Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “I used a 2012 Smartphone in 2018 – Here’s what happened.”.
Smartphones are getting iteratively better every single year, but it can be tricky to keep on top of all the small changes that are continuously happening. So what I’ve done this week is changed. My daily driver, as it were, from the Google pixel to excel to the Samsung Galaxy Note 2, as we move towards 2018, I’m moving from a modern flagship phone to one from 2012 and it’s been interesting to say the least. Let me tell you what I found out.
The first thing I noticed here was software quirks lots of little niggles. I had with the software, which have slowly been ironed out over time, but you never noticed their disappearance, for example, on the home screen in this TouchWiz OS. You can’t drag one icon on top of another to create a folder that doesn’t happen automatically.
You have to manually, create the folder and then add icons to it. The settings are sorted into menus, which is good, but there’s no search option, which means that if you’re searching for a very specific thing to toggle, you could be in there for one to two minutes, just trying to dig it up. There is no dedicated multitasking button.
This phone was around at a time when Android prioritized the Menu key since then, of course, that has been phased out, but it means that, in order to access, multitasking, you’ve got to hold down the home button, which is obviously much slower than just tapping a button. On the left, alright, so the Galaxy Note 2 was released in a time when it was pretty acceptable to have a fully plastic flagship smartphone, but it really just make you appreciate what we have today. Looking at that and comparing it to the glass and aluminium slabs we have now, this feels so much more flimsy.
It feels somewhat Hollow and there is noticeable creaking in the body just by applying even a little bit of pressure. I would say it’s still pretty comfortable to hold, but it feels particularly on the wide side. Now I’d say it’s much more noticeable now in 2018 than it was back in 2012, simply because we’ve been spoiled by tall 18 to 9 aspect ratios and near invisible side.
Bezels, none of which this has even though the pixel to excel, has a larger display. My thumb can quite easily touch my fingers on the other side. That is not the case with the smaller screened Galaxy. Note: 2. As a result, doing literally anything one-handed with this smartphone is a tricky task.
One more thing which is completely disappeared under the radar is rear-facing speakers back in the day. These used to be a commonplace trend, and you can see the fairer she has a little bridge in between the two speaker grilles, which stops it directly getting muffled by being placed on a table. I think so that it’s really not ideal. The sound is not very loud, pretty tinny sounding and can also very easily still be my fault by almost any surface, you place it on looking round. There is also no fingerprint scanner here, something we almost take for granted on modern day phones, even budget, smart phones, but that was just not a thing back in 2012, it was a couple more years until those became somewhat mainstream and so on this phone you have To use a pattern compared to the press in to eject mechanism on the Galaxy Note: 8, the s-pen on the Galaxy Note 2 feels absolutely archaic.
You actually have to wedge your fingernail behind it and tug until it feels like it’s about to fall off and eventually the s-pen is released. You actually have to press noticeably into the screen to the point where it’s uncomfortable in order for it to register, and it also it feels very thick and not the most economic bit of kit all right. So, as I was using this as my daily phone, I did have a lot of chance to try it on day to day applications like Spotify like Instagram and turbulence for the most part performance was pretty good back in the day, this was the most powerful phone On the market, it’s got an X in US 4412, which is a quad-core chip. In fact, the most noticeable difference between this phone and and your 2017 flagship phones in terms of social media apps, is rarely that squashed 16 to 9 ratio. Again, it really makes you appreciate the taller phones that are out today, because on this phone you just end up doing that little bit more scrolling.
Having said that, the scrolling itself, as with the rest of the UI here, is actually just as responsive as you’d expect. When you’re doing one particular task as soon as you throw a multitasking into the mix, the Galaxy Note 2 completely cripples I’ve got to say I did remember the note 2 quite fondly for its multitasking capabilities at the time. This was the Beast. This was the phone for people who wanted to do productivity tasks, but as of now, whether it’s because of Samsung’s updates or just the fact that we’ve experienced so much better. This feels absolutely horrible. Even trying to do two.
Simultaneous tasks cause the real burden on it. Trying to download an app all of a sudden means your internet browsing experience becomes really laggy and the unti r2 score of twenty two thousand six hundred probably reinforces the idea that this chip hasn’t exactly aged, so well, it’s actually pretty okay with games, whilst of course, Since 2012, smartphones have gotten about ten times as powerful games have not got ten times more demanding, and so, unless you’re pushing it with the latest 3d games that she keeps up okay, not to mention it does only have a 720p displayed to push here. So there wasn’t actually too much slowdown in most titles. Truth be told.
The 5.5 inch super amoled display on the note 2 is every bit as vibrant. As what we’ve seen on the Galaxy Note, 8, what it isn’t as good at is brightness and color accuracy throughout the whole software interface you’re constantly faced with a slight green and yellow tinge, which, to be honest after a week of using you, did get used to It but then, when you look at someone else’s phone, which is displaying whites correctly, you start to notice the impairments in your own. The resolution or lack of is particularly noticeable when you’re trying to read articles when you’re trying to watch high-resolution videos, but the high saturation does somewhat make up for it and I’d be tempted to say. I would still pick this phone’s display over a really dull, 1080p LCD, one okay, so this was not meant to be a rant about the Galaxy Note 2, more of an appreciation of how far we’ve come in not a long period of time. There are so many things about our modern smartphones that I’ve only really appeared in the last couple of years and jumping back in time for a bit really makes us appreciate them.
This whole video is also a serious evidence of progress and it’s exciting to think that in another six years time will very likely be saying the same things about our current flagships, which we now find pretty great. So thanks a lot for watching guys. I really do hope you enjoy the video.
My name is Aaron. This is mr. he’s the boss and I’