Hi One of my viewers wanted me to talk about the new Samsung Galaxy fold which is this newfangled $2,000 smartphone that folds open like this. You have it closed. It's a like a regular, large, thickish smartphone and you fold it open and it becomes a tablet. Very cool technology.

Hats off to all the design engineers at Samsung who've made this thing work. but unfortunately it has been failing spectacularly in the hands of reviewers. they've just it like a like a week ago or something and all these reviewers that all the screens started to fail on it and it's just launched in the stores. But and they have now announced that note, they're going to delay it and while they investigate this thing so it's been a huge marketing and technical fail right off the bat.

Incredibly embarrassing now. normally I wouldn't talk about these newfangled smartphone and gadgety things I didn't know anything about this I Really don't care about newfangled smartphone and gadget releases and stuff like that. As impressive as this technology is, it looks absolutely fantastic. But there's two reasons I wanted to talk about this: a one whereas because it's an interesting if from an engineering point of view, how and why something like this failed and two is actually from a YouTube reviewers point of view because I'm technically a youtuber of UID reviews and thing.

granted I do it on if you haven't watched me before I do like engineering test equipment, oscilloscopes, multimeters, and other sorts of test gear and a few other little gadgets occasionally reviews. So I want to talk about that first before we get to the engineering stuff now because somebody asked me to take a look at this I thought oh I know nothing about this galaxy fold thing Oh have a look at a few things and this particular video popped up from a YouTube review an incredibly popular one eight and a half million subs Wow I've never really watched any of these stuff I don't know. The first thing I heard of him was he was in the YouTube rewind video when Will Smith said Maggie's name and jumped. oh whatever.

yeah if I control rewind I would want fortnight and Marques Brownlee right Marques Brownlee Hi Marques if you're watching this good I don't a review and unboxing video but he's also doing a more recent one and I'll link it in down below have how explain how these things are failing, why and things like that and something caught my attention. Listen to this screen protectors I start peeling it up and within a couple seconds you start to realize like it's a little it's more well, glues, drama and all the screaming screaming. and then by the time I get to an area the size of like a dive like five seconds those screen just goes black and then like this little area, there's like a stripe and then the top-left corner starts flickering. That's definitely not good.

I'm like I really just broke it like I feel like such an idiot and I kind of regret that I didn't get to keep that footage because it's on camera literally. as I'm peeling it, the screen goes black again like I feel like such an idiot and I kind of regret that I didn't get to keep that footage because it's I kind of regret that I didn't can't get to keep that footage is the quote and the YouTube reviewer me goes: what the like you didn't get to keep it. Who stole your footage? The footage fairy-like Yeah, okay. he obviously he's a professional reviewer.

He shot this footage. It's his. He owns the copyright on it. He can show it.

There's only two reasons that I can think of from a YouTube reviewers point of view. Why you why he's not going to show this footage: A He was even under some sort of contractual obligation to Samsung to let them either review or vet footage beforehand or something like that. Or maybe they requested to him that he not show this footage or be. He voluntarily decided I'm not going to show this footage because it may look bad for Samsung and I don't want to ruin our good relationship.

That gets me all these you know, review units ahead of time and stuff like that and being an 8.5 million sub I Believe this is what he does. He doesn't. He reviews gadgets and things and stuff like that. Yeah, he does want to damage his relationship with Samsung either one of those is is not good.

I From a YouTube reviewers point of view, I reckon both of those things are a bad option. I Reckon he should show the footage. That's just ridiculous. Anyway, let I can't think of another reason why he would not show the footage and I think it's got to be one of those two reasons.

Anyway, let us know what you think down below. But anyway, sure, Marcus has these reasons. Anyway, from a YouTube reviewers point of view: I just heard that and that sounded interesting. So enough of that.

Let's get on to the more technical stuff. So naturally, this OLED display screen that Samsung has spent years developing. We'll get into that: It's actually more than a few years with a folding OLED screen, right? it's the first one. Folding screens aren't particularly new or bendable screens are particularly new, but I believe this is like the first one in I'm like a real important mass, high-end high-volume consumer product like this.

