The HTC Pixel 2 XL and the cutting-edge Razer Phone | #PNWeekly 277 | Pocketnow By Pocketnow

And we are live. Welcome to another episode of the Pocket weekly this week. Talking you 11-plus in you, 11 life, T-Mobile and Sprint prepping for a merger and Apple has some discussion over there touch ID face ID some controversies from videos that have been posted. While we also have a hot sexy new phone from razor to talk about. We've got a lot to talk about so make sure you're charged and ready for episode.2 7 7 of the pocket now weekly recorded November 3rd at 12:30 Pacific time. This weekly podcast is where we dissect and discuss those gadgets that make our lives mobile, smartphones tablets and wearables.

It's all the stuff you wished existed when you were a kid and a razor cell phone was a very different kind of cell phone. As always, I'm Juan Carlos bag now senior editor at pocketnow. com blasting. The signal from sunny Southern California joined, as always by plucky podcast producer, Mr. Jules Wong out on the East Coast how's it going buddy boy.

It was missing a letter ? like you could yeah, but in Seoul vowels that your will and what does it'll take that phone. Absolutely it was the L or a slab or a little thing of fortune, whereas this is we'll talk about this in our rubber half of the podcast. But it is a hear it's a badass, smooth thing and all I can see of. It is just a black slab which is supposedly just smooth and kind of Spartan in its design. Yeah, call someone summed it up.

I can't remember. I should've put this in my notes, someone on an on high Mays. First, look video made that made a joke about this being like the next bit Robin going through its edgy emo face pretty fun. That would be a sophomore decision, I, guess and terms right. If you're going okay seriously, yeah Scott Troy was like yeah, you know what I'm going to make this my statement, I'm going to leave this a little and just head out razor I'm going to go with flying flames all over the away, that's true, but we should out.

We should probably jump into some tech commentary before we get into those shenanigans, mister, Mr Wong. How might people get in contact with us for this show? Oh yeah, that's right! I should probably turn up the Twitter page right now, because it's hilarious that you just said that, because, if you can't hear I'm typing in the background as I ? pull up the Twitter page hilariously, and we actually do most of all heart live interactions. If you're watching live at 3:30 on the Eastern Time Zone, although sooner or later here Boston, we may be moving into the Atlantic time zone, but that's neither here nor there what we want. You are to be here with the hashtag, P and weekly, so that we can see your comments can't do the YouTube live because even with slow mode, it's still ridiculous. How fast those things come along and yeah.

We appreciate voluntary that chatter is great, but we can't produce a show and keep up with it. At the same time, hashtag, P and weekly is the thing, and we'll be able to see you there live and if you can't be here, live if you still want to ask a question, we do a mailbag episode every so often end of the month, and we should do that this month as well. Yeah, no I like in front of the plan that we should do mailbag at the end of the month and I thought. That was a great idea. So now I'm wondering if that would be our Black Friday episode this month, Oh.

What no I, don't think, so I think we'd have one more what I think. So because it's its the fourth Thursday, then usually that's the last one. But so our mailbag episode would be the 24th 20 yeah yeah, maybe yeah, maybe all right. What about that? I might be, it might be. Broadcasting from an airport.

I will have to check in good idea, we'll be doing a remote, podcast I'll sound great, a podcast at pocketnow. com to get to the point of things because that'd be an interesting one. So definitely we want the echoes of the airport's blasting out all the answers to your questions, for whenever you might be talking about things that are really it's a tech, mobile tech. We would appreciate that in the meantime, Twitter hashtag, P and weekly, let's get out of the show, let's talk about some lazy that that has been enriched that has been added to that has been plus in some as one might be inclined to discuss, and of course we are talking about none other than the HTC you eleven plus, like plus, live to twelve. This in the videos title I mean: do you? Do you think that we might be looking at HTC's attempt at trying to build a pixel to excel? So this was circulated about with the verge? They were talking about this with one of their sources and this sort of extended the lore a bit, because it did sound like that.

This was in the plans as the new eleven series that was planned for 2017. They were going to be three in the early part of the year and all them had Co names inside HTC that had to do with ocean master ocean note ocean, just ocean Ryan, and he ultimately only got the ultra and the eleven yeah basically, and you play, but no one talks about that. You play no okay, so that's on me, I keep forgetting about the play, but I just like this is. This is just me saying: oh I, sort of I sort of like that little cute thing, because he was between the time like before the U 11 was launched. We sort of dropped off this ocean master device for a long, and then there was the talk about the Google Pixel two devices.

Originally there was going to be a walleye which would be the regular pixel ?, and then there was time and or no muskie. Muskie was first, those were the only two ? and to Excel, and then there was this little timing thing that came up in which was even larger and or something and supposedly LG had something to do with that and between all that jostling around, and we finally found out yeah LG is making screens for the pixel ? EX. So that's interested in oh they're, also making the pixel ? EX itself so yeah that sort of made sense and that's when we start like a little after that was when we started picking up on the ocean. Mastery game like it was revived. I, don't think there were there was a sense of continuity but somewhere, and that was starting to be talked about.

As what we see here today is the HTC you a lot from so pixel to excel and the 11 plus. There are definitely a lot of similarities, a lot of sames a lot of the same specs going on it would just have to be the pixel. You know internal design language and how the PCB would have to eat, spread apart and also the supply chain. Those would be different aspects to that which would have to be a local so, and so I mean when we're starting to dig into this dig into this story. HTC wasn't responsible for assembling the pixel to excel I mean that that's all in-house LG correct intern yeah it would.

The assemblage would be LG, yeah, so I think it's kind of interesting like because we're watching this sort of timelines unfold and one of the things you were pointing to in that verge story is. We know that a certain section of HTC manufacturing is just going to go and live over at Google. Now, and one of the reasons for that at least stated reasons is to try and help abbreviate the time and working with partners to building device incorporating new software developments into the hardware. Optimizing it all, and so it's still been I. Think one of the curious aspects of this pixel launch is that they still worked with two different manufacturers.

When now the U 11 plus comes along to sort of illustrate that HTC has been involved in trying to manufacture, you know, sort of more 2017 design, language phone, more, a more current device than what the U 11 represented, and so I think. It's just sort of that. Curiosity we'll never get the full inside scoop what these companies are going through internally, the negotiations, the partnerships, the relationships, but we see this come out, and you think it's I just think. It's fascinating that HTC was already on this kind of design language. They could have probably fulfilled the manufacturer of the pixel 2xl yeah and in time.

Ii goggle has really made a point of just saying this is our stuff. This is our design and we made it well. I mean to be honest, it's its. The totally I mean I'm saying this, as, if it's 2016, it's a totally different mission, we're talking about this as a consumer oriented front and that it doesn't really matter who the ODM is, although we have since been painfully reminded that oh dies do matter or that supply chain does matter, because the people are staring at the screens, people are wondering what the heck is going on. A Google itself, I think the most troubling part is Google key way, because at the scene you know you can make the unit's HTC and LG.

But when you start shipping boxes with slip of paper and say that yeah when it didn't pass QA, and they still ship the phone no see. This is I. Think this is a fair criticism of where we're at with Google as a first party manufacturer now. Are they don't? Have the Nexus excuse to hide behind anymore? You know, like you, don't have as made by Huawei or made by LG on the back of your Google phone. This is a made by Google device and, if you're going to make that claim, then you have to be responsible for the support for the QA and the buck stops with Google, not with all, not with HTC, but I mean I.

