“As the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 launches in South Korea, reports have emerged in the Korean press of an unusual hardware issue affecting some Note 4 units,” Alex Dobie reports for Android Central.
“The story, first broken by local outlet IT Today, says some Korean Note 4s include a gap between the screen and the metal trim large enough to insert a business card,” Dobie reports. “Samsung directly addresses this issue in its manual for the European Galaxy Note 4, which arrived on the company’s support site in the past day. Tucked away on page 180 of the document, under the ‘Troubleshooting’ section, is the following — ‘A small gap appears around the outside of the device case. This gap is a necessary manufacturing feature and some minor rocking or vibration of parts may occur. Over time, friction between parts may cause this gap to expand slightly.'”
MacDailyNews Take: Samsung has probably already added another bullet point to its oh-so-beloved spec sheet: “Business Card Holder!”
“This suggests the Note 4 screen gap is a characteristic of the device in general, not just a manufacturing aberration affecting early adopters,” Dobie reports. “The second bullet point may give buyers pause, however, as a widening gap between screen and chassis doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in the device’s build quality.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Compare this actual issue with the non-issue shitstorm of FUD that greeted the iPhone 6 Plus. Now imagine the reaction if Apple attempted to sell a device that “features” a dirt-, moisture-, and scum-collecting gap that “expands” over time? Go ahead, we’ll wait; it takes some time to fully imagine 317 quadrillion articles, podcasts, and YouTube videos. But, with Samsung, nope… nary a peep.
Well, we guess when one settles for cheap, blatant knockoffs, inferior apps, rampant malware, and other assorted niceties, one also expects a certain shoddiness with the hardware, huh?
We wouldn’t know.
[Attribution: The Loop. Thanks to MacDailyNews readers too numerous to mention individually for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Apple posts new how-to guide: Switching from Android phone to iPhone – September 16, 2014
Computerworld reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6: ‘Sleek, gorgeous and incredibly well built’ – October 1, 2014
Computerworld reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6: ‘Sleek, gorgeous and incredibly well built’ – October 1, 2014
iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus tested at Disneyland: ‘So badass’ – September 17, 2014
Re/code reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6 Plus: ‘A statement phone,’ not a ‘plastic toy’ – September 17, 2014
Megapixels mean nothing: Apple iPhone 6 trounces Samsung Galaxy S5 in camera shootout – September 17, 2014
The Telegraph reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6 Plus: ‘It’s peerless’ – September 17, 2014
TechCrunch reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6: ‘The best smartphone available’ – September 17, 2014
USA Today’s Baig reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6/Plus: ‘Smartphone stars’ – September 17, 2014
Walt Mossberg reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6: ‘The best smartphone on the market’ – September 16, 2014
The Wall Street Journal reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPhone 6: ‘The best smartphone you can buy’ – September 16, 2014
Macworld reviews 64-bit iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus: Bigger is better (in the right hands) – September 16, 2014
Gap-gate
Hear! hear! hannahjs!!!
@MDN, I am surprised at your take! /s
That gap has been left there deliberately to hold credit cards. You can then one ‘hand’ swipe your credit card in an action that simulates Apple Pays action.
Ta daaaa! No need for an iPhone 6 or 6 Plus. The Galaxy Note 4 comes credit card swipe ready!
Ps the increment in gap size is to cater for the PayPal credit card when it is finally issued. 🙂
Shouldn’t that be spelled “GAPGATE!”?
Only if you had thought of it first R Badger!
Yup.
It’s obvious they needed an orifice for all the schmit to come out.
FUD FIGHT!!!!
If you just look at the picture of the Samsung POS you will see the amount of thought that goes into Samsung design. First, the device needs four names: Samsung – Galaxy – Note – 4.
Next, each word and digit uses a different font style.
My dog has better design sense than the Samsung people.
good call
Hey, good point. Graphic designers say using too many fonts is “Ransom note design”. You’ve given the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 its nickname. . . The Ransom Note
Hey, come on, give Samsmug a break. It’s a necessary manufacturing feature. I love that language. Great stuff.
