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  • Samsung just released a new folding phone with a bold claim that it has revolutionary

  • flexible glass. Like it says here on their website. We'll be putting that to the test

  • today. This is the Samsung's Z Flip, or the Flipz depending on how you open the box. It

  • does come with a case, one for each half of the phone. Kind of nice. Samsung says this

  • is a statement smartphone for people who want to stand out. A phone that demands attention.

  • And I'd have to agree. The ability to fold your phone in half is genuinely crazy...and

  • by crazy I mean crazy awesome. We can now have a full sized phone in a compact design

  • that takes up half the space. The future is amazing.

  • It's time for a durability test. Let's go. I mean, let's get started.

  • [Intro]

  • Starting off, pay very close attention to this first warning and remember it. It says

  • avoid pressing hard on the screen or the front camera lens. Tap the screen lightly to keep

  • it safe. Samsung said at their launch event that they've done the impossible and created

  • ultra thin glass that folds. This glass can be folded over 200,000 times. Samsung said

  • that when you fold it, you're not just bending glass, you're bending the laws of physics.

  • But that warning included on the phone isn't as confidence inducing as Samsung's launch

  • event attempted to be. It does feel nice though. This type of fold is definitely my favorite

  • so far. I like having a phone that folds instead of having a tablet that folds.

  • There are two things I noticed right off the bat with the Z Flip. One, is the crease here

  • still along the center. Not a big deal. There's also a small divot in the display above the

  • front facing camera lens. You can see the curve of my lights along with the bend of

  • the surface of that display. The Samsung logo along the spine gets entirely covered up when

  • the phone is open. This new hinge design apparently has thin brushes inside to keep out dust.

  • We'll test that later. There's also no screen lifting off the frame like we saw in the Motorola

  • Razor, which probably makes this design much safer and more long-term.

  • There is a bit of a gap between the two halves of the phone when it's closed. Also fine.

  • And it makes sense because if the screen really is glass, we can't have glass clacking against

  • glass every time the phone gets closed. That just wouldn't end well.

  • Speaking of things not ending well, it's time to see if this material really is glass or

  • not. I've been doing this same durability test on every major new smartphone since the

  • Galaxy S6 came out 5 years ago. It is an expensive hobby, yes, but I think it's fairly useful

  • in finding out what your phone is made from, and how well it will handle every day life.

  • Plastic, as we know, scratches at a level 2 or 3. Real glass would scratch at a 5 or

  • 6. And sapphire would scratch at an 8 or 9, right under diamonds which are level 10. As

  • my first Mohs pick touches the display of the Galaxy Z Flip, we can see marks start

  • to appear. This is rather unfortunate. Continuing onward, we can see deeper grooves happening

  • at a level 3. This is exactly how a plastic screen would react. Exactly like we saw in

  • the Galaxy Fold, the Motorola Razr, and basically every other plastic screen smartphone ever

  • made.

  • For kicks and giggles we can bump it up to a level 4, and I could physically feel the

  • the tip of the pick start to cut the display surface open. So why in the world would Samsung

  • talk about flexible glass so much on their website and at the launch event? It could

  • be that they're using a hybrid plastic polymer with little specks of glass ingredients inside,

  • and then just, you know, calling it glass. But that doesn't really seem like a very nice

  • thing to be doing. If a company saysglass”, their customers will think of a hard clear

  • material that has excellent scratch resistance. From a durability perspective, that scratch

  • resistance is the primary reason that glass is used on basically every smartphone display.

  • Samsung is calling thisglassbut this display clearly doesn't have the scratch resistance

  • or structural benefits that customers are expecting from glass. If glass isn't glass,

  • then truth doesn't matter. And truth should matter. This isn't American politics. Samsung

  • is currently the number one smartphone manufacturer in the world, and we shouldn't be calling

  • this screen glass when clearly my fingernail is leaving marks on the surface, over and

  • over. I'm not sure what Samsung's thinking over there, but we clearly have scratches

  • at levels 2, 3, 4, and fingernail. I don't know what material this is, but Samsung definitely

  • shouldn't be calling it glass, and I'm disappointed. Even if I jump up here to the front facing

  • 10 megapixel selfie camera, the surface is covered in that same so-called glass material

  • and can still be scratched with my fingernail. I'll come back to this again in just a second.

  • The raised screen bump around the edge of the screen is made from plastic. This is the

  • same thing we saw in the Galaxy Fold. This guy kind of holds the screen in place and

  • keeps people from peeling off the top layer. The volume rocker is made from metal. The

  • recessed power button over here on the side is scratchable. I'll set my fingerprint and

  • see if it still works. Don't mind my thumb by the way, I smashed it with a TV a few weeks

  • ago. Now the phone is still able to be unlocked even though the fingerprint scanner is damaged.

  • But to test it some more, I added some more scratches. And after the additional scratches

  • are in place, my fingerprints stopped working. Interesting.

  • The frame of the Galaxy Z Flip is made from metal. And down here along the bottom you

  • have more metal alongside the singular loudspeaker, the USB-C port and, you know, the no headphone

  • jack. The whole frame of the phone seems to be made from metal, which is a good thing

  • and will hopefully keep the phone together during the bend test later.

  • There are a few plastic antenna lines and a removable SIM card tray. But no expandable

  • memory. The center hinge mechanism is made from metal with that Samsung logo recessed

  • into the spine. Each of the tiny letters is made from a piece of shiny foil that is glued

  • inside the cavity. These will probably never fall out on their own, but it's interesting

  • to see what the Z Flip is made from. The rear panels are made from glass - both the top

  • and the bottom sections. This mirror purple is kind of growing on me. It gradually switches

  • between purple and blue depending on how the light is shining on it.

