Foldable phones are coming

[ManchesterBeth]

i thought samsung did this in the early 00s? you'd unfold the screen to get access to the keypad.

I think touch screens are the worst thing about modern phones. can't even type with the speech turned off anymore cos you have to let the synthesiser tell you which letter ur on. what a travesty.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Bit of a faf if you just want to check a message though...

Wonder if we'll see that idea floated again of small screen on the other side for that purpose?

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

OH MY GOD LOOK AT THE PRICE LOL YOU’D HAVE TO BE IN THE REALITY DISTORTION FIELD TO BUY ONE ETC.

Oh, hang on, it’s not made by Apple, so it’s OK. As you were.

 

[cheesethief]

OH MY GOD LOOK AT THE PRICE LOL YOU’D HAVE TO BE IN THE REALITY DISTORTION FIELD TO BUY ONE ETC.

Oh, hang on, it’s not made by Apple, so it’s OK. As you were.

It would appear your strawman has slipped his leash.

 

[pesh]

that actually looks worse than i thought it would.

 

[editor]

OH MY GOD LOOK AT THE PRICE LOL YOU’D HAVE TO BE IN THE REALITY DISTORTION FIELD TO BUY ONE ETC.

Oh, hang on, it’s not made by Apple, so it’s OK. As you were.

Err, the price will come down as the technology matures. Obviously. And no doubt Apple will offer a more expensive version that comes with a stupid proprietary port. Perhaps they'll get some twats to queue in the rain for them and they can be applauded for spending lots of money by the whooping in-store morons. HIGH FIVE!

 

[cybershot]

that actually looks worse than i thought it would.

I don’t like it doesn’t go completely flat back.

 

[pesh]

I don’t like it doesn’t go completely flat back.

it will

 

[editor]

For reference, the first mobile phone you could buy in the UK was "the size of a breeze block, had 30 minutes of talk time and cost £1,650 – the equivalent of £4,600 in today’s money."

30 years on: First mobile phone weighed 11lbs and cost £4,600 | Metro News

 

[pesh]

Marconi's first transmitter incorporating a monopole antenna. It consisted of an elevated copper sheet (top) connected to a Righi spark gap (left) powered by an induction coil (center) with a telegraph key (right) to switch it on and off to spell out text messages in Morse code.

they've all been shit since they did away with spark gaps as far as i'm concerned.

 

[cybershot]

Xiaomi might build a three-panel foldable phone

Now that's more like it. If it's legit. Probably not.

 

[cybershot]

The world's first real foldable phone is rough around the edges

 

[editor]

The world's first real foldable phone is rough around the edges

Impressive!

At this point, it seems pretty clear that the future of smartphone is packing ever bigger displays into ever smaller bodies, and Liu believes Royole's low-key work has set the company up for success. He might be onto something. Google is working to build foldable device support into Android, a move that could fix some of the company's biggest software and compatibility issues. And if nothing else, Liu hasn't ruled out the idea of just supplying foldable screens to other smartphone makers. Even if the FlexPai gets overshadowed by flashier rivals, there are ways forward for the company -- in any case, expect to hear the name Royole a lot more soon.

 

[cheesethief]

Big kudos for the technology and being first to market, but wow it looks impractical... My phone spends 99% of its life in one of the front pockets of my combats, where this device might not fare so well. My GF has hers in her back pocket and sits on it half the time...

If you have to treat the thing with kid gloves, it's not really a "mobile" in the contemporary sense. It feels a bit like the early "portable" computers that were more like leaden suitcases.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Wait... they fold so the screen is on the outside

What the fuck? That’s ridiculous

 

[cybershot]

Seems the biggest issue the reviewer had was the OS. So will be interesting to see how Samsung deal with this if the underlying Android OS isn't ready for this as of yet.

I doubt we'll see Apple market anything like this, this year, but you can bet (without getting into a discussion about price) it will work much more smoothly with iOS.

Getting first to market these days isn't the once glorious thing it was, consumers/business staff want stuff to work, and if that means waiting for the 3rd version of it, then so be it. As seems to be the norm it takes 3 attempts to get stuff how people actually want things to work, and has been for decades!

