Galaxy Z Flop By This Is

- Hello and welcome to This Is Austin why are you a flippy boy? - Oh my friend, I've been a flippy boy for a while. So we did a video several months ago on the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip. And honestly, this phone has been my daily driver ever since. So I felt like the perfect time to answer some of that and really ago deep on why after several months I have still continued to use what is a very unusual device. - Yeah, I mean the first thing I'm gonna ask you is, how has it not fallen apart? - So let me be... Before you even get into this, because I know I'm gonna get the comment.

I bought this phone with my own money. This is not a Samsung review unit, they did not pay me, anything like that. This is a phone that I purchased with my own $1,400. - I love that you have to have that disclaimer, because no one's allowed to like anything without secretly being sponsored by the Illuminati. So I'm glad you have that disclaimer in there.

- Now, initially when I first got this, my main concern was absolutely the durability, especially when you look at the corner and the crease where the screen like folds and unfolds. You can almost see a little bit of a gap there, where like dirt or debris could get in it. But something else, which I think is important to think about, as a folding phone actually in a lot of ways, is better protected than a standard... What do we call normal phones now? Old phones, flat phones. - Boomer phones.

- Boomer phones, yeah, yeah. So if you've got an old school boomer phone, what you're gonna find is that of course the screen is exposed all day, right? So if it's in your pocket, lint, dust, debris, all sort of rubbing against it. In every phone I've ever used for the last like, seven or eight years has always got like, sort of tiny little scratches. The thing with the Z Flip is after three months of daily use, I have a couple of tiny scratches, but honestly, this screen is in better condition than a standard smartphone, which of course is sitting in my pocket all day long. So honestly, for durability, I have no complaints with the Z Flip, which is really surprising.

- I mean, I'm so shocked by that because as our lord and savior, Jerry Rig Everything has taught us, you know, typical standard smartphone with a glass screen, they start scratching at a level six with deeper grooves at a level seven. The fact that the Z Flip, I think what, scratched like a level two from his most pics of hardness. And so like you say, as long as there's no, like large chunks of dust in there, then, you know, it's gonna hold up pretty good. - Well, it's just a matter of it's not exposed as much, right? - Yeah, I mean unless you're walking around with a pocket full of sand. - Well I mean I do that sometimes, but yeah.

- It's crazy to think about though, because as much as Samsung has done right with the Z Flip, as far as like, you know, they're keeping dust out and whatnot, it seems like Motorola razr, they did everything wrong. So, you know, it had that gap under the screen, it creased really, really weird. I guess and that gave folding phones in general a really bad rap. - There's a lot of problems with folding phones. Like if I'm being real, like obviously as someone who has a Z Flip, I like the phone.

but there are a lot of issues with people widely buying phones. First and foremost, these things are expensive, right? I mean these first Galaxy Fold was $2,000, the Z Flip was $1,400. Now yes, the prices are coming down. Yes, this is brand new technology, and of course smartphones in general are very expensive. But one of the big downsides, I will say to the Z Flip is, it's kind of a little bit out of date as far as the spec goes.

Like it almost feels like, with the original Galaxy Fold being pushed several months last year when it got delayed like almost six months or whatever. I almost feel like the Z Flip should've come out last year as opposed to this year, because it's got like a Snapdragon 855, like it was obviously an older processor. It doesn't have 5G, the camera is based more closely to the Galaxy S10 than the S20. Like in a lot of ways this is a very expensive $1,400 phone, which has realistically just a Galaxy S10 from last year that you can fold in half. Even though it might only be a folding S10, the Z Flip is still good enough, right? Eight gigs of RAM, completely fine.256 gigs of storage, not even close to filling that. The processing is quick enough, I crank it up to like ultra performance, which gives it up a little bit of battery life.

But that being said, the battery is big enough on the Z Flip that I have no problem getting through a full day. But generally speaking, there's new deal breaker with the Z Flip. - What I do appreciate with Samsung is that they offer multiple form factors. So, we had the kind of argument last time when we first did a video with the Z Flip, that everyone comes down to, when it comes to the flip phone, you're either a hotdog or a hamburger. And it's like different form factors fit different needs for different people.

- So height-wise, when you open up the Z Flip, it is almost the same height as something like a OnePlus 7 or OnePlus 8 pro rather. So it's simply a little bit of a tall device when you have it open. The thing is though, I don't mind it that much, I actually prefer to have a little bit of extra, sort of screen real estate there. So actually Matt, a good point here is when I'm watching Twitch. So if I'm watching your Twitch stream, what I can do is if I rotate the phone on the side, I get a basically full screen window, your full 16 9 window of your stream, and I have chat on the side with almost no sort of issues.

There are certainly advantages to having a little bit of a taller display on this guy. - I'm looking at like the iPhone SE that just came out. To me that's like the perfect size for a smartphone. I understand what you're saying with the screen real estate, you know, you can't have screen real estate without a bigger screen. If I got to use both hands to like to do even simple things, you know, to navigate, that kind of negates that for me.

Now obviously the Fold was a first generation version of folding phones. And the Z Flip definitely feels more refined and definitely, you know, a better device overall. But I'm excited for the Fold 2 coming out, which is supposedly, you know, gonna be more in tune with like the Note line. - Now I will say for me, I've appreciated the Z Flip, mostly because I carry two phones with me everyday. I like having something small, and the fact of the Z Flip being able to stand up on its own, there's a ton of uses for that in my day to day life.

