government needs to get involved I would rather the video game industry police itself I would rather Google and Amazon negotiate behind the scenes not use us as bargaining or as leverage similar to how cable companies now have to do with a lot of like you know NBC or CBS when they're you know they're deciding the boycott certain challenges negotiations didn't go and then there starts flooding TV with you'll start getting ads from from your carrier price if you want to be able to see this you need to do this and so on it's a visit the Comcast was like intercepting traffic yeah eating people ads exactly it was just basically saying was it you're right it wasn't even that they were feeding people ads they were saying you need to upgrade your modem and then nothing was wrong that's wrong it was a it was it's that story got buried that's how crazy news has been yeah that a story like that cop berry is a lot of things going on with you just have to realize you're right they should have taken care of it I think it's great that we have them back on them on the on the market itself on Amazon and the fact that matter is that people want an Amazon fire stick they're not going to go and pick up a Comcast they're not gonna go pick up your Apple TV because it does different things than what those other things do and that's why you buy you buy for the integration with Amazon and people that want chromecast I'm not gonna look at Amazon and they're not gonna look at an Apple TV and you know what's what's frustrating too is I feel there are a number of us out there and we all you know and if you're watching this if you're interested in this kind of technology you probably have a family mixed ecosystem of different operating system iOS and Android and everything else too we can make an impassioned argument to say hey Amazon I'm Amazon Prime I would like to be able to consume Amazon content I'm paying for that service but you withholding it from chromecast as my my preferred option for connecting my TV to my phone means I'm going to use your service less and if prime becomes less of a good deal for me then I will stop using prime if someone has an Apple TV you can use their Apple TV to still fulfill your service exactly holding it as some kind of leverage that we're all gonna have like five different dongles sticking out of our TV four different Wi-Fi connections is a foolish business notion they're trying to leverage their their retail presence in the living room which doesn't make any sense to me at all I would say get Amazon video Amazon Prime Amazon music on everything that you can and we started seeing at the co2 with the mystical within video right and video came out with the shield TV they had Amazon video built into it so that's that's one thing that you realize but again they did they struck that out is like a proprietary partnership for one and you're like yeah don't do that don't make me have to go and figure out how to splice an apk I like installing Zeigler to do something else no no I think you're right I think it's fine the man at the end of the day Amazon needs to realize this is a source of revenue if they're not looking at it correctly you're you're basically pushing people out by telling them look I don't want to support your devices but at the end of the day the market will get what the market wants so if you don't give it to them they'll figure out a way to get it to work or they'll just give up yeah no no you know we just started streaming what is it the marvelous miss Mazal it's a show about like 1950 stand-up comedians that's on Amazon as from Amazon Studios it's a really charming show but my wife wasn't happy figuring out how to jump through hoops to get it on on a TV screen even though we have a vizio smart connected TV it's the wasn't I mean she gets chromecast she gets Apple TV we don't have an Apple TV but you know we have enough Apple family hell you just go boop boop and it's flying Oh chromecast I hit the little square thing in the corner and it's playing alright Amazon how do I log in look for it and then search and use if you don't have the right remote you can't talk to it the right way let's use the keyboard so first a lot of things and then you know with their but if you notice actually nothing else Amazon did kind of copy chromecast with their latest fire TV mm-hmm that was a straight copy you just got the square over a circle kind of thing you know oh I see it's totally different cuz the icon that's our goal not the same they're getting into that market I think that's probably also why they're kind of conserving look we can sell their products we can keep it and you know I think chromecast also hasn't been updated for about a year or so so we're probably due to see something new and hopefully will be some new stuff we can we can move the needle on that um two quick stories that I just kind of want to touch and we don't spend a lot of time on them i vivo actually made a little news recently really that we posted this on pocket now pocket calm and it seems like they will actually be the first manufacturer to properly integrate the fingerprint sensor under the display the display glass and this is something that I've been kind of running into some frustration like iPhone 10 and you spend time with a knife I just kind of laid with that I had it for about a month it's it's a nice device okay I'm gonna say it's a nice device so 20 2017 represented ones cranky spectrum of change for change sake where we get the Galaxy SAE and there's that pulse vibration motor this or the home button but we didn't have the fingerprint sensor so it moved it off-center to the back same thing with the note kind of bugs me still just because I want that spectracal design then Apple coming up with I feel own an akward set of gestures to replace functionality that really wasn't broken especially for how good their their haptic feedback is that the their vibration motor is they already were training people about force pressing in the screen or such and it's still there you can still do four starts which is the weird part about it so they didn't take that part away no but they took the fingerprint sensor away so it's like in the home button which was already a virtual button anyway yeah it wasn't really a yeah you haven't been able to click on an iPhone since the 6 and the 6 plus was the last ones they had a probably a like a full-functioning button and the 7 way would that yeah it's basically just a touch it's sensor it's a Sony yeah yeah it's a great phone it has it has a lot of good things going forward the form factor was a little bit too small for me I appreciated the 5.8 inch display but I didn't like the fact that it was the size of an iPhone 7 or an 8 for that matter I like the bigger devices bigger phones everything I carry I like the you know I want to have a bigger screen and I think probably next year we'll see something a little bit bigger I think overall the iPhone 10 for what you get from the difference between it and the 8 plus I think your ne VA plus is the better I think I think honestly at the end of the day you get the same performance you get the great camera in the back you're not gonna lose on the bouquet effect and you don't have any Mochis but I think that's a time thing we'll see that on the road it's it's really software there's nothing special about it that's the there really is no reason for it to stay on the 10 I think right other than the again exclusive for a certain amount of time so really it's a great phone great cameras the portrait mode gets better as time goes on and the gestures it doesn't it just doesn't feel right but after a couple weeks you get used to it like the I did like a whole series of videos how I thought every company screwed up on my personal channel screwed up sorry exactly and and people were like oh totally you're used to it it's $1,000 phone yeah I should not have to get used to change for change sake at that price this should be a device that adapts to how I wanted to infuse it natural evolution and Apple as a company is built so much of their wrap on I'm used the word intuitive that familiarity hmm yeah we've never changed how you operate an iPhone just for the sake of changing something and there was no reason especially picking up a galaxy there was no reason why we couldn't have emulated the home button experience for iPhone users in a similar way but this kind of full circle and really roundabout way I ramble getting us back to vivo and again being one of the first companies to accomplish the familiarity of that front home button you're in sensor yeah because we heard also that iPhone was trying to do it as well oh yeah many rumors about it trying to be part of the 10 but that never made it there but and I love forget who it was how crud it was one of the top Apple executives coming over god no we were never working we always meant to just go straight to face ID because we're Apple and we don't make mistakes that's a discussion for a different yeah it's a whole whole server by dad but so vivo again not that the top not that the most recognized a reputation in the United States but a very competitive force internationally especially in Asian markets do you think these features will move the needle like do you think consumers are gonna appreciate I now have more screen on the front face and I still have my normal fingerprint sensor gesture or do you think it's well my favorite brand moved it to the back so obviously that's the preferred way to do things now the fanboy ISM is gonna win or do you think that the acknowledgement of that muscle memory is gonna help sell more it's gonna be it's gonna be an interesting so I think the best thing that's the