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Do a factory reset and you have to log into the original owners samsung account

Not just Samsung... all Android phones. Though usually it's your Google account, not your Samsung account, that you need to authenticate to prove ownership after a factory reset. (In fact, even Samsung says it's your Google account; so I think maybe you're confused about that.)

This feature, called Factory Reset Protection (FRP) by the Android team, was implemented in both iOS and Android 4-5 years ago,, to comply with a California state law that mandated it. For Android, it was launched in May 2016, in Android 5.1. Although it is only legally required for devices sold in California (AFAIK), it's generally a very good idea. Device theft was rapidly ballooning into a huge problem, but thanks to FRP has ceased to be a significant issue. If you set a password on your phone, thieves get no value from it.

However, there's no reason that FRP-locked devices have to be destroyed. At least in the Android world, device makers install keys on the devices which can be used to bypass FRP. These keys are only accessible to authorized refurbishing centers, of course, because if they leak to phone thieves then the purpose of the feature is defeated.

https://www.tomshardware.co.uk...

And a quick comparison:
https://www.samsung.com/semico... - 1200TBW
  vs
https://www.intel.com/content/... - 17,520TBW

I would LOVE to have a powerful, generic (and upgradable) processor/storage/radio package in my pocket, knapsack or attached to my belt or armband, with my own choice of wireless input/output devices.

The market spoke and thoroughly rejected that concept. While they continue to repeatedly fail to get any interest aside from a few nerds you won't be getting one.

And my processor/storage module could plug into a desktop-sized workstation when I'm not on-the-go.

This however is something that at least one big company continues to push: https://www.samsung.com/global...

It looks like Samsung makes one!
https://www.samsung.com/hk_en/...

The company I work for is all in on Google apps. The standard for email is GMail, we use Google Calendar, we use Google Drive to share files, we use Google apps for collaborating on spreadsheets or word processor documents, and most people use Google Slides for presenting. For remote meetings we use Google Hangouts. We also use web-based software such as Slack and an issue tracker.

Because of all this, a Chromebook is an excellent solution for many people in our company.

The best thing about a Chromebook is that it Just Works. It's locked-down nature means you really don't need to worry about malware, and it automatically downloads security updates. (Unlike Windows 10, ChromeOS never forces you to take an update while you are in the middle of a meeting or presentation.)

Also, if you are using "cloud" storage apps like the Google apps, then if anything happens to the Chromebook, the data will all be backed up. Your employee would be able to just get a new Chromebook and could get sorted out and back to work very quickly.

Because your business is too small to have a dedicated IT department, using all Google apps would have significant advantages. And those apps are IMHO about as easy to use as Microsoft apps or MacOS apps.

As a bonus, if you standardize on Google apps, then your employee has the option of installing some of the apps on her phone (maybe just GMail). I have everything installed on my phone, including Google Hangouts, and I can deal with a lot of possible emergencies with just my phone. I like that.

The one question mark I have is whether bibliography software is available for a Chromebook. A Chromebook does have Linux app support now, plus Android app support, and there are web-based bibliography systems, so... maybe?

Also, some people strongly disapprove of Google, feeling that Google track too much about what you do with their software. If you have a philosophical objection to Google you may not want a Chromebook solution.

I agree with all the people saying not to skimp but to get something nice. If you do this, I'd recommend one of Google's own branded products... the top of the line would be a Google Pixelbook which gets very favorable reviews.

P.S. I personally own a Samsung Chromebook Plus with a non-Intel CPU (a hexa-core OP1 running ARM instructions). I've been happy with it... IMHO it looks a lot like an Apple product but it has a much better keyboard. It's half the cost of a Pixelbook but not as fancy. Like the Pixelbook it's just a touch over 1 kg and has long battery life. It does come with a stylus and it has a storage silo for the stylus.

You most certainly can buy SmartThings for Germany: https://www.samsung.com/de/sma... and I'm pretty sure that Vera also has a hub for the European market. Not sure about Wink.

Samsung has an app called SmartView that runs on Android, Windows, and iOS and pipes the contents of that device directly to a Samsung TV. I use it occasionally and it works fine for YouTube and such but I've not tried it with a video game or anything that complex. Of course you have to have a Samsung TV...

https://www.samsung.com/us/app...