Apple could counter that the 9 “bendy” iPhone 6/6 Plus units we’re a small-batch-run with a “feature” to cradle BUBBLE & HunchButts
“Necessary manufacturing feature” is Samsung’s “you’re holding it wrong.”
Samsung is shameless and I am simply speechless.
It even took you guys long enough to report the story of the shotty build quality on the Note 4, this has already been all over Twitter for over 2 days now!
The ScamSome Galaxy Note 4: it’s not a phone, it’s not a tablet; it’s a ‘Shamblet.’ 🙂
Hilarious how Shamsucks PR jumped on the so-called Bendgate Apple issue bandwagon and here they are left holding the genuine faulty device bag with egg all over their faces. These guys are Grade A Assholes. Long may they FAIL.
Why I’d never buy anything but Apple products. I demand quality, not rushed out the door me too products. Boycott Samsung!
Why the media is not aggressively reporting Android/Samsung issues:
1. Apple is not paying off media to report Samsung defects
2. Google “owns” most media – speak poorly about a Google partner and get delisted/censored
3. Much easier for governments to spy on users that have Android
4. Much easier for media apps to spy on users that have Android
5. Samsung stock is at 52 week low – more difficult to short, spread FUD and make money
6. Samsung speands $15B or so a year to advertise their products – don’t want to lose that account
It’s plainly for the simple reason that Samsung doesn’t arrogantly flaunt their build quality like Apple does.
Actually, Galaxy 3.5. Long dimension of a business card.
You buy the junk brand, you get junk.
Bigger and bigger!
samsung would probably spend a bit more on bribing bloggists (they officially have a reward system for the ‘best tech’ site etc) and paying astro Turfers (fined in Taiwan for posting fake reviews) than spending on R&D to fix it.
The Unbox Therapy guy would be selling the gap as a Note 4 ADVANTAGE “Only the wonderful Note 4 has this special gap in it to increase structurally stability — similar to the expansion gaps they put in CONCRETE pavements! — .. See how HARD I bend, I’m actually SWEATING!! …. impossible to even dent the Note 4 !!! When will the bendy iPhone get a ingenious gap like this ??!! Next I’ll show even with a pair of PLIERS I can’t bend a Note 4…. ”
(btw Enderle today was going on about the radiation emission problem with the iPhone vs the Note 3… AND SO IT GOES …. ).
Enderle! That carbuncle needs to be lanced and the site cauterised. Whoever performs this public service must needs be goggled and masked against the powerful effluvia. Should he or she survive the intervention, there would be no pub and tavern charges forever after.
Whoever shitcans Enderle will be up for a Nobel Peace Prize.
=:~)
Nuke from orbit, it’s the only way to be sure.
thank you, my dear, for i have not seen or heard the word carbuncle in SO long, because its use is so limited, but this is the perfect situation to bring out this visually stark word for the purpose of fully describing the dearth of reality spewed by this sorry excuse of a human,
Please let me be a part of the cauterization of the site (tidy process compared to lancing that infectious louse), I don’t wish to lance, since i am sensitive to the effluence that will spew forth from such carbuncle’s festering bowels
After a full decontamination, I, for one, would offer for life, my home brew to the brave soul who carried out the not so delicate process of removing the source of this discharge from the very screen I rely on for more wholesome forms of information
Just sayin’
You are a brewer? I knew a man once who did that in his home, but it tasted awful.
i have been brewing for a while, have some practice, and am a chemist so i understand what makes beer taste good, and of course, what makes it taste like your friends version !-)
i prefer a belgian golden or tripel personally, so for instance Duvel or Orval style
Have you written about the experience of it, or the art or technology of it? I’d want to read about such things, and so would others, I imagine. That happens over at The Magazine for one.
As for the social part; I do believe you tend to hear more truth, and tell it yourself, when you and your companions have downed one or two; and when the beverage is smooth and finely crafted, the resulting conversations can solve the world’s injuries, at least during the mingling and the trip home…
Hi Hannajs,
I would LOVE to write something about brewing, as it is a passion i have had for some time.