Kinda want to get back to the you 11 plus I think this is. This is a part of the conversation when we see HTC is still producing and releasing products. This is a second half of the year flagship, it's really late in the second half of the year, but it's a second half of the year flagship, just as we're gonna start getting ready for conversations and rumors about galaxy s, 9s and LG, G 7s, and things like that um. What do you be at the same time frame as with the bolts last year, a Made, the pretty champion, and also the one a9 which was kind of start of a new push for the fall flagship, yeah and then, and then also I, think HTC's distribution on this is a little wonky too? Whether it's coming to what regions this phone will eventually be dropped off in us is not going to be North America, which is a sham and I hate it and well I, do like the U 11 life at least come into T-Mobile, because it's been rough times trying to get HTC into the carriers. These days it's going to be with the sense version.

I really would have liked to have seen what it would be like with Android 1, which is going to be around the world as opposed to just the US, but I, don't know, but yeah, so I mean just real quick I mean kind of like detailing what this phone, what this phone is I mean we've been talking a lot about it. We actually knew you just said what the phone is: it's um a snapdragon, 835, 64, gigabytes of internal storage, 4 gigabytes of RAM, or an option for 6 gigs of RAM and 128 gigabytes of storage, and it looks like the 12 megapixel ultra pixel sensor, with an F 1.7 aperture is making its return, and the I mean the biggest change from HTC's. Current design, language is incorporating the taller aspect, ratio display and the three color options. I think one is really techie cool in not just having a black and a silver you. We also have sort of a dark translucent where you can see all the guts of your phone.

When are we going to get over the Game Boy, the Game Boy guy, like no I'd, say, do it anything that helps a company stand out. I mean this is I was hoping to see a 11 in solar red as I thought. That was one of the most aggressive, visible design choices. Any company just look for a jingle brands, quality stuff where you can get the light players of blue. If you want your phone to be the cause of lens flare, not just capturing photos with lens flare, so I was hoping to see something like that and I.

Think HTC is actually succeeded in a discussion piece. Your phone as a conversation piece, the translucent you 11 I, think I think achieves that at least in its more interesting than a lot of the other glass back devices that we've been playing with recently. So all in all, this is again I think it's more evidence that HTC manufacturing can still turn out a good phone, but not releasing in North. America makes me nervous for the future of what's left at HTC and that all the the talent on flagships may have been merged and migrated over to Google. Well, the thing is, with HTC: they've always done the extra models going into it like the one m9 plus when a 10 player, whatever the heck they had for like s, that's right and these little weird things, and they went out to your Airport to certain parts of Asia.

They were market specific and I. Don't think that what would do what we dealt with back then, is the same as here, because this is a secondary flagship with like a change at a leading transition of a feature that being the 2x1 display. I, don't think that is fair to the market or to whatever HTC, there's so much, there's so much manufacturing from the U 11 that the company has already sort of landed on. You know the this is a? U 11 with a taller aspect ratio display. So this is what I mean like the last sort of year of HTC devices because the U 11 was probably what a year and a half two years in development, and so whatever was left from that time frame in two years, will we see the brain drain? Moving people from HTC over to Google start to affect the manufacturing of devices in 2020, and, and that's the oh, that's that open-ended big click.

Baby hype question is HTC. You going to be gone into year. It's to see, 2020 well, I. You know this is also where I'm kind of pointing to phones like the U 11 life. You know, HTC globally, still has a reputation and find some success in making mid, Rangers and entry-level devices they've been having difficulties in their flagship end, especially for Western markets and in Europe.

So now this is where I'm concerned that HTC's, the team of HTC employees that went over to Google might represent that flagship design team, and this could be that slow process of pulling HTC IP over to Google without having to face the same kind of nitpicking or the same kind of criticism that Google faced when they bought out Motorola. You know so this gives HTC plenty of time to figure out what to do with the vibe they'll exist as a mid-range her brand across the world and whatever flagship talent they have will now be dedicated towards pixel 3 in pixel, 4 well, I mean that that could be it, but they're still gunning for five or six or seven flagships or whatever models smartphone models next year, as well. They're smart to keep on that schedule, I'm not sure. If even that is sustainable and to be perfectly fair, I am reading a lot into one smartphone release. We do have a tweet from Ronda great using the p-n weekly hashtag, you 11-plus not coming to the US is worrisome, but people can import it and that's my plan.

So it looks like there's I know for a fact: there are still some HTC friendly folks out there, especially in our audience, people who are watching our videos and watching and listening to our podcasts, and so, if you're considering is this, does this help close the gap between HTC in the competition? Is this sort of up your alley a device? It's going to be the right fit for you drop us. Some comments shoot us. Some emails shoot us some tweets, because I think also anyone launching a phone in this quarter we're already facing those conversations of how does it? How is it? Going to stack up against next year's new phones, probably landing sometime around March, and that's that's already. If you're talking about a seven, eight hundred nine hundred dollar investment, you know to turn around and know that in three months, you're going to see a ton of headlines about what's new and the next generation of hardware and Android Oreo 8.1, and what does that mean for the device? That's currently in your pocket. I think that they can't afford to keep up with this whole going with the numbers' thing, because we had the seven m7m eight and nine, then it was like hey it's the 10, it's the perfect 10, and it was a great phone.

It was a perfect 10, it's no one! No one bought it, but still like what do we are there anything clever about going into the number 12 and because you know you want to make like you know, for HTC 13. You have like your baker's dozen, but you were saying that you, you kind of liked what you saw for the 11 life, making it to T-Mobile what is it? What is it that you're seeing in that phone? What makes this stand out for you opposite every there's others like mid-rangers, just boring old specs. I mean really it's one of the first with the new generation 600 series, processors that is gonna, be widely available in the US and less like the g. We did the g5 s from motor, have like the 629, well 630, or the 625 I can't remember now, because I think you might I think it might be right, but this might be the first with the 632, have a proper North American release, not just like that. We could import another manufacturer.

Yeah, I'll have to look at I'm, probably wrong. Sooner or later it says the apparently has the 4:30 in India at least, so I'm assuming it's going to have the 4:30, sorry India. They never give guys the good chips that do they, but this is going to be a little of a little litmus test in terms of how we expect things to go. We love the 625 in many phones, not just the BlackBerry key one, so the Motor he's done other great 625 to so. This is uh.

This is a 5.2 inch. Full HD 1080p display it's an LCD, so you won't have to worry about any blue or red tint. If you tilt the phone, and you look at it off access these, oh yeah, free, gigabytes of ram and I don't have and a 16 megapixel camera. So that's that's not embedded! That's not bad! For not bad paper! Specs I mean, and with the price at 300, at T-Mobile and 3 yeah, well, yeah and 350, and for HTC with the android one. Maybe I'm not sure if that international markets, North America, it's gonna, be cents yeah.

