SammyGuru with Jeff Springer
SammyGuru with Jeff Springer
Samsung's Paint Peeling Excuses + Z Fold Special Edition Incoming
This week we have a fresh controversy to explore - paint is peeling on certain Samsung models, including the Galaxy Z Fold 6. Samsung has a funny excuse for why this is happening (Hint: it didn't come in your box when you bought your phone). We also have numerous new leaks about the Galaxy Z Fold Special Edition (the new name for the Z Fold 6 Slim/Ultra). Samsung is gearing up to launch a better fold just months after the Z Fold 6, and we're not too happy about it.
In the second half of the show, we dive into One Hand Operation+, one of Samsung's best Good Lock modules. We're also taking a look at the new Bowers and Wilkins Pi8 headphones, and answering some great questions about the marketing of foldables going forward in our Q&A segment. All of that and more, so get to listenin' already!
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Welcome back everybody. This is episode number 11 of the Sammy Guru Podcast. My name is Jeff Springer and with me is my co-host, torrey. Hey, how's it going? And yeah, we're back. We made it through episode 10 and all the way to episode 11.
Speaker 2:You know.
Speaker 1:I was thinking maybe we'd just quit after 10. It's a pretty big accomplishment, but you know Torrey's like maybe we should just come back and do the 11th one. So here, we are. We're actually here on a Saturday. Usually we're here on Friday afternoon. So Tori and I, you know, have a little bit different look today.
Speaker 2:Maybe a little less tired, maybe a little less tired, I don't know. Casual.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a little more casual today. We're just hanging out here at the office on a Saturday A lot of interesting Samsung news to talk about. And yeah, you guys know I really love you because it's the first college football Saturday. And yeah, you guys know I really love you because it's the first college football Saturday and I came in to actually do it.
Speaker 1:I thought about canceling it because I was like I don't want to miss the college football, but I decided to go ahead and come in and still do it. Luckily, Alabama doesn't play until later today. It's Georgia-Clemson though right now, so we are missing the big Georgia-Clemson game started right now as we started the podcast at 9 am Arizona time, so maybe we'll make it for the second half.
Speaker 1:For those who don't know, Tori and I are huge Alabama Crimson Tide fans. We're both born in Alabama, we both lived there for a big part of our childhood and so obviously, as a result, if you live in Alabama lots of the time anyway, you're either an Alabama or an Auburn fan.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah. Thankfully we are not Auburn fans.
Speaker 1:Thank God for that, but yeah, so it's a big, big game today, not because Alabama's playing anyone good, but it's the first game of the Kalen Daybor era Next.
Speaker 2:Saban is gone.
Speaker 1:And it was very weird. This morning I woke up before I drove in to do the podcast here at the office and I turned on college game day. You know that's espn's like show. They do before the football starts on saturday and nick saban is now like an analyst on. It's so weird seeing nick saban like doing college football analysis, like he's supposed to be on the sidelines.
Speaker 2:It's like what is Nick Saban doing?
Speaker 1:We have a game today.
Speaker 2:He's in a new commercial for getaway home rentals as well.
Speaker 1:He's just making all that money. That's good for Nick Saban.
Speaker 2:He earned it. I'm not mad at Nick Saban.
Speaker 1:The guy came in, he more championships than Bear Bryant. You can't really like no one ever thought Alabama was going to have another dynasty that would rival Bear Bryant, let alone surpass it.
Speaker 2:For a very long run.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean we had like 15, 16, 16 years of like every year we were competing for a national title. Most college football fan bases they can't really hope to ask for that. No one gets that. So I think Cale and Dave will do a great job. I don't necessarily think we're going to win a national title this year, but new playoff format this year 12 teams. We should make the playoff. At least this team should be good enough to do that, agreed. What else have you been doing this week, Torrey?
Speaker 2:Let's see Just work, work and working. Let's see, the football season also started off at the high school. So we played the big Chandler Wolves. They're ranked number eight in Arizona and I think we're ranked 105. But we really did give them a run for their money, I mean for the majority. Up until the last five minutes we were only trailing by two points. So you know, I think it was a really good start to the football season and I thoroughly enjoyed the game. So that was like my really big thing. I was looking forward to this week.
Speaker 1:Oh, you went to the game last night. Actually it was on a Thursday. Oh, it was on Thursday for varsity, Because normally varsity is on Friday.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that one was weird, but all the other games will be on Friday for varsity.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Nicole, when she taught at her high school they were awful. The first year she went, they didn't win a single game.
Speaker 2:I still went to a bunch of the games.
Speaker 1:It's fun, but it's not as fun when the team is oh and 10 yeah, it's like when are we gonna win a game, guys? I know right, it's like we have no hope to go to the playoff, the state playoffs or anything, but we just want to win one yeah, just give us one, just one game, that's all we want.
Speaker 2:That's our goal for the season but luckily they got better over the time that she was there.
Speaker 1:So but, yeah, I really do enjoy seeing high school football as well. Uh, it's always feel like, you know, if I know somebody that's attached to the school, it's kind of just strange to go to a regular high school game, cause I don't have any connection to the schools. But, um, you know, if you don't know somebody who teaches there or you teach there, it's kind of same atmosphere like because when these guys are paying, playing for tens of millions of dollars, the fans, they're enthusiastic, but it's not as like enthusiastic when it's just for the pride of, like, your school school. Yeah, the community now college isn't necessarily like that anymore either, because those guys are now not making tens of millions, but they're making hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars.
Speaker 1:Uh, the best players because because of the NIL deal, but old college football and then high school people are just playing because they love the game. That's what I did when I played high school football. I wasn't getting paid any money, obviously. I wish I was, because I was playing in the 110-degree Arizona heat for the first two months. It's pretty much September, but it's still like over. It's around 110. So, yeah, we talk about the heat every week, but hey, you guys gotta get used to it. This is arizona. That's what people do in the summer. When it gets to the fall, I won't talk about the heat anymore, because then I'll just be telling you about how nice it is here and you'll be like oh no, there's 15 inches of snow where I live and I'm like I don't know what to tell you.
Speaker 1:It's 75 degrees outside, I don't know. And so, yeah, let's go ahead and jump right in to the news. Samsung news Got a little bit of an interesting slate this week. Oh, and an update Last week, remember we talked about Google, the Pixel Studio, pikachu with the vodka deal, and I said Google probably will interview an apology. This week they kind of did. They issued one to the Verge and a couple of other websites where they said that, even though Pixel Studio was created with the intention of giving users the freedom to create what they want, to have creativity, maybe they need to refine the algorithm some.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you think, and maybe I mean I don't think it's a maybe.
Speaker 1:I think it's definitely. We need to refine the algorithm. For sure the one I showed you guys last week is the minimum amount of like obscenity and vulgarness that you could get. There were people who did some really bad things and if you check, like I said, various websites, even some of the tech sites, publish some of them. Like there was one where, like Mario, someone created one where, like mario was a nazi leader, like mario was hitler, it it'll do like that kind of it would do that kind of stuff with like no hesitation. Um, now, they did obviously tweak it. They tweaked it server side, because I tried some of these things earlier this week and some of them don't work now and do it.
Speaker 1:So obviously they're refining it on a granular level, but I think it needs like a more deep refinement yeah, and I do think samsung is ahead there, because samsung had the intelligence when they pushed out sketched image, like to make sure it wasn't going to generate anything that was like super obscene. And not only that, they also had kind of the foresight to put a watermark on the images, because google doesn't put a watermark.
Speaker 2:So you don't know, like if you see mario as a nazi leader you'd be like.
Speaker 1:Did nintendo put that out there? Yeah, right like.
Speaker 1:Was that made by nintendo america? So you don't know, because there's no like watermark saying this was made with pixel studio. So they should probably do something about that. But they did issue a half statement. It wasn't a full statement.
Speaker 1:Um, so, getting into the Samsung news this week, we have some interesting stories here. I'm starting with one that kind of broke at the end of the week. I made a video and Sumit covered this story. Samsung released a statement in various countries saying that paint is peeling off of Galaxy phones due to cheap third-party chargers galaxy phones due to cheap third-party chargers.
Speaker 1:So if you look at the story here and I'll pull it up so you guys can also see it who are watching the video version on the website if you look at the photos on the website, like people have these paint chips to see this guy's z-fold. They've got like these paint chips missing out of their phones and it appears to be the z-fold six specifically. See that right here around the power button. Now I don't have any. I checked my. I have my z-fold six right here and if you go watch my video on youtube, I actually showed a close-up you can see mine like there's no paint. Yeah, no chipping on mine or anything, um, but this does seem to be a problem where a lot of people have been talking about this on reddit I've seen. You know, obviously, when a problem is kind of widespread because of the volume that samsung sells of their phones yeah, you're going to see like a lot of people talking about it and if you only see like one or two, it's not a big deal.
Speaker 1:but I've seen like 30, 40, 50 people talk about this. Usually that means there's something going on. I mean, you would say if it was just one or two people, maybe those people scuffed their phone or they dropped it and they're just making a big deal trying to get a replacement. But if it's 50 people on Reddit, these are the enthusiasts. So obviously they kind of talk about stuff more than other people. But still this seems like an issue. So Samsung commented on it. So they gave some traction.
