The Broken Galaxy Folds: Explained!

hey guys mkbhd here's ok so there's something cut from my samsung

galaxy

fold unboxing video last video from the other day but you've probably seen it all over the place by now mostly on twitter all sorts from unfolding unfolded at the same time multiple

galaxy

folds

broke in reviewers hands almost at the same time for separate but very related reasons mine was one of them so this is the explanation for galaxy fold breaks So three days ago when I shot that unboxing I noticed what appeared to be a screen protector on the Galaxy Fold and you guys already know this anytime there's a film on the screen out of the box whether it's in front of the camera or not, I take the plastic off if it's an apple phone, a samsung phone, whatever you take. outside of the pre-installed screen protector you've seen it before so on this phone there was what looked like a thin lip around the inner screen just like your typical pre-installed screen protector actually just for one given image that galaxy s10 had a similar experience also from samsung this is a brand new galaxy s10 straight out of the box and it has this pre-installed plastic that basically looks exactly the same it has a lip basically around it and it has a cutout around the hole punch screen with a similar look.

I would take it off right away, so when I saw the same lip in the galaxy crease, I said ok. Let me add that to the unboxing video. I'll take it off and just take it. off so I pointed a camera at it and started peeling from the bottom where it's easier to take a fingernail under the screen protector so I started peeling it off and within a couple of seconds you start to realize it's a little , it's stuck better than a normal screen saver um and then when I get to a dime sized area in about five seconds the whole screen goes black and then like this little area there's like a streak and then the top left corner starts flashing uh that's definitely not good i really tore it up like i feel like an idiot and i regret not being able to keep that footage because it's on camera literally while i'm peeling it, screen goes black um yeah Clearly that wasn't just a regular screen protector so I emailed Samsung they seemed to totally understand which is interesting but then they replaced the phone éphone, so this is my replacement Galaxy Fold that I'm definitely not trying to remove the screen protector from.

I set up the new phone, all is well and have been using it ever since, but yesterday I saw a tweet from Dieter from the edge. My Galaxy Fold screen broke after just one day and this whole article explains it. then i see for sure on my timeline they are all next to each other in a row within minutes there are other reviewers with a galaxy fold saying “hey my screen broke too oh yeah my screen broke too it broke, mine too, all next to each other, so i'm reading all this thinking oh i didn't realize i wasn't the only one, but now we have all the information about the galaxy fold couple that had problems, so out of the four galaxy

folds

that broke in the last two days here are the reasons why they broke so the first one puts him off he never messed with the movie on screen but started developing this bulge for some unknown reason like something got under the film somehow and that bulge finally a day later killed the screen and gave it these stuck pixels then number two steve kovach he did too no I mess with the movie, but m i look at the photos you sent before returning the phone to samsung and it doesn't look fully intact so it could have been damaged somehow but either way it clearly didn't survive and it looks like half the screen has gone completely nuts, then number three mark germans actually tweeted that the phone came with this layer he thought was a protective film he took it off completely so it must have survived that peeling but that did pretty quickly sparked the death of the screen which slowly over the next 12 hours went from half black to two thirds black to completely

broken

and then to mine i took a few seconds to remove what i thought was that screen saver and then very decisively that's exactly what broke the screen so it's two of different types of breaks the way I see it the first two came unstuck from the film and the other two just damaged the screen or film somehow through regular use which is those two seconds that are much more worrisome but as far as film goes that's what will happen psa people if you're one of the few thousand people though many pre-ordered the galaxy fold don't remove that protective film it might as well be basically part of the screen in fact dez from t-mobile tweeted this photo which started making the rounds which is clearly a warning where it says on the plastic in the fold that it says the home screen includes a special protective layer Peeling off that protective layer or using adhesives on the home screen, such as a screen protector or stickers, can cause damage.