What in this? Oh, go ahead. Sorry, just I'm trying to think about how I feel that sense these days, because it's during It's if it were talking about it getting a little older, that's like long in the tooth right last year, then you have to wonder okay with the skin. If you can get your hands on the 630 series phone, I would be very concerned about performance on a Qualcomm 400 series phone running, a skin like sense, I mean, and I'm sure it's been optimized HTC has some great software developers. I know it's not gonna, be the same beast that we were left with like the one m9 we wanted either. We really need something like sense, 5, where it's just you.

You took away all the ski morphism and you really just who did ever, although I do miss what was it being a touch flow back on Windows Phone, Windows Mobile back in the day when you would have like the analog flap. Why I had to install so through me? Finally, got I, don't even know where my phone is, so I put Nova Launcher back on my V 30 I wanted something cleaner than LG's sort of front interface, and when you do that you lose the LG clock widget, so I go, and I get my beautiful widgets, and if anyone has a suggestion for a better weather clock widget, please send it my way: because I'm, so out of touch with what's new there, so I throw it on there and of course, the first clock that beautiful widgets has up. Is that like old school 1970s, flappy clock here, just like we've so, so far left that visual? Look, it's so old! It just brought me all the way back to like run yeah in, like everyone was still doing that even up through 2015. They were just placing it there because they couldn't just deal with that. Just didn't know how to quit.

You 1970s flappy clock, so pretty terrible but um. No! This is this. What I think is so critical about HTC with the 11 life here, ip67 water-resistant I, don't know that we've seen many devices again with proper targeted, North American launches that have included rated water resistance for under $400 that's kind of a big deal, and in addition to that, this to me speaks of a company that is finally figuring out how to compete in North, America, with attractive phone design and reasonable mid-range specs, and not just making an iPhone clone like they did with the one a9 at this rate, design it's terrific, and it gets its HTC design. It's not because you know people will throw these things back and forth like oh well, Apple Coppola, copied, HTC s, antenna, bands and I. Think that's true, but when you look at an HTC m1 phone versus an HTC, a one phone that a nine was as close as we'd ever seen, an iPhone clone yet to looking like an iPhone, and this is an HTC design, language, its HTC DNA camera placement.

Look polished glass on the back and incorporating important lifestyle features that flagship phone owners repairable and not doing it at five hundred dollars where the AAA, the one a9 launched. I would like to see this as a like. Replacing the desire like this prepaid, absolutely and- and this was probably gonna- be mu, throw plastic back on this phone and, more probably looking at a desire phone. You know what I mean yeah, so this to me like, if, if we lose HTC flagships, but HTC becomes a force in the mid-range where we can continue to expect high quality lifestyle grade devices. You know this.

This to me looks like a phone that will do a very good job of not only covering the basics but giving you a little more than that people receive yeah yeah. Oh sorry, this seems like the first phone in which HT has not just priced it above everything else it just. It wasn't stubborn with that, because they have been stay close Eve throughout their portfolio for just keeping it just a little, but just scoring that premium on the design of things which, to the credit, was pretty nice, but it did make sense with depreciation and with the specs and with everything else. Considering and so. I just got this from random P mode.

Ox4 is IP 68 water-resistant under $400 and has a headphone jack, so yeah III forgot about the x4, but it's a're still talking about a rarity in this market of having those kinds of forget about the x4. It's not project by well and then also I, just like I love, those conversations yeah, and it has a headphone jack you're right. No, that's actually fairly I. Don't know how many headphone jacks is because I haven't been impressed with Motor's audio Hardware of late, but it does have the convenience of that jack being built in yeah yeah, but I mean I got these I got these J bruh Sabra, whatever the elite sports eats 25e, which is launching over those we did um, we had it published late. We did like a little headphone review round up from not headphone review a headphone roundup from A?fe yeah and, like we I was you know.

I was spraying some time with Bayer, dynamic, and I was walking over to Sennheiser and the time that I spent, oh as for hit up aftershocks, because I love aftershocks. The time I spent going to three different booths to shoot footage. Hi Ma was playing with the elite. Twenty fives that whole time just Sabra, Jabra Larry battery life has lived up to all expectations. What did they? What did they claim that the runtime 18 hours and like I haven't had enough continuous usage to really get a context on that, but it seems like- and you know if not 18 hours, at least 16, because maybe there's a little thing going on between yeah? You know when I sleep, but in terms of like the fit on the ears is the best that I've ever had and that's because they have the elongated ear buds.

The tip I got to get back to some proper like neck bands for pies, I, I, think I'm going to go back to maybe my LG tone. Actives there's week round, I spent some time with Trend labs. They make these really inexpensive, truly wireless earbuds, and they work well. They actually do, but it is a lifestyle shock going to a wireless audio solution that can barely last the length of a Joe Rogan podcast running on fumes. After a couple of hours.

You're like this is so cool. It's so flexible, I've got individual earbuds I can go to one earbud use both, but I know they don't last very long, so there's I guess there had to have been a reason for the air yeah for the air pod stems because oh yeah a little a little better battery capacity, and that's also why I think the companies that have been more successful in this space that your buds are bigger, I. You know I, think Joe Burris new current generation, it's like they had the and this is coming from Jaime, and they will do a better job of talking up Sabra than I, but explain yeah. We should just like. Can you just talk about Sabra for an hour, and then he will um know that talking to their product rep about how their design was? Can we make truly wireless earbuds that, above medium, volume can last for an average competitors marathon, and you're like okay? That actually makes a lot of sense.

No one's going to want to recharge earbuds in the middle of marathon, and so that is a design philosophy. Actually I think makes a lot of sense. Because that that that carries over into just general lifestyle, are you really going to have these things in your ears playing audio for more than four or five hours at a stretch? Probably not if you can hit that window great, but then for some less expensive solutions where you know, maybe a third that time, maybe a quarter of that time. So let's get into some other news stories on that GCU, eleven plus in the eleven life. So you can definitely check that out on pocketnow.

com, and you are going to add Renata Lahore, OMG, beautiful widgets, so 2010 some gadget guy, another timeline, I love it you're, not I'm, going to pull it up right now, while we're doing this podcast downloading the address tech, and we'll probably sever my connection to hangouts, because my internet sucks as brought to you by spectrum cable and before we, the dole talk to is an in winter. Do you think Android one is a better implementation of the to google play edition, phones, and personally I think there its equivalents, like you, didn't, really understand the whole mission of Google Play edition phones and that they used flagship and alright, so I, don't know like, but there was a whole mission thing, and it was really much an awareness of it? Whereas this is its a shame that we're talking about mid-range phones or what an entry level in mid-range yeah. You know, Jane I, think it's interesting, because we're looking at different philosophies, Google Play edition, was really trying to showcase like, like Jules, are saying that sort of flagship grade product but supported by Google, and then it's really kind of sad that that experiment didn't resonate more, but it was also at a time when Google really had no relationship directly to consumers buying hardware. It was just very ill-timed. What I think is is so positive about Android one the people who are out there not spending seven.

Eight nine hundred thousand dollars on a phone are often the ones who were receiving far worse support from their manufacturers, especially in terms of software, and if Google can find a way to execute. Timely updates bug fixes security patches for people who can't afford the top of the top of the line. I think that just speaks to a better culture and a better climate for everybody buying any kind of smartphone or computing device. I would be far more inclined to recommend Android one to someone who's, also looking to save some cash, or they're on a budget, their budget conscious, then some sort of you know off-brand or sort of less well-known manufacturer in the same space. Maybe they can offer some better hardware.

