Sansumg announces Galaxy 6s Edge and Note 5. Meh.

[Harold Mansfield]

I'm a big fan of the Samsung Galaxy Note 4. Best phone I've ever owned. Expandable memory and replaceable battery is a big reason for that.
With the new Note 5, both of those features are gone.

Sure it has a few new toys, and display advances but most of the changes are aesthetic more than functional. Therefore they've probably lost me on the upgrade. I'll probably go Nexus 6 now. If I can't get expandable memory may as well just go full Android without the fluff and bloatware.

For the price of phones these days I don't understand why featured device makers are taking away the features that people want in exchange for style.

Any other Note fans think that taking away these functions is a huge mistake to the loyal users who've been used to having this on every new iteration?
Samsung Made the World's Best Smartphone Display Even Better (http://gizmodo.com/samsung-made-the-worlds-best-smartphone-display-even-be-1724794337)

[vangogh]

I'm guessing Samsung thinks the changes will help them sell more phones. Expandable memory is nice, but I'd bet the replaceable battery isn't important to most people. Some, like you, yes, but I bet it doesn't matter to most people. It's also possible it just costs Samsung more and they want to increase the profit per device.

I think Samsung lost a lot of customers to Huawei over the last year or two and they had to make some changes so they're making changes. Some people were going to be unhappy with the changes. Clearly you aren't happy with them. My guess is they won't be as big of issues for most people, despite being useful features.

[Harold Mansfield]

I love a good looking phone, but it seems style is more important than function these days. The amazing thing is that from all of these device makers, none of them are making a profit (except Apple) even at $700+ a phone. I honestly think it's because they make too many phones, that are too close in specs and release them too close together.

Samsung must have 100 phones on the market from "flagship" models to budget models, and some models just for emerging areas and new markets.
That's nuts. How can you make money like that?

They're like Toshiba and laptops. 200 different models of the same or similar specs.

[vangogh]

Yeah, but I think the phones sell more based on the style. Keep in mind it's only tech geeks that really care about the specs. I agree that Samsung has too many phones, but that's always been their business model. They're set up to manufacture things quickly so they manufacture a lot of new things. Ultimately it's a race to the bottom in terms of price, because everything they do is the same as everything else.

Once Huawei entered the market they were able to sell phones with the same specs cheaper, which hurt sales of Samsung phones. I think that's why Samsung might be putting more emphasis on style. They think that's the secret to Apple's success and they're going to try to do the same or similar.

I think the expandable memory is going to go away, because all these companies now want you to sign up for their cloud storage. I think it's inevitable that's what we're all going to be using in a few years.

With the replaceable batteries, I think Samsung is following Apple's model. I'm not 100% sure of this, but I think not allowing the batteries (or much of anything) to be replaceable allows Apple to better integrate all the various components. I think they get better battery life that way, though don't hold me to that. Many of us are replacing our phones sooner than we'd need to replace batteries and there are plenty of 3rd party solutions that can give phones extra battery for the day by connecting them to the phone. Less convenient that swapping out a battery, but something that probably works for most people.

I run into similar things with the iPhone and iPad. Not the same issues, since neither is that important to me, but features I see Android has that I wonder why Apple hasn't introduced yet or something they remove in the name of progress that I wish they hadn't removed just yet. Overall I think the pros outweigh the cons in the changes.

Before long you might be storing your data on some cloud service and won't care as much how much storage your phone has. I find myself using iCloud more for certain things and I'll probably end up paying for a pro Dropbox account at some point.

[Harold Mansfield]

I think the expandable memory is going to go away, because all these companies now want you to sign up for their cloud storage. I think it's inevitable that's what we're all going to be using in a few years.


I know and I'm resisting it just like I resisted the death of cassettes, and then the death of CD's.



Before long you might be storing your data on some cloud service and won't care as much how much storage your phone has. I find myself using iCloud more for certain things and I'll probably end up paying for a pro Dropbox account at some point.

I use all of my free cloud accounts as back up to my back up, but for my main back up and storage I bought my own little server that acts as my main "cloud" storage.