I mean, I should say that it will definitely do a lot of damage and possibly break everything, but the only problem with this anyway. The caveat is that it must be a late edit related to T-Mobile or a carrier because this text is not on the packaging of any of the review units. I asked other people who had opened a fold if they had any kind of warning. in his box you can go back and watch my unboxing video there is definitely no text on that movie you can also check out lou's video he did an unboxing there is no text on that movie uh joanna also confirmed it didn't have any marks soldier knows better didn't have any either , this is actually my galaxy fold wrap, there is no text on mine at all which means that sometime in between they give these review units and hit carrier stores someone must have realized they probably should put a warning somewhere and i think now they're realizing that the warning should probably be even bigger because no one really reads that fine print but here's the thing even if i never tried to peel it off a movie with a lip as this one will eventually start to collect a little bit of dust and may even start to peel.

In fact, joanna, since she tweeted a photo that she already started this is her galaxy fold she somehow managed to resist the urge to peel, but the scariest part is even if you don't mess around. with that film there's still a chance it could get damaged somehow with regular use so samsung seeing all this in the last 48 hours put out a statement we don't really learn much from it but they did from anyway they said we got some reports regarding the main screen on samples as long as we thoroughly inspect those units in person to determine the cause of the problem which is definitely for the ones that were not obviously due to film peeling but then they parted ways.

Only a few reviewers reported removing the top layer of the screen causing damage to the screen. The main screen of the Galaxy Fold features a protective top layer that is part of the screen structure designed to protect the screen from inadvertent scratches. Removing the protective layer or adding adhesive to the main screen can cause damage so we will make sure this information is clearly delivered to our customers so essentially that's it, a foldable phone requires a plastic screen instead of glass and that soft plastic is the culprit here as i'm going to guess like scratches on a level three with deeper gouges on a level four if you know what im saying but this is PR brutal not just for Samsung but also for foldable phones in general even now i'm much more skeptical about huawei mate x which i thought looked amazing but now i'm a bit worried about that foldable screen being on the outside how will it hold up in normal people hands?

It's pretty sad that it's going to affect the way people think about these phones now, to be very clear, I was never going to go out there and recommend people buy the $2 galaxy fold. I don't think most people would, but there's always a lot of room to be optimistic, for example, if you're a tech geek, you support these things like you want to see things, these crazy new ideas really succeed and win ground so we can see a second generation and a third. generation and then you can improve one of the most common comments I've seen actually is people saying that Samsung should have waited and worked on this more until it was done and done instead of rushing to try and be the first foldable phone but the the reality is samsung has been working on this for a long time they've said eight years of development so you can only imagine how crazy this was back in prototype form so this is the point where they felt it was ready. but glitches h show up in all kinds of ways and on all kinds of scales with all kinds of tech products, I mean everything from butterfly wrenches to wireless chargers to exploding phones and everything in between, it's just brutal when it happens to a product that really excites you.

I guess you don't have to say this is a flop yet because as far as I know they are not delaying this at all they are still going to ship galaxy fold in this first generation it feels like a public beta test like that. as we learned a lot from it, but that's our job as reviewers, to give this feedback and when it's out in the hands of the public, we'll learn even more from it, but I think the main takeaway right now is that we have foldable phones. one is a delicate phone 200,000 folds from a robot doesn't necessarily translate into a lifetime of use by a human there's a thing called user error and it's going to happen there are moving parts there's a hinge there's no water resistance as if there would be all sorts of new things to consider with a new form factor and this is definitely a roadblock to them getting good as a pretty big roadblock, but that's the thing: I still can't wait to genuinely say as in a future video in some like Video from 2023 where I can say hey foldable phones are getting really good like that's what you're looking for in technology is things to get better and I still think I'm rooting for phones foldables so they'll eventually get good but with technology right now we have a few hurdles but that's it that's where we are that's all the info on the pair of

broken

galaxy folds that existed in the world in the early days and what it means, but let me know what you still think.

I'm going to continue to use this phone as my daily driver over the next few days for a full review and it's still going to be quite an interesting experience, but let me know what you think, maybe you're still interested in a galaxy fold, drop it. in the comments section below eit your way, thanks for watching, catch you on the next one, peace.