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Why are Android phones plastic-metal-glass boringburgers when there's a world of premium materials to play with?
OnePlus's Kinder Liu explains why they aren't made of stainless steel, sapphire, titanium, or other high-end materials
I've been envious of the iPhone over the last few years for one, not-so-obvious reason: Apple makes its recent flagships out of stainless steel. Here in the land of Android, the best we can really hope for is aluminum and glass, but there's a whole wide variety of premium, super-durable, and exotic materials out there phones could use. So, why are almost all Android smartphones boring glass and plastic or aluminum slabs? I was able to speak with Kinder Liu, COO and Head of R&D at OnePlus, to find out.
Rumors have swirled for the last few weeks regarding materials in Samsung's upcoming Galaxy S21, claiming that some of the models may use plastic materials in place of glass, as Samsung did for last year's Note20 and Galaxy S20 FE. According to noted leaker Roland Quandt (and confirmed by Android Police's Max Weinbach), the smaller Galaxy S21 will have a polycarbonate plastic back.
Pixel 5 rises from the dead after withstanding torturous teardown video trials
1000° heat is mere child's play for the Pixel 5
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Google may have gone wild with bio-resin on the Pixel 5, but does that make it any less sturdy? JerryRigEverything's newest teardown videos put Google's latest flagship up against formidable foes like a cup of acetone and a powerful heat gun — and although the phone does die by the end of the first video, it makes a surprising comeback in the second.
The Pixel 4a is an incredible phone, and not just for the money. With an incredible camera, a new design that feels much more modern, and amazing battery life, Google really did knock it out of the park with its new budget Pixel. Seriously: this is a damn good phone. But we wouldn't be proper phone nerds if we didn't nitpick, and there are a few areas where we think Google could take the Pixel 4a from a 9.5 to a perfect 10 in our book. Here are five additional features we'd have loved to see in the Pixel 4a.
There's little to complain about when it comes to the just-released, often-leaked Pixel 4a. In our review, we praise Google's latest phone for its phenomenal performance and great hardware in a more than affordable package, and smaller nitpicks like a tinny speaker and a lack of secondary camera lenses can be forgiven at $350. There's one thing we can't quite understand, though — the Pixel 4a is only available in matte black.
Sometime in the last few years, "plastic" became a dirty word in smartphones. The reasons for this — like evoking the kind of cheap and unpleasant designs that defined early Android phones — are probably less important the outcomes. A whole class of materials were re-branded as low-rent, and today even many relatively affordable phones have made the switch to fully aluminum or metal-and-glass sandwiches for the superficially premium look they impart.
If you haven't at least glanced at YouTube gadget aficionado JerryRigEverything (whose real name is Zack), you should close this tab and go do that. He puts new phones through excruciating damage tests for "entertainment purposes only" - it's the kind of thing that we're not really supposed to do in our standard reviews (unless the phone dares us to kill it). In a breakdown of the Xperia XZ, Sony's current premium flagship which retails for $700, Zack found a surprising amount of materials that were less than premium.
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LG has said repeatedly that the LG G5 has a metal alloy body with cleverly hidden antennas. The company didn't really go into detail about how that was achieved, except to say the process is called micro-dizing. It seems that micro-dizing may have something to do with plastic because a teardown video from YouTuber JerryRigEverything reveals what appears to be a plastic coating on top of the metal frame.
[Review] Solid Gray Polypropylene Backpack: So This Is What A Hermit Crab Feels Like
A good backpack plays an important role in the life of a geek. It's a catchall and a safe haven for gadgets. While we've looked at a very good traditional
A good backpack plays an important role in the life of a geek. It's a catchall and a safe haven for gadgets. While we've looked at a very good traditional backpack once before, today we're going to look at one that is anything but traditional: the Solid Gray backpack.
ASUS continues its domination of the Android tablet market with the introduction of the Transformer Pad 300 Series. While the naming scheme for ASUS' tablets may be reaching near-Samsung levels of confusing, the new mid-range tablets look to be a great way to get yourself a 10" tablet without breaking the bank.