Have you tried Samsung's own SSD Magician software? it gives a lifetime estimate. https://www.samsung.com/semico...

Are you in Canada, because I'd love some of what you're smoking :)

https://www.samsung.com/us/com...

"Mixed Reality" is just MS branding for the whole thing, this is just a VR headset.

Resolution is NOT by definition pixels; the context must be understood to infer what is meant by "resolution". Traditionally, resolution is measured in lines per millimeter, or more properly "line pairs" (cycles) per millimeter. If you speak to an optical engineer about resolution, he will be thinking in these terms or similar, a linear measure.

Step 1 - Ignore obvious context of remarks.
Step 2 - Assert remarks must be understood in context.

Pixel count is related to the square of what is normally thought of as resolution.

The crazy thing about language is everyone gets a vote. Marketing departments *ALL OF THEM* count pixels.

https://www.sony.com/electroni...
https://www.usa.philips.com/c-...
https://www.samsung.com/levant...
https://www.lg.com/us/uhd-4k-t...
https://www.vizio.com/picture-...
https://hisense.com.au/uhd/

When someone says a display has twice resolution majority of people in the real world understand it to say display can display twice the number of pixels.

You are free to develop specialized terms or understanding that only apply to specific group or industry yet in terms of the public you are squarely on the losing side.

https://www.samsung.com/us/mob...

close enough. Functionally equivalent. More open policy toward apps. Use at own risk.
But a clear, simple option.

Wow, that's a lot! 42 km of solar panels.

Of course, a lot depends on how WIDE that 42 km of solar panels it is....

In other words, would it be too much to ask the editors to actually, you know, edit?

Remember they are editors, not the people writing the story. The writer, one Emily Price, wrote that they were using 42,000 meters of solar panels.

You have to go back to the actual announcement from Samsung to see the itty bitty superscript 2 next to the meters https://news.samsung.com/globa...

See what you made me do though? You made me stand up for the editors at Slashdot. I need a drink.

...requiring all packaging and marketing materials to state "This device will not receive security updates after [date]"

Samsung already does this on their website. http://www.samsung.com/nl/smar... Look under the title "Software support". The S9 will receive updates until March 2020.

Now that said this is just the general service period for the device. That's not to say that if a security issue arises that is serious they won't issue an update for older devices as well. My Galaxy S5 got the July 2017 update because it was serious enough, that was 3.25 years after release, and well over a year after the official service period ended.

This is also why this got thrown out of court. You can't sue someone for something that hasn't happened yet. If a widely exploited security vulnerability starts affecting handsets, expect either a) Samsung to issue an update regardless of formal support, or b) this court case to be brought again and this time the finding will be in the other direction.

Yes they do. Cell phones have become bigger because people want a bigger display, but have bumped into the size limit of pocketability. The obvious solution is some sort of portable display technology, which would allow the processing bits of your mobile computer (your smartphone) to remain small enough to fit in your pocket, without sacrificing screen size. The pressure to increase smartphone screen size is so great that manufacturers have been clamoring to eliminate bezels, and use dead space to display additional info.

The advantage of putting the display in glasses is that it's not really the physical screen size which matters. It's the apparent screen size - a combination of physical size and viewing distance. By putting the display right next to the eye, you can create a display with a massive apparent size even though its physical size is tiny. You avoid the drawbacks of a large physical screen size (loss of portability, easier to break, greater battery consumption).

The only solutions I've seen to this problem are a foldable/rollable display, a projection display, or a display mounted close to your eye via glasses.

The control feature would let iPhone users perform some tasks by moving their finger close to the screen without actually tapping it.

So basically, Samsung's Air View which they introduced in 2013.

(I don't think they're really copying, given that proximity is a basic universal concept and thus an obvious choice for an interface. But I figured I'd use the term in honor of Apple fans throwing "copying" around at everything and everyone who does anything remotely similar to what Apple does, even if they did it before Apple.)

So will I, soon. Well, as soon as this got a revision or two.

Samsung sells at least 4 non-smart TV's with USB inputs. I wanted to add external and portable (Roku, in this case) devices for my "smart" capabilities.

That said, I agree with the rest of your post.

