Galaxy Foldable Smartphone Makes Samsung Fidget | TechTree.com

Galaxy Foldable Smartphone Makes Samsung Fidget

After repeated attempts to get their first smartphone into the market, Samsung is hoping that an issue of dying pixels is only a one-off challenge

 

Samsung Galaxy is launching the registration for its latest foldable smartphone in India starting October 1, but if latest reports are to be believed, the marquee model is not exactly garnering the bouquets that it was expected to in the geographies where it has already reached the hands of customers.

The smartphone, which launched in the United States, parts of Europe and South Korea earlier this month, had been given out for beta testing some months ago following which Samsung went back to the drawing board to iron out issues that got reported. The revised launch was therefore watched with great anticipation.

However, Brian Heater of TechCrunch.com has been confounded by an amorphous blob that he located between the folding wings of the smartphone. He took a picture of this and believes that it could be a result of the display surfaces pressing too hard against each other when the smartphone is closed.

Heater isn’t unduly worried about the blob as he recalls that when the first model was released, there were several devices that reported an entire side blacking out, which in many cases was “the result of a peeling back of a laminate that resembled the protective layer that the devices ship with.”

The fact is that Samsung has been through a lot when it comes to the foldable smartphone, which has been in the works for several years now and released earlier this year. Sadly, the phone didn’t find reviewers entirely happy as they reported design issues resulting in breaking displays and unwanted behaviors from the device.

In fact, the company has reportedly fixed additional caps around the hinges to ensure that particulate matter such as dust doesn’t hamper the display, which also boasts of a protective layer tucked under the bezel. With Heater’s discovery of a few pixels dying around the place where the smartphone folds, Samsung could just be looking at another challenge.

The company had specifically instructed that excessive pressure be avoided when handling the phone, though in the case with this reviewer the pixels seem to have misbehaved right t the point where it shouldn’t have, given that the company had reportedly made concerted efforts to fix things post the original launch.

The phone, priced around $2000 in the markets where it was released, could face public ire if the issue is more widespread that it was originally thought to be. The company, which has been silent about the issue, is reportedly leaving no stone unturned to figure out if this was a one-off challenge or something that it needs to worry about.

In fact, Jay McGregor writing for Forbes doesn’t believe the book type folding phone is the one that Samsung should have gone with. “I am curious as to why Samsung started here considering the concepts it has teased, patented and played with,” he says in his article suggesting that the paperback form factor is the “first chapter of this technology.”

He believes foldable phones need to be less imposing and for starters Samsung should consider launching a smartphone that folds from top to bottom instead of from side to side. 

For, there is no doubt that from a technology point of view, Samsung has brought something unique into the smartphone market that others would soon be chasing, but if the gadget ends up being as fragile as these latest incidents suggests, then it may be a good idea for the company to fold up their experiments with foldable phones.

 


TAGS: Samsung, Smartphone, GALAXY, Foldable

 
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