way they look at it is the the way it gets implemented people implement it in the right way and does the navigation around it correctly yeah because the big problem about this is it's behind the display where your finger generally will rest so if you have it there but you don't put a home button behind it meaning it's just sitting there behind the fingerprint sensor yeah and it's activating certain things so that's gonna be kind of like the UI and I think the weird part about it is and I'd hate to bring back Apple into the discussion Apple doesn't necessarily bring the new tech into the market right a make it right it's the best way to explain it is I think they polished the edges ology edges enough on it so that it makes it into a functional thing so this idea even though has some concerns the implementation is very nice I think vivo being gen1 should be really looked at as Jen one expects some growing pains expect some kind of some concerns out of the door but they're going to be the ones to bring it to market so you need to appreciate that so I think there's gonna be the fanboy ISM and where we go in and jump in we take a look at it and we may be super critical about it but at the end of the day we're gonna appreciate that they started it and they're gone especially with some of the stuff that we're seeing also with as9 and we're not seeing the fingerprint under the classroom I've seen it in in the back and it much you know maybe Pleasant placement so I would appreciate I would love to try it out check it off and see how how it's done and then you know dream of how it can go upwards from there that's the best way to and then also just kind of interesting that this is a Chinese manufacturer leading the way on one of these yeah I mean normally when we're talking about I'm here in the United States we have a perspective on companies like oneplus very reactive companies after a new technologies been out one plus five to the five T you know for example yeah we don't see them so ahead of the curve or on the pulse because they're making they're they're making their market in a completely different way which is about like cost savings and cost savings you can't do this exactly and so seeing a VEVO branded phone lead with a feature like this I think it's just kind of an interesting commentary on what I think the changing shape of the international market is going to look like over the next year's let's save that for when we're talking about Samsung yeah um one other just quick story before we hit that Samsung block I even took me a couple minutes to even pull it out of the crazy case yeah I blackberry proved dead does I know dead dad end-of-life no more updates go on it's pulling the phone out it was it kind of it's always nice revisiting this this build it's an amazing build I die it's love I love the device I love the slider the the mech the mechanism is built in perfectly they displayed a body ratio you had that perfect display size right in front of you you slide it up you got the keyboard you don't want to use the on-screen keyboard you have to worry about it and it kept it you know reasons we get to go yeah exactly you didn't have to get that bulky extra attachment case like you know Samsung sometimes will sell sometimes they generate a version of most of us don't see it but there's the you know keyboard case that gets released with I really hope that the the kids who said the development community does actually take this on and start helping you know give it some life although with the fact that blackberries so kind of locked and the way they do things I just it's I think some of the security stuff on there would probably get in the way yeah well that's the first things unless you were to do is completely gut it exactly lose a lot of don't worry about blackberry you know you just want to get the next update on this you can move forward there is always gonna be a risk obviously but yeah security stuff whenever you safety net you know you brick safe unit that's not much you could do they're relying on safety net they do set it up correctly but if you want the hardware you want the you know new software there's no reason why not the report isn't it's a physical keyboard it's not software so you gave me that really the the big problem with that phone was it had nothing to do with blackberry it was they entered the into the android market during the Qualcomm 8:10 8:08 era and then there was yeah the whole man that phone ran hot that phone see this is like one of the few this phone was scary if you had it on and plugged in and it started updating your apps oh man yes battery would crank and it would still lose charge oh yeah yeah it was just it didn't have enough because you had so many things drawing power and this charge wasn't fast enough Oh scary the last ones to have you know micro-usb sorry this microUSB I get cranky when I have to charge like bluetooth headphones now how where that something else got come on yeah I gotta get myself a big pair but that's also why I've just been happy to see the other pathway the the resurgence of TCL manufacturing with the key one I can't wait to see what key to brings I again I saw my first key one out in the wild oh wow okay I again it was it was another sort of just like I'm at my my daughter's pediatricians office and some dude just pulls it out starts to happen it's like how great is that keyboards again I know it was just like the mid nineties just like yeah yeah I'm sad to see that but hopefully we'll see some new things and I'm hoping they do generate generate a new design or at least bring something familiar familiar to this yeah or similar to it because it it's very nice it's very nice it feels great in the hand and literally if it had better internals maybe you'd love it better as far as the power consumption and as well charging could do a lot better I I would hope so and especially just for its it's one of those nostalgic companies I don't understand a world where blackberry doesn't exist I want to see them just you'll continue you know exactly and exciting when they do something well like you know our expectations are so low and then a phone like the q1 comes out and people will make I was on set for a new egg now yesterday now I was talking about it and they're like well yeah but I mean like keyboards like you don't know until you use it we've had that much time since the keyboards went away yeah you but you go back to something it's so awkward for the first day and then without even thinking about it looking you start typing you start it's you pull it out of a pocket and you hold down one button and it automatically starts calling or automatically launches an app and it's there waiting for you before you're even looking at the screen and you're like and then I'm looking at like $1000 iPhones like I have to hold it up to my face and then it unlocks and then I can use it Apple and that seems backwards yeah trying to use you have to get and then he actually had it was about 80 maybe 90 percent success rate with the with the camera it's not being able to do face ID but yeah trying to get in when you're in the store you just do this to kind of look at it make sure it unlocks then you double press and again it just looks like it's it's gen1 it's it's change it's changed so wanna change looks great yeah but it's it's a change for change sake so I'm gonna take it we're gonna take a quick break here just to hit our sponsor block if I can pull this up I have way too much I'm actually running this from my laptop and it seems to be doing okay that's right now but it's it's a little over work it so I'm gonna go to the phone screen for this but this episode of the pocket now weekly is brought to you by the number one New York Times bestselling author James Rollins the thrilling new novel the demon crown often compared to Clive Cussler and Michael Crichton Rollins combines real science and history with cutting-edge military action off the coast of Brazil a team of scientists discovers a horror like no other I have problems with that word horror they didn't discover a never mind an island where all life has been eradicated consumed and possessed by a species beyond imagination to save mankind's future the members of Sigma Force must make a devil's bargain and join forces with their most hated enemy is that so awesome even if it means sacrificing one of their own it's great place join in on the wildly successful Sigma 4 series Roland's latest Sigma first novel is one of the best of the series says book lists and publishers weekly calls it bone-chilling and we might be using this as a future episode for my book podcast the geek book club but I think we're gonna be adding this to our calendar so get started with videos audio and more james rollins comm definitely check out the website if you're interested in the Sigma 4 series he's got a lot of other things on there that kind of helps supplement the the stories themselves some really cool audio files interview stuff like that so definitely want to check it out once again James Rollins comm and check out the demon crown and we thank them for supporting the pocket now weekly okay um so how you wanna you want to talk about some Samsung I do want to talk some Samsung but I do want to take a real quick circle back oh yeah I made a small mistake I'm not we do have four million you've got a clarification we do have four K on the grabby hands so it's switching back to the back camera you got a yet and then going to the settings so it does have 4k four by three aspect ratio you have to learn that okay where's the video and swipe and he came come on man what are you doing I know I know I'm slipping now I really you had me you