Comment by Yhippa

1 day ago

I've had two folding phones and I am not going back until the issues are resolved. Here were my problems:

1. After a while, I think dust would inevitably get in the hinges and wouldn't fold flat. I've seen demos in stores of newer gen Samsung foldable phones and it looks like those wouldn't fold flat

2. The inner screen protector eventually lifted off the screen, causing catastrophic damage, and requiring repair (under warranty thankfully)

3. The aspect ratios were weird. I ended up using native app sizes, making the extra space kind of a waste

One thing I did like about the Samsung foldables was that when they were folded and using the front screen, I finally had a phone that fit my smaller hands! It was nice being able to use my thumb to reach the other side of the screen. Will be interesting to see how this works out because it looks decidedly wider.

From a Samsung Fold 6 user of 2 years...

1) mine folds a few degree short of flat. Not sure if it gotten worse over the years but never noticed not folding flat cause any less enjoyment of the large screen.

2. My screen protector started peeling near the top on the crease close to the 2 year mark. It's growing. Haven't decided what to do about it yet but I'm not against just ripping it and going naked on the inside.

3. 50/50 if an app looks good or not in wide. My usual use case that works great on full screen is web browsing, reading docs/ebooks, zoom calls when someone is sharing code/docs that's normally too hard to read on regular devices, youtube doom scrolling videos with comment/ai summary on 1 view. For those experiences that account for 90% of my reason to unfold it works great.

> After a while, I think dust would inevitably get in the hinges and wouldn't fold flat. I've seen demos in stores of newer gen Samsung foldable phones and it looks like those wouldn't fold flat

For your first point, the iPhone duo is rated IP 68 Dust and Water protection. Literally none of Samsung's book foldables so far have achieved this IP rating.

I trust Apple to do better here; for example, after about ten years, no one has caught up to Face ID yet.

  • I get the form factor difference but Windows Hello (which actually works extremely well, probably due to its incubation with Xbox) came out two years before FaceID.

    • Anecdata of course, but my experience with Windows Hello is that it only works under perfect circumstances. Me just being positioned slightly differently in my chair is enough for it to not recognize me. As opposed to FaceID that has (for me) worked flawlessly for these past almost ten years.