I was curious about where their locations might be, so I clicked. The Find Service Location near you page is totally broken. It has three fields: dropdowns called Type and Category, and a fill-in Zip Code. I can type in the Zip Code field, but there are no options listed on either of the dropdowns. These people don't know how to HTML.

Funny how other phone manufacturers don't seem to have the "phone shuts down when it is cold" bug that Apple had and was the excuse to throttle old devices.

Also funny Apple didn't just have a message saying "Your battery is worn out. Please visit an Apple store for a repair. In the meantime you may see lower performance".

Posting as AC to avoid undoing mods.

You are a either a moron, or are willfully ignorant.

Do about 2 seconds worth of Googling, and you will see EXACTLY this issue for EVERY phone OEM, including the supposed "bulletproof" iPhone 4s and 5.

But Samsung, LG, HTC, et al., ALL have multiple reports of "sudden shutdowns" when battery charge is in the 50% or lower range, and/or the phone gets cold.

Here's some random examples:

https://us.community.samsung.c...

https://us.community.samsung.c...

https://forums.androidcentral....

https://thedroidguy.com/2016/1...

https://www.ifixit.com/Answers...

https://www.reddit.com/r/lgv20...

https://forums.androidcentral....

https://forum.xda-developers.c...

https://androidforums.com/thre...

https://android.stackexchange....

https://discussions.apple.com/...

http://iphone-tricks.com/tutor...

https://apple.stackexchange.co...

So, it appears that Apple actually found a REASONBLE software fix for an INDUSTRY-WIDE problem.

Their ONLY "sin" was in not being clear about the fix.

Funny how other phone manufacturers don't seem to have the "phone shuts down when it is cold" bug that Apple had and was the excuse to throttle old devices.

Also funny Apple didn't just have a message saying "Your battery is worn out. Please visit an Apple store for a repair. In the meantime you may see lower performance".

Posting as AC to avoid undoing mods.

You are a either a moron, or are willfully ignorant.

Do about 2 seconds worth of Googling, and you will see EXACTLY this issue for EVERY phone OEM, including the supposed "bulletproof" iPhone 4s and 5.

But Samsung, LG, HTC, et al., ALL have multiple reports of "sudden shutdowns" when battery charge is in the 50% or lower range, and/or the phone gets cold.

Here's some random examples:

https://us.community.samsung.c...

https://us.community.samsung.c...

https://forums.androidcentral....

https://thedroidguy.com/2016/1...

https://www.ifixit.com/Answers...

https://www.reddit.com/r/lgv20...

https://forums.androidcentral....

https://forum.xda-developers.c...

https://androidforums.com/thre...

https://android.stackexchange....

https://discussions.apple.com/...

http://iphone-tricks.com/tutor...

https://apple.stackexchange.co...

So, it appears that Apple actually found a REASONBLE software fix for an INDUSTRY-WIDE problem.

Their ONLY "sin" was in not being clear about the fix.

Samsung 960 PRO specs in at 3500MB/sec an that's not just marketing wank. I'll see if I can dig up the screenshot of mine far exceeding that (to my own surprise) if it will shut you the fuck up. The ability to maintain those speeds when using encryption falls on the other components of the system, as the drive itself is not (and should not be) aware of the encryption in the first place; Ryzen and anything put out by Intel for the last few generations will be able to handle encryption at well above those rates through dedicated silicon on the CPU die, so that was a silly goal post to erect in the first place.

I will, however, post a correction to my earlier claims: The 960 PRO was released in October of 2016, so it hasn't actually been out for over 2 years as I had stated. I thought it had.

Anyone know who makes these SSDs for Apple? Because you know damn well they aren't making them themselves and Foxconn wouldn't know where to start. If I had to guess, they're 960 PROs in Apple's custom configuration, which requires rearranging some data paths and making things slightly less efficient, thus the just under 3000MB/sec speeds on parts I've personally seen run much faster.

...and still end up charging some $15 more than in case of other brands.

Yeah. Right. What do other companies with built-in batteries charge for a replacement you don't have to yourself?

Authorised replacement for Google Pixel battery; only $79.99

Official statement from Samsung about replacing batteries for Samsung Galaxy S7 edge: "t's $73 according to Samsung customer service (12/14/16)."