  • There are 2 cameras on the back – a 12 megapixel ultra wide angle camera, and a 12 megapixel

  • normal camera. Both are covered in real scratch resistant glass. I think the fingerprints

  • are getting a bit out of hand though. Thanks to our channel sponsor dbrand for hooking

  • me up with the limited edition Robot Camo. Each of these fingerprint fighting skins are

  • totally unique. No two phones will be the same, and the individual drawings are super

  • intricate and are currently available for every phone that dbrand coversnot just

  • the Galaxy Z Flip. I got one added to the back of the grip case for my Note 10 Plus.

  • Since the grip case has the cut out for skins and can be swapped out whenever. Kind of fun.

  • I'll leave a link down in the description if you want to pick up some Robot Camo or

  • a case for your own phone.

  • One cool thing about the folds is that it has the world's tiniest viewfinder for selfie

  • talking. I can double click the power button and it lets me see myself and take a cute

  • little pic. Thumbs up for that. We'll perform the world's smallest scratch test on it. And

  • moving up through Mohs scale of hardness, we can see that picks 1-5 don't leave any

  • marks like we would expect. We only see scratches starting at a level 6 with deeper grooves

  • at a level 7, which is the scratch resistance we expect from anything with the wordglass

  • in the name. Anything that scratches earlier should not be calledglass.”

  • Even if the Z Flip display does hypothetically have glass ingredients in it, we shouldn't

  • be calling itglassunless it has the properties of glass. I can't go make a pile

  • of mud, sprinkle in some chocolate chips and then call my mud a cookie just because it

  • has some of the ingredients of a cookie. That shouldn't be allowed. The thin display lasted

  • about 15 seconds under the heat from my lighter. When I pulled the flame away there were burn

  • marks still left on the screen and it did not recover.

  • One really interesting thing though, if you watch again, is that you can physically see

  • the screen change shape as the heat from my lighter heats it up. Plastic of course is

  • affected by the temperature of my lighter. Glass, however, would not be physically affected

  • in the same way. As the surface cools down, the shape of the screen returns to normal.

  • Let's start with the slam shut test. You know, if you get a little aggressive with hanging

  • up on someone after a phone call and you smash the phone closed. We got to see if the phone

  • survives. It does have the physical raised bumpers all along the outer edge of the screen.

  • Those bumpers are absorbing most of the slamming force and the screen is still in one piece.

  • Of course the phone is meant to fold inwards. Samsung said it would survive 200,000 times,

  • which is 182 times a day if you plan on keeping your phone for 3 years. Bending back the opposite

  • direction though is a different story. With the first flex we get a small separation of

  • the frame near the antenna line, and the top half bumper started coming loose. But the

  • screen of the Z Flip is still entirely intact and in one piece. It still shuts and opens

  • with no grinding of the hinge. We'll try it again. You can see the back panels of the

  • phone meet in the center, providing more support to keep the phone from bending backwards.

  • And the phone hinge does a really good job of keeping the phone shape for the most part.

  • Only on our 3rd bend did we finally hear a snap from the frame near that power button.

  • And even then, the so called glass screen of the Z Flip is still intact. Folding screens

  • are pretty resilient. Even though the phone doesn't really shut quite right anymore, it's

  • physically withstanding quite a bit more abuse than I initially thought it could. Only now,

  • after all its previous bends and cracks does the back panel shatter. It's only a cosmetic

  • wound since the display is still working just fine, and this is good to know. All the important

  • things are still functional.

  • You might be asking, 'Hey Jerry, what if there is a super thin nano layer of glass on the

  • top of the display?' If that were true, we would start to see fractures and cracks from

  • that nano layer. But instead we only see the tip of my Mohs picks cutting into the plastic,

  • like we would see with any piece of plastic that gets cut. This screen is in no way scratch

  • resistant whatsoever. And if poked hard enough, the pixels will still get damaged. It does

  • survive my bend test however. Everything is still functional. This is certainly the most

  • durable folding phone we've seen yet. Samsung did say that they designed this new hinge

  • with little tiny fibers inside, or little brushes, to keep out dust and dirt from the

  • folding bits. It'll be awesome to see what this looks like from the inside during the

  • teardown. So make sure you're subscribed for that.

  • After pouring my rocks on the screen and making sure they cover the entire phone, just like

  • it would if you dropped it when you accidentally go outside. Initially I could hear a few little

  • complaints of the dust inside the hinge. But after blowing all the dust off, those complaints

  • mostly went away. This new hinge design might actually be the start to something really

  • good. But the real danger of calling something glass means that people will think they have

  • the protection of glass when that clearly is not the case. Glass distributes pressure

  • along the whole phone. While this plastic allows that pressure to get in and damage

  • pixels, you can see that each pressure point from my pick kills the line of pixels directly

  • above it. This would not happen if the screen were glass. And it's dangerous to let people

  • walk around with that false sense of security, like Samsung gives them when they call it

  • glass. And that's not all. Each of these puncture wounds does let air get inside the sealed

  • OLED layers, which kills even more pixels. A puncture or cut in the plastic screen is

  • a cancer that will eventually spread across the whole display. Yeah, I sound a bit apocalyptic,

  • but it's important to know what your phone is capable of and what might damage it. So

  • remember, the Samsung Z Flip does not have a true glass screen and it's still very fragile.

  • That being said, it's also still pretty awesome. Samsung should just correct their verbiage.

  • Let me know what you think of Samsung's verbiage down in the comments. If you enjoyed this

  • durability test, come check out my last video. We modeled a normal wheelchair to go on a

  • safari in Africa. It turned out pretty cool. Come hang out with me on Instagram and Twitter.

  • And thanks a ton for watching. I'll see you around.

Samsung just released a new folding phone with a bold claim that it has revolutionary

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