But, I read so voraciously on so many subjects that i cannot find time to write (except the thousands of emails required for my job as a field service engineer) about brewing
I hope someday to retire and have time to join clubs and organizations that share the brewing interest, since i know there are a lot of brewers like your friend, who may not get invited to as many parties as i do !-)
There are many sites that cater to home brewers, and some that also focus on the love of beer in all its forms and styles
beeradvocate.com is one but i could send a pile of links for beer analysis, and byo.com is a brewing website with lots of good stuff, anyway, I could go on and on and… well…
as to the part about the ills of the world, i know what you mean…. some of the best connections and closeness is felt when the veil of shame and fear is washed away in a blissful sip of liquid courage, the tongue freed from its jaws to play and join others in sharing, and i know that my best friends that invite me to their parties and ask to bring my elixer, do so for the emotional lubricant, not just to get wasted (tho that seems to happen occasionally !-)
I guess my favorite part about brewing is exactly that part (not the wasted part) because the people who taste my beer get so involved in tasting the beer that they forget that there actually doing the same thing they do every other day or maybe a couple times a week, but the experience is so different because of the difference in my beer versus Budweiser Coors Miller experience
Let me know if you want to taste one, i will be on the east coast during 16th-25th of this month, otherwise, i am a way far left coaster… (now i am really opening myself up, no?
Prepare for a slamming by the jerkbot in three, two, one…..
Hopefully i am safe due to the time since original post, ad the short attention span of the denizens of the web…
maybe i will meet you in a less controversial thread and reveal
Actually there are far more websites that specialize in belgian and french farmhouse style ales, with information about the various yeast strains and how they affect the phenolic/ester profile (think spices at finish and bananas as aroma and starting affects, some having a wet blanket rainy wheat field aroma etc, as finish and initial aroma/attack of the flavour)
Actually there are far more websites that specialize on belgian and french farmhouse style ales, with information about the various yeast strains and how they affect the phenolic/ester profile (think spices and bananas, as finish and initial aroma/attack of the flavour)
if you know about wines, you know about attack and decay and finish, if not read about that and you will have something to say at parties !-)
beer is Cheaper maybe, but no less complex, if you get the right yeast and mash it up just right if you know about wines, you know about attack and decay and finish, if not read about that and you will have something to say at parties !-)
Cheaper maybe, but no less complex, if you get the right yeast and mash it up just right
have to use the proper ingredients, some slop from a producer of sugar ooze will not yield quality product, which i believe your friend went to out of convenience
Cheers,
e
With your permission I’ll save your wonderful comments for when I open my blog in a few weeks – Sláinte!
Please feel free to quote me without any acknowelgement, i won’t remember i said it anyway !-)
Let us know about your blog as well, i promise only kind words for you
Thank you
Kind words, like honey I expect from you. Raked over the coals, from the ranks of the jilted. 🙂
Slot loading stylus!
Secret paper note storage!
Pop out screen to suit your mood!
Feature gap that just keeps getting wider!
Wasn’t it M$ the company that claimed ‘bugs’ and ‘flaws’ as features? ScamSome is now copying M$! ScamScum has no shame, they’ll steal anything from anyone! 🙂
Gap or no Gap it’s still one big POS! 😛
“Mind the Gap”!
Cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep, cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap . . .
No, that’s not the sound of the press ignoring the story. 😉
Expandable Gapacity
There’s snotty and then there’s Apple snotty.
From a real-life perspective, of course Samsung’s got problems – and advantages. Since Apple was dragging out the larger phone offering I went with a Note and found it workable and useful. My HUGE peeve with the Apple phone line is the non-removable battery. I can and do charge and change out a battery and move on with my real-life.
Perhaps Apple should have presented bend gate as a ‘manufacturing feature’. Talk about having a laugh.
Hello NEWS media… why no love for this Samsung Gapgate?