had me wondering so I like it I mean hey let me double check I have the phone sitting right there but this is the European model so that's Susan I just want to see on the boat game mode we're gonna hire this this is this is like literally the worst audio for the people listening to the podcast is watching two people I think use the camera to listen to two people using the camera actually the bouquet on this did really well like I said what I found that as long as you get your subject centered correctly and you have enough of a contrast between the foreground the background it does presume here's like one of the problems is behind you right now is an open window of the whole bunch of trees and leaves and light yeah it didn't mess up the stitch the cutting yeah you can cut you out well it it actually did that and then look at the microphone in the foreground it didn't blend that into you know that's surprisingly good yeah 200 on our phone I wouldn't have expected no I keep calling them stitching errors no cutting cutout errors and we're even um my my pixel had a few issues yeah busy backgrounds like that I would just look a little bit around the top part there's a little bit of it's a little um a little stair stepped yeah white again for when you try to post as a social media for in $200 exactly I'm pretty impressed but yes let's jump into Samsung right now so I want to kick this off first just again another short little news blip I do you need another smart speaker in your home yes you do because he is coming to a smart speaker rumored to cost around $200 we'll probably be getting more news on this around CES it's actually pretty pretty decent but again we question is this really the the killer app because I think what Bixby is done well on Galaxy phones has very little to do with like The Voice Actions that I rely on Guk for Google now yeah no different you get different exposure the Bixby sort of macro is actually pretty compelling that that has actually become a use that I happen to and that I like yes is automatically controlling and switching settings and stuff its built-in exactly it does exactly what does that really hasn't been able to reach and so I wonder what does a speaker bring to the table that you know an echo or a Google home yeah isn't already trying to bridge that gap between IOT manufacturers smart home manufacturers and tying all these things together is is that Samsung's in is it that is just it's so raw right now for smart home that they can maybe do their what is it they're smart things mark things is there there a built-in help and which works really well with Google home and even with the Lexus systems I think that's probably what they're trying to tie into it's it's pretty much just as straight we haven't been able to basically give our users access to you know the smart things outside of you know install an app on your phone or you and integrate it with you Google home they want to have that ability and say look we can control your entire home with that one hub yeah they just partnered up with Nvidia to be able to bring that over you can just bring the smartthings hub to the Nvidia shield so you can okay you don't have to even buy the entire hub you just buy a dongle you plug it into the back of the shield it uses the internals for power and you run automation you know turning on lights setting timers and all of those things and I think that's gonna be their approach is it gonna do more than what Google home or Alexa can do right now I don't think so I don't think there's much for them to do because their ecosystem isn't set up that way but that's he lets you set up macros on the fly and then I think we've got interesting because right now we couldn't do that that's where I mean that we don't have like you can tell you know your speaker to say hey I want light XYZ to turn on every day at 7:00 p.m. and turn off at and every you know next day at 6:00 a.m. if you could do that or the office is right there doing it then dad would be there a little bit of heads-up I think that's what they need to focus if they have automation ahead of what the other guys are doing because right now Google home can take two commands at the same time gotcha and that's a you know Amazon can't do anything like that and just ability when I go into the office and I start my shoots in the morning I go and I say turn on those lights and turn off these lights and I have the Mac the the configuration set that these are the main lights and then turn on my desk lights and my camera and all that stuff I don't have to touch anything as I'm setting up things and putting things on the table and getting rounds done I think that's what gonna be there now do you think Bixby might be a part of a grander ecosystem strategy when we look at all the other like Samsung appliances you know again tapping into washer and dryers later introduced didn't they introduce an AI component into one of their washing machines I really want to believe that I that that was it like Aoife that they had yeah I don't think they did it as see us I think LG did something like that last year CES when they were trying to bring into their little robot and they try to bring their there they talked more about their home home devices but I think well yeah but keeping my also they have their refrigerators they have that you know then tablet with it a refrigerator in great things be there but it wasn't easy but it was a big B III I'm spacing on this bad and I probably should have looked it up for our show notes but I really believe I think it was something like hey I special AI system just for their washing machine I'm gonna have to look that up like your washing machine will know what to do washing machine knows all about your dirty drawers so you gotta gotta look out literally but like in a creepy way two of the bigger stories Samsung this year I think we can kind of combine these in a way to galaxy s 9 renders yeah not a lot of surprises no no it's it's gonna be a small I say yeah it's gonna dual cameras the one thing I was happy to see in the renders headphone jack there were those rumors that maybe Samsung was thinking about walking away I think I think they've had a good recipe for hardware the dual lens was a natural thing we see it every year right whenever the road that comes in that small speck bump that you got in the note comes into the next version of the s and the S kind of brings in the next CPU new RAM configuration and then we'll always kind of push the envelope with Laroy anymore I think the fingerprint sensor if they if the renders are true would be nice yes very nice finally something that makes perfect sense because to this day I can I've mastered it on the right hand which is weird but if as you guys know we use our devices in many different positions a lot of times I actually use my vise with my left hand actually I got better at it typing even I always confused with a fingerprint sensor is analytical for the lens because my mind always thinks the lens you have to reach where where the finger is and it's the mirrors the same message tells the left hand to do what the right hand is so learning and relearning and trying to reconfigure it oh dude you're making a big deal out of it you know always just totally get used to it I do tend to yeah definitely yeah that's we're not saying you I mean I'm saying if you're if you're persuaded to leave angry comments on YouTube videos about people who don't like the fingerprint sensor location that that might be a you problem yeah but um no I really happy to see that vertical stripe in general so moving the cameras vertically and having the fingerprint sensor live underneath makes perfect sense for a bone is that it's lean long tall water since we'll have to we'll have really good internals and you know curved display yeah sure they're not gonna lose that oh definitely not but I just mean like it's it's it's an awkward aesthetic I look at the note and I see that horizontal chunk for the camera sensor camera module on a phone that's long lean and tall and so seeing them switch that if they go vertically like that like Huawei's gone with their cameras again so I got a lot of people hating on the fact that I called the may 10 pro the nicest designed phone 2017 and it's all because of symmetry so even the the the autofocus sensor and the flash bridging the cameras an identical oval no cutouts with the vertical mounting of the camera sensors directly above the fingerprint I mean like every every fraction of a millimeter of that phone is on point and while galaxy doe I'm not saying Galaxy devices look like garbage I'm just saying there is this asymmetry happening and that knocks it out of we're talking about $900 phones we're yeah we're all ready for it the most critical and market some tiny little details even just a little bit off it will be the determining factor why it's a bigger deal that if you have $100 burner and if the rumors are and they're able to work it out you could potentially have that comparison yeah early 2018 oh definitely before the you know the note 9 or whatever the next iteration the note comes in you could potentially have the ability looking at both the device and say which one you think looks better yeah nuts again not knocking on Samsung design they make beautiful phones great design but I am knocking the finger it ya know I'm a big fan when I was at the UK for the honour of and I streamed for Anna 45 minutes to the livestream you know date follow device yeah audio quality picture quality back facing camera front facing camera everything's switch and it was just a champ that's why I like them but I'm you know at the end of the day when you have so many this you know