This is a $2,000 flagship smartphone slash smart tablet. I'm sure someone will come out for wanky word for it, but this is as serious a product as you'll get in our business from one of the top-tier manufacturers. Samsung and it's failing in the hands of reviewers like this. isn't like the Samsung battery thing like from a couple of years back where it was out for quite some time before.

like the first Samsung phone. Galaxy phone caught on fire and then you know, write it off as a one-off These things happen right? A lot of energy density and modern batteries and stuff like that and they have to pass stringent testing like the nail test where they put a nail through and short out all the layers inside the battery. It's got to pass that without catching on fire. Yet somehow these Samsung batteries are caught on fire and that was a real big deal.

They had to recall all these phones and fix the problem and they mast tested it and it was all better and everything's good again. that sort of stuff happens when you have like really like small tolerances in manufacturing, small manufacturing variability and when you sell things in large enough volume that manufacturing bell curve, you're going to get these outliers and took some time and shipping. I Don't know how many hundreds of thousands or millions of these units before that sort of problem was discovered, but in this case on my timeline like all next to each other in a row, within minutes our other reviewers will see galaxies fold saying hey, my screen broke too. Oh yeah, my screen broke too.

Mike Lee's reviewing all next to each other. some readings all thinking oh, I Didn't realize that I wasn't the only one but now we have all the information about the couple galaxy folds that had problems. So of the four galaxy folds that broke in the last two days, these are the reasons why they broke so the first one deters. He never messed with the film on the display, but it did start to develop this bulge for some unknown reason and that was eventually a day later killed the screen giving it these stuck pixels.

and number two Steve Kovac He also didn't mess with the film but I look at the photos that he sent before he's sending the phone back to Samsung and it doesn't look fully intact so it might have taken some damage somehow but away. so he did not survive and it looks like it's a display is going completely insane. Then number three, Mark Durman's he actually tweeted the phone comes with this layer that he thought was a protective film. He peeled the entire thing off so it must have survived that peeling but that did pretty quickly caused the death of the screen which slowly over the net.

So there you go. We've had like maybe half a dozen or so fires from these reviewers and there's more reports than Marquez's are showing here and a couple of them were do - including. Marquez is one of peeling off this so-called protection film which isn't a protection film. It's designed like it's a proper layer on the screen, but it was like not glued on well enough that you would think it's there and I don't blame him for doing that.

I probably would have done a very similar thing and since are the reviewers found this problem, apparently the ones that they the few that they have shipped have now had this warning label on it that says do not peel this off and do not It's only a small print so maybe they need to make it. you know, huge or do something else to ensure that users don't do this. But anyway, they've decided apparently to stop shipping. the thing it's on hold is delayed worldwide.

We don't know for how long. Pulling them from the shelves and you won't be out in car. Buy more. You won't be able to buy them.

So you have all these failures in the hands of reviewers. So as I said, unlike that battery thing that happened out in the field once millions of units have shipped, this is like okay, I'm sent out what a few hundred of these to reviewers or something like that and like what? ten percent of them are failing or five or ten percent. This is insane how they can spend so many years. In fact, they've been doing this for more than eight years.

I'll show you this Fiz Physics Org from May 2011 Foldable display shows no crease after a hundred thousand folding cycles. This is from Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology They'll be working on this. just the display. just this folding mechanism.

For eight years they've been working on this thing and they of course have done these folding tests again. They do these automated tests like this and this is very common industry. I've designed and built and worked on jigs like this for various our production testing of connectors and other things like this hinge that moves. but it's one thing to test on this jig but it's another thing entirely to actually have it in the hands of a user.

I Know somebody did a video of where they folded a thousand times and it was just fine. Yeah, they have actually tested this and they spent eight years developing this and even eight years ago they folded a hundred thousand times and it was fine. So what's the deal? Well, and I These jigs never really replicate what a user is going to do and abuse this thing because it doesn't. These jigs are purposely engineered and you can actually see it.

and I'm sure the mechanical engineers can go to town here, but like you can like, there's different methods to actually fold something like this which either puts less stress or more stress or tries to even simulate. You might have a bit of variability energy to try and simulate users, especially when you're testing connectors which I've had done before. If you have a jig that's perfectly aligned and you made it perfectly each time that doesn't really simulate it, you want a sort of it a bit loosey-goosey to sort of simulate how users actually try and sort of force it in. Even a one degree difference or something like that can make the difference between five thousand cycles and a thousand cycles for example.