Maybe they can offer some cooler features, but I really don't like the idea of someone spending two to three hundred dollars on a phone and then being left out in the cold for support, and it's not enough at that price point to say: oh well, you could route your phone and install other ROMs like there really does need to be a culture of holding manufacturers up to higher standards, the future of our economy, the future of all of our services all comes down to data data-driven devices and if they can't expect good security, good support, and we're kind of leaving a lot of people out in the cold, yeah, yeah and speaking of data and support, and all that um. Do you want to edit it in? Let's hit the news block yeah. Let's do that for the week of October 9, 2017. This is all the news that is fit to podcast T-Mobile CEO John Legal is reported to have contacted Sprint, CEO Marcello, all right about a new offer to merge. Sprint and Softbank chairman Masayoshi son, had developed some reservations about a prior merger deal that would have left him out of control of one of his largest foreign assets.

No terms of this new deal have been put out just yet. Apparently the axon M is its own thing, as the teepee USA has confirmed to friend of the show Andrew Wallace, that sequel to the axon 7 is planned, not sure if it's going to be called axon 8, but instead cherished in this new axon line, you have someone to celebrate, I, guess Apple, and it's ensuing antitrust legal battles with Qualcomm is said to be considering modems from other companies like Intel, which has provided some modems for some iPhones this year and last year, and even media attack yeah we're talking about those people from Taiwan from next year. There is a growth of counter litigation to deal with between Apple and Qualcomm. It doesn't look like there's a settlement in the cards for at least watch this space, Dan Richie, L, Apple's SVP for hardware engineering has now twice insisted to TechCrunch and Mashable. That touch ID was never part of the grand design for the iPhone x10, whatever you call it.

We have also wanted today that the original due date for the 10 was next year, but through quote hard work determination. It is now a 2017 phone. Nothing was really told of that been why. Finally, Best Buy has stopped offering iPhone 10 buyers the option to pay a lump sum for their iPhone 10 and also have to pay a $100 surcharge for it, as it is basically doing the carrier's bidding of selling the phones through their respective financing options. It doesn't really make a turn unless Best Buy decides to I, don't know activate their phones at the store, so that's where the $100 kickback comes in and if the carrier is well they're lining that it's there they're fighting the calling it a kickback but well yeah, that's true.

They are available. They are a bill mature in terms of that process and that they provide an alternative. Furthermore, they want to be an alternative to Apple stores uh, who have people lining up? Well, actually, let's, let's jump in on that to discuss news? Do you I had not heard of any other retailers that would be supporting iPhone 10 I mean you know like back? In the day we had Radio Shack's all over the place that basically just became mini stores for other carriers and stuff I hadn't heard of any other retail outlet trying to do the same thing as you're, not gonna, walk into a target, activate an iPhone 10 and have to pay $100 premium on that, and is that in part, because, like you know, you just won't see iPhone 10 at Target? Or is it just this Best Buy relationship is singular to how they work with carriers. Do you think I'm I mean Apple talks with the carriers, and then Apple sells its phones and whether the carriers take up so much stock? They have control of their own stock, and they decide hey, let's send them over to Best Buy, where we get them to. We get them to work with us in terms of our financing deals.

Our phones and it's a case by doesn't have accused to the OEM, because your Best Buy stock is actually filled by the carriers. That's right, that's why I'm saying here, because if the know if it were Motorola for Nokia that'd, be great but Apple, really touching down clutching at its I forgot about that correct and saying it's not a kickback, because if the phones priced the same at a carrier as it's priced at a Best Buy, then basically all you did was give all the money to the carrier, because Best Buy had to buy that stock from the carrier. That's okay! So in the blog post, sorry I've got to pulled up in front of me now. Finally, my internet super slow as brought to you by spectrum cable, so quoting from their article from forever cosponsor no not-not-not our sponsor, but this prod cast is literally being broadcast. I'm saying it's never going to be a sponsor and never will be I actually well and listen.

They want to dump a ton of money in my lap. I will kindly ask them just to give me a fiber solution. This is from the Best Buy blog. These inactivated phones were priced higher than those we sold with a contract to reflect the fact that the phone carriers only pay us when a phone we've sold has been activated on their network, so yeah this. This smells this.

This looks bad. This doesn't sound great I can understand where retailers saying this phone is on our store shelves. People want to buy the phone from us, but we can't profit from that activity unless we just build in a premium, unfortunately, for Best Buy, because the optics on this look terrible, it's one of those is it like. If you want to sell iPhones, you better hope that you're going to make your not back by combining it with accessory purchases. Just like we do with like printers.

Why, for so long you would buy a printer, and it wouldn't have a USB cable in the box. It was because Best Buy couldn't make any money on the printer unless they sold you a $30.00 gold-plated, USB, cable, yeah, exactly, and I mean I understand to some point that Best Buy was trying to offer that options. They wanted to be a secondary option, and you know it had limited stock to offer and because of the nature of iPhones, where they're, basically, some free they're not really tight in anyone unless you get insert a CDMA enabled than GSM whatever. But it's its. It's tough and I.

Don't think that they should have finagled something the situation, because that was just that's kind of a good transition point because I do want to touch quickly, and we don't have spent a lot of time on it. Because I'm sure this is gonna, be a story developing more aspects of the story over time, but um talking about Apple and Qualcomm. You know we instantly saw this generation of iPhones there were the stories coming out about the different variations, whether you were really getting the same kind of LTE performance and people recommending if you were going to buy an iPhone, buy the Verizon variant, because then that had a Qualcomm modem in it because it had to support CDMA technology, which also, in turn even on a GSM carrier, delivered faster LTE speeds. I wonder how Apple will be able to build phones for North America without utilizing Qualcomm components, I, don't understand how they can support Sprint or Verizon over the next year or two until I guess we're all everyone's. Just you know LTE for everything.

Without that kind of modem support, yeah I mean the whole litigation started up throughout the course of this year, and we've seen the suppliant chain. I guess I have grind to a halt, and this is where I can say: kickbacks because that's what's being described in the antis right, antitrust suits and the whole complicated site bill of how manufacturers parts manufacturers have to pay Qualcomm or OT and whatever. So at this point, we're we're looking at Intel, perhaps taking the whole of the kitten caboodle, yeah or perhaps MediaTek starting to mix into that and yeah. I don't know, I think intel probably makes the most sense as a main components' supplier. I I I'm, unfortunately, I'm not very familiar with MediaTek chipsets in general, which I just started able start to be able to produce CDMA parts yeah, that's what we saw with the LG X charge on Sprint I did not know.

That was a media attack. That's fascinating, so I'm sure. So you know what maybe one of the things about this story is the fact that if Apple is going to start pulling suppliers to manufacture on mass, and they're looking at a supplier like MediaTek, then it's probably just built into the contract. That MediaTek is the company. That's licensed Qualcomm's patents on CDMA connectivity and that then apples just doing business with media tech to supply the actual part.

That's coming in something like that. I think could actually make a lot of sense. I didn't know that there was another player out there who was outfitting, CDMA, compatible radios, I thought Qualcomm still had the monopoly on that perhaps- and you know, monopoly is kind of the term that is being wielded around, but still in disputes. The ugly aspect of have even having C CDMA shouldn't exist. It was a way like to kind of create the illusion of competition in the United States, but it was never going to be.