Speaker 1:Whenever Samsung comments on an issue, that means they're acknowledging that it's a real thing. Comments on an issue, that means they're acknowledging that it's a real thing. Because if something is just complete BS, samsung's not going to take time to have their PR team write up a statement and publish it to their official websites, because if it's not a really big deal and they think it's just user error, then they'll just ignore it. So they published a statement and I'll go to the statement here. Basically, they're saying that third party chargers could be the reason for this. They're basically saying that third party chargers could be causing the paint to peel on your device, and it's very interesting that they said this. And actually what's interesting now is if you go to the link that submit link in our article, it no longer points to the same page as before. So very weird. Hey, this is what happens when you do a lot of podcasts.
Speaker 2:Did.
Speaker 1:Samsung change their statement on this? I guess maybe we should research this a little bit. Samsung said he has the pull quote there. It says Samsung said, however, there are third-party and counterfeit chargers on the market that do not meet the requirements from the Qi standard and they can corrode the metal of your device. And then they had a picture as well of how this could happen. Basically, your phone connected to a third-party charger and they're saying basically, these third-party chargers like on Amazon that are kind of cheap, that are not made by reputable third-party brands, could cause this kind of problem.
Speaker 1:Now I'm kind of curious, since we do this live I mean, hey, this is live investigative recording Let me see if I can kind of search over on um samsung's website and see if the other companies, if anybody else, has kind of have another statement from samsung, because they obviously remove this from their website. So I wonder if they're saying that this is not an issue. Yeah, so let's click this support page. Oh no, so I don't know why the support page that we linked it looks like they might have removed it from the uk support page, but the canadian one is still live. So I don't think this is.
Speaker 1:I don't think samsung has, like, retracted their statement. I just wanted to give you guys the most up-to-date information. This is still there, so this is the same statement. I think they just must have removed it from the UK page. So I'll go back and update the link on our website. I don't know why they would remove it from Canada but not remove it from, or remove it from the UK but not from Canada, but obviously I'll go back and do that. So, anyway, this is very interesting. I made a video on it and even in my comment section on YouTube, people had said that they had this issue as well, not only on the Z Fold 6, but also on some other phones. So, and then also some people were chiming in saying that's complete BS. Samsung just made poor quality, you know lamination on the paint, and now they're blaming third party chargers. What do you? What do you think about this story?
Speaker 2:You know, I'm actually like a little ticked off, you know, cause I think again as like an average consumer, and also as as most people who do, who are not like Samsung enthusiasts or, you know, keeping up with the tech of all time, but like if they're not going to include chargers, like with the phones and then with the rise of everyone buying a lot of their stuff off of Amazon, like people, like if they just paid all this money to get this really expensive phone.
Speaker 1:That's what most people were saying. Yeah, and Tori is right.
Speaker 1:It's like how can you complain that people aren't using your first-party charger when you don't put it in the box? You're like make sure. At the end of the support article, too, it actually says at the end make sure you're using an authentic Samsung charger that's designed for your specific device. Well, that's great. Why don't you put one in the box that the phone comes with? Because how do I know it's designed for my specific device, right?
Speaker 1:This is what's hypocritical, too, about Samsung wanting to appeal to the more general consumer base, like the Apple fans and all that. Wanting to appeal to the more general consumer base like the apple fans and all that. Like, if you want to appeal to those people, those people are not educated as much on tech as your general, like the samsung audience has been for years, because they're enthusiasts. Those people might not know which chargers designed for their phone. So how, how can they go out and buy a third-party charger that's compatible with their phone? Just put it in the box, because then they know they're like this is my charger because it came in.
Speaker 1:It came with the z-fold six it was in the box when I bought it. Samsung obviously endorses it, so if I charge with this I shouldn't have any problems. Yeah, so, yeah, I mean, I think this is kind of annoying for a lot of people. I think it's it's it's hypocritical in the fact that you're telling people that they should. They're you. They're doing something wrong when you didn't offer them a charger specifically with this phone, which seems to be the biggest problem. This is a 1900 phone, yes, and now you're telling them to go buy another 50 official samsung charger. That's how much the 45 watt one is, so mead had linked it in the article at the bottom, um, on top. Now, to be fair, all the reputable charging brands that I advertise on my YouTube channel, that I'm partners with, that we put in the mystery boxes, like Anker, basis, uag those are all fine and Samsung is not saying that they aren't. Those are certified by Samsung.
Speaker 1:There's really cheap ones on Amazon where you can get a charger like 45-watt charger for like $4. I would not buy that. Don't buy $4 chargers. It's not a good idea, not just for paint peeling, corrosion, but serious electrical issues like fires and stuff you don't really want to. A charger is not a place where you want to buy the cheapest, like there are some things like a case. If you don't really care about your case being protective, you just want something to make it not get scratches, you don't care about drop protection, then sure you could buy a $4 case and maybe it would be okay.
Speaker 1:But don't buy a $4 charger, because that's something where, if they're not designing it properly, you could have some serious issues and risks, particularly with fire. I mean, this is another thing but fire and causing harm to you and your family. Spend a little more money on a charger to get a company that's certified by the brand. I'm not saying spend $50 on Samsung's charger. I wouldn't do that. Anker and Basis have chargers that are like $18 to $20 that are certified, also 45 watts. So save $30 off of Samsung and then buy one of those and you should be fine. But yeah, samsung really should put these chargers in the box and then they're going to say people are making errors and paints peeling off because they don't have a first-party charger.
Speaker 2:I just want to add one thing to it. Have you ever noticed that, okay, like for Apple products, like chargers and stuff, they're very easily available when you go to like Walmart and Target and seeing them, but like you never really see Samsung chargers.
Speaker 1:That's right.
Speaker 2:Or Samsung items, but like you never really see Samsung chargers, that's right, or Samsung items, and so if you really do want to appeal to that VM base to persuade them over, they need to get it out. They need some first-party accessories in the retail stores.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the only place you can find them really is Best Buy. Best Buy, yeah. And even then, when you go to a Best Buy, if you don't go right at the launch, you're not going to find the full range. If you go to Best Buy now it's been only a month since this phone launched If you go in there, you probably won't find every case option, whereas if you go in there for Apple, they got every color, every size. They got everything that you could possibly want in addition to charging products. Yeah, accessories has always been a weak spot.
Speaker 1:Samsung really needs to do a better job of putting their first party accessories out, but they also need a better job of partnering with third parties to make sure that, like they're advertising and getting their, their products out there yeah, um apple I think does a very good job of like.
Speaker 1:they give early access to like the designs of their devices to some of the big manufacturers or accessories and I think they also subsidize it, subsidize some of the Apple works for them to make sure they place iPhone priority in terms of getting the max number, because if you ever look at case colors for different stuff, samsung always has maybe one and Apple has seven.
Speaker 1:So if you go on any major website except a couple, exceptions, like UAG, they usually have the full range available for Samsung. So bravo to them. Seven, yeah, so like if you go on, like any major website. Except a couple exceptions, like uag, they usually have the full range available for samsung. So bravo to them. But, uh, and maybe speaking, but like most case companies, they have like 10 colors for the iphone 16. And then it's like I want a case for my s24 ultra. They're like, here I have a black case, yeah, but I don't want a black case.
Speaker 1:They're like, well, too bad, you're a samsung user, you're gonna, you're gonna have a black case.
Speaker 2:They're like well, too bad.
Speaker 1:You're a Samsung user, that's all you get You're going to have a black case and you're going to be happy with it. Now, of course, you could go somewhere like Casetify. They charge you $90 for a flower print case, but I don't want to pay $90 for a flower print case. And also Casetify had some. They ordered some hot water for doing some very unsavory things earlier this year, so don't know if you want to buy a case from them. We can talk about that another time. But a lot of you probably know they got in some legal trouble with another youtuber, with um zach from jerry rig everything and d brand um.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about the z fold special edition. So we were originally thinking that the new z fold that's going to come out next in october or november is going to be called the 6 Slim. Well, it turns out that is not the name. This week it leaked fully that the name will be the Z Fold Special Edition. So that is what it's going to be called. Samsung is going to remove the 6 from it and this is the story right here that Samit wrote Forget the Slim or the Ultra, say hello to the Galaxy Z Fold Special Edition. And this interesting move just in the way of the naming, because in some sense. By taking out the Z Fold 6, the 6, they're kind of removing the temptation for Z Fold 6 buyers to say, well, I just bought that phone and released a better one.
Speaker 2:That's what they're trying to do, I think.
Speaker 1:It's like they don't want to leave the 6 there, so people can be like, oh, you just released a better version of the same phone I bought. They're like, no, this is a completely different fold, it's the special edition fold.
Speaker 1:It's not a new version of the Z Fold 6. It's the first ever Z Fold special edition. So you bought a phone that's in a different line so you have no reason to be upset, which is complete garbage. I mean it's just marketing garbage. I mean I've been reading these marketing books trying to learn some stuff myself and it's just pure marketing choice.