In both cases you can't even find that information online from the companies themselves, you have to rely on what a customer says in some support forum.

The gear 3 does everything you ask for other than have a one week battery

https://www.samsung.com/us/mob...

they only rate it for about 3 days between charges, but have a wireless charger that you just set it down on when not in use.

You see this failure mode in Samsung phones with an OLED display. And the iPhone X uses a Samsung display.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Seems like it is a bad vertical line driver looking at this.

https://us.community.samsung.c...

One of the vertical line drivers is stuck 'on'. So you get a line mostly in one of the primary colours - R, G or B. Or, less common, a combination of the two.

My S5 is still fine, but for some reason I've seen a few people with battered looking S7s and S8s with the vertical line. Not sure if the battering causes the failure or if some display panels just fail spontaneously.

Incidentally, there's an amusing bit of Apple overcharging for glass

https://www.theverge.com/circu...

The iPhone X went on sale today, and with it, Apple released some information about the phoneâ(TM)s repair pricing â" and like the phone itself, it gets expensive. If you donâ(TM)t have the extended warranty, a screen replacement will cost $279. Thatâ(TM)s more than twice the price of an iPhone 6 screen replacement ($129) and about 65 percent higher than a new iPhone 8 screen ($169). The pricing was first spotted by MacRumors.

If that sounds high, you should be careful not to damage an iPhone X in any other way: all other out-of-warranty repairs will cost $549. Again, thatâ(TM)s a lot more than what other recent iPhones cost to repair. iPhone 8 repairs cost $349 and 8 Plus repairs cost $399. That means if you crack the glass back of the iPhone X (or the iPhone 8), you might just want to live with it.

Appleâ(TM)s extended warranty, AppleCare+, often looks like a pricey upsell. But for iPhone X buyers, it seems like it might be a necessary safety net. Appleâ(TM)s warranty costs $199 for the iPhone X (up from $129 for the iPhone 8 and $149 for the 8 Plus); but while the warranty itself is more expensive, warranty service fees (which apply only when Apple is repairing something with âoeaccidental damageâ) donâ(TM)t go up at all. So an iPhone X can still get a $29 screen repair if itâ(TM)s under warranty, and it can still get a $99 repair for anything else under AppleCare+, too.

So it's $279 for a replacement display out of warranty. Or $29 with warranty. And the warranty costs $199. And all other repairs are a whopping $549.

So if you're the sort of person who cracks the display on your phone, you're going to be paying through the nose for it.

IHS reckons the display assembly is

http://www.businesswire.com/ne...

IHS Markit estimates the cost of the display module, which includes the cover glass, AMOLED panel and Force Touch sensor, at $110.

I.e. Apple make a fair bit of profit out of people dropping their phones. Arguably the reason Apple and Samsung have moved to glass front and back is that glass breaks and repairs are profitable. Also, especially in the Samsung case, it's hard to take the phone apart without damaging expensive bits if you look at the iFixit videos.

I reckon I could get a whole new, or at least 'pre-owned' S5 for less than $279 if I looked around a bit.

Total track length less than 6.5mm (has anyone else made a 5-element telephoto lens that small? Apple hadn't.)

Pretty sure Samung has

And how exactly is taking a lens design with multiple elements and making it smaller novel?

The second half sounds like it just continues a generic recipe for making a camera lens, rather than being "specific" it seems absurdly broad.

We'll see how it shakes out, but if it goes badly every camera maker that includes a camera is in trouble.

More info about how this works here - http://developer.samsung.com/w...

you do realize the NVMe drives are "standard", they're just soldered in, IIRC

I've had my rMBP open, the m.2 drive is replaceable, actually, held in with a single screw. The soldered RAM is really annoying, though; my PC with RAM sockets is thinner than my rMBP and "thinness" is the excuse I always hear, so there's really no excuse for it.

Yeah, they started soldering them in the touch bar MBPs in 2016, and the 2015 MBs. Another reason to only buy non-touch bar MBPs.

Who said anything about much slower write speeds? I'm seeing sequential writes in excess of 3GB/s, which also exceeds the performance level specified by Samsung for the drive in question.

For sequential, that seems too fast and is 50% over the max.