selection all running the 8:35 or comparable processors you know when you talk over to the care inside so your own you you have to kind of figure out whatever you feel like it looks better in your hand alright but I think we can we can definitely point to the fingerprint sensor being the absolute objective cause of Samsung's terrible market slip um it's really the explanation is they mess of the fingerprint sensor and people aren't buying their phones and that's that's yeah crash and burn that's and you know it's it's probably worse than what happened to the note seven last year and we're obviously being facetious /s I don't know like what else to say to make sure that you guys know we're being sarcastic no it's um this is a story and we were talking about this a little before the podcast I started the frustration of the click Beatty headline we were even at pocket now we played the same game where it's like Samsung's market chairs totally slipping against Apple and Chinese manufacturers when we actually look at the sales data though Samsung sales have been remarkably strong considering what happened them at the end of 2016 cuz you gotta keep in mind you need to look at as a whole not necessarily just Samsung the phone manufacturer yeah because that's not so when we think of Samsung to us we think note and San gallons just think the fact is they're hardware and it was trying to make mine very quiet I just whenever I went very smooth on the side this podcast not brought to you by Lucroy no but ya know what we have here essentially is the presence of their hardware and other manufacturers yeah and you need to realize that they make great panels a lot of people realize are the sensors okay that the panels that we have on on this on our devices and that's really where you're noticing a lot of the increase you know how are they being you know are there is there other manufacturers on the market that are basically you know starting the game market chair yes it's an evolution every year every once in a while when you don't change you know your design you're gonna have some companies they're gonna creep up a little bit and then you know they'll have their own or they'll carve up their own market I think well I was doing great so this is this is the frustrating aspect of focusing in or overly focusing in on one ill-defined metric yeah market share is a very fluid way to describe the smartphone ecosystem and looking at the worldwide numbers of sales so it can totally be true because I think Samsung sales are still growing like they're they're facing some of the high-end plateau that Apple has faced but we're still seeing an uptrend we're not seeing a downtrend so it can still be completely true that Samsung sales have never been stronger but they're still building their user base yeah they're actually user base is still growing but in facing more competition from Chinese manufacturers emerging LTE markets around the world that high-end premium and even their mid-range options are gonna face a wall up of competition from Huawei Oppo and jemmye oh no definitely yeah you know a lot of a lot of they actually they really so many devices every year most people don't talk too much about them but yeah they're a line devices I mean it when you go to CSU see all of their devices and you see that in the main top and the esses and they you know denote line but it just that's what it is yeah I mean there's there's more options and I think that's what this is what's going to be within 18 we're gonna see a lot more resurgence or not a resurgence but like a flurry of new manufacturers coming into the market with great hardware comparable prices I mean may not have the same you know the run with the kitchen sink kind of thing but you'll you'll see some good competition I think that'll be really good I'm hoping that'll bring a new market into that middle ground because we have the budget devices that Alex 500 bucks price point right I mean how crazy is that discussion right now yeah and I am like a thousand dollars off to $600 is now the mid-range the lobster it wasn't even a lobster pot effect it's two years where we flip the switch on well now a top-end phone is $1,000 yeah but this discussion wasn't even we weren't even talking this way the beginning of the year which is the weird part about this is a state here well it's sinking that Apple was gonna do something big it was always on the radar but it was I was like oh that's on the horizon and then it snuck up on us really yeah and the iPhone 10 was released and nobody was surprised there was a thousand bucks but the reality is yet no you'd expect Apple to do that but then you see the note come in at 950 I'm like whoa and then you know and then so with tax both of these in the US and you know some of you guys are not in the US may not realize but $1,000 isn't just $1,000 like 1,100 bucks after you factor in tax yeah and even with the note no this is over $1,000 when you fact that any meaning unless you have some kind of subsidy with your carrier which not that many carriers they're not really doing now most carriers are doing zero interest loans they're still gonna pay yeah yeah just okay no full price of that phone they're just gonna carve it up for you and not turn interest yeah so you're still gonna pay $1,000 that's 500 550 to 600 to a thousand that became an open market now yeah there is a there is a gap now that's called I think that will be what it's like maybe not flagship but like a premium premium I'm just I'm still I'm still gonna do this and it's gonna piss off so many people that watch our videos but I look at the market and I say you have a reasonable smartphone experience from around 150 dollars for his entry level now and the end player the base model version of the top-end phone is a thousand yeah in between a hundred and fifty dollars and a thousand is somewhere around that five to six hundred dollar tier that's the mid-range razors luck about 700 and so it's now when we get to like seven $800 we are cresting into flagship territory or the high-end market and at that like 3 to $400 word that blurred line between just entry-level fare and the beginnings of what could be called your mid repeated range yeah but if 500 you're smack-dab in the middle like it'll be just see what time sometimes with the s-line the price point because if they're bringing the the features that you had on the note 8 that were justified to basically get you into that 900 something you may be seen yeah and against Apple you can't undercut your price too much because then psychologically people are gonna look at that and go oh well it's not as good yeah so because apples made this play to a thousand dollars and because the note was already priced above 900 I really don't see where you can launch a Galaxy s8 the little s 8 below 7 maybe 750 like there's no way you can make that that pricing argument because then people are gonna look well the iPhones $1000 so it's $300 more better than a galaxy s 9 which is so frustrating that that's kind of the emotional impact of consumerism on our tech space but I really think that I'll be surprised if the galaxy s 9 the smaller galaxy s 9 punch is significantly below $7.99 meet you know definitely especially in the US because they can also release with 64 gigs of internal storage you're gonna be yeah I think we are we are moving forward and hopefully we'll see the 845 but we'll see I'd be surprised if they I mean I feel like the same thing will probably happen this year is what happened with the 8:35 where Samsung sort of sucks most of the wind out of the market for the early batches of that just pretty much what they did yeah and then but everybody else ended up getting the well but but again Samsung had that being first for a good chunk of time yeah you know because their only other competition was the g6 with the 821 that was the thing yeah but the GC C Series is always a year behind so you never expected geez seriously just come in there the last few the t5 and the g6 both came wood last year CPUs the g5 was in 820 it was the 821 we came in on the b20 so the eight meet you know the V 20 was in 822 yeah so it's like the g6 was the first one that actually interrupted that the g5 launched a little bit after the S but it was also an 824 that I mean every every manufacturer was trying to get as far away from the a-10 as they could and so that's right that's right that's right the 810 was the one people wanted to run away from and so and so LG made the play on the g5 it was just they they sacrificed build quality for modularity hilarity and and that's you know I know a lot of people are talking boot loops on V tens and g4 is the LG that gave me the most problems with the g5 I went through three of them and the one that I had that worked for the the wrap-up on our review now doesn't work so I've gone through three and I have three bricks now in g5 land and I know they're modular but they're modular met the friends modules were to the United States we've got our via no DAC but not for you know I'm so like I literally couldn't be happier with my b10 right now but it's it's still it's like I've got to call them out I got a call LG out on like you've got to work on that I've got to work on your distribution and especially your couple markets still good not in the US but not in at least South America did receive them I put out a video and I was like my one cry because we got vno headphones last year yeah and this year like nothing though I got headphones tumor serious the US is the one that you don't give it to because we don't like music or something I don't get it when especially when the one of the biggest selling points that you can really market it's