Speaker 1:But this is a leak that pretty much you can guarantee is true. This came from Evie Leaks, who we haven't talked a lot about on this show, but he's a old school leaker who has been leaking smartphones for like 20 years online haven't ever since Twitter X started and he also has one of the best track records in the business, so you can almost guarantee that this is, in fact, true. At the very least, you know it's going to be an accurate leak. However, it does seem that it's still coming to China and South Korea only. So if you want this in the US, you're going to have to buy this and import it, and I'm guessing it's going to be $25,000 to $3,000 depending on where you buy it from. Probably I will import one from eBay. There's a couple of reputable Korean kind of overseas shops on eBay that I've bought from before. Definitely, make sure you buy from somewhere reputable, because you can get fake. There are fake Samsung and Apple clones out there and people make a lot of money off that because they make some garbage white label phone that looks like this one and then it doesn't work, it'll break in like two days and then you'll have just lost three grand.
Speaker 1:Um, a lot of other news about the z-fold special edition as well. Tons of leaks came out about it this week. Um, it's super slim and some of the biggest news it could use it looks like from the the S24 Ultra's 200 megapixel camera. So it means you actually would have the same camera as the Ultra S line on a fold for the first time ever. That's what everyone's been asking for. That means the primary sensor would basically be amazingly good, assuming that Samsung fine-tunes the software processing, because, of course, as we know, the S24 Ultra has had some issues of its own with Zoom but at least the hardware would get a massive, massive upgrade In addition to that. Not only that, we talked about the titanium backplate last week.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But it seems that the Z Fold Special Edition is also going to have new display technology. It's going to have brand new display technology that will allow it to be one of the thinnest foldables on the market. The UFG panel, which is basically a special type of ultra-thin glass. It has uneven thickness underneath the surface and basically it allows them to reduce the crease. So, we're also going to get a crease reduction.
Speaker 2:That would be good. We're going to have a larger cover display.
Speaker 1:Larger main display, better under-display selfie camera on the inside, better camera on the rear and still maintain S-Pen support and still maintain the S Pen support. Some people thought no S Pen, because if you make it a lot thinner, the digitizer might not work with the new glass, but another leak that Sumit uncovered shows that it also will support the S Pen. This truly could be the fold that we always wanted from Samsung. This could finally be the fold that everybody's looking for. Unfortunately, it's not going to be available officially in the US, so if you want it, you're going to have to be okay with one, spending a lot of money, and there's no trade-in program when you import it.
Speaker 1:You don't trade in anything Like if you want to get.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you have a Z Fold 6,.
Speaker 1:Your option is you could sell it locally, but of course the resale value of these has went down a lot because it's been a month since the launch. So you could probably sell this for about $1,200 to $1,300 and then pay the difference for the other one. But you also get no warranty. You're stuck. If something happens like you're completely screwed, because it's an international phone, they won't honor the warranty. Like if you buy it in the US and it's a Samsung Korea device, they won't honor the warranty. You can't just send it back to Korea. And then of course also you don't have the official support for all the bands.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so like you might not get 5G service. Like even if you're a big city, like we are in Phoenix, where on a regular phone you get 5G everywhere because it's a massive city. If, where on a regular phone you get 5G everywhere because this is a massive city, if you import this phone, you might only get 4G in a lot of places You'd probably still get 4G everywhere because at least the 4G bands have become pretty ubiquitous but you're not guaranteed to get 5G, which for a lot of people. If you spend $2,500 on a phone and you're not getting 5G service, that kind of sucks. I mean titanium backplate. 8-inch folding display on the inside, 6.5-inch cover display. S-pin support. New display technology to reduce the crease.
Speaker 2:You name it this is the package.
Speaker 1:This is crazy. I mean it's absolutely insane If this is a preview of what the Z Fold 7 is going to be. I mean Samsung has a chance to really just completely destroy everybody else. This would be like we talked about last week, when Samsung kind of came in with the Galaxy S6 series and they just destroyed everybody else in the market. No one else existed after that. They just took so much Android market share that LG and HTC and Motorola basically all went out of business.
Speaker 1:I mean, motorola still sells phones, but not on the scale they did like 10, 12 years ago. They basically just put everyone out of business. This could be an opportunity for them to do the same thing on the phone. They could just come in and say, hey, honor and Vivo and Oppo, you guys have been doing some cute stuff, but we're Samsung. We want to remind you, we're still the big bad wolf of. Android. And yeah, you guys are gone, so no more market share for you we're going to do all the stuff you did.
Speaker 1:Do it better, put better software on it, better software support, longer update cycle, and that'll be the end of all of that stuff. That would be so if they do this, so absolutely crazy. I'm definitely importing one. If all these things are true, I don't really care If I have to sell a kidney. I'll import it to get coverage of this on the site and on the channel. I won't need to sell a kidney, he will do it for you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I won't sell it, I'm just kidding, we're doing pretty well.
Speaker 1:Thanks to you guys for just paying the mystery boxes and listening to the podcast and all the good stuff you guys do for us that we should be able to get one. Even though we won't get one for free, I will be spending. That will be money coming out of the business pocket. No one is going to send me a free one of those.
Speaker 1:So you can be sure when you see that on the channel that that uh, sammy guru llc. We we paid between 2500 and three grand to get that phone here, but we will have coverage of that. Um, more s25 ultra leaks. I know tory is interested in that because of course he's gonna be probably getting an s25 ultra. So the s25 ultra leaks. They just keep uh coming out and we got some updated information this week. And, by the way again I mean I know I said it before um, samit is just doing an amazing job with this everything you need to know post. It's got so much information there.
Speaker 1:But the s25 ultra is the thinnest and lightest top tier flagship. Um. Basically, he's talking about the fact that we've got the new specs here that are coming out. Uh, for S25 Ultra, it should be thinner than 8.3 millimeters and weigh less than 221 grams. So that's about a 0.04 millimeter reduction in thickness and about a 11 gram reduction in weight from the S24 Ultra. Now those sound like minuscule numbers but I can tell you from experience I've reviewed phones for a long time Whenever you have like a 10 gram to 15 gram difference, that's something you can notice. In your hand it doesn't seem like a lot because, like 10 grams, like oh well, you know, if you know what a gram is, it's not that much weight, but this is an object that you're holding, like all day, every day. So, like the difference between 200 and what was it? 32 grams and 221 grams is actually a big difference when you're holding it and when it's in your pocket Because, like the Z Fold 6 went down by, like I think, 12 or 13 grams from the Z Fold 5.
Speaker 1:And I can definitely notice like when I carry this around.
Speaker 1:you guys notice I still have it so, like last year, I stopped carrying my Z Fold 5 around after like a month because I just didn't like having the brick in there. And I didn't like having the brick in there and I didn't find it to be useful in my workflow. I still carry this, along with the S24 Ultra and also the Pixel 9 Pro XL because I'm doing some camera tests. But this could be a pretty big change, I think, for the S25 Ultra. What do you think? Do you appreciate having a lighter, thinner flagship, because the size is so big now?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, no, definitely. I mean and I think we talked about this maybe on the first or second show that we did I was just like a regular consumer and you know just to like, our pockets are only so big and I can only imagine for our female.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they got, like you know, some of their pants don't even have pockets.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I have pockets. What's up with that? I don't understand that Me. I got like, you know, some of their pants don't even have pockets. Yeah, I have pockets. What's up with that?
Speaker 1:I don't understand that Me either. Why don't pants people? I mean, this is not a fashion podcast, but you know, come on, pants manufacturers, put some pockets on women's pants.
Speaker 2:Please, please. Sometimes my wife like we go places and I'm like can you put this in the pocket?
Speaker 1:She's like you don't get any pockets, no pockets for you because you got that purse.
Speaker 2:That's not right, man, that's not right. It's not that hard.
Speaker 1:Just cut some like little pieces right in. It doesn't take much effort. You guys could easily do it. I'm advocating for women's rights on this.
Speaker 2:Samsung mobile podcast too. That's what we do here.
Speaker 1:But yeah, Tori, what were?
Speaker 2:you saying about the size? Yeah, no, I mean, it's just like they're just so big. And even when they're so big, to the point, even when you wear gym shorts, I mean there's still a good portion of your phone that's sticking out when you're sitting down.
Speaker 1:It doesn't look good either.
Speaker 2:No, it doesn't. But then it weighs down so much and even when you just have it in your hand, it is all day it can be fatiguing, yeah, like if you're reading or you're just like scrolling through if even if you're doing some work, like it can be fatiguing to hold the phone and so some people are going to make fun of that.
Speaker 1:But it's, it's not a, it's not really a joke. I mean it can be fatiguing like to hold that phone and for long periods of time trying to show a friend, like a video, you're like, yeah, trade off.
Speaker 2:And if you're trying to show a friend a video, you're like you got to trade off hands.
Speaker 1:And if you're trying to read something in bed, like if you've turned on your blue light filter and you're doing some reading. If you like to read on your phone which is reasonable on the Fold because of course it's got that big, you know open it like this. It basically could be an e-reader. So you know you don't want to have something super heavy, so were doing anything. The weight is great and, like I said, definitely check out this post. This is everything you need to know about the s25 ultra, so meet updates this every week now.
Speaker 1:I mean, he's updating this with leaks every single week, so part of his weekly work is to go through and add stuff to this. He's put a ton of work into this. It's got a q a section at the end. So, as you're thinking about, should you buy the s25 ultra? Definitely check out his post, so bookmark he's updating. I know a lot of people have been reading that and saying how much they like it, so we appreciate his efforts. One of these days, too, we're going to get some meat on the podcast because I want to get some of his thoughts. Obviously, he's covering the news in the trenches every day, so we've got to get some of his thoughts about some of these various pieces.