The world. Technology was never gonna play at the world stage, so you know, Qualcomm has this COO and I don't mean this to sound, is flip or is dismisses of dismissive of quality. He scored a coup and being the only company that was really building high quality, radios and modems, and that's why Brent went into y MX yeah Oh WIMAX? What was it? It was. My was it my you know it was now wasn't. The Eve was on the epic was the galaxy fest, but it was the one with the keyboard was the only galaxy s with the slider keyboard, and it had that WIMAX radio in it, and I was I.

All felt like I was such tough stuff man I could, I had like 10 megabit downloads in the middle of la who could even think of that data speed. This is amazing days out of 2008 right well and at the same time also like I, have tens of minutes of battery life when I use that CD that WIMAX exactly and that's what that's. Basically, what wasted the Eve 3d for me. So that's my first actual phone from 2012, because I got that we've got a've got a couple: it's coming in here, P and weekly from Renato Lahore. These are actually pretty cool.

First, he just mentioned Huawei. They have really nice modems, if only they would provide them for others. While we make great connectivity gear, but I do believe they have yet to support CDMA, which is again why this is so sort of precious in North America as Verizon and Sprint combined make up a pretty sizable chunk of the US carrier market. But this is a this. Are you sort of not breaking news, but this is stupid? This was posted up Broadcom on Bloomberg, I am Bloomberg, so broad comedy has the right chipmaker Qualcomm.

This could be huge, yeah, apparently they're talking about $100 bid for Qualcomm 100 billion dollar hands, not $100 bid. That's $70 per share. If you want to talk market but- and this would be both the largest- would this research yeah it would be topping EMC and whoever bought that Intel? Maybe I don't know in terms of all this, because Broadcom was in the news this week also for having reincorporated from Singapore, which they have been for a while back to the US and had they've been talking about tax reform and how the U. S. is gonna, try and do that make corporate tax reform I'm, not sure in terms of the whole repatriation thing where foreign earnings have to be taxed again, where they have to be brought back to the United States.

That's going to be worked in to this legislation. That's being crafted right. Now, that's been talked about and is being bandied about, so big impacts all around in broad common I, think is one of the pushers of the dominoes and could also be one of the dominoes itself. Yeah, in this whole scheme. You know that's true, yeah I mean, but the numbers on this urn saying what current valuation Broadcom 111 billion Qualcomm 91 billion, and they'd be seeking $100 a hundred billion dollar bid for Qualcomm.

This would be. This would be enormous if that actually went through I wonder what kind of opposition governments would have against this kind of acquisition. Well, I mean there could be something with NXP, because call comes has been trying to chase an XP for 47 billion dollars, and they make a little sound parts to I. Think a lot of sound parts for phones, so there's just a whole Hungry Hippos at the very top end of the tech sector. Here in terms of valuation, and they're all involved in making our phones work well, yeah, rightly the chips.

Sorry, prices of chips have been rising, everyone's been citing that raw material costs are skyrocketing. I mean we talked about a couple of months ago, when we were talking about battery tech, to I mean, like the materials that go into our phones are gonna, be facing increased competition from IOT and cars, and everything else imagine that coming from one source like one freaking source, when you also combine the fact that you know like Broadcom radios are also in Apple products too. So this would be probably cloudy the waters on whatever kind of future deal. The two companies would be able to execute. Lets uh, let's just kind of shift gears here.

Real quick I want to point this one out, because I was super proud of our buddy Andrew Wallace. He was a guest commentator on the podcast a couple of weeks ago, just on his own felt like reaching out the axon 7 was a fan favorite for people who, like mid-range, premium, flagship, mid-range phones, whatever you want to call them, there's a $400 phone, it's in the middle of the market. It's a mid-range phone value, flagships! Okay! Well, you can, you can preface, however, you want I'm saying it was probably one of the best phones of last year, and it just happened to be priced halfway in the market of smartphones, especially if you were into audio, because this was definitely one of the audio champs of last year, opposite the v20. So uh, you know Andrew. Just on his own.

We saw the ax on em thought: hey, you know screen flipping school, but you know the axon 7 was a great phone I wonder if we'll get a follow-up. Besides, he's going to go out, tweet, tweet, ZTE and CT. He replied to him. ZTE doesn't reply to me asked about whether we'll have an axon II, but he did get a reply from ZTE and apparently there is some notion of a follow-up, hopefully to the axon 7 I mean yeah, yeah good on Andrew I. Think timing also helped because this was after the there missed flagship corn, unquote launch and where the states, which was the Exxon and there, and so that's the timing bit, but also every so often- and you know just the straw that breaks the camel's back, because there aren't whether they're on social media, and they do get asked about all these sorts of stuff, all the sorts all stuff my cut is my conjugation correct, I, don't know yeah close enough I get what you're saying what they get.

You know all these questions all the time it just you know. One fan on this one particular moment goes and asks the same question as like yeah we're going to answer that question, because now is the time that we can actually talk about this so yeah, so I mean if they can also the same philosophy for an axon 8 that they that we saw exhibited in on seven. That could be really compelling device. I mean you know: we've been fans of phones like from OnePlus and Huawei in this sort of mid-pack market, but there were few devices that I think ticked. All the checkboxes for multimedia powerhouse, like the axon 7, did, so I.

You know I know a lot of people who would have said like just give me the exact same axon 7, but throwing that Qualcomm 835 and charge a little more for it and that would have been a 20-17 dream phone for a lot of people like the axon 7 was a 2016 dream phone for a lot of people, so I'm very curious in what they might be able to deliver, because I think it's its nice to be seeing this kind of competition start filtering more aggressively into the unlocked market. Yes, yeah well, I was gonna, say just wrap it up an axon 8 on Amazon, you know as part of like Amazon's. New push for unlocked phones would be really exciting. I think ZTE is having a soft year. This year, I mean they've gone through the whole huh I mean to what was it? The Iran sanctions where they were training was Iran and back in 2012, and they had to pay like 800 billion million dollar.

Excuse me fine to the International Trading Commission. Then there was the thing with CX, a CSX which was the crowd's phone thing and that had to be retracted and reworked, and you haven't heard anything on that French. It was supposed to be talked about in September or October. Again we haven't heard anything on that and then there's this there's the axon M, which was a great opportunity, I think who shows something off on a major carrier: 18 T mm-hmm it sort of had to be this kind of thing. That is an anomaly to everything else that we've worked with so soft year.

Well, yeah. It definitely has and I think as emblematic by, because I have not held I've not played with, and I don't mean to speak ill of the dual-screen acts on em, but I do find it to be a curious entry when they delivered such a great experience on the axon seven to not have a follow-up phone for that, but what I hope? What I? Really hope is that we'll see a traditional carrier like, for example, I, think Amazon is sort of the juggernaut that a lot of other retail outlets should be looking at. How can they compete against Amazon is a storefront and the way you compete against Amazon isn't to sell your products on Amazon I like that? That's not that's you! You need to right now. You currently need to do that. If you want to exist, you need to have a presence on a market like Amazon, but what I would really hope to see, and I think it makes the most sense in the grand scheme of things I think it makes the most sense, for like say a T-Mobile to start acting as an unlocked phone disrupted.

