Speaker 1: Here's a phone that can unfold out to a 7.6 inch tablet. It can be plugged into a monitor for a desktop computer mode or bent in half or on the go, Hey, I'm Justin Tech and this is the Galaxy Fold for now. Samsung touts. This phone could be used as a computing device and I am putting that to the test this week at work I'm gonna be using the Galaxy Fold for as my main computing device for a week. It's [00:00:30] an $1,800 phone and that's not cheap, but it, it can be more than your phone and also your laptop. Then it may be well worth your purchase. So let's start this up and see how it goes.
Speaker 1: Now this has been a really fun device to use over the last week as my laptop. And of course there were some frustrations which I'll get into, but there were also a lot of abilities that it offered me that my laptop does it. You can connect the fold for with [00:01:00] SBC to any monitor to use deck mode. And this ability is basically how you get a desktop computer mode with the phone. So let's start there. I plugged it in and it literally popped right up. I've got desktop mode going. As soon as I plugged in the phone, it started charging. So I've got an entire desktop set up working with Apple products. Um, and it's charging. It's good to go. Here's the home screen. I placed all of my go-to [00:01:30] apps on the desktop similar to a pc. Along the bottom I dragged a select few to the dock, which felt like my Mac.
Speaker 1: The bottom right of the dock has the time and the date. Battery life control panel tools like Bluetooth and wifi notifications, which can easily be accessed using the keyboard shortcut command n and a screenshot button to take a pick of your screen. The next thing I discovered were Dex mode settings. There are a bunch of features and customization that you can go in and change. Like [00:02:00] anything from the mouse size and color, which is something that I've never had the option to do but kind of like. And the ability to hide the task bar, which is pretty cool, kind of reminds me a bit of a Mac. I can turn that on and then the task bar will go away. And then if I just bring my mouse down, all of my apps will show up, which I really like. It gives me extra space on my screen.
Speaker 1: Dex Mode feels similar to a desktop experience moving around and resizing windows browsing the [00:02:30] web and writing Google Docs feels similar to what you'd experience on a computer. The biggest difference using the fold was the UI for certain applications. Now, lots of apps didn't translate the way I would want them to on a desktop. For example, if I was using an app like Slack in desktop mode, I would still have to go from tab to tab in order to access my chats or my contacts. I wasn't able to have both of them up at the same time. The way you'd expect to have them up on any desktop application. [00:03:00] Google Docs also felt like a mobile app when it came to selecting text. You can't easily highlight text with a mouse the way you would on a computer. You have to double click on a word and then drag the little end of it over all the words.
Speaker 1: After a couple hours of writing this script, actually I was able to just get that muscle memory down and it was a good experience overall. Dex mode worked super well, but I did find one glitch as I prepped for my first Zoom call of the day. I had a zoom open cuz [00:03:30] I'm testing it out before I have a meeting and it's working. My camera is horizontal the way I want it, but as soon as I change the framing of this window, there you go. It goes vertical and the only way to fix it is by picking up the camera going that way and then flipping it back and then we are good to go. Now that I had the camera situation worked out, it was time to try out my first Zoom call. The Zoom looks pretty great. I like having all these boxes.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately I'm trying to make the window bigger [00:04:00] and to show more people, but that's just not working. It still kind of only shows three rows and just makes the boxes bigger. But besides that, I think that um, this is looking pretty good and this is definitely an experience that um, I'd enjoy when using Zoom. Notifications on Dex mode are great. In the bottom right corner. Alerts appeared when I received a new message on Slack so I could just tap on that notification and respond to whoever messaged me. Day one is complete and [00:04:30] I've gotta say I'm very happy with the experience I've had so far. Check this out. Multitasking going on the phone's been at a hundred all day, being plugged in with uh, the power. I've got my Google doc up, I've got a video playing up on YouTube, my Slack down in the corner. We'll see how things go tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Today I'm having a little more fun with the windows. There's a lot of versatility here, so I've got like a Google Docs open. If I go all the way to one side, it will take up a full screen. It will [00:05:00] also suggest other apps that I have opened if I wanna open those. So I'll have like an article up and I like that it instantly takes up the full screen, giving me a side by side experience. Let do something else. I'm gonna do Option Escape. That's gonna bring me back to my home screen. I'm gonna open up Spotify and I really love the Spotify player so I can have it nice and large when I'm like going through music and choosing what song I want. But then later what I like to do is make a super small screen and then I can have it just show the actual song that's [00:05:30] playing like a super small little web player, throw that in the corner, bring back my apps, and then I can go access that in the bottom corner if I wanna change the music.