Speaker 1:One-hand Operation Plus removes Smart Select on certain devices. Now this is apt to upset a lot of people. I made the video on this yesterday. I wasn't planning on making a video yesterday, but this came out and then I was like well, I got to, because this is kind of a big story. Samsung pushed an update to Smart Select and the update actually removes a feature, which is a rare thing. Usually, when they push an update to an app, particularly a GoodLock app, it usually adds a feature or fixes some bugs. So this fixes some bugs, but it also removes Smart Select. So we talked about Smart Select earlier on the podcast. Basically, if you're scrolling through something like your Instagram feed, let me make sure I got no explicit.
Speaker 1:Instagram stuff here, Like Flossy Carter says in his videos what's going on there? Make sure you got nothing explicit.
Speaker 1:But, anyway, if you're scrolling through your Instagram feed and you see this revolutionary post, apple's going to put 16 gigs of RAM to be the minimum in their new Macs. Wow, congratulations Apple. You could highlight this and just kind of crop it and share that photo somewhere else, like I can share it to Twitter. So Smart Select works a lot of ways. You can do it on the edge display over here, but it also used to work inside of one-hand Operation Plus, where you could crop your photos and just share them. So they removed this. But here's the weird thing I made the video and I originally installed it here on the Fold 6. And when I installed the update on the Fold 6, everything that Samsung said in the changelog was true. So when I installed it and now when you go into one-hand Operation Plus, there's no more option for Smart Select.
Speaker 1:Smart Select used to be right here, right around the screenshot, because these are in alphabetical order. Actually, no, they're not. Samsung doesn't do anything in alphabetical order, but for some reason they put all the starts that starts with S together, and so Smart Select was right here, and now it's gone. You used to have Smart Select rectangle, oval, animate and pin to screen so you could do an oval tool, highlight something as an oval, a rectangle, you could make a GIF automatically and then you can also pin whatever content you smart selected to your screen for later use. But now it's gone. So on the fold six and the flip six, I tested this on both. If you install this update, it will remove all the smart select options. Samsung has said no idea why. However and here's the weird part when I made the video.
Speaker 1:I went through and I was thinking, oh, I'll just do the update live because I already did it on here. I was like I'll just show people what happens because I'll do it on my S24 Ultra. And I went through and took the update on the S24 Ultra. It doesn't remove the options. So that's actually good for S users because for some reason if you update, the smart select options are not taken out. They stay there. So I'm super confused.
Speaker 1:One why would Samsung remove a super popular feature? I use this all the time. I tend to use it with the S Pen more and it's still there in the S Pen menu and it's still there on the edge panels. So it's not gone completely. But a lot of people who use one-hand Operation Plus, they don't want to use the edge panels because then you have basically one-hand Operation Plus. I actually listed it as today's app of the week so we'll talk about it a little bit later. But you have handles on the left and right side of your device but the edge panel also lives as a little handle up here. That's the edge panel right here. So if you use one-hand Operation Plus, the edge panel and the one-hand Operation Plus panel, they can kind of conflict with one another because they're both in the same spot, so some people don't want to use both. So I don't know why they removed this option.
Speaker 1:But I figured I would remind people again if you didn't see my video. If you want to keep Smart Select on your foldables, just don't do the update. You can always roll back using APK mirror. But on the S line phones, pretty much everyone in the comments of my video said the same thing. They installed the update on their S series S22, s23, s24. I don't think I've seen anyone with anything older than an S22. But I think all those phones. If you install it, all the options are still there. So you're good to go. So you get the bug fixes and nothing is removed. The real question is why the heck would Samsung remove this? I don't know. This is like a classic Samsung feature and I think a lot of people like this feature. This is probably one of the most, if I had to guess, it's probably one of the most used features in terms of, like the really old Galaxy. This has been around since, I think like the Note 3 or something. It was launched with one of the Note phones. Have you ever used Smart Selector?
Speaker 2:I think I've used it like once or twice. I think that's a lot for a casual user. You know it exists at least. Yes, yeah For a casual user.
Speaker 1:Like you know, for some Samsung features they don't even know that the feature is there, so I just don't know why they would remove it. It's a great tool if you share a lot of stuff to social media because, like, if you see a photo on instagram, you want to reshare it to your twitter. You don't want to necessarily copy, you'll crop the whole instagram post. You don't want to take a screenshot of the whole thing, you just want to crop that photo, and instagram doesn't make it easy to save photos directly from your instagram reel, so you've got to, like, take a screenshot and then you can reshare it. Anyway, I don't know. We'll try to dig into that more.
Speaker 1:I sent a question question on the Samsung community forums to the good luck moderators the people who like filter support questions at Samsung and I also sent a question to Samsung's mobile PR. I'm trying to finally get a contact with them because now that we have a website, hey, you guys should be talking to us. I mean, we're covering Samsung 24 seven. So I reached out to them also trying to reach out to them about stuff that's not related to review units. That way they can see that I'm not just in it to get free phones, because some people reach out to PR only when it's about getting a new device. They're like, hey, I need that new phone. But you know, I want to try to help them improve. That's the goal of Sammy Guru as a whole. So I'm trying to reach out about stuff that's not just related to uh.
Speaker 1:Related to that um, you might be able to disable activity alerts on your galaxy watch soon. So you know those alerts that say you need to stand up and get off your lazy butt, yeah, yeah. So you can't really turn them off fully right now, but, uh, you might be able to do that very soon. So basically, you, right now, you can schedule it so that they'll be off during a certain time. It's like, if you know you're going to be sitting at your desk from like 9 to 2 or 9 to 1 until lunch, you can turn it off. But Samsung is debating letting you turn them off fully, which I guess is good.
Speaker 1:But I also kind of like those, because I don't know why they bother people, because sometimes I forget that I've been sitting there for so long and I forget that I've been sitting there for so long and I think that could be kind of really useful for people to have that.
Speaker 2:I don't like my water break because sometimes when you're in it, you just forget you can drink water.
Speaker 1:So when, I get it.
Speaker 2:I'm like, oh, I need to stretch, drink some water.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it can be very helpful if you're really in the zone. If you're doing some work at the computer, it's easy to forget. It's like when I'm at the casino and I'm playing.
Speaker 2:You don't even know what time it is outside.
Speaker 1:It's like I don't even know Is it daytime what?
Speaker 2:day is it? What day is it?
Speaker 1:Speaking of which, I was going to mention that at some point, probably in six weeks, might be our first remote podcast, which means we might both be doing it on the computer, because I'm going to be in Vegas for the. Steelers game that weekend. So if you're okay with it, we'll do remote, which means we'll just both be on the laptop.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And we'll probably use some software to record. We won't have the amazing mics and the amazing Rodecaster, so the audio that week might be a little bit below our usual benchmark, but we'll still get it done. Yeah, the Galaxy XR headset specs have leaked out, so we now know a little bit more about the Galaxy XR headset specs. We've talked about this a little bit 16 gigs of RAM and it's going to run Android 14. So that's very interesting. The model number it looks like is going to be SMI130 and its controller is SMI610. So the headset's SMI130, the handheld controller's SMI610.
Speaker 1:And it looks like the specs here that we're looking at is the single core scores are between 1054 and 1088. Multi-score between 1047 and 1093. On Geekbench, the processor has six CPU cores and it looks like 16 gigs of RAM here. So this is looking interesting, but I still think the problem here is more not having to do with the specs and more having to do with, like, what is the use case of this? Because we talked about this before, tori, a lot of people that I saw go out and purchase the Apple Vision Pro, like they were super excited about the Apple Vision Pro and then six weeks later I saw them posting on Twitter and they're like hey look, my Apple Vision Pro is boxed up and in my closet because I don't use it anymore.
Speaker 1:Because they're back to using their laptop and smartphone and all their traditional tech For the first two weeks after they got it. They're like, oh, I'm in the future and I'm doing all my word processing and computing using Apple Vision Pro. But then most of those people they went back to like, no, I'm back to using my phone and my MacBook Air and my MacBook Pro or whatever Windows machine I like. They didn't just keep doing that forever. So I mean, I don't know what do you think? I feel like it's not about the hardware for this.
Speaker 2:It's about.
Speaker 1:The hardware is part of it.
Speaker 2:But the software, like the use case, like tell people why they need to use it. Yeah, that's how you're going to sell these, don't you? Don't you think, yeah, no, um, I, I just don't think we're there yet. I mean, still, uh, I think I went to target last weekend and again, seeing all like the vr headsets and stuff, still, just like I haven't moved, I don't really see anyone buying them. Um, you know, I, and just like what we said too, like I'm not gonna go to starbucks and see, or even myself, right using this sitting there at starbucks, yeah, middle of starbucks yeah now there have been some idiots do that for like tiktok views, but then people aren't doing that for real.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no uh, yeah, I just I just don't think we're there as a society yet of seeing that or even like again, it's kind of like where do you find the time to even try to learn and use it, and when it's just so much easier to be using your normal devices at the moment?