So all the mechanical engineers, if you are one who has experience in these folding art type jigs, please let us know. But really, you can't be the four-year-old test just giving it to a four-year-old or give it like a couple in the Samsung like the engineers must have play. Everyone must have played with this. the engineers the management should have given it to the receptionist and said here, have this for a week and see if you can break it there.

should have given it to the cleaner or whatever, Whack this in your back pocket and fold it, open it a couple hundred times and go around and do your job and see if see if it fails. Let us know and surely they would have found these if it if like Hoffer doesn't fail in the hands of reviewers in the first day or two. Why this didn't show up before is yeah. The thing is, this must have shown up before I Can't believe they've released it and all of a sudden are they so it could be a bad batch.

Granted, there could have been something wrong with this first batch. all the previous ones might have passed all there. all the tests. not only the the formal mechanical jig tests like this, but it could have passed all the like user tests within the company.

or you know, things like that. and then they might have just had a bad batch. That's possible. But after working on this for eight years and they had it nailed, they reckon they had it nailed a hundred thousand tests eight years ago.

Okay, so I'm not I'm not buying that. I I Think potentially they probably knew about potential issues like this. So yeah, and coming out with that warning like straightaway within like days of these reports. Yeah, or something.

Something smells a bit fishy. So if I actually have a look at a typical configuration for a foldable OLED display like this are actually quite complicated. This is from 3m and I I'll have to link it down below. There's like touch sensor.

there's cover windows as polarisers, there's transfer berries like cathode emission layer at the end. that's the actual word display down there. and things like that, right? A very complicated thing to get is to fold reliably. Hence, you know the eight years of research before they actually released a product here.

But they're talking about things like, you know, shear forces and things like that. So when you're this is to do would have to do with the peeling off. If you're trying to peel off and there's a lot of forcing, you're trying to overcome that glue and stuff like that you're You're peeling off those top layers in there. Could there's the shearing stress or whatever? I'll let the mechanical engineers explain better and sure they will in the comments and over on the Eevblog forum down below.

but you're gonna get shear stress on there. It's not just about the folding. did they test for that sort of stuff? Obviously not because Mark is like and others have just peeled it off and boom. It failed.

So others have reported peeling off and there weren't any problems. But then a couple of days later it failed and then they're talking about actually, interestingly, the jigs. the dynamic bend test jigs and things like that and there's different ways to actually implement these. I Won't pretend to know the mechanical physics behind here.

we always my companies, we always have mechanical engineers to sort of advise on this sort of, you know stuff. whereas I'd come up with the more random like oh yeah, you want to just plug it in and randomly I can I can do a jig that wobbles, no worries, and his design is important whereas a single hinge or a mandrel bending and all that sort of stuff. max strain versus fixed distance of whether or no it keeps like a certain separation in there. And and there's many sorts of things involved in these sorts of Bend tests.

so I'm sure passed that with flying colors. But I Can't believe that they didn't have any other issues with inside. Samsung I I think they knew it could potentially be a problem and whether or not I know the engineers spoke up and I think we've got an issue and they went No, no yeah, we've been working this for eight years. We have to push this out now and like yeah, we're going to take the Magus by storm.

we have to be first. Maybe they got rumor that somebody else was going to beat them to the the folding our smartphone e phablet thing I Don't know. but anyway, it's really interesting and you wouldn't something like this to be super rugged. and I watch one hour reviewer skip through and I heard he mentioned that the first thing I thought about this is that this is not rugged.

You've got to treat it. It's delicate and they're saying they've actually held it in the hands ago. Yeah, this doesn't really like paraphrasing. you know, instill a lot of confidence in me in terms of the robustness.