Thunderbolt 3 uses the USB-C port. Check the specs on the newest laptops to which you refer:

Yes, I know. Hence the statement elsewhere that USB-C sources that have TB capability should be fully USB-C compliant. I'm not too worried about accessories. Those could be USB3, 3.1 or TB whatever, and be perfectly fine. You're not going to connect your monitor to your drive array or printer after all.

and a bigger battery (to enable that extended load and long-term use). We might even consider 4mm and a full pound if it means workstation-class graphics, or at least a current-gen gaming GPU.

7-10 hours seems pretty significant to me already, and by far outpaces all but the most recently available non Apple products. As for thickness, 2-4mm doesn't bother me. Weight, however, does (yes, more thickness generally equates to more weight, pretend it's hypothetically "free") I don't even like carting around the power brick if I don't need to.

I actually had someone tell me, here on Slashdot, today, that Apple (and only Apple) cares about the consumer. My 3 line response to that took longer to type than the rant you see above, because I couldn't stop laughing for long enough to type it.

I don't know.... they might care more than others, but I'd say the primary care they have of late is revenue, image, growth, ensuring products stay ahead of others in usability (one place they care about consumers because this leads to more revenue) app store growth, music store growth (again - both consumer oriented because consumers make this growth happen)

But yes, I'd say a lot of their recent decisions killing products like Aperture, Final Cut Express/Pro, etc without adequate better replacements ready to go, along with the mini/pro changes and the disabling of hardware fixes/upgrades are all anti-consumer. We'll see what their redesigned mac pro brings, that will either herald a new approach or nail the coffin shut.

you do realize the NVMe drives are "standard", they're just soldered in, IIRC

I've had my rMBP open, the m.2 drive is replaceable, actually, held in with a single screw. The soldered RAM is really annoying, though; my PC with RAM sockets is thinner than my rMBP and "thinness" is the excuse I always hear, so there's really no excuse for it.

Moving on, yes, they totally screwed up both the mac pro and mac mini in 2013. They've finally admitted it in 2016, at least on the mac pro. I'm hopeful they'll also correct their mac mini mistake this year. Coming out with a nice tower and a mini block that can be put into a grid was where I thought they should have gone in 2013. Instead we got design over technology. It's a computer, make it do neat computer things. Imagine if I could automagically hook up a MBP to a network with a couple of pros/minis on it, and when I want to edit/render video, it automatically allowed me to utilize the other machines on the network, provided I had access to them, of course. That 2 hour rendering job on a single machine could be cut down to tens of minutes, at least in my house.

I almost didn't quote this because I really have nothing more to say other than: agreed.

I'm guessing you accounted for the up to 4 or so GB caching utilized within a machine? It's pretty impressive what goes on within the OS.

If they've come up with a way to fill that cache with data from disk before it's been read, I'm sure there's an award somewhere they should be receiving. We're talking about read speeds, here; disk caches are only useful for caching writes and reading recent writes that haven't yet been flushed, they're not really helpful for large sequential reads of files not already present in (or exceeding the size of) the cache. I'm fairly certain Samsung's benchmark utility takes that into consideration; if it does not, nine 32GB passes with CrystalDiskMark surely didn't fit into the portion of my workstation's 64GB of RAM dedicated to disk cache. Considering that 4x PCIe 3.0 lanes total up to 3940MB/s, topping 4GB/sec wouldn't require much compression at all, mind you, and I ran these benchmarks without any sort of OS-level filesystem compression (it's an option with NTFS, but not enabled on the drive in question), so it has to be being done at the driver or chipset level. I will say I wasn't seeing much over 3GB/sec before applying the most recent firmware update and the performance I noted after the update far exceeds what Samsung specifies for the drive in question.

On the Mac, BlackMagic Disk Speed Test is more or less the standard test and it agrees with the benchmarks listed here for the SM0512F (utilizing Samsung flash) found in my rMBP. Apparently in 2014 they were running 2x PCIe 2.0 lanes; it wasn't until 2015 that Apple started using 4x PCIe 3.0 lanes for storage in the MacBook lineup. At least, that's what I just read. Even so, with 4x PCIe 3.0 lanes totaling up to 3940MB/s, that's as fast as you're gonna see without compression, so we're already at the point where a run-of-the-mill consumer part available at Fry's is as performant as the underlying technology allows; Apple can't do better than that.