That being said though, I would wager a guess, that a lot of people, maybe the majority of people, if they were going to choose between which form factor was better, will actually go with the Fold, right? I think people are always pushing to have bigger and bigger devices, bigger and bigger screens to watch Netflix, to watch This Is on YouTube of course. And I feel like, while yeah, it's a little bit of unusual size, it's kind of almost square when you open up the Fold, there's still some real value there. - To me, a tablet size is much more usable than a phone size as far as real estate and multitasking and whatnot. I know I'm kind of contradicting myself when I say I prefer the larger folding device, but yeah, of course I'm gonna need to use two hands for a tablet, but at least that screen real estate is much more usable than a slightly taller one, which I still then have to use two hands with. - Well, speaking of two hands, I will say one of the downsides Z Flip, is that... I'd say two hand open, right? Like you can kind of use it and sort of like flick it open.

It feels like I'm always gonna drop it especially considering I don't use a case, is very much a phone that I would pick up with one hand and use another hand to unfold. - And that's so contradictory to what made flip phones amazing. With the flip phones, you know, you literally flipped it open with the flick of your wrist, and then just like, "hey girl, what's up, how you doing?" And then you slammed it closed, you can't do that now. - Every time I'm on a call with the Z Flip, "all right, cool, peace. " I snap a close man, every time.

That is a legitimate advantage cause it makes me feel cool. - Yeah, but it's the flick of the wrist when you go to answer a call, that was what real cool people did. - Times change my friend. I think it's really interesting to see Samsung really leading on this. Because really, the Fold has been out for almost a year, at least since it was first sort of announced.

So we're gonna be getting generation of two of that hopefully fairly soon. I really hope we get another generation of Z Flip before too much longer. And there even been rumors of something in the middle, right? So with something like the Galaxy Fold 2 Lite, or whatever the case is. If we start to see folding phones within a year ago from 2000 to about $1,000, that to me is very, very interesting, because it really goes to show just how quickly the prices are coming down, and how much of that exorbitant price is really down to the fact that this is brand new technology that is more for early adopters beyond anything like, "oh, folding phones "are always going to be twice as expensive. " - There's one thing you glossed over there, which is where I think that... Like I agree with you for the most part, you know, to cut costs, to get it to be a little bit more market friendly.

If you suddenly cut that major protection from it, how many people crack the hell out of their iPhones? You know, they just abuse their smartphones. And now if you're gonna have a device that is even more fragile, it's still gonna be expensive. That might just have negative impact that it's even more fragile than even the ones that were more expensive. - Well, so I agree in principle, but actually the thing is that there's a couple of things that are gonna make that less of an issue. First of all, most people equate folding phones with breaking, right? The very first Galaxy Folds immediately put that connotation in people's head.

The Z Flip already has ultra-thin glass, which I will fully admit is not as good as something like a full, you know, Gorilla Glass 5 display right? But it is a big step forward. - Yeah right, which it can't be because it's folding. - But the thing is we've seen a lot of improvement in literally just over a year of folding phones and systems, right? So my main sort of takeaway is less about the Z Flip or the Fold 2 or the Fold 2 Lite, Or any specific device, but more of a general sort of category. I see a lot of reason to be optimistic about folding phones, they're advancing very quickly. Samsung has a huge lead, right? Like, I mean no one's coming close to competing with Samsung now in the technology front, but just the sheer amount of phones that they're bringing out with folding capabilities.

So I'm just really excited, generally speaking, about the idea of foldables going forward, because honestly this Z Flip man, for the trade offs and for the price that it is, still makes me so happy to use. It's such a tactile device, like it looks generic, it's not the prettiest device, it's not the obviously most powerful or the best camera or anything like that, but it has character in a way that no other phone out there does right now. And I legitimately love using this phone. - I agree with you that there is a future, I just don't think we're there yet. I'm looking at like the Fold right now and obviously, the Fold 2 will make a big difference in how I interpret this.

If you look at the Fold right now as it is, it's cool that's the folding phone on the inside. But if you look at it from the outside, it looks like, you know, one of the pre Android smartphones from 2007 right now. So all the things that, you know, we look for in modern smartphones, like thin bezels and stuff like that, it doesn't have on the outside, because we still run into the issue of there's only so much space in that device. - (mumbles) If you look at some of the lit stuff on the Fold 2, it looks pretty good and honestly who knows, right? This thing is supposed to come out pretty soon, by the time this video goes live, the Fold 2 may already even be official. But regardless, I feel like Fold 2, and if they have this lower end sort of Fold 2 Lite, which brings the price down, that feels like most of the way there.

Do you think we're not gonna see an $800 foldable phone in 2021? - I'd say if we do see that $800 foldable phone, it's gonna be the equivalent of a year ago smartphone. I think we have an uphill battle for both the technology and the price to go with it, and that's what we need to like, you know, make a couple strides. - My goal here, my thought of where we really can ultimately land is, there may be a standard version (mumbles). So let's say there's the Galaxy S30 right? Just as an example, right? So, for $1,000 you get the Galaxy S30, it obviously has all the high end specs and whatnot. And then for another $100 more, you get the S30 Fold, right? And it's basically the same form but it folds, right? I feel that is the sort of spot where, yes, it might not be necessarily next year for something that straight forward, but I feel like that that's not a crazy ask, right? I mean, essentially imagine you just pick the no unfolding and the folding.

- I don't think that's a crazy ask either, I just think it's a little farther off than you think it is. - Well, we shall see. Anyway, thank you very much for watching this episode of This Is. Make sure to subscribe here. And of course, as always, you can let us know, and by us, I mean you can let Matt know, exactly your thoughts on folding phones in the comments below.

I'm sure everyone's going to disagree with both of us and they think that folding phones are dumb.

Source : This Is