so rare that you have a phone where you can point to a feature which is objectively the best yeah and LG has one feature that is objectively better than any other manufacturer on the market that these and they're not advertising it and now they don't even include something in the hardware in the box to take advantage of it include the DAC like you want a blog you want to open the phone it's that new box I've got to find some earbuds but ya know I hope I hope definitely that we know we'll see we'll see some new new surprises it's gonna be obviously an incremental upgrade yeah but you know the 8:45 would be nice just to see that and I know you guys know some comforts on that as well yeah with the summit over I may have made the trek out - oh poor guy had to spend a week in Maui I'm sure I was jerk oh my vixen - camera takes amazing sunset photos with its hdr+ mode weight and the warm sand oh this is the warm Pacific Ocean waters there was nice although I have to seal for them it was very windy poor guy yeah poor guy I know I love Hawaii my Maui's my favorite but yeah no definitely 8:45 looks almost my name is travelpod casket is a channel podcast let me tell you about port Empire ah let me tell you about London in December no it's a beautiful place I lucked out I didn't actually make it their windows snow alright stop snowing a few days before I got in there and after I left it's too brown a little California which I brought some little bit of heat and a little stand there looking like freezing force I'm from Southern California 85 degrees out right now guys I'm actually overdressed for the weather right so yeah it's December that's beginning to look a lot like September so galaxy s 9 rumors I hope that these are on point these are the kinds of changes that I think makes sense for the Galaxy S series and I think they fulfill a lot of the evolutionary issues I've had since the SX okay so s7 I think was probably the perfect 16 by 9 smartphone yeah I still don't like glass back devices so I I'm pretty much I just have to give up on that fight because I don't think any other manufacturers are really gonna come back we're gonna get quite a few especially with wireless if you're gonna try to bring that in well cuz I was like you know you could make Kevlar or go back to leather or something interesting and call it a premium man so you brought the g4 back in my mind all right yeah nice motox moto x - moto maker yeah I mean these people have heard me prattle on way too much about my Captain America Moto X - over there but anyway these types of things finally I think fulfilling all of the little issues in the the final design language for that phone we have a problem in Samsung land though that I think Apple users can commiserate with in very expensive premium products top of the market can we still count on consumers following Samsung's I think manufacturers are hoping that a significant chunk of their user base are gonna follow yearly mm-hmm we know that the average amount of time that someone holds onto their smartphone is now past two years which means there are significant chunk of people who are holding onto their phones probably out to three years now yeah that's galaxy s6 territory yeah so do we think that those people are looking at the s9 the same way that iPhone 6 users might be looking at an iPhone aid that could be the pretend that could be the reality and actually it's weed that you brought it up because one point I changed my devices a little bit more frequently a little bit when I talk to people at stores and I talk to people and I say like I switched me my permit from the Samsung LG to a huawei 2 and they're like you spent some time with the razor phone an amazing phone and it's you're right people are carrying their phones a lot longer I do see or walk around I see s7 even as 5s I even I know person was on set with the sound guy he had a fight on iPhone 5s and he's like I'm not getting rid of it yeah there's really not much it's crazy we're hitting that point with the hardware that the hardware realistically is just still good yeah there's no reason that the you know these Snapdragon 800 it's warm I mean there's nothing you know it'll still keep up with most of things that you're gonna do it may not have the right thing as a sensor or the camera I still revisit my v10 you know that well the v10 is I think it's a point in time that a lot of us kind of need to appreciate it's a beginning of a line for velji that brought in durability audio quality and just a great combo mm and they kept on it and they're moving forward it's not I mean we varied a little bit on the 20 and the 30 like varied a lot but I think you know this is this will be the basically the point where people want to upgrade they want to say oh it's a big enough of an upgrade from what you have you know you're getting that you know the much different display if you're from the s5 going in you're getting glass first time you're getting a really good battery in the s6 and six plus I think they had some concerns with battery well they went been over battery the battery's kept getting smaller but they're getting better processors now better operating system to give you longer battery life so it it would be good hopefully people can you know be Hulu and recognize loriel to her brand it's a big jump because if they remember what the pays for the s5 and then they're like what no that upgrade is not the same in that multiple layer you know so well and I know from Samsung's perspective I'm sure if they were looking at like s5 users they would have hoped like okay well s7 would have been their upgrade yeah and but that still it doesn't quite jell like you do the s5 to s7 to s9 jump or you're like my mom's still on her s5 the screen is starting to flicker like the phone is starting to die she doesn't want to get rid of it the idea of an iPhone upgrade is just stress like it's just she's it's it also goes back to the data transfer a lot of people are concerned with the amount of data they have on their phones yeah when you care that's why about a year year and a half their concern is how do I transfer they're not really familiar now that transferring data from a not Samsung to a Samsung pretty easy oh yeah extremely but you don't know that until you take up line exactly it was really hard to get do a whole video on that so it was a part of my video coverage for the note 8 where for the first time I didn't set it up fresh like I actually did one of these data transfers literally the very first time I've ever I've really ever played with that cuz any time I've tried and I just I want it clean I want it new I want to like take me out of the box and let's see the horsepower that's your horsepower without any of the box but then also realizing like so many of the people watching aren't gonna be first-time smartphone buyers they're not gonna they're gonna want to just transfer over as quickly so I think so I finally take the plunge um but your point about price is actually is actually legit too because I think one of the things that that is scaring my mom off I mean using her as a specific example is she got her s5 towards the end of the first year of the s5 life got it on a great deal because it wasn't as popular as on the phone as previous ones and it had things that she cared about like the the more grippy durable backplate there's a lot of resistance even though I had a flap it was still first like it's a true for a in the water resistance for a flagship and then she picks up and has set in sae and it's curvy slippery glass it's it feels less durable it feels more brittle it feels like it'll break if it hits the ground for two second and so she was really interested in maybe going I say active that was yeah until she saw that it was gonna be a $900 price tag and then it was like well I'm just gonna stick with my s5 and you're like well unfortunately the more you wait the more expensive your options are gonna get the less the last updates you're gonna be getting the more vulnerable you're gonna be running your device those are the things that people keep in mind yeah you can keep your device for a certain amount of time but once you start getting updates security updates patches and stuff like that those are the things you want to keep in mind there's a security factor that is you put a lot of your personal information there so you keeping yeah keeping it up-to-date keeping it with at least something that's reasonable within the last two years keep it within an update cycle that most manufacturers was thinking to I think is a benefit to you as a person so I think she's weighing benefit against what activity she does put on and a $900 price tag for her to have that brand exactly again and so you know I recently did a trip to the UK and I sent her with a 6 X mm-hmm unlocked because we were having some issues with her carrier just making sure she could do like a local SIM if she wanted to I didn't have any problems the honor the hunter 6x was a heady competitor for her she was way less concerned if that phone got broke because she knew like how much it cost and it didn't actually cost me anything because it was a review phone um but this is also one of those things we're looking at through the impact on the market and what these companies are doing to try and I think keep the emotions running high the wow factor running high at a time where I feel like consumers are kind of cooling off I don't feel like you know we're in the were quite there yet I've we've had the conversation before over dinner the post smartphone world like what comes next and we're not there yet but we're really stinking close and I think one of the things that's that's a difficult