I'd guess the data on disk is compressed, which would explain the much slower write speeds.

Who said anything about much slower write speeds? I'm seeing sequential writes in excess of 3GB/s, which also exceeds the performance level specified by Samsung for the drive in question.

Just color me skeptical

I would be, too, had I not seen it with my own eyes, then re-run the benchmarks in disbelief.

I'm not sure about that, with them going all full USB-C or USB-C only on the latest laptops.

Samsung HMD Odyssey (Headset)
Platform Windows Mixed Reality
Display Dual 3.5” AMOLED
1,440 x 1,600 @90/60Hz
Interface HDMI2.0 + USB 3.0 Interface Bound Cable (4m Length)
Lens Single Fresnel
Field of View 66, FOV 110, 6.7X
IPD 60-72mm Range
Camera 6 DOF Camera x 2
Sensor Accelerometer(6 Axis)| Gyrometer(6 Axis )|
Compass(3 Axis)|Proximity Sensor| IPD Sensor
Acoustics 2 MIC Support| Cortana|Built-in AKG Headphone
Control & Function Volume|IPD Adjustment
Dimension 202mm(W) x 131.5mm(D) x 111mm(H)
Weight 645g
Samsung HMD Odyssey (Controller)
Control & Function Touchpad (Clickable), Menu button
Windows/Controller power button, Trigger, Thumbstick, Indicator light
Sensor Accelerometer(6 Axis)| Gyrometer(6 Axis )|
Compass(3 Axis)
Battery AA Battery x 2ea
Dimension 154.2 x 119.1 x 119.1mm
Weight 160g

from https://news.samsung.com/us/sa...

The M.2 specification allows for PCIe 3.0 (4 lanes), USB 3.0 or SATA 3.0 to be exposed. Most NVMe cards such as the Samsung 860 Pro use a M.2 interface. See http://www.samsung.com/semiconductor/minisite/ssd/product/consumer/ssd960.html

It's up to the host device (motherboard) maker and storage device maker to decide which bus to allow through the M.2 interface.

Bullshit. Claim it is the users fault and charge $149 to fix a problem that was a manufactures defect. Maybe that was the point but with your head so far up apples ass you could not get it.

$149 was a reasonable compromise, considering that the frequency of the problem did not strongly suggest an issue with Apple's CM's manufacturing process (except that it had to be RoHS, and thus REAL solder could not be used!), and it SURE wasn't a "Design Defect".

And other OEMs have had similar issues; but they don't generally make the news unless fires and explosions are involved, and because they aren't given a catchy, easily-searchable name like "Touch Disease", and so are almost impossible to search-for...

But here's one:

https://www.ifixit.com/Answers... ...and another...

https://www.ifixit.com/Answers... ...and another...

https://www.ifixit.com/Answers... ...and still more...

https://thedroidguy.com/2015/0... ...and even more...

https://us.community.samsung.c...

And now, on to the Digitizer:

https://www.fonepaw.com/androi...

http://www.droidforums.net/thr...

https://www.ifixit.com/Answers...

https://forum.fairphone.com/t/...

et cetera.

But as I said, without a catchy name and lots of press-coverage to draw attention of the masses, no one gives a shit.

There's another better solution.

and make there hardware in NK $0 /hr labor will push there profit high!

Confused with Samsung. http://www.samsung.com/us/news/newsRead.do?news_seq=520

Samsung actually makes a profit of around 100 billions per year.

What are you smoking, and where can I get some?

Samsung had a 2016 operating profit of $26 billion USD. If you don't believe me, visit Samsung's newsroom website.

https://news.samsung.com/globa...

Asian? Does this apply to the corporate culture overseeing code writing in the Bangalore office, the one in Noida, or the one in Delhi? http://www.samsung.com/in/abou...

I prefer Samsung's RAPID mode myself. Up to 1GB of RAM used as read-cache, though no write-back caching to ensure protection of data (not everyone has a UPS on their desktop, and most RAID cards have a lithium battery onboard to assist against write-back caching data loss). It's fast, and will scale back if more system resources are needed by the OS and apps; though that's only an issue for systems with 4GB of ram, and 8GB in rare cases. Did I mention it's FAST!?. Can't execute anything faster than DDR4 at the moment on a desktop :)

Intel can suck my fat one.