So you could go to amazon. com and look at pictures of unlocked phones and decide whether you want to try one buy one of those- and you know, potentially, you know, look at video reviews on sites like pocketnow. com who make phenomenal video reviews of smartphones, tablets and wearables, or what, if you had a kiosk at a T-Mobile store where you could go in, and they aren't the official T-Mobile launch phones, but these are compatible with T-Mobile right you go in, and you can play with an axon seven. You know the person at the counter can say well, this won't support our Wi-Fi calling, but it supports everything else on our network, and you'll still have your binge on, and you'll still have. Your international travel works in all these different countries, and it's guaranteed to work on our network.

It's just not supported like a galaxy phone with T-Mobile branding on the back I think there could be something really compelling about having just one little corner, just one little chunk of retail floor space dedicated in the back of a store where consumers can engage with other types of devices and other types of products, and you would actually be able to go hands-on with that gadget in that store space and see what makes it different I think that could be a really compelling way to try and compete against amaze John's, current, and I'm sure they're going to be building into other devices too LG releasing a bunch of their phones, including the g6, for this Amazon unlocked sort of experience. A carrier to get into this I think could be a fascinating way to turn up the heat on retail competition. I can't hear you Jules I, don't know if it's me, or did you unplug yourself? We have make funny in here it's off it's now. It's not I'm, not recording anything. You know what I want to take this opportunity to record the rest of your podcast from here pixel.

So everybody listening to this podcast you're about to hear a market quality difference in Jules's, audio, and we'll have to see hangouts audio in between now, and then I'm, trying to figure out where the hell I don't know that there is one on the pixel I, so I ended up returning my pixel to I was gonna, see if Murray wanted it, but she we were playing with it, and it was unfortunate that um, you know, I decided I didn't want to keep it. It really wasn't a phone for me and I reached out to Google and I asked like you know: I bought this phone I, don't like it. My wife is really interested in it. She thinks this is gonna, be a good phone for her. Is there any way that we can not only transfer her account but also buy her protection plan since we're still within the two-week return window, and they were super helpful in transferring the phone over to her account.

Only to then say, oh and adding a protection plan is impossible. Sorry, and so it was really disappointing that there wasn't any way to try and make that happen. I typically don't buy protection plans on my phones, because I have way too many phones, and it's highly unlikely that I'll have one phone and constant operation long enough for me to worry about really damaging it beyond being able to use it. But my wife is a one phone, throw it in her purse, it's chucked around by our daughter. She needs.

You know better support than just that, and so they're only so Lucian, even though the phone wasn't damaged, the phone was still within its two-week return. Window of you know full price. You know a grace period was well, you can return the phone and then buy a new phone and buy the protection plan with the new phone and my wife went well, no I can just buy any phone then, and we sent the pixel back. I was really disappointing, but I don't believe there was just a straight-up memo recorder on the pixel ? and I can't hear you again Jules. This is this: is some hot podcasting right now? I love! This is summer.

This is some hot crap. Indeed, I wouldn't record this, hopefully with my b20, and this is gonna- be okay. The laptop Mike's going to be okay for the live broadcast, at least because life no I'm, really great, it's okay, so you're moving to the v20. This will be the experiment when we go back and listen to this podcast after the fact. How much did Jules is audio change, going from a zoom h2 to an LG, V, 20, and I mean I'd want to like compare simultaneously that yeah.

Unfortunately, we won't be able to do that because your zoom h2 turned off, but um. We can wrap this up here. Real quick I did want to touch on very quickly Sprint T-Mobile, central merger for a while I brought six months. Seven months well, I mean ever since what ever since sprint was bought out by was a soft Bank. We've been talking about blink, first and merging with Sprint or buying Sprint, or you know, acquiring Sprint and T-Mobile seems to always kind of come up as being the right merger to compete against Verizon and AT&T I kind of hoped.

This wouldn't happen: I rationalize everyone saw the writing on the wall for Sprint. It was very likely this company would get optioned by another company or acquired by or another company, but I really miss having more competition in this marketplace. So I always held out hope that Sprint would find a way to build up its user base and become a bit more receive, opposite T-Mobile, and especially opposite 18, t and Verizon. But you know there are only so many resources for people to want to shop when looking at cell phone coverage. So here's the point where I get into my argument with PC Mag Sasha Began, because he was cheering against the whole thing, ? cheering.

If the merger and heat width- and he was about a week ago when Softbank was you know, Masayoshi Shawn was son was trying to your know: I wanted to get out of the deal because he wasn't, he was about to lose control of one of his largest assets, which I guess is understandable. It's green, it's part of the whole doing business kind of thing, and he has a big personality too. So again he wants to exert control, and you know do something unique and whatever that's that's his prerogative. Purportedly I said this is kind of stupid, because I really wished like we would have more competition, and that would be through a new carrier that would pop up somehow or a new major player, a new fourth-placed player, where they would be able to act on whatever concessions go through reg, a regulatory speaking because they would have to give up some spectrum. They would have to give up some assets.

They would have to give so those away, and that would bolster a great, maybe a US Cellular, even though I don't think that family is trying to expand or someone we've seen, Canada make its own network outs, and they had wind mobile for time back in 2008. It started up its own network, and we're very hard. So you try and work it out very expensive task, I understand that, but suppose, every market we would want to see some road where someone could walk into this market and compete and on four generally, it seems like we're back into a very you know. Very few number of players that are controlling the mass of towers in spectrum and like the idea of like starting a carrier today, like the inevitable, isn't care if you live or die. It's pretty.

It's pretty cutthroat like that. So unfortunately that means in a continuingly, unregulated market. It's just going to become easier and easier for companies to merge or acquire, and that's where we find ourselves at today, where you know US Cellular stands as I, always go: Tom Brokaw whenever I say cellular nuclear. Sorry I apologize to anyone, Tom Brokaw, if you're listening, that was uncalled-for it's it does a good job, doesn't care yeah, I'm sure he doesn't care about what I have to say about his gorgeous voice? But it's an it's a troubling aspect of where we find ourselves now that for T-Mobile and for Sprint to compete against AT&T and Verizon. It really does make a lot of sense for them to merge and to unite their user bases.

But that also means increasingly, there are fewer places for consumers to turn to. If you have a problem with, you know, Verizon service, you can kind of go to 18 t, but that means maybe having to buy a new phone or going to a T-Mobile or a sprint, and now that's increasingly becoming and so like, with the only opportunity is for a company like Apple or Google to start selling their own service. That's not necessarily addressing the problem of who actually controls the pipes and what service do you get from the person who controls the lines of access to the Internet and that is I, find I, find it to be somewhat worrying situation that we find ourselves in today if this, if this deal goes through, but I think it'll probably take a while to hammer out the specifics, because you know for Sprint being the fourth place carrier they're still worth about half of what T-Mobile's market cap. Now that's a big chunk of change to try and address if one company is looking to buy out the other. Indeed, so that's something that we have to keep on the back burner, which is still burning somehow.