challenge for companies trying to talk directly to their customers you can't keep selling this wow factor when we're all really well-established smartphone consumers exactly these are commodities now and so how do you command a premium when there isn't the same kind of lifestyle argument it's not exclusive everyone has one most people are probably looking at a top tier option or solution and then just Lobster potting how much they pay per month to lease it essential yeah exactly so so how do you make someone excited you know like the s9 isn't gonna make people excited whereas even the SAE people looked at him like wow and it's really clean then he had a bunch of people on s7 edges going nah I'm good exactly because they had that that's all the Ani monk factor they changed on the s8 over from last year's they did the curve display they no longer have no flat display and the curve version of it you had that on every device and I think that was a good move for them but that was yeah that's kind of about it if they move to fingerprint sensor from the back to the middle lemon people will be excited about that but are they gonna be like well is it worth that extra selling my phone that's probably gonna be and you know there's gonna be an SM and edge guy going yeah my fingerprint sensor is still in the front I'm good so why do I need an S now why would I need that's one of those yeah the camera sensor hasn't really changed much for them that's the other thing they ever really changed this dramatic thing right may have gone down in the aperture of maybe one point seven or four point six think I've poured seven for a first listen s7 was one point seven also yeah but that's what's mean is when they went down when they went with that 12 megapixel sensor on the back they haven't really gone and saying oh my god this is a 16 they stopped playing that game yeah they focused it there and then now they brought the dual sensors in the back so again they're they're banking on what works there they're reading their metrics they're working their numbers they know what works they know what people want but that wow factor I know what is gonna be that next wow you know is it gonna be that dual display the phone or is it gonna be that phone that does you know what the you know orders you know order something for you without you and and to a point where someone might take a risk on straining from the manufacturer that they know yeah so like I'm I'm a little nervous about my mom leaving the Samsung ecosystem like I'm not gonna recommend an LG for my movies yeah she's so well acquainted with what the s5 can do in the samsung apps exactly but by the time she upgrades Samsung software is not gonna resemble that at all so already that's true Samsung's as they change so many things just for the sake of changing things and they don't bring those changes to older devices and so there's really no point for her to have that kind of brand loyalty like I could say like maybe it is time to look or maybe you do want to go to an iPhone if you're facetiming with Grandma a lot maybe this is a solution that you want to take a look at cuz you're gonna have to relearn everything anyway it is that's that's the one thing that I've I've that iPhone has had and that was it was a good and bad thing on the I content that I found that it's they even though they did some innovation with the moving and the gestures but do you I still look the same looking at the same grid I'm still looking at the same things we didn't get that much different there but you're right going from an s5 to no date or an SI plus or even an SI it's a different device yeah it is different there's some resemblance in the background that we all that kind of but it's a very little that you can't hide and yes God will probably have a new version of you know with you you know Sam Sonya what what is it called no they don't call it test person with Samsung experience variants the UI yeah the UX so it's like Apple watch edition it's something that they keep wanting to fine-tune and make less jittery you take out some things and fine-tune I think it's been always a fine tuning process but they need to bring it back bring it back to the older devices they need to give that access to people say look you know we care about you this isn't that hard for us to bring in a launcher from one device to another yeah at the end of the day but for me all devices look pretty much the same yeah we're getting Sam point where I'm kind of phone blind yeah this entire year it could be marker okay it could be basically just a subtitle 8:35 four gigs gigs of RAM and tall screen all screens name your device that's you'll any flagship that pretty much answers all of those so we're getting there so we need to see something you need to see something different and you're right razor for me was there was a breath of fresh air great in the midst of all of these 18 by 9 aspect ratios and all of those things hundred twenty Hertz eight gigs of ram beautiful sound yeah speakers in the front yeah yeah that was to me a WOW factor when I held that phone it was like wow but I you know again we're we have a little bit more access to things to be able to pay around but at the end of the day when you're looking at all of these things you're looking at numbers the price factor is gonna be a big thing I think that's what it is people have to have a way of being able to kind of gauge and not really get to compromise yeah no no totally so like my dad my dad has so they this is so funny like they bought phones in the same era and they're still holding on to him my dad has a galaxy what is it it's the mini note 4 the galaxy alpha do you remember it was the super super skinny one that had the metal edges and then the rubbery back plate just like the note 4 yeah man that was and he wanted a little phone and you're like that was for that year the best small form-factor Android device but again it is starting to go to he's got a crack screen like they're kind of he's actually looking at going blackberry I don't know that he's gonna go key one but I think he's waiting to see if he can keep his phone running long enough to see he doesn't want to go first-gen he wants to see what they follow up you have Android ecosystem isn't that different 2017 I think started us off on a conversation of like it's okay to maybe specialize maybe you don't need to try and fight Apple and Samsung with the best all-rounder soft around the edges does everything generally good but doesn't excel in any one area phone and key one I think is I am Blu Matic of one of the best examples of that I think the rate there becomes another great talking point on we we are really willing to make compromises in some areas so that we can focus on making sure that this is the best that it possibly can be exactly key one we're not gonna try and impress you with the best multimedia device of all time and SIA but we're gonna give you two and a half days of legitimately two and a half days of battery life and the best communication features that we can pack into a phone today we're gonna see a lot more of those I'm really hoping that that's maybe how we can diversify the conversation of it I think that works to Samsung's detriment because I still think that that Samsung is most successful when they have a target in mind for their demographic my favorite phone of theirs this year was the active they knew exactly who that phone was for the features were built specifically for that phone and if you liked samsung's aesthetic mmm why not go with the Samsung that also has the biggest battery I was gonna say it's the only one that has the biggest battery he has a bigger battery than even the know date yeah wow that's huge exactly with the smaller the smaller screen so it's the best of both worlds you've got the more rugged device you don't have to slap a case on it you've got all of the same features there's life that the UI is actually oh you can run that phone a lot longer you know Andy and supposedly people care about those things until they found more than one carrier this year - that was the first year I saw that exclusivity die and we finally are able to pick it up on t-mobile which it's a big thing for a lot of people because you at least now have that option the only gripe that I always had with it is they always released it somewhere in the middle a year after so many people have invested into the s8 yeah so unless you started with active from before it's hard for you to justify the it's that weird timing of the yeah I really think like the timing on that also worked against them because they were looking at how they could stray from 18 t exclusivity yeah so 18 T didn't make any noise and we were expecting that AT&T push alongside Samsung and then it never came and they just sort of one day when oh here it is yeah you're like okay well that kind of shot them in the foot but I'm hoping that means that for next year it's part of like a three-prong you've got like your your s9 the s9 active splits the time between the s and the note and then we have like a three tier strategy coming there's a perfect time it's a perfect time yeah summer because that's when you want to have that super rugged phone where you go into the beach you're going outdoors your phone drops you don't want to worry about that you want to be able move forward to not have to worry and not have to worry about getting a case which the first thing you have to do I mean like it's I'm not gonna tell people not to buy the iPhone 10 but you absolutely should not buy the iPhone 10 unless you're getting a case a screen some kind of screen protection and Apple care so you're a thousand dollar phone is really Apple