Your S5 is IP67 certified - dust and water resistant - not waterproof.

http://www.samsung.com/us/supp...

Why do you continue to be ripped off by your carrier?

That's quite a leap. But you seem to be in good company pole vaulting over there, so perhaps I should explain why this is relevant...

You see, in the US different carriers tend to have semi-incompatible phone networks. Therefore, I can't just go buy any cellphone and expect it to work optimally with my carrier. For instance, if I want an S7, I need to go buy the version of the S7 that is customized to work on my carrier's network.

Does that mean I need to buy it from my carrier directly? Of course not. I believe I bought my last cellphone off of Amazon. But it does mean my carrier's "phone store" web page is a good place to go when I want to present a nice central list of "the different types of phones that work on their network" for the purposes of discussion.

I assure you it is also the case that if we were talking about cars, and I illustrated a point with Toyota's web page for a Corolla, that doesn't mean I go buy brand new Corollas directly from Toyota all the time either.

When was the last time you heard someone complain that their full HD screen that's only 5" diagonally wasn't high enough resolution?

When was the last time you tolerated looking at an LCD that had ever so slightly the wrong resolution leading to strange screen artefacts? This site is news for nerds, so please think about the technological implications of your suggestion.

Meanwhile having a screen with that resolution is known to hurt battery life significantly

The feature was introduced to improve battery life. People who bought this phone are in no way worse off even at the worst possible setting.

Well, there is one reason, meaningless marketing drivel to try to pretend that your rectangular slab is somehow way better than the competitors' rectangular slab, without having to spend any time or money actually coming up with a useful differentiator.

Yeah if only Samsung had a reason and a differentiator to justify needing that resolution.

Battery replacement is. After a few years, battery life will be half of whatever it started with. At that point, the MBP and its irreplaceable batteries can never stray very far from the charger. Users might accept that, as many people don't depend on the battery all that much. The ultimate deal breaker is soldered SSD. When that fails (and it will), the computer is junk.

If Apple offered a MacBook Pro with HALF of the current battery life, HALF of the memory, and HALF of the storage capacity, but made the components replaceable, they would sell a lot more of them, even if they were TWICE as thick.

Sorry to burst your fantasy-bubble; but my 2012 MacBook Pro gets indistiguishably-differernt battery life from when it was new. If it is "down" at all, it is only by a few minutes, and nothing I could ever put a finger-on, given varying workload.

As far as soldered SSD, I'm more with you on that one. But I will bet you will find that less than 1% of MBP owners suffer a catastrophic SSD-failure before they are ready to replace their machines anyway. I believe that this is essentially what Apple is using.

Also, the iFixit teardown uncovered a "connector to nowhere", that appears to be a way for at least Apple techs to access the SSD of an otherwise dead MBP directly, for data-recovery purposes.

As far as the batteries go, they are glued-down as usual; but are reasonably replaceable, considering you might have to do it once before the laptop is due for replacement.

I think the following link is still relevant to the discussion: http://www.techspot.com/news/4... A 2008 Apple Power Adapter BOM (Bill of Materials) is/was less than 5 USD. And that would be for 1000 units: it's easy to imagine Apple getting a better price with millions of units built. This does NOT include, labour, assembly, casing, packaging and shipping costs... Looks like a hefty profit there to be made ;-)

Well, an Apple USB wall adapter costs $19. The cheapest USB wall charger from Samsung is $29.99. Okay, unlike Apple's the Samsung one comes with a USB cable, but still, that's hardly less, now is it?

I tried to find one over at Lenovo, but it looks they don't even sell phone chargers, only upward from a USB-C charger for their ThinkPad X1 Tablet. And that cost's $41.99.

... according to Samsung.

I can somewhat agree but look at the stupid competition. Can't buy a cheaper android phone from china without a 60% chance of some kind of backdoor. Also, given how Apple doesn't just discard updates for their phone after 6 months and trying to make the iPhone a black box really appeals to me.