But yes, going to keep burning until quietly, smoldering I. Don't know that we have market fire, there are the embers are still glowing yeah yeah and with that I would say that we haven't had to read but Jules. Where might someone find more information on these types of Technology stories? If one were so inclined to look up, you know really cool new sites and videos and stuff on the state of the mobile industry. You can see full details on these stories on more hip pocket. Now that common look for the podcast section to get to this episode's rundown, you can chat with us about what you have been reading yourself like Renata Lahore did yeah.

That was awesome. Didn't you'm the hashtag PN weekly and also be sure to check out Jaime Rivera in the pocket Mel daily on our YouTube channel, terrific, oh boy? We do have to thank a sponsor this week. The pocket net weekly is brought to you by app River I'm going to go to the copy here now, if you're, a business owner, you wear many hats, and some of those hats are literal like the hats, I wear and some of those hats are figurative or metaphorical. You know- and this is what I believe a proper is commenting on- it may seem, like you- need an IT degree to keep your business safe from cyberattacks, especially with all the vulnerabilities that come with having email systems, networks and devices that allow you to access anything from anywhere. So how do you stay on top of everything? Keep your data and network secure and still run your business pass that hat over to App River a leader in cloud-based security solutions for businesses with a prefers premium, email and virus protection.

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com, slash weekly, and we thank them for sponsoring the pocket now, weekly, hooray for them and hooray for us for being able to nosh that sponsorship, yeah I feel again, I, don't know if it's you, or we're having some fun meltdown issues this week on this week's podcast, you went for all the noise I mean I have no idea if we're actually still connected or not. Maybe it's all the noise that's been generated from the webcam because it has to make do with the like compensate for the dark background, in which case I wish I had better lighting here. I'm sorry for that I'm using really nervous people work. Lamp I'll, send you one it's super gross, but it seems we've got to talk about the razor phone. You know we are our own.

I may be. Etta went and spent some time playing with the fruits of the acquisition of next bit team under the razor umbrella and I. Think they've they've managed to release something which is at least garnering a healthy amount of discussion. People interested in another player in this market potential offering from a trusted brand in the world of gaming, and this is striking up a bunch of questions like gaming phones. Is this now a market that people need to start taking more seriously or is gaming just one of those things that on a phone isn't going to appeal to a mass-market audience and so just to break down real quick, the razor phone we're looking at a Snapdragon welcome: snapdragon 835, the Arena 540 GPU.

It's a 5.7-inch quad HD, so it is 16 by 9, Gorilla Glass 3 on the front face with 8 gigabytes of RAM and 64 gigabytes of UFS storage. They don't mention if it's you, FS, 2 or 2.1. Hmm, I was assuming. It probably would be at this point right now: a 12 megapixel rear camera, 8 megapixel front shooter, 1/4, dual camera come on man. You can't bring it about that point: yeah! That's right! That's right! I, apologize, I missed the zoom sensor on this bullet point sheet here.

Four thousand William hour battery, which is pretty great, especially if you've been a fan of phones like Huawei's. In the past, that's a excellent number of milliamp hours, William hour capacity to have a quick charge for from Qualcomm. They claim 85% charge in one hour and a machined aluminum body coming with Nova Launcher as the front skin, with Android 7.1.1 NGA backing up the guts of the software, a pretty compelling offering a very minimal machined hardware, very low profile buttons, not really marring or distracting from the design and front-facing stereo speakers, which I think a lot of people are going to be happy about in terms of multimedia know, how big so no head pointing if anyone is playing a lot of games, you're using your battery more aggressively so having a headphone plugged in and not being able to charge at the same time might be a consideration for some folks. But of course, then you can just start dealing with the Bluetooth, but the biggest flip side to that is with that bright, TO LCD. You have also the 128 Hertz, the splash that you're playing around with, which is fire, and it's also titled an ultra motion, because you've got a brand.

Your brand, your technology like that. But it's about you know smooth, and it's great. Hopefully all the games support that and well they've. This is what was really compelling again you're, bringing something new to the table. This isn't just a powerful smartphone with a racer logo slapped on the back.

They are trying to make sure that their gaming DNA is incorporated in this phone. So when the discussion reaches like the frame rate of the screen scales to the actual frame rate of the app on the screen, yeah all the way up to a hundred and twenty frames per second. If this phone can drive a game at 120 FPS, the screen will properly match that frame rate for the gray for the gameplay. That is actually kind of a big deal. If we're talking about a multimedia device, yeah, and certainly I mean we have a lot of multimedia to talk about here, because as Geezer's wants, they have a ton of partnerships that will help them or for a gaming phone, because when you bring out the term gaming phone, you kind of have to wonder well what games am I going to play on that? That would totally make sense, and they have run out Arena Fowler as one of them where there was a tabletop care things, the beat'em ups, no, no I am a gamer so high.

No, but it's illegally League of Legends kind of thing going there and there's also a pocket edition of Square Enix is Final Fantasy 15, so fans of that franchise have lots to look forward to. Of course, you have all the new tender stuff, but I would say that, as a richly textured thing that I've only ever played like two hours of I think that's a pretty good I think that's pretty good. You like the game or not, but also it's. What I think is fascinating. Is this is another phone that I've seen really fronting a partnership with honor of kings yeah that was OPPO had something to show off with one of their last phone releases.

Talking about this and ten cent has been blowing that up, especially in the Chinese market, but it's become a very popular game elsewhere too, so that they're also working a collaboration with DC for honor of Kings, where you can play DC characters, yes, and seeing as how I'm like a massive nut, and I was totally addicted to my Marvel future fight, mentioning DC characters in a game like honor of kings, like actually has me somewhat more interested in trying yeah, so I might have to break that out and see you like if I can be Batman, always be Batman, that's kind of big. I thinks that we do need to mention the no headphone jack, but it does sound like they're following the Google Pixel model for their headphone dongle, so a little less terrible that it'll, hopefully be a proper 24-bit. Portable DAC, as opposed to your know like an HTC or motors. Have you seen the whole thing? Because, it's actual debt yeah, it's a chunky, little thing right, but what I'm hoping is unlike a proprietary dongle like Motorola solution, where the motor dongle only works on the motor. It doesn't work on like a laptop, hopefully that DAC will be compatible with any computer like the Google Pixel.

Dongle is because that could be kind of cool like if say your laptop has crappy headphone audio, and you can just pop out from the USB-C port. You don't have to detach the dongle from your headphones. You can plug it into your laptop and get much better audio. That am I. Think the right way to do this moving forward.

I still think it's a bummer that it doesn't have a high quality headphone jack, but this takes a little of the sting off. It's also not gonna, be water-resistant, so I know some people who are concerned about an expensive phone, not having some kind of IP rating. That might be a bummer there, but we are talking about US, six hundred and ninety-nine dollar phone, and that sounds like a lot, but that's still way less than I was about to say. That sounds like a lot, but no, no! It's not any more yeah. The iPhone 8 is $6.99 hello to you, yeah and when you consider that if you took a one plus five and just I mean this is kind of a sense, it makes sense. A 700 bucks like already we're seeing the 1 + 5 t, get little hints and little triggers going on and who knows what that might be priced, but we're talking about the screen technology, the audio I mean KJ X had, which is whether subsidiaries had you that stereo speakers, and just a bunch of other kind of back.