 

[Saul Goodman]

Wait... they fold so the screen is on the outside

What the fuck? That’s ridiculous

Beyond ridiculous, but the screen can't fold sharp enough to fold it on the inside.
It's a gimmick, at least in that format.

 

[editor]

Wait... they fold so the screen is on the outside

What the fuck? That’s ridiculous

Why? I'd rather be able to see the screen than have it all folded away. But it's obvious the technology isn't ready for the mainstream yet, but just like Apple fanboys guffawed at the announcement of the big Samsung Note phones - only for the iPhone to copy the form factor some years later - I'm confident that there's a future for foldable phones, if they can make them workable.

I'd love to be able to fold out my phone and double the screen size, even if that's at the expense of a slightly thicker handset.

 

[Baronage-Phase]

There was a roll out telly on telly last night at some major techno event.
Don't ask me any questions.
I have no idea

 

[dervish]

There was a roll out telly on telly last night at some major techno event.
Don't ask me any questions.
I have no idea

It's this

Looks amazing, I'd definitely have one I don't think I'll have close to the bank balance to be able to afford one though.

 

[editor]

Brilliant and heartbreaking!

Firstly the phone has a dual SIM card tray so you can dedicate a SIM for each side of the handset. Or you can prop up the phone in a tent style mode for multiplayer gaming, where one player can use one side of the screen and play against a friend staring at the other. It's a great idea, but Royole is going to need developers to actually make games that take advantage of it.


The feature that may be most appreciated here is the ability to use the main camera facing forwards or backwards. If you're taking a photo of someone else, both you and the subject can see the shot before it's taken, with the camera's viewfinder displaying on the back screen and on the front at the same time. There's an option to also disable the viewfinder on the back if you prefer.

When folded, there's a notification bar that appears alongside the hinge so you can watch videos without interruption on the main screen as incoming messages and emails are displayed on the edge.

Interesting:

The screen itself is a 1920 x 1440 resolution AMOLED display, and the bendable panel was developed entirely in-house. Royole invested over $US1 billion dollars in a factory in Shenzhen to manufacture its bendable screens, which can also be used on other items such as handbags, hats and shirts.

https://www.smh.com.au/technology/w...-glorious-and-a-hot-mess-20190111-p50qqh.html

 

[NoXion]

i thought samsung did this in the early 00s? you'd unfold the screen to get access to the keypad.

I think touch screens are the worst thing about modern phones. can't even type with the speech turned off anymore cos you have to let the synthesiser tell you which letter ur on. what a travesty.

Touch screens are by far the most inferior of all input modalities. Way too fucking delicate, crap feedback, crap latency, "oh no you lightly brushed some other point on the screen, here let me disappear your 'keyboard' for you while you're in the middle of typing something", just fucking rubbish all round.

 

[editor]

 

[skyscraper101]

That looks friggin awesome, and I want one. Now.

Also, when are people going to stop making videos with chirpy ukulele soundtracks. They are SOO 5 years ago.

 

[Chilli.s]

looks good but breakable

 

[cheesethief]

I don't get this whole fold-out business... The end result looks bulky & fragile. My thoughts immediately turn to what happens when you stick it in a trouser pocket? What would a screen protector look like? Seems more of an objet d'art than a practical device. Very impressive technology, feels like the future, but also feels a long way from commercial viability.

 

[skyscraper101]

It looks a lot less breakable to me. No brittle glass in sight, just a nice curvy bendy screen.

 

[dervish]

But if it's bendable it has to be softer surely, which I would have thought would make it a magnet for scratches.

 

[editor]

But if it's bendable it has to be softer surely, which I would have thought would make it a magnet for scratches.

That very much depends on what glass/plastic technology is used. I've got a hunch that when it comes to market they won't be selling something that gets scratched within minutes as is likely to be a commercial failure, innit.

 

[skyscraper101]

I guess we'll never really know until they start existing in the real world. Some people seem more prone to scratching up phones than others though. I guess like everything it'll depend how much you take care of them.