Speaker 1:um, but like wouldn't mind wanting to try it, but I just don't see myself doing that you have to have a revolutionary use case to introduce new tech and let it really take over. When the smartphone first came popular, when Apple introduced the iPhone, they're the ones who started the smartphone revolution back in 2007. That was a completely new way to do so many things you had. Instead of having just a thing that you could make calls and texts with in your pocket. Now you had a thing that was a browser. It was a word processor.
Speaker 2:It was a video caller.
Speaker 1:You had a calculator, video caller, voice recorder. It's got like 200 devices in one. It revolutionized your life by releasing that device. Hundred devices in one. Like it revolutionized your life by releasing that device. So you know, like the xr and the ar and vision pro headsets, like what are they doing? That's revolutionizing my life, like if I could put one on and I could teleport to mars for real. Or like I could time travel with it then I'd be like oh well, yeah, that's going to be a big deal.
Speaker 1:People are going to love that and it's probably going to be the end of the world, because you know people go back and change the time continuum. You know, we've seen the movies, we know that that's not good and if you give that to consumers it's going to be a disaster. Right, because there'll be no one to go back and fix it because everybody will have gone back and messed up things there. But it doesn't do that. So I don't know. I mean like I need a compelling reason. I'll get one because it's going to be Galaxy and this is Sammy Guru, but I don't know how much I'll use it. I kind of feel like I'm going to be one of those people on the Apple side where I buy it and for the first two weeks I'm like guys, I'm in the future, I'm doing all my video editing on my Galaxy XR.
Speaker 1:And then like two weeks later I'll be like oh, that hurt my neck and I'm kind of tired of wearing that around and looking stupid so now I'm back to using my MacBook Pro, my Book 4 Edge and then my regular phone and tablet. It sounds cool, it sounds interesting, but there's still a lot of like considerations that you have to kind of take into account.
Speaker 2:You know, I think like if people were using it like in the privacy of their home, I can see them maybe, but like I feel like people like want to go places for like the scenery and the vibe right, it'll kind of take you out of that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, and so I think that's what some of these places, what these companies are missing, like it's cool that like you can feel like you're in Tokyo, but it's not the same as being in tokyo yeah, because there's a lot of other things than just like seeing stuff, like the people, the food, the language, like the genuine part of being in tokyo, and the act of traveling to somewhere like tokyo is obviously a big part of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, even though the appeal is like, look, you can put this on, and then it feels like you're're in the middle of Tokyo not really, though.
Speaker 1:I mean a lot of these appeals that Mark Zuckerberg and other people made when they first introduced these headsets. They haven't really come to fruition yet. So that's the problem. Last thing in the news before we get on to the second half of the show Google delays the Android 15 update, and so this is bad news for those of us waiting for One UI 7.0, because Google is now saying that Pixels are not going to get Android 15 until October. So that's a long time. That's over 30 days away.
Speaker 1:So people keep wanting me to update them on the status of One UI 7.0 and 6.1.1. There really are no updates. I keep not making videos about it. I made one last week to update people, but I don't want to just keep making videos and be like, yeah, there's no more updates. I'm just making a video to tell you there's no updates, because no one really knows right now. Everything is delayed.
Speaker 1:Google's behind on developing Android 15. And obviously that means Samsung is probably further behind. Plus, they're adding a whole bunch of new features to Android 15 on top. I'm sorry to tell you, there's not a lot to talk about here, other than to say Google's pushing it back to October. So that means we're probably going to be waiting some time Now.
Speaker 1:Of course Samsung has the source code, so it's not like they have to wait until Google releases it for the pixels. But it probably at least means the beta won't start until September sometime because Google's still tweaking some things, obviously in the final 15 source code. So Samsung might want to also do some stuff in parallel before they release the beta. But, like we said, it should be a more stable beta. It gonna be shorter, so maybe in the end it won't be a big deal. Be a big deal for me because I have less time to cover the beta features and, yeah, usually when I the beta comes out, I make like 30, 50, 30 to 50 videos legitimately about all the features, individual features. I just pray. I'm just asking samsung if they listen to this podcast, which you know they. Obviously they do. They must, because this is Sammy Guru and they know that this is where they should come to get insights about what their customers think.
Speaker 1:Don't release the beta If it doesn't come until October. Don't release it the weekend of October 10th through the 14th, because I'll be in Vegas and I'm really not planning to make content that weekend. So let's try to release it like the second week of September, so I've got a full three or four weeks before I go. Try to take a real break for four days while I go to Vegas and see the Steelers game. I know that usually doesn't happen, but just one time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's a simple man. I just want one break a year where I didn't have to worry about something breaking.
Speaker 1:Uh, and I figured we'd be safe. Because October I figured the beta would already be over. But because they keep pushing it back, I get more and more nervous. Like, is it going to come out that weekend I have to go. That would be very unfortunate, but anyway, we'll get it covered. Before we get into the second half of the show, as always, we're going to take a quick break to hear from the sponsor of today's podcast.
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Speaker 1:All right, guys, we are back and in the second half here today, as usual, going to talk a little bit about hardware before we get into the app of the week and the Q&A. A couple of pieces of hardware that I want to talk about ever so briefly. First one is the Z Fold 6 one-month review. So I'm going to post my Z Fold 6 one-month review. I told you guys it was going to be last week, but with all the stuff I do, writing a full review for a phone is very difficult. My review is already 4,500 words. I don't take writing a review lightly. I haven't wrote one in a while, since I left XDA, and I also wanted our first flagship review to be incredibly detailed, because there's a lot of people writing reviews out there and in order for our reviews to stand out, I didn't want it to be just kind of short. Know, because it's a phone I mean, obviously with a watch, with buds or something it can be a little shorter, but with the phone. You know we need camera samples. You know a lot of testing, so I'll give you guys a little sneak peek though here on the podcast, because that's what you come to the podcast for. You get stuff that early so this will be posted sometime next week. I'm finishing kind of organizing my camera samples.
Speaker 1:Um, you said a lot of things about the Z Fold 6. When it first came out I was very critical of the camera hardware because it's basically the same camera hardware as last year and I kind of changed my mind a little bit in the course of the review. I don't think the camera is completely the same because the software processing they did does do some stuff. But I also think that sometimes the software overcompensates and makes some photos look worse because the hardware is outdated. It could really benefit from updated sensors and, obviously the Z Fold Special Edition, getting the 200 megapixel S24 Ultra camera. That will certainly help a lot, I think, with that that sensor, with the processing they have on here because remember, this processing that they're using on the Z Fold 6 is not yet incorporated into the S24 Ultra because this is One UI 6.1.1 specifically generated with this launch. So the S24 Ultra doesn't have 6.1.1 yet, as we were talking about.
Speaker 1:So, camera-wise, I'll put a couple of samples up here. What you'll notice is, if you compare it to the Pixel 9 Pro XL and the S24 Ultra is you'll see that it over-brightens a lot of stuff, so you get less contrast. The colors aren't as accurate. Lot of stuff, so you get less contrast, the colors aren't as accurate. Um, and with the zoom, even though the s24 ultra struggles a little bit with, maybe, low light zoom, this one not only struggles with low light, also in good lighting sometimes the colors can be a little splotchy in the zoom. So you know there's a couple of things with the camera. I still I still think it's way behind some of the other flagship foldables out there from Xiaomi and other Chinese companies. So Samsung is still behind on that front. But I really do have to give them credit as a whole package. And I said this from the beginning, even though I criticize the camera and I also don't like the fact that they raised the $100 price, because they didn't really add $100 worth of value.
Speaker 1:upgrades here the design of this though.
Speaker 1:I mean I want a wider cover display, but Samsung has really perfected, like the hinge mechanism. It's more durable than any other foldable out there. Like I have the OnePlus Open, I have the Xiaomi I just got that one I have the Pixel, whatever they called it nine two pro fold xl, whatever that's coming next week but the the hinge mechanism on the z fold six is just like so solid, like they. They've perfected that. Like you, this thing has a satisfying open and close and you know, like you could fold this million times, it's probably going to be fine. The durability and everything on the frame. Samsung has perfected that.
Speaker 1:It needs to be wider, for sure, and I would certainly like the crease to be lessened, but I do think that part of the reason for the crease is because of the durability of the frame, the way they've constructed the frame. I hope that with the Z Fold Special Edition, they are able to decrease the crease because of that display technology that we were talking about, the uneven, ultra-thin glass. But the crease doesn't really bother you when you start using it. You forget about it eventually. It just doesn't look good in photos and obviously it would be nice to decrease it. Decrease the crease Decre to decrease it. Decrease, decrease, decrease, decrease decrease decrease.
Speaker 1:That's going to be one of the taglines of my review. But I mean, everything else about this phone is is pretty awesome. I mean, the software is the best on any book style foldable. The speakers are fantastic on here. It's great to watch media because obviously it's a much bigger display than your your. It's great to watch media because obviously it's a much bigger display than your your s-line phone, so it's great for that. Uh, really, the only qualm I have is the camera, and then personal qualm is I want a wider cover display. I think a lot of people want that. Um, I am a little concerned with the z fold special edition because they're making it thinner and lighter, which we all want yeah, and they're also making it wider on the cover display.