The constant interface between devices. A safer app store, abit shitty search for years. Its really REALLY hard for me to look at an alternative

Hell, it was a Samsung phone I was looking to upgrade my iPhone 5 from, just because it seemed to have all these features above. They blew that one. There really aren't that many smart phone companies out there that keep this kind of quality. I am looking at the Google pixel too, but it's just too new and doesn't look that impressive to be honest. Its still $600+ too.

I very much doubt anything is going to change in the next few years and both Apple and Samsung can charge insane prices for the phones because of it

VRT® Technology Samsung washers use VRT® Technology (Vibration Reduction Technology). VRT® is a system that Samsung has developed to reduce high RPM vibrations drastically.

Important

With VRT®, when the washer spin cycle reaches approximately 400 RPM, it pauses and vibrates for a few moments. As it pauses and vibrates, it checks the load balance, and then the VRT® technology identifies the spot where the load is unbalanced. Once the washing machine "sees" the load is properly balanced, the spin cycle continues and ramps up to maximum RPM with minimal vibration.

That is pretty much the opposite of saying no to a feature. In fact, they worked hard to develop it and make it work better.

Since Samsung only announced the first-ever 8GB LPDDR4 package last Thursday, they probably won't be in volume production for another 6 to 9 months.

https://news.samsung.com/global/samsung-rolls-out-industrys-first-8gb-lpddr4-dram-package

Apple only started using LPDDR3 in MacBook Pro on last year's 13" Retina MacBook Pro, which used two 4GB LPDDR3 packages for a total of 8 GB. To get to 16 GB on this week's model, they probably had to put 4 packages onto the board, and to get to 32 GB, they would of had to put down 8 packages.

Schiller probably means if they had to put down 8 packages, it would have eaten up more board area that would take away from space for battery. They've been packing just about every available space in the shell for battery.

I'm going to bet Apple does a late or mid-2017 refresh that uses four 8GB LPDDR4 packages to get to 32GB....

Sure you can.

http://accessories.dell.com/sn...
http://accessories.dell.com/sn...
http://accessories.dell.com/sn...

See, the key thing you are missing is that flagship =/= all phones. There will always be ways to get what you want. You are comparing all phones that a manufacturer makes to 2 or 3 of their phones. Samsung makes much more than the S7 and Note 7.

http://www.samsung.com/us/mobi...

Why would they suddenly reduce their selection to kill off a port that is very popular? You seem to be equating the Apple way with every other company, when it is rather obtuse to do so. No, Apple doesn't lead the industry, they are routinely 1-2 years behind the rest of the industry. Removing the analog port is a money grab and nothing else. You can keep denying it all you like, but it doesn't change the facts around it.

Did you even bother to read TFA? This is all Wild Ass Speculation (tm), not actual fact, or even an announcement. You are taking rumor as fact, nothing says that Samsung will sell 0 phones in 5 years with a headphone port, and in fact that would be absurd to expect to happen.

And yet the most recent bit of information on Samsung's own website is this release which is the one quoted in the previous story. Their investor relations site doesn't contain any references to a permanent end of production either.

So are these stories reporting new facts and Samsung just hasn't updated its websites yet, or are they misunderstanding the earlier release, inferring the word "permanent" when it wasn't in the original information?

And yet the most recent bit of information on Samsung's own website is this release which is the one quoted in the previous story. Their investor relations site doesn't contain any references to a permanent end of production either.

So are these stories reporting new facts and Samsung just hasn't updated its websites yet, or are they misunderstanding the earlier release, inferring the word "permanent" when it wasn't in the original information?

Samsung already has water resistance that is more than adequate.

That's not what many Samsung owners say.

USA, no tax:

Galaxy S7 $669.99

http://www.samsung.com/us/mobile/phones/galaxy-s/samsung-galaxy-s7--32gb---unlocked---black-onyx-sm-g930uzkaxaa/

Galaxy S7 Edge $769.99

http://www.samsung.com/us/mobile/phones/galaxy-s/samsung-galaxy-s7-edge--32gb---unlocked---silver-titanium-sm-g935uzsaxaa/

iPhone 6s $549.00

http://www.apple.com/shop/buy-iphone/iphone6s/4.7-inch-display-32gb-silver#00,20,30,40,60

iPhone 6s Plus $649.00

http://www.apple.com/shop/buy-iphone/iphone6s/5.5-inch-display-32gb-silver#01,20,30,40,60