You know back flanking of franchises coming in to support this thing, and so we ultimately have to arrive at a question, though, is gaining a killer app that has been missing from the smartphone market. I think this is gonna, be a fascinating. First test case is: if razor can start building a core user base to become evangelists really built around. That idea of mobile gaming III think it's an it's a section of smartphone use, which is often overlooked. We talk about gaming in our reviews and stuff, but I think for a lot of people out there.

You're going to spend $700 on a phone. Gaming is one of those activities that kills phone batteries right. You know you don't want to have your phone dead at to before dinnertime, because you still need your phone as a primary communications device. When you know games eat through battery life, a lot more aggressively now I think razor has done exactly the right play in talking about fast charging technologies and a larger battery thermal cooling system that they have to hopefully keep your phone running more efficiently, and I can say: I can get through a significant amount of Marvel future fight on my mate 9, because this battery is ginormous compared to a lot of other devices in its class, especially a lot of other devices at its price point. So III guess I'm I'll be really curious to see.

Do you think people are gonna are going to latch on to this idea? Do you think we'll get enough people latch on to this idea that we can build a fan base around it, because this isn't the same argument that, like a one plan, is making I? Don't have the answer for that? Right, do you know that? No you, liquid future, you get the future wrong. You're gonna push this greatly, and this is because they have some retail flex with this because they have their own razor stores, of course, which are farmed for you between, but there's also the Microsoft Store for at least the North America I'm, trying to still parse out the partnership, but they have a lot PC periphery bills, so maybe they felt like I saw that maybe they're trying to leverage that going on, and they're also able to still use I still use the razor laptop, so I'm very tied into their product line exactly, and they're, and they're also partnering in Europe, at least for with three, and they also work with three for design and hardware, and they made an agreement like earlier this summer. So there we go. There's some movement on this phone, whether the case gets made for it is, is that well maybe up to Microsoft. Maybe it's up to the carriers and hopefully well the nice thing like it won't be for lack of trying I think these are all the right plays.

Like and I'll be shocked if this phone isn't available on Amazon on B&H on any other sort of web retailer I'll be very surprised, so I think they've made pretty much every right move. You can make in launching a new phone. Very, very few leaks. Very few. You know, like you know, spy pictures or blurry cam photos anything like that.

They controlled the narrative of its announcement. They arrived with pricing and availability information ahead of some other products that always seem to announce a phone and then not tell you how much it's gonna cost or when you can buy it, and then, knowing that it's going to have some decent launch partners, even if they aren't carriers is at least showing that there's been some relationship. Building going on behind the scenes for this phone, we've got a bunch of tweets a bunch of questions on this. Let's go ahead and jump into those so that we can wrap this podcast up from Andrew Wallace he's got a couple tweets here: does anyone else wish that Racer had included better PC to mobile streaming solutions? I want to be able to play sieve? Five civilization five on mobile and what strategy do you think Racer should use in order to sell the there 700 dollar phone if they aren't going through carriers? Actually, we kind of talked about that, but I do want to talk about game streaming, because we've got Samsung, has a big well and then also we've seen from traditional gaming platforms. You know: Microsoft has been working on sort of game mobility, the Xbox stick, PlayStation the same thing: Nvidia and steam all working on.

How can you get a game from your PC to your living room, and then you've got a know, a common, a mainstay sort of I think the leader of mobile gaming, Nintendo, blurring the lines between console quality and mobile gaming quality with the switch I actually do kind of wish that I that we saw something that was you know like, because Racer has a living room solution to that I think about it. It would have been really compelling to have some kind of service that could offload a PC driven game just displayed on a phone screen. It's just then also I think you would have had to have had the discussion about game, controller or peripheral that could interact with a phone well enough to actually control the game that you were streaming from. Your PC yeah yeah and one of the odd bits that I noted, while the event was going on, was that they had the whole preamble about how they've become the number one in PC, peripherals and console peripherals, and they also made an announcement about their streaming equipment that they have for PC, and they said, and if you're worried, and we've been out of stock for a while talk soon- and that was one of the few times during that preamble- that people actually applauded that there was an actual strong applause. That's funny I mean okay, sorry, I'm, just I'm, also going through our tweets.

At the same time, here Joel I didn't mean to cut you off like that. Well, no! No! No! It's just that like when they say that there's my gamers I presume that when they have trying to fill their audience, maybe that was what they were asking for, and yeah they're from Zayn winter hashtag peon weekly. Are you surprised, Nvidia, isn't making a shield phone or partnering with razor for theirs? Well, first, I seriously doubt Nvidia would be trying to partner with Racer as I think they would view them as more of a competitor in this space. But you know III, it's kind of interesting to see you know. Nvidia had tried to enter the mobile space, the chipset space with Terra and when Terra didn't become a primary chipset for manufacturers to compete against Qualcomm.

They seemed to lose interest in that space. I, don't know, I, don't see them really trying to make any other mobile gear shield tablets or shield controller mobile gaming setups anymore. So I just don't think, there's enough interest in the space for them. When they're more focused on streaming solutions and graphics cards, so I mean the race is on they're, not necessarily in the hole in terms of components. In terms of serving up software to stream, like that, that's really the only vertical that they are competing in, but just doing hardware and micro components, I, don't know how much, how much of that means something to them in order for them to collaborate or go or not, and then this is well I.

This is what I think is so interesting is like you're launching a phone in 2017. This is kind of becoming you know like the 2018 model year. You know like just with cars. Yeah, is the end of this year. So it's technically next year's phone- and you don't I- mean anyone who's walking into the space knew.

First, they just have to know that this phone isn't gonna, sell like crazy for the first gen, especially when it's priced at a know the bottom end of the premium tier of the market, but we've seen other players, try, and so I'd love to have a conversation with someone internally. A razor and I know they'd. Never let us kind of do you know, talk candidly and publicly about stuff, but like what? What about the timing now really made them feel that this was the right time to play, especially when they aren't trying to make the same argument. Nvidia did with console or PC quality gaming on Android powered devices. But lastly, this is from Jonas, and this made me laugh: Jonas Timothy Kamal, the razor phone isn't worth the price without chroma REV, look: look.

They have the special edition. They're going to produce 1337 left unit with snake the TRI snake force logo at the back in green cup. Row green is more than anything. You'll ever have no jewels. What we need, what we need is a rainbow ripple effect.

Every time you touch the screen just like they have on my keyboard and that's that's. What's going to sell some phones, there's no RGB come on I'm actually shopping our GB RAM in a separate window as we speak, because I've got to rebuild this workstation and I want pretty colors on all the things but yeah. Let's go ahead and wrap this up here. I think that's! That's an amount to dinner. Yeah, and I want to thank all the folks that were to chatting, and we saw that we saw a lot of chatter on this episode and then all the people sending us in tweets and stuff, don't forget, we're going to be doing our mailbag viewer mailbag episodes at the end of each month so shoot us those emails.

If you're listening to this and the recorded audio version of this podcast, and I'm gonna pull up my script here to get us back out contract in the sack there, you have its folks. This episode of the Pocket weekly is over. The conversation continues, though, on Twitter, where Jules is outpointed, Jules, and I'm humbly at some gadget. Guy pocket now is around the web on Twitter Instagram, Facebook Google+ and our home site pocketnow. com for Spanish speakers check out, yes, pocketnow.

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