Speaker 1:Is that going to make it less durable for the hinge? Because the hinge is very durable right now, like I said, very solid and also, even if you drop this like I haven't dropped this one yet, knock on wood, hopefully I don't drop it, but I did drop the z-fold four and the z-fold three and neither of them had any issues. The main reason that I end up getting damage on these when I drop them is because I don't use a case on the foldables a lot, because I just don't like foldable cases. We talked about this a couple episodes ago.
Speaker 1:All that adhesive on the cases is annoying and I don't like it. So if I drop it it's going to ding it, but it never cracked and the hinge kept working on both of those phones. So Samsung has really perfected the durability of the folds, I think, and so we'll see with the Z Fold Special Edition. That's why I want to import one. Are they going to sacrifice some durability in giving us all this innovation that we want? Are we going to get what we wanted?
Speaker 2:and then regret it.
Speaker 1:Because sometimes you know you get what you wanted and you're like maybe I didn't want that. You want it until you get what you wanted and you're like, maybe I didn't want that, yeah you, you want it until you get it. And then you're like maybe samsung knew best, because now we're gonna have to baby it because it's not going to be as durable. But we'll see a lot of. The chinese phones are thinner and they still seem pretty durable. I don't think they feel as solid, though as uh as this guy. So overall, I'll post my thoughts. But. But everything else about the phone is great. Performance is great. Audio is great.
Speaker 1:The software I think Samsung has made some really well-intentioned kind of upgrades to the software. Everything else I love about this phone. I did a lot of testing with different audio for Bluetooth codecs and stuff to kind of test how it performs with different pairs of headphones. So if you guys are audio fans fans, make sure you check it out. Um, and I did quite a few different benchmark testing and things like that on geekbench. Not that those really matter in real world use, but uh, and then some also some real world performance tests so you can see. I would say, if you like foldables. As I said before, it's a. It's a good phone and if you're coming from a Fold 4 or earlier, you should go upgrade, maybe, maybe, wait and see what happens with the special edition, but it's not a bad decision to upgrade in my opinion.
Speaker 1:But if you have a Fold 5, I wouldn't upgrade to this. There's not enough changes to warrant the big amount of money. If you're coming from a slab phone, this is where it's tricky Because, like, you really have to think about and this is advice for anybody moving to any foldable from a slab phone. I would give this advice to Tori or anybody else you have to think about, like what percentage of the time are you going to use this display? Versus what percentage of the time are you going to use this display of the time are you going to use this display? And basically, my advice is if the answer is you're going to use this display about 30% or more, then maybe it's a good idea. But if your answer is I'm so on the go that I'd be using this display like 80% of the time or more then I would not upgrade to a foldable because you're not going to feel the utility.
Speaker 1:You're not going to feel like you have that innovative product If you just leave it like this all the time you're going to feel like you have a downgrade from your S24 Ultra or your S23 Ultra because the screen's narrow and so you're dealing with the compromise of the narrow screen all the time, plus the camera's not as good, plus you don't have an S Pen that's embedded. You have an S Pen but you have to carry it around separately in your pocket. That's the other thing I don't like, but I wasn't going to make that as a big con, because everybody knows that. But the S Pen not having a slot, it's easy to lose it. I've lost a couple of them the last few years. So that's my thoughts. If you're coming from a slab phone, you really have to think about, like, what percentage of the time am I going to be folded or unfolded in terms of using the device? And if you're not going to be unfolding it enough, just stick with your slab phone.
Speaker 1:But if you have a productivity task in mind or you're a gamer or you watch a lot of media. Like, if you consume a lot of Netflix, youtube on the go, it's a no-brainer Because it's much better to play games on this and it's much better to watch media on this because it's just a bigger screen. So if you're going to unfold it and you're going to be doing stuff, then I think it's a really good decision to move over. What else? Bowers Wilkins PI-8. So I, tori, just got a chance to see these. These are the Bowers Wilkins PI-8. They're right here. These headphones released this past week and I got some to compare them to various things, including the Bud 3 pro, so I figured I'd talk about them for a second. There they are, tori, I'll take a look at them yeah, so that's the nice blue ones yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So these headphones are some of the best on the market. They're more expensive than the buds 3 pro they're 400 bucks but I figured I would talk briefly a little bit about the audio quality on these. Versus the bud three pro, now you don't get the same integration you get with your galaxy phone, because you know it's perfectly set up to work with bixby and all the voice calls and everything like that, and you also have some special software features that you get, like the concert hall effect and things like that. But this thing has an amazing equalizer on it. The buds three pro can't really compete in the audio quality area.
Speaker 1:So I just want I wanted to make this comparison. I'll probably make a video too, because a lot of times people ask me, you know, if I want great audio quality, should I get the Samsung Buds because they work so well with my phone? And the fact of the matter is and I talked about this in my Z Fold review as well Samsung and android support so many high quality bluetooth codecs which is what allows you to get high quality audio, basically from your phone to a good pair of headphones that if you really care about audio quality and you don't mind spending extra money. It's probably better to buy something like this or the bang and olufsen headphones, because these guys just make headphones, they don't make 50. Xamson makes phones, tvs, sound bars, refrigerators stoves, washers, dryers, sinks they make everything including the kitchen sink so you know
Speaker 1:powers and wilkins. They only do one thing and that's audio. They didn't do anything else. They make speakers and headphones, nothing else bang and olufsen else. They make speakers and headphones, nothing else Bang, olufsen. They make nothing else Speakers and headphones. They are an audio house. So of course you would expect, like, if someone's making 50 things, they're all pretty good. Samsung makes all their stuff, you know high quality. But if someone's only making one or two things, they're going to do them a little bit better. And also $150 more, $400 versus $250. But I really am impressed with these. This is the best pair of buds I own now. I actually bought these myself. This is not something I was planning to get for the channel. I'll make content on it.
Speaker 1:Usually what happens is I see something I want to buy and then I'm like well you know, I could buy it and then I could find a way to make some content. Maybe we can make half the money back.
Speaker 2:So then I don't feel so bad.
Speaker 1:I was like I can make a couple hundred off the AdSense, maybe on YouTube, from comparing them to the Buds 3 Pro. So then I only spent $200. It's like it's how I justify my reckless spending. So I saw Flossie Carter make a video on these on YouTube and he does great headphone reviews. If he does great headphone reviews If you guys like audio he's got every pair of earbuds on the entire planet.
Speaker 1:I love watching his audio stuff. I like his phone stuff too, but because I do so much phone stuff myself, I tend to not watch people's reviews before I review stuff. I talked about that before just because I don't want someone else's opinion to then become my opinion just because I saw it somewhere. But his review of these convinced me to buy them. He's talking about how loud they are with YouTube music and they are incredibly loud. Like these things, you've got to be careful with them honestly if you buy these headphones, because they could bust your eardrums probably on YouTube music YouTube music has like an extra equalizer boost, separate from the headphones, and then also with that high quality, screaming bluetooth codec.
Speaker 1:And then, of course, you guys remember I talked about the app of the week we had a few weeks ago, remember wavelet. You can also tune these to be even better inside wavelet. So I was using the wavelet app with these and they sound amazing. So if anybody's been thinking about these or if you've been thinking about should I do, buds 3 pro versus another pair of high quality headphones, it really depends on what matters to you. If you care about the convenience, like with voice assistant, with answering calls, with some of like the simulated sound effects, but if you care about like raw, balanced audio quality, like really crisp, clear sound and like really good bass, like really good lows but also really clear mids highs. So if you listen to different types of music, then you're good.
Speaker 1:If you listen to just like one kind of music like if you listen to like just hip-hop, for instance, I listen to a lot of that the Buds 3 Pro have a decent amount of bass. These still have more, but they have a decent amount of bass and you can tune that inside of the Galaxy Buds Manager to get great audio. These ones fit great as well. So did the Buds 3 Pro. If anybody's interested too, I'll take it out. These are not stem styles, so they won't look like an AirPods clone for you. If you wanted to go back to the old Galaxy Buds style, these are basically the same style as the Buds 2 Pro. If you've been longing for that Samsung style but you didn't want to upgrade to the stem design, there you go.
Speaker 1:There you go, if you guys have other questions about that, you can hit me up. I'll drop a link below if you want to check it out. As always, it's an affiliate link. So if you want to support the podcast, if you want to buy a $400 pair of headphones, you can help us out.
Speaker 1:We won't judge you and we will appreciate that quite a lot at all. Um, I think that's most of the hardware. Uh, I was going to talk about the xperia 1 6 but I don't have it yet. I am going to do a comparison of that phone the pixel, the s24 ultra and the fold. I'm working on a full camera shootout of those. That takes so long. Some people can do these camera shootouts and like instantly after they come out. That's because those people are single. They're like tori they don't have any kids.
Speaker 2:So they can just go out.
Speaker 1:They can just go out anytime they want and just take a bunch of camera samples and then organize them. They've got all this time. I have to do that during my work day. I can't do it. It's hard to do on the weekends because kids don't want to sit still.
Speaker 1:So the shots that I take of the kids, they're going to be like blurry because they're running around, so they're not going to be like let me get that perfect shot, Because you know, for a camera shootout, like if you have four phones, you've got to take the same photo four times one with each phone. So, like, my four-year-old is not going to sit there and be like hey, jonathan, sit there, keep the same pose, let me grab this other phone.
Speaker 2:Keep the same pose.