Speaker 1: I also discovered one of my first major limitations using the fold over a laptop and that was the max number of apps allowed open on your desktop at any time. I've got five apps open, I'm gonna go and open up Slack and check this out. Can't show more than five apps on screen at the same time. So what it does is it closes [00:06:00] the oldest tab While there were some shortcomings, the fold offered abilities that I don't have on my laptop, such as pinning windows, I have Spotify up. If I click this pin, that means it will pin it to the front of my desktop no matter what goes up. So when I go and put up this script, it stays right in front. I really like that. I think what stood out most to me were keyboard hot keys. This made the fold feel much more like using a laptop because I'm a major user of Hot Keys on my laptop.
Speaker 1: So [00:06:30] for example, when I wanted to toggle between apps on the phone, I just had to click option tab and it allowed me to work just as fast as I would on my Mac. Perhaps what is the most unique way of using this phone is in what Samsung calls flex mode. Now flex mode is when you open it up like this and you can actually put it down and it acts as its own stand. It's got a camera here, so it's great for doing video chats over Zoom and if you wanna put a document or [00:07:00] some other app on the bottom of screen, it will do split screen in this mode. Now I use the flex mode to zoom into my morning meetings and overall I loved how it looked. So here we've got the zoom open, we've got people talking and if I go to switch active speaker, it'll put who's speaking at that time right on the top.
Speaker 1: Then I'm right in this corner, I can move it around on the screen. What I don't love about Zoom in flex mode is when you wanna chat, it takes up the full screen and I [00:07:30] can't see anyone. I'd prefer the chat only take up possibly maybe the side of the screen. That way I can still see the people who are talking. But besides that, I like the layout. I like that I can see so many people on screen at a time and it's so easy to just switch between to the active speaker. Flex mode is super helpful during video chats, but this mode alone is not a viable replacement for a laptop. But what if I added in some extra peripherals to take advantage of the full screen space of tablet mode? That [00:08:00] leads me to the next part of my experiment.
Speaker 1: I'm working from a coffee shop today with the fold four. It's at a hundred percent. We'll see how long it lasts. I've got some peripherals. Here's my Galaxy Fold four coffee shop setup. I have a super compact foldable keyboard and a Microsoft Arc mouse, all of which are connected to the fold over Bluetooth and a phone stand that raises the phone about a foot off the table. I've thrown links to all these accessories in the description. With this [00:08:30] setup, I basically created my own mini desktop workstation tablet mode, gave me a bunch of screen space to work from and felt like a monitor. It gave me more than enough space to feel comfortable writing a script and opening up a Zoom call on the other half. I could also easily swap between full screen apps and split view just by using the keyboard shortcut option tab.
Speaker 1: So I popped between Spotify to adjust my music and then then went right back into my research and script side by side. Throughout the day [00:09:00] of using this phone, I logged Battery Life. I was really impressed by how long it lasted because I was using it nonstop. I was taking Zoom calls, I was listening to music. Whenever I was writing, I was browsing the web and I even tried out Adobe Rush for video editing after a full day of work from nine to five, my battery stood at 35%. That includes two hour of Zoom calls. So even with pretty heavy use, you're getting a full day of battery life. So can the Galaxy fold [00:09:30] replace your laptop? Theoretically? Yeah, it can. If you're someone who's mainly checking emails, sending slacks, writing or browsing the web, it could easily be your main computing device. If you need to use more sophisticated apps for video editing or programming, then this probably won't work for your entire workload.
Speaker 1: Overall though, I am impressed by the power and functionality of both Dex mode and tablet mode. Flex mode is great and it's an added extra if you wanna be able to take a quick zoom call, [00:10:00] but it's not going to change your life with this phone. You'd have a productive workstation in your pocket at all times. And if I wasn't so ingrained in the Apple ecosystem, gosh that gets me so angry. Then hands down I would be a fold for owner. What do you think? Is this $1,800 phone worth it? If you take advantage of multitasking or the Samsung decks? Would you consider buying one after seeing this video? Let me know in the comments. Now, be sure to check out our reviews of [00:10:30] this phone, the fold four and our Z flip four, which I'll throw up on screen and, and if you wanna see more videos like this, be sure to subscribe to our channel and give this video a like if you enjoyed it. I'm Justin and I'll take you later.