It felt quite delicate and like you've got to treat it gently and stuff like that and well, that's always going to happen with this. Sort of like Samsung are leading the way here. so hey, they should have done this. They should have released it.

But for it to fail, this is incredibly in the hands of reviewers and so many. oh, it was one. It was just a simple manufacturing defect - Samsung would be worried, but more than that, it's there's obviously some sort of systemic problem and to have them actually pull this from the shoals? A lot of people asking what, how long is it going to be delayed? Well look, they've been working on this for eight years. They thought they had it leaked.

Many at least management thought they had leaked otherwise they would not have released this thing and sent it to reviewers and started to sell the thing right. This is a huge deal to sell a groundbreaking new product, world-beating product like this. It's a massive deal, so they were so confident that they went ahead with it. But as it turns out, they come a gut so completely.

how long is it going to take them - like it's nobody knows at this stage? I Don't believe it's unlikely that you'll get a comment on them when they're going to actually potentially release, re-release this thing and fix the problems. But look, working on - for eight years it would take at least unless they knew about it as I suspect. I Think some people in Samsung know about this and they go. Yeah, the first thing they'll go to the engineers and what's causing this and the engineers will go.

Oh well, it was in the report I wrote six months ago. Right here it is. Here's the data. this is why it failed and but even then to then fix the manufacturing issues which they either knew about and didn't fix before or is something brand new could entirely be something brand new and it could be.

You know they did their best practice and and they thought they were good but failed and happens so it could be that. But yeah Anyway, let's let's just assume that they know instantly what caused the problem and they have to engineer a new production solution or some other solution. Maybe it could be a slight variation in the manufacturing of how the you know the screen layers and stuff a you know gone together. Maybe there's some slight variation in that they can tweak in that process there.

that like fixes the problem. and by the way, the those folds that we'll see in those little bulges. They're obviously due to peeling of the different layers and stress. I Can't believe it's the folding stress cuz they've tested this.

You know, unless there's some drastic variation between the G and humans actually doing this and there's some little combination of some users, they're just getting it just right that it causes are like delamination for one of a better term of these particular layers. and I think that's what we're seeing with some of these phones here. So yeah, I think that's what we're seeing here. The layers are like delaminating up and that's what causes the systemic fire either due to the sheer force of pulling that protector off or due to some other folding mechanism.

It's I think we've got layer delamination there, so maybe they can tweak something there. Maybe they cut them. If they have to re-engineer this whole thing from scratch, it's going to be months and months just to reengineer this, Then it's going to be another month or two to thoroughly test it again. Minimum minimum and then they then they'll want a close review cycle.

Probably they'll get in I Don't know who they'll get in either. The existing reviewers I would get in. There's existing reviewers most definitely. I Give it to him and say here: do exactly what you did before and even more to it and try and break it again.

So I I Can't see them getting this back on the market for four to six months minimum. So yeah, I wouldn't hold your breath trying to get a new game. Yeah. Samsung Galaxy fold anytime soon.

a There's just unlike the battery problem this thing is. Well, it's just out of the gate. there's ten. This is just like having the Melbourne Cup for example, which is a huge horse race here in Australia if you didn't know.

Anyway, it's world-famous anyway. 20 horses lined up in the barriers. They're all ready to go. They go out and a couple of them just fall on their ass straight out of the gate and like three or four of them fall on their arse.

That's exactly what happened here. and it's not. so that's really embarrassing. So I Feel bad for the engineers at Samsung who obviously worked on this for a long time.

They've done an incredible job. This looks like an amazing product. It's probably not something I'd use on a daily basis, but I can understand why people are going Wow about this since two thousand dollars and you expect it to work and well anyway, they've come a guts up so yep, don't expect to see it anytime soon is my prediction. So there you go.

Let us know what you think down below. if you have experience in these foldable Y jigs and or even foldable OLED displays. My audience is vast and wide and let us know in the comments or over on the EEV blog forum. Anyway, what the video has Always give it a big thumbs up and you can discuss down below on the Eevblog forum in the comments.

Catch you next time.