Speaker 1:He'll gone like after I take the first shot or halfway through the first shot, so you can't just be doing that motion, and yeah. So that's why a lot of my photos you guys will see in the z fold six review, they're not necessarily in the perfect scenarios, and that's how real people take their photos, though. So that's why, like, I don't mind that, like, a lot of people are buying, these are people who have families. They want to take photos of their kids or their pets, and so those are not, you know, not everything is going to be sitting there for you like a perfect scenario to take your photos. So I'll move on to the app of the week. We got one hand operation plus, so we talked about it earlier and so I wanted to go ahead and talk about it more. People don't know about this app, so this is mainly for Samsung newcomers, which we do have some people watch the podcast every week who are basically their first Samsung phone, and if you know a lot about Samsung, you probably know about it. But what One Hand Operation Plus does for you is it lets you put these handles on either side of your phone, and the handles can be used to trigger various actions. So, like, if you tap on the left handle, you can map three actions to a short swipe and three actions to a long swipe. And, uh, there's a bunch of different stuff you can choose from. I always keep the short swipe. I'll show you over there too, dory. I always keep the short swipe set to the default because I use the navigation gestures. So if you change the short swipe it's going to change like what happens when you swipe just a single swipe, and that's not good because that's the default back gesture if you use gestures, so that'll mess up your. So you don't want to change those if you use the gestures. If you use the three button nav which I think tori said you still use the three buttons at the bottom then you could change those and that's the benefit of using three button nav is you have more customization with this.
Speaker 1:But I use the long swipe and there's a couple of cool things that I use. I'll just point out the ones I use. I use Quick Tools. What Quick Tools does is when I swipe long to the right, I get all my quick toggles. See it right there, the quick toggles come up and so I don't have to swipe all the way down from the top of the phone to get them. That's super useful on the Fold, because this is such a big phone, you don't want to always have to go to the top.
Speaker 1:Uh, if I do a long diagonal down swipe, I get all my recent applications. You can see them right there. That way I don't have to do oops, I've got to move this mic to the other side. We're going to do that, probably, so I can easily do this. But I'm also working on the overhead cam. But yeah, if you do diagonal down, you get your recent apps, which is nice, and then if I have diagonal, you can see I get my favorite apps. So these are my apps that are kind of ones that I use the most. The other ones are the ones I use the most recently. But there's a lot of stuff. It's not just the stuff that I have If you look through the list. Well, one thing that's not there anymore on this phone is Smart Select. We talked about that earlier.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of stuff you you won't find smart select in this list, but, uh, flashlights, split screen view, quick pop-up view. I use that one sometimes too on the other handle. Basically, if I do a long diagonal down swipe, it opens my app in pop-up view so I can quickly multitask. Uh, you can use the google assistant app, bixby. You can use, use swipe to do a screenshot screen record. Show or hide the nav bar, rotate right, rotate left, turn on game booster, turn on color inversion, start application. You can open an app directly, just like if I want to just swipe and open Instagram directly. When I do a swipe, you can get keyboard shortcuts, task switcher.
Speaker 1:Uh, widgets, pop-up. This is a really popular one too that I really do like. Basically, you can have a bunch of widgets here and you can make it so that you have a bunch of widgets. When you swipe right, you can just swipe through your widgets. Instead of having to put widgets on your home screen, you can just have them off to the side and then you have to swipe right and then you see the widgets and you can swipe through them. This is actually how I like to use widgets, because I don't really like having widgets all over my home screen, because I feel like it clutters up the nice look of my home screen. Sometimes I either put them off to the home screen on the right or I'll use the pop-up view to do that. So what do you think, tori? Will you try OneHand Operation Plus? I know I don't think you've used it before, but would you give it a shot?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I hope you don't, but I do have a question. I really like the Edge panels.
Speaker 1:You use Edge panels.
Speaker 2:I use it all the time. I have all my hot or the ones that I use all the time, like that, yeah. And then when I had my other symptom phone, I like all my contacts here, but I didn't really feel the need to, but I really like this. Does that ever interfere?
Speaker 1:That's a good question. So basically, if you look in OneHand Operation Plus, the handle here does overlap with the edge panel handle. You can see those two right there. But you can change where this is. So you see this right here. You can move it down and you can make the size smaller.
Speaker 2:Okay, so what you?
Speaker 1:can do is you can make the size smaller so that it doesn't interfere with your edge panel there and you can still utilize it. So if you guys see that at the bottom of OneHhand Operation Plus you can move it and you can also move where the edge panel handle is. So you can move them both so they don't overlap, because Tori's right. If you use the default, the way they're set up by default, they will overlap and then you'll end up triggering you don't know which one you're going to trigger?
Speaker 2:It's like is it going to be the?
Speaker 1:edge panel to be the edge panel or will it be the one hand operation plus, uh, you know feature that I have mapped to that handle. It it's like hit or miss, so you have to make sure you don't have those things overlap. But you can change all that at the bottom and also, not only can you change the size and the position, you can also change the touch width so you see, like the width of this, like handle, you can bring this down. So that way then, depending on where you swipe, if you don't want it to trigger when you swipe further in, because obviously some people don't like that, because then if you're swiping, like on a web page, left to right, it might accidentally trigger.
Speaker 1:So you could change the width of these two handles as well at the bottom of the app. So I highly recommend it. If you haven't used it I mean whether you're a new user or you're a turning user you've never given it a shot. If you work it into your daily workflow, specifically if you have a phone like the Fold 6, fold 5, like one of the book-style foldables, when the phone is open, I use it all the time because you don't want to be reaching up to the top to do much of anything. So quick launching, getting to an app, all that stuff, any actions you use a lot, map it to One hand, operation plus and you can just keep like two handing the phone Like you would if you're playing games or you're doing productivity. It's really easy to use.
Speaker 1:So, okay, we've arrived at one of our favorite parts of the show. We got the Q and a. You guys throw some cues, we throw some A's. Today, tori is going to go ahead and read the question. We have a question for the third week in a row. Read the question. We have a question for the third week in a row we've got a superstar question from.
Speaker 2:I forgot the guy's name. You can read it yeah uh, glex, glexence, I, I think. Uh, so here we got uh great show again, fellas. Uh, here's a question for you. Uh, what would you personally do to market foldables and make them more than a passing fascination for a traditional slab style user? I've noticed that, as of late, the Samsung efforts to market the flip phones to women seem to finally be bearing some fruit, so I think that there's a chance to make them more aggressive in the marketing, because the ladies do seem to really like the form factor and just how personizable they are.
Speaker 1:So yes, it's a great question. I think Tori and I talked about, maybe back on episode, like three about how the flip definitely seems like Samsung has always leaned more towards the women marketing and not so much towards the men, but I think there's an opportunity in both of the form factors. Personally, I do think they should keep pushing the flip more towards the female side, but I also do think they should open up the flip more towards market, some towards males, and I think they did that yeah, a little bit.
Speaker 1:You know the ad if you've seen the one on team.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, and if you've seen their, ad on tv.
Speaker 1:We saw the one they play at the movies, that one where the guy's going around trying to play in different languages he's trying to like hang out with people it's like can. I can you kick it? Yes, you can.
Speaker 2:Can I kick it? Yes, you can.
Speaker 1:That's a good ad and it shows that not only you know one. It shows that, obviously, the translation thing, which I like, that feature, but it's that's not a feature you're going to use a ton because, unless you like hanging out with people who speak five different languages regularly, that's not a common occurrence for most people, um, but it does show that, like, it's something useful for men as well as women, because the camera angles you can achieve, the way you can do like tent mode, the way you can prop it up as a tripod, um, like I think they were doing. Was he doing skateboarding or something?
Speaker 1:in that, yeah, skateboarding, basketball, yeah, so you could take like photos of your various like sports, like if you're skateboarding, you could set it up and get some photo or video of your skateboarding tricks. That reminds me of that movie we saw, Didi, yeah yeah, yeah, the guy was skateboarding yeah.
Speaker 1:So you could definitely do that. So that shows like a pretty cool uh thing. But I also think that in order for it to truly appeal more to a wider audience, they need to continue like evolving the use cases, um, and also maybe for women, try to integrate it more with different like fashion, like try to partner with some different fashion houses, yeah and be like look, because you know apple does this and we.
Speaker 1:This is going back to what we were talking about earlier. Not, I don't try to tie these things together, they just come together. We're talking about apple having a lot more accessory availability, like they partner with, like kate spade and like all these, like female they do very popular like target like coach, yeah, um and so like.
Speaker 1:If you want like a case for Coach for your iPhone, you could get it, but not for Samsung. Cades Bay, you could get it, but not for Samsung. If they would like partner for flip cases on all of these various fashion houses, I think that would be incredibly helpful. I mean, they'll get it in the bag.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because the women love.
Speaker 1:Women love like customizing their case to match their purse or their other accessories, so I think that's a place where they'd be like OK, not only does this thing look really cute, because it's like a compact, like a makeup compact that fits in my purse, it's nice and thin, I can fit it into my back pocket because I don't have any front pockets, because no one will give me any front pockets here.
Speaker 1:But I can also match it with my accessories, like that'll throw it over the top, but I can also match it with my accessories, like that'll throw it over the top.