I still can't completely trust not having physical access to my stuff on my own network. I'll probably always have my own server from here on out.

I can probably deal with the battery. As you said, there are plenty of recharging devices. I have at least 4 things that act as a recharger.

But the expandable memory...being able to put a physical SD card into the phone is kind of big. To me it adds to the value of the phone knowing that I can get a 16GB model and toss in a 32GB card to get more functionality out of it. I kind of resent them taking that away and then charging $800+ for the model with more memory. I mean seriously, how much more can they keep increasing the price while taking away functions and expect people to keep paying?

They're pricing me out of my comfort level because it's starting to not make sense to pay so much for a few parlor tricks and features that have no use to me right now....like shooting 4K video.

I just got the Note 4 last year. Normally I get a new phone every 2 years. I would have probably got the Note 5 this year if they didn't take away expandable memory. Now I'll wait till next year and will probably not get a Samsung phone at all.

I love having the hot new phone, but models like the Moto G for $200 are starting to look pretty good these days. If it had NFC I'd be all over it.

[vangogh]

I'm the same way. I don't like the idea of storing all my data in the cloud. I know it's inevitable. It makes sense, but I'm fighting it, just like I fought CDs and then .mp3s.

I've started to use iCloud a little, mostly for syncing when I have apps that work on multiple devices. Most have you save the file in iCloud and then it's there when you open it on a different device. Apple hasn't been very good historically with services like this, but recently they've gotten better with some. I don't expect I'll be paying for extra storage as they charge more for the same space, but it has made me think more about using cloud storage in general.


it adds to the value of the phone knowing that I can get a 16GB model and toss in a 32GB card to get more functionality out of it.

If you have a TB of space in the cloud, why would you need the card? You and I might not be rushing into the cloud, but I would think most people who want the extra space on their phone are moving toward the cloud. Our devices are going to go back to when we were younger and everything was a thin client for a server somewhere that held all our data.

[Harold Mansfield]

I use the external memory mostly to store my music so that I don't have to use the native phone memory, and some app data.

I do use the free TB that comes with MS Office, and the iCloud that comes with iTunes. But my main back up is my own little server.

The speed at which I can pull stuff from my own server (even when I'm mobile) is just as fast as it coming from someone elses server..all depends on how strong/fast your wireless connection is. And I can multiply storage locations anywhere in the world with additional units. I like that. Right now I have 2. One at home and one in Michigan. This would have been too expensive to do just 2 years ago.

[vangogh]

Makes sense. My music sits on an external hard drive plugged into my network. I have a backup on another external drive. Sometimes I think of signing up for one of Apple's cloud services to store music, but I think their music stuff is one place where they don't do cloud services well. I suppose another backup is all the CDs I still have that became the .mp3s I now listen to.

Most of my data is on one of several computers or on a drive connected to my network. I know I should store a copy of the really important things off site, but I never seem to.

One day maybe we'll both get with the times and have everything stored online somewhere with a local backup on whatever external media we like best.

[billbenson]

There was a chick on a different forum who drove to a safety deposit box daily with a revolving stock of external drives for each day. Seems like a good idea if the bank is convenient. There is a strip mall about 2 miles from me that has my bank, PO Box, Supermarket, and office supply. I go there about every other day. I could set something like that up.

[vangogh]

I would think it's a lot easier and more cost effective to just sign up for a backup solution.

[Brian Altenhofel]

I used to think having a big card was a big deal, then I noticed my actual usage barely made it to 20GB after four years of usage on my last phone. The only thing that bothers me on the S6 is the non-removable battery, but capacity seems to be a lot better than previous Galaxies.

I couldn't justify the extra $100 for the S6 Edge. The edge mini display just feels gimmicky.

[Harold Mansfield]

I couldn't justify the extra $100 for the S6 Edge. The edge mini display just feels gimmicky.

It's totally gimmicky. Unfortunately sometimes I'm weak and want the gimmicks. But not this time. It doesn't really do anything special that solves a problem or makes things easier. It just looks cool when your phone is face down, something I've trained myself NOT to do anyway.