the worst thing about the galaxy fold is the crease because even though this is
the first device in years that you can pull out of your pocket at a party and
be confident that it'll spark the curiosity of everyone there it's the
first thing that they're going to notice especially at the wider viewing angles
as they look around your shoulder leading some people to immediately lose
interest and honestly that's a shame because
i absolutely love this phone i'll be
using it as my daily driver probably until the fold 2 comes out so don't
write it off just yet stick around and let me tell you guys why i think this
phone is not just really cool but changes the way that i use my mobile
device right after this message from our sponsor pulseway with pulseway you can
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pulsewave's gonna be a way better experience on the galaxy fold
anything productivity-wise yeah i'll wait i'll wait i'll wait
most of you have seen this phone by now so i'm only going to spend two breaths
describing how it works when it's folded the front has a 4.6
inch 21x9 amoled display a 10 megapixel
selfie camera and all the hardware you need to make phone calls while on the
back there's a triple camera setup with a telephoto wide and ultra wide lens
but when you open the phone up that is when the magic happens one continuous
7.3 inch display with 362 pixels per
inch and a 4.2 by 3 aspect ratio
there we go now i will admit that the crease was distracting for me at first
but i've been using this phone for almost two weeks now and at this point i
barely notice it especially in dimmer environments when the background image
is displaying something bright or when i'm viewing it straight on and watching
video content on this thing is badass thanks in part to the stereo
speakers it really is like having a
tablet in your pocket except that it's still useful once the show ends and the
large screen puts productivity through the roof because even if you don't use
the super intuitive controls to open up and switch between up to three apps at
once it still makes even full screen
basic things like controlling a remote desktop through teamviewer or using a
website that wasn't built for mobile way
easier the folding screen does have a couple drawbacks though while the
smaller display on the front is glass and therefore feels totally normal by
2019 standards glass don't fold so the big screen is a
soft plastic with a higher friction feel
and the tendency to grab onto junk that's not easy to wipe away especially
if you don't want to risk you know using your fingernail to
pick it away and then accidentally scratching the screen
but the bigger issue literally is the gigantic and in my
opinion completely unnecessary notch it
contains cameras five and six
but it makes swiping down notifications more difficult if you're right-handed
like me while cutting deep into your full screen content
now i will admit that there are benefits to having these cameras accompany the
main screen because it makes taking selfies way better and it turns your screen into
a really nice foldable pocket mirror which happens to be a common use case
but as someone who rarely does either of those things i would much rather lose
those cameras and the notch and the extra price that i paid for them and
just have all the cameras on the outside of the phone then open it up if i want
to preview an image speaking of outside wear a hoodie when you go outside
lttstore.com
speaking of the outside i ended up using the outer screen a lot less frequently
than i originally anticipated seeing as it's a fully featured screen opening the
phone all the way really does take some extra effort and holding the unfolded
fold one-handed felt quite
unwieldy at first
while there was a learning curve for me i actually now find that even one of my
small hands can hold and use the phone
stably as long as i'm not trying to do anything complicated like reach all the
way across it combine that with how limiting such a
small screen can be especially once you're used to a big one
and the fact that using this thick and heavy chocolate bar one-handed is itself
actually kind of tricky because of its thickness
and the end result is i basically only ended up using the front screen when i
was gonna dictate a message to someone or when i wanted to close up the google
maps search i just did and like put it in my phone holder on my windshield
actually overall this is kind of crazy the fold
made me use my phone less as a whole the extra time that it
takes to open it has nudged me to use my phone more
intentionally with less time spent just idly scrolling stuff that i didn't
really want to read anyway and fewer instances of just mindlessly taking it
out of my pocket when i'm like waiting for an elevator
it's counter-intuitive but the phone made the time that i spent on my phone
better without compelling me to spend more time using it with one notable
exception this thing has actually got me reading more because the kindle app on
it is so awesome i mean i've said it a couple times now
but it's like having a folding tablet in your pocket which brings us i guess to
the software experience as a whole which
is aside from the kindle app a bit of a mixed bag this is the only device of its
kind and samsung is doing their best but they still have to rely on third parties
to optimize for it some apps like google maps are really
great at keeping continuity as you transition between screens which is
something that you can configure on an app by app basis but others are
completely unable to resize themselves while they're running and need to be
restarted it's a little annoying
typing is a bit of a different experience as well now samsung did a
fantastic job of designing a split keyboard that's really smooth to type on
in fact it was one of my favorite things about the device until i realized that
no i in fact still do not like samsung's prediction but if you want to load up a
custom board you're kind of rolling the dice g board no longer supports a split
mode and swiftkey which is my preferred third-party keyboard does support a
split mode but the keys are ortholinear which takes a little bit of getting used
to so does the price tag at 1980 us dollars this thing costs more
than a lot of people's cars it is really
expensive it is 500 more than even the
most tricked out
it is 500 more than even the most tricked out iphone 11 pro max which by
the way we did review so go check that out
and yet i don't think samsung is being entirely
unreasonable here not only are you getting more hardware than any other
device like for real basically three screens six cameras and
a pair of wireless earbuds in the box and not only does samsung need to and
deserve to be compensated for all the r d that it took to bring this thing to
market but the fold also delivers experiences that you are not going to
get on any other phone like this is the
first phone that i thought maybe when i'm on the plane
i don't need something with a bigger screen as long as i don't need to do too
much typing is it a first gen product
yeah they need to lessen the crease i would
love it if the fingerprint reader and the lock button were combined into one
and an official ip rating would be really nice to have at this point not to
mention that the accessories ecosystem needs to catch up so i can like mount it
to my dashboard and get you know a variety of cases that make any sense
but overall i'm super impressed with what
samsung has accomplished here with the fold and i'm looking forward to all the
copycat devices trying to emulate this form factor in the coming
years speaking of emulation many have
tried but no one quite does it dbrand is
your source for awesome textured vinyl skins they're available for laptops
phones tablets consoles controllers and more even the samsung galaxy fold dbrand
skins are made from high quality 3m vinyl that's true textured and the
patented adhesive is guaranteed to leave no residue on your device if you want to
change the skin not that i would ever change this exclusive robot skin this
looks absolutely fantastic their uncompromising precision in
cutting the vinyl ensures a factory fit for your selected device and not only do
dbrand skins look great they also protect you against incidental scuffs
and scratches their customer service robots are easy and great to work with
their products are affordable and they ship worldwide so check them out at the
link in the video description man if even this giant two thousand
dollar phone doesn't have a headphone jack oh wait no no it doesn't
well that's it guys they're dead for good if they converted me then
you're not gonna be far behind
hey james could you grab the galaxy fold for me please
you