Speaker 1:I think for men they need to continue to evolve the photo capability because I think a lot of male consumers it's kind of weird because women take a lot more selfies, so they care more about the selfie camera, but men they care about the rear camera, because we're taking photos of objects, like of your car or sports that you're playing or your kids, because usually if you're the guy, like in my case, you're charged with taking the videos, and every birthday or holiday I'm the one I mean, of course, obviously, because I do smartphones for a living, but I'm charged with you've got to make sure you get the right photos or the videos, or you're in trouble Because the doing, like administering the gifts or doing whatever administering the party you're responsible for, like capturing the moments. So maybe that's why, if they continue to evolve the cameras, I think that would be a big opportunity for men. What do you think about in terms of the flip anyway, tori? What could they do to market it more to women or men?
Speaker 2:yeah, like you know, because uh, just like how we kind of talked about before, like I'm, I'm even seeing, I've saw, even at the high school, three female students who do have the Samsung flip.
Speaker 1:Cause you were interested in the flip too, cause you're trying out the Motorola razor flip, so obviously it's not just a women?
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I think it's just because, like you're starting to see, now it's starting to be like innovative, like not to say that slap phones have like ran their course, but at some point, like you know, you need to kind of push the innovation, and it's like one is nostalgic and two, it is really innovative like no one. No one would have ever really thought, at least like the average consumer, that I'd be able to fold my touchscreen phone, and so each year is making it more and more possible and seeing that, oh wow, we can have a really great quality phone that's foldable. And so I think they just everything that you just said. Women want customizability. I just everything that you just said. Women want customizability. So, like they're already attracted to the folding part, but you also need to capture them and having customization, like so maybe even having like more colors, because I saw, like when Apple did that I think it was the iPhone 5C when they had like all those marketed and all the different colors, like the ladies ate that up yeah, having like a true pink.
Speaker 1:I mean they have some that are like lighter but having a hotter pink might be not a bad idea for the flip. I also think reducing that crease in the middle of the flip will be go a long way yeah, into getting to more consumers.
Speaker 1:so mean it's not bad right now, obviously, but it is not ideal, it's not where it necessarily could be. So I think if they could reduce the crease in the middle it would be nice. The new Motorola Razr. I saw Flossie Carter actually post his video review of the new Razr phone last night, and that particular phone looks pretty interesting too. I don't know if I'll get it, but it seems like the crease on that one is even more reduced Because the one I gave you from last year is not that bad.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, the crease on that one Once the phone is open and you're looking at it for a bit. Yeah, I think Motorola has reduced it a little more than Samsung.
Speaker 1:So if Samsung could do that, that would be great In. So if Samsung could do that, that'd be great In terms of the foldable, like the book style fold, like the Z Fold. I think to keep marketing those they're going to have to do a couple things. One, they need to get it to where it's flagship quality, like the LSS line, which basically it looks like the Z Fold Special Edition is going to do that for them. But they also need to bring the price down.
Speaker 2:Those two things are in conflict right now. Those two things are in conflict.
Speaker 1:Right, because it's like to make it more like the s line. That's going to raise the cost because they've got to increase, like a lot of the quality of the components. But then if that price goes up, less people are going to be able to buy it because just because of their purchasing power and people don't have three thousand dollars on a, a phone or $2,500, they're going to need to get it to S-line quality and the price needs to come down Now, maybe not all the way to the $1,300 of the S-line, because it is a foldable. People could see the value.
Speaker 1:It'd be like $1,500. If it got up to S-line flagship quality with a camera, it had the S-pin embedded, it had the titanium backplate. It's thinner and lighter, with a bigger cover display, like we're talking about, and it was 1500 instead of 2500, I think a lot of people would buy those oh yeah, I think you sell those like you would get a lot of apple users being like maybe maybe we should see what's going on under there and go buy that, because that that would be very appealing.
Speaker 1:I mean, that would give people everything they want. The price would not be so much more than a slab phone that you couldn't justify it because you'd be like, oh well, it's only 200 more than buying an s24 ultra but, I get foldability, I get a bigger screen when I want it. Uh, it's almost as thin and light. See the same camera. It'd be not as many compromises. So those are my thoughts. Didn't he have one more?
Speaker 2:question yeah, he did, he did all right. Second question do you think an fe line of foldables priced similarly to the S series would sell?
Speaker 1:well, I do, but I think it would have to be kind of like Tori mentioned with the iPhone 5C, where it's like it's specifically marketed to people who want a phone that looks cool, but they don't care too much about the specs. Yeah, I think the key would be yeah I think the key would be like they need to give it like a great selfie camera, because I think that would really appeal to the women oh yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:It would like if you if you gave them like a flip 6se that was priced at like 750 and you you took out the great primary sensor on the back camera but, you made the camera on the inside a little better and maybe it's not made of as crazy materials. Maybe the display is a little bit not as good. I think you could sell a ton of those.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you would.
Speaker 1:They want that front, yeah, the flip honestly would do better as an se than the fold se. Um, people talk about, like, making a lower spec version of this. People who are buying this want the top, top specs, like I mean, at least their current demographic is not going to buy a cheapened version of this phone for the most part. Now could you get new people maybe, but again I think it would be difficult for the Fold because most people who are upgrading to this already have the ultraline flagship or they already have the maxed out iPhone 15 Pro Max. They're not the people buying the cheap phones. And so if you've released a Fold 6 SE and say it's $500 cheaper, well, that's still $1,400. And if you've increased the specs, that's the exact opposite of what I just said before. If you increase the specs and lower the price, it's going to sell like crazy. But if you decrease the specs and lower the price, I'm not so convinced because people who are buying this, they're people who are usually big time tech enthusiasts, at least for now, until you give them like a more mainstream use for this, and that would mean it needs to be it. Really. This one is very difficult because it's not as thin as a regular slab.
Speaker 1:The Z Fold Special Edition. If that were to come out with maybe slightly lower specs but still stayed as thin and light, then maybe it would sell. But I think Z Flip 6 SE put a great selfie camera on that. Maybe decrease the sensors on the back. Maybe save some money here and there on some other pieces. Maybe maybe lower processor. We don't need the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. Put a mid-range Snapdragon processor in there Right there. That's a winner. Samsung, contact me. It's marketing at sammygurucom.
Speaker 2:Get in touch with us we will do some business.
Speaker 1:Contact me, it's marketing at sammygurucom. Get in touch with us, we will do some business, no problem. So that is the phone that they should release because they could get like all of the like college girls who want that cute phone but they don't want to take as big of a cost risk necessarily jumping from their Apple phone. Lost risk necessarily jumping from their Apple phone. You know, if they sold that and then they gave like basically they could sell it and give basically $750 trade in so it costs nothing. If you're trading like an iPhone 15 Pro, they get so many girls to trade their phone in for that they really would.
Speaker 1:They could just market it, put some good ads together, because if you're like, you can just give me your iPhone 15 Pro, get this thing. A lot of people would say yeah. So I think that's the SE model that I'd really like to see. The only other question that I saw on Twitter this week there was one about the Galaxy XR, but we already answered that. Someone was asking about what I thought the specs needed to be in order to compete with the Vision Pro. We did that earlier. The other question was someone had asked do we think we're going to get some guests soon? So I figured I would address that.
Speaker 1:Yes, I've talked to various people. The hard part is Tori and I are both busy and then we have to coordinate with another person's schedule. So I have a list of guests that I've reached out to that I'm kind of waiting to hear back on their schedule. And then I've got to kind of get their schedule and hand it to Tori and say is this going to work? Because a lot of people are not going to be able to necessarily do it on 4 pm on a Friday because that's not a great time for most people it happens to be a good time for me and Tori, but for a lot of people that's not really. That's like a busy time for a lot of people. So we might have to like move it to like a Saturday or something to do a guest show. But we will start having guests probably after a year of doing this and we're really comfortable. We'll try to have guests like every other week at least.
Speaker 1:But, I'm really aiming for our first show that's live stream in a few weeks to have our first guest, so we'll see if we can do that. There's a couple different people that you guys said you wanted to see, and I reached out to some of them. I put a poll on X and people told me who they'd like to see on the show, and those are some guys that I also would love to see on the show, and so I reached out, so we'll see. We'll leave it a surprise as to who the first guest will be, but I think it'll be some people that people are interested in. People in the tech community, people on, you know think, youtubers, samsung journalists, people like that, some of the influencers on X who do stuff like. It'd be really cool if we get Ice Universe on the show, but I don't think he's.
Speaker 1:I don't think he's ever done the interview. We should work on that. I should reach out to him and just be like, hey, we need Ice Universe on the show bring the cat on the Sammy Guru show show, I'll reach out.
Speaker 1:He'll probably never respond to me, but I don't know, he doesn't seem to do a lot of like, just posts, leaks and goes about his business. Maybe we can get that done. Anyway, that's pretty much it that I had this week, tori, what about you? Pretty good, yeah, we'll be back, assuming we don't burn alive in the Phoenix heat.
Speaker 2:But otherwise we're about to get out of here.
Speaker 1:That was 99. 99, that's not bad. It's going to be cool when we go outside. Beautiful. I'm so cold I probably need a sweater when we leave the office. Anyway, we're going to get out of here. I'm going to go enjoy some college football. No-transcript.