care $1400 glass cost you $400 the back that's ridiculous okay we got a couple comments here on Twitter this is using the PM weekly hash tag from Peter Hayden there are more options with Samsung but oh wait I'm sorry I've got his tweets reversed I do believe there's potential for Bixby especially with the deep app integration that's an excellent point the issue is the availability and continuity between devices I think if Bixby were made more widely available in Samsung could probably properly commit then it would compete with Google assistant there are more options with Samsung but I'm not so happy that they have stopped releasing so many phones in our market where they used to release a phone because it's Tuesday and this made it really difficult for a purchasing decision to be made um I know they still have Galaxy a series and other sort of lower end and mid-range devices I'm kind of surprised they didn't piggyback on the Apple strategy of you could buy last year's phone for cheaper cheaper yeah that would have been that would be kind of away from that III there's a part of me that kind of likes that brand cohesion of the one year old phone is still plenty good so let's use that as our mid-range err ya know why not because Apple always does a really good job about the fact that they don't ignore their history they reduce it they lock off a hundred bucks and the people were like yeah nothing's wrong with the iPhone 7 plus it looks exactly the same just doesn't have wireless charging like ok great ok I'm we're pretty decent cool it you know to apples detriment this year they also have what they're still selling the SE the 6s the 7 the 8 and the 10 so you've got to you've got eight active iPhones that consumers can shop between the different screen sizes that I think is probably a miss its it's gonna be something I think Bixby coming to other devices we're gonna face similar issues of the way Alexa had refused finding out because of that deep integration of the assistant built into your Android device that the way Bixby is built into your Samsung device and they have to put that button there otherwise you wouldn't really know how to initiate it because more initiation only works on Samsung but when you bring it to another ecosystem where it's not baked into the OS you're gonna have to push a button and I think that will be where the smart sphere gonna make sense right that makes a lot of sense but I think if they can do automation on the fly with it beat beat the other guys automation process to add their game and then jump the gun because they already have smart things are things is actually one of the best two hubs that you can get on the market right now it's comparably priced and it has a lot of support from many technology and he also supports z-wave technology it's just really something I don't know if you've used so knows that stuck one of the first things we started getting when you got into automation you have a big ecosystem of it well-established people like maybe used to Vera home or some of the older yeah and they can upgrade to a Xia to new smart things and then the speaker can be your gateway your hub for that I mean I just feel like you know your speaker could also be that for a google assistant for a go it is there now it's the potential of whether or not Samsung's timing on the market makes sense then I also have this tweet from Andrew Wallace PN weekly my dad literally buys replacement HTC One m8 to cannibalize parts when he's when he has one and he's using it and it dies I don't know how we're going to get him to upgrade and again like I'm kind of in the same boat with my mom like if you like the phone keep getting the same phone and you're watching it just get cheaper and cheaper and cheaper every time so um you actually have to get going here pretty soon so I want to wrap us up talking a little about net neutrality um we didn't want to make this the main focus of the podcast because we've obviously spent a lot of time I think on our various social media blogging writing and talking about and so um the vote was from the time of this recording the vote passed yesterday the FCC in a three-to-two vote on party lines the Conservatives out number because we have a conservative president voted to repeal title 2 regulation of the Internet and obviously there was the flurry of activity a lot of like dank memes posted on Reddit you know about how much edge a pie the current chairman is obnoxious and has a punchable face um I think what gets lost in that initial fervor is one so this is policy this policy's been voted on we we should expect that there should be a legal fight yeah happening do you think do you think that if lawsuits hit that they'll be able to enact a stay so that title to regulation is kept while there's legal proceeding the legal proceedings while this is being taught in the course put a pause definitely we've seen the legal system being able to actually put a lot of Hulk's on policies and things within the content of an issue it just it literally means that Yui as a user or us everybody that is concerned about this needs to voice their opinion it's not you know we didn't lose the race not like you just crossed the line and that's it it's all over you need to still be able to bring up the subject and understand what's going on what needs to some of the things that we've been dealing with for so many years I mean just the fact that matter is is this was there to help us get a fair experience that we don't have this we're you know my YouTube keeps getting really bogged down every time on AT&T they're in the middle of the day it's it's funny how like when I canceled my expanded TV package with spectrum that my Netflix doesn't stream as well even though my internet download speeds have actually gone up no I mean it's it's correlation it's not causation no so and but those are the things that we need to keep in mind reality is we depend the Internet is no longer this thing that we'd like to have access to we depend on it on a daily basis this is things using it it's becoming a resource like water or power exactly yeah you have the smartphone is no longer this luxury thing or do you want to get a phone with a display it's pretty much what we most look at I mean the feature phone or flip phone is no longer a phone it's like you still have you can you can you make a legitimate argument that you could leave the house without your wallet wallet or keys but you might not be able to leave the house without your smartphone exactly I will go home I've done it in the past where I'd left I forgot my wallet I went over to my brother's house we had breakfast and we were kicking it and on the way back I forgot and I had my cars running out of gas I didn't panic I'm I have my phone and I didn't have my nobody I went inside paid with my with Samsung pay got gas and went home I didn't care about it and the reality is it's a resource and what they're doing right now is they're saying as though we don't want to be able to you know manage it like a resource they're thinking okay this isn't it no but it is a utility yeah well and I think they're blurring the line I've mentioned this before too the difference between a telecommunication service and an information service yeah and it's like just because Time Warner has an investment in content doesn't mean that the pipe that gets you onto the Internet is also an information service that's like the same as having a phone yeah or having running water or electricity at this point that's that's the real access this is the access this is the the way you get to all of those things and what they did this this week or with the decision that went through which it's a really really kind of get immunity at the core is didn't listen to the users no they in fact it was it wasn't even that they disregarded us is that we can find videos of their actual deliberation where they're laughing at the comments that they have received from from the FCC website and then we had a edgy PI's ridiculous video things you can still do on the internet I still bought a burrito like you just its rage-inducing but I feel it with purpose because I feel if we're just directing our ire at how much he's obnoxious then we're not actually being productive and how we can fix the problem exactly and so focusing on on chairman pie is a waste of energy because he has obvious contempt and disdain for the actual citizenry citizenship that are trying to join the conversation in earnest he is not an agent of actual functioning government he is a occupying a position to kind of prove the hypothesis that government can't work right it's it's something that yeah the playground was not a fair playground yesterday I mean you totally basically saw the train wreck and you're just watching it as opposed to chairman wheeler we we had the expectation that Tom wheeler was gonna well for the telecommunications industry because he came out of telecoms and instead what we got was a fairly well reasoned individual who I didn't agree with all of his policy but when it came to things like basic consumer protections we were in agreement on a lot of how he enacted Title 2 hmm especially how we fought for title 2 so I think moving forward what do you think are some of the outcomes that people can turn to like actually investing energy in some kind of positive outcome um I I know there's we need to have this catharsis where we stomp our feet and we yell and we shout and we make art our tasty memes about how much Egypt pie sucks um but once we get through this sort of weekend or something else will come up and you know and we know that there's gonna be other news it's going to be crazy out of politics it's gonna eclipse this for the general populace out there this is what keeps happening to the net neutrality debate is know that the tax bill is gonna occupy you know healthcare is gonna occupy media those are like topless fear that they're together situations but net neutrality deserves to be on the list of things people pay attention to what do you think are some of the things that people can invest their energy in for hopefully a more positive outcome I think it's just be more mindful of what things are going on understanding what's going on with the internet with with the services that you're going if you seem concerned you seem like you see issues with providers you see you know we start seeing that whole you know certain packages for certain speeds right and these things where they're basically flat out and one comment it kind of got me yesterday at during the when they made their announcement is the fact that matter is they can get away with it mostly now by just changing their in terms of agreement it's totally legal because if they say this is what we're offering then they're sticking to what they're saying so there's a problem and they they publicly disclose it then the only agency that can fight for consumer protections is the FTC which is totally separate and not only that and all they need to do is disclose we are going to throttle this service that's part of their terms of service it's like saying unlimited 4G internet but then in the fine print yeah after four gigs or five 250 gig and that's totally legal and it's totally acceptable from the purview of the FTC because the FTC can't set policy they can only respond well to those kinds of abuses so there's no response is that no it's no longer where we can actually it now it needs a bigger group of people to be really upset about something you're attempting to be so bad for us to be able to go in and try to change it this was such a backwards step process that they took us here that it's a lot it took a lot of work to get us to where we were and then we just yes it was out the door I know we keep bringing this up in very limited segments but the open Internet was a fight in the courts I think for over a decade yeah and so now that we've taken this huge step backwards we could be looking at another multi-year process before we can even try to find something comparable to what we had so I'm hoping that the top some good legal minds will be able to convince a judge that this this order needs to be stayed until it has its day in court exactly I'm not confident in this current administration in this current especially at the circuit court level it's a little bit harder because yeah yeah you need to realize that yeah there's a good part of the population that doesn't won't even notice it till it's too late by the time didn't realize what has been done because it'll it'll start coming out small amounts it's not gonna come out first like next Monday we're like congratulations your packets have been changed now you have Friday based here you'd like to add although yeah you look at people in xfinity markets you know you're already dealing with data caps oh man you know like a streaming package or you know what we'll just have a special Xbox plug-in and now like this traffic isn't going to count against your data cap so why stream Netflix when you can use your Xfinity and it's one of those things for free you need to keep the subject going I think that's the main goal I think if we keep talking about it realize what's going on and you know bring it up bring it up and those sound hall meetings bring it up to your Congressman being enough the people that you work with yeah because those are the people that need to realize when you know and he sits on the board and says I ordered a burrito on my phone from last week and nobody kind of looked at I'm like so what that's the dumbest thing I think anyone's ever said that's not what we're worried about is your burrito consumption mr. Reese's mug Oh God he's stating that all of his sources were ISPs oh my and I talked to the little eyes be in little town and you're talking to the companies that do want to be you want to be able to upsell your own market on packages talk to the consumers people that use the Internet the people that don't want to have or then deal with YouTube you know spinning wheel of death never about loading correctly those are the people that get do you think that some of these state initiatives might have some teeth like we saw Washington Washington state governor saying that they were gonna try and enact a local version of net neutrality a state senator I think it's Chris whiner or Chris Weiner is talking about trying to pass a bill in California that would be so there's gonna be some big concerns there because you have to keep in mind of how that bill gets passed now it depends on where you are in the state's whoever owns the poles or the landlines yeah that's a big problem for a lot of communities the infrastructure that a lot of us don't look at you don't see obviously you know the tower but those towers are owned by companies I'm AT&T t-mobile and so on share share towers your eyes and all of those carries they sometimes if they don't own it they're leasing from other companies around paying a fee and if they do own it obviously they're getting payment from other companies to unanimous state government yeah exactly so when we see things like that done at the state level we'll see some benefit from it it's not gonna have the same impact that's the big guys at the end of the day it's a small market for the big company you know Verizon sort of just a new and even in Californians have to do business with entities outside of our state exactly so interconnect fees still still exist exist yeah so it's something that we need to kind of if that happens I think we start being able to kind of like to move forwards toward it it'll be beneficial for it right but at the end of the day I think there has to be a solution where we get back to something somewhere it may not be this global exactly or not go I mean a nationwide agreement say this is at least the bare minimum this is yeah exactly and you know I'm not gonna try to knock on it but t-mobile has there is something very similar that they do right if you're using their binge on the men or all right you know all of that is included doesn't count against your data and but your cap to a certain speed but that's the standard you know what you're going into Ronnie turn in their disclosure yeah it is right there and but it's not it's not a bad experience we are talking about literally loading not loading or even getting bad quality pictures and not enjoying a service or intercepting traffic exactly like what we've seen with Comcast yeah let me tell you about how you need to buy a new modem even though you don't because you were able to do this just fine but it's mandatory and we're gonna intercept your web traffic and serve you this ad so you need to keep it open I I think this is now especially the time we're continuing to join the conversation continuing to reach out to especially local and state officials is mandatory because we need to set a consistent precedent that this is something that people care about as soon as you let the pressure off they can go OC no one cares anymore I guess it was fine and then they can go on with whatever other policy bad policy that they want to enact so I think that's gonna wrap it up for us especially because I want to we ran a lot longer than I thought cuz like having these conversations in person so um before before we make the jump um where can people find the content you're producing or some project that you're gonna be working on I know we're also wrapping up the year to if the exactly so there's gonna be wrap up going on I'm actually getting pretty ready to go to see us I'm excited pretty excited I know it's doing on my pre-pro - yeah I'm starting to kind of like in my mind trying to figure out what I need to do for CES you know uh online I'm basically on YouTube is TK Bay just TK PA why and then on Twitter TK DSL eight six five five you can also see someone my contact on XDA Developers if you familiar the show or the the actual web site an amazing Android development site so definitely before I get on my software stuff XDA if you want to extend the life of any device you know I project trouble yes all magic trouble yes definitely but ya know I'm around and hopefully we'll you know movies information breach happen yeah ask questions you're talking great alright guys there you have it another episode of the PocketNow weekly has come and gone the show is over but the conversation continues on twitter definitely give TK if i'll follow TK dsl 8 6 6 5 5 and I'm humbly Assam gadget guy pocket now is around the web on Twitter Instagram Facebook Google+ you too in our home site pocketnow.com spanish-speakers check out yes stop pocket now calm and shows like this cannot exist without your support sharing the weekly with your friends who love mobile technology dropping reviews on iTunes stitcher Google Play wherever else you can review a podcast and once again we want to thank this week's sponsor just definitely check out that number one New York Times bestseller author the demon circle book wrong let me just pull it up I already forgotten his website and I didn't have my show notes up here James Rollins calm he's helping us keep the lights on here in the gadget lab but ultimately there wouldn't be a show if it weren't for our listeners and subscribers who have kept us on the air since 2012 the PocketNow weekly we'll be back next week with all kinds of delicious Technology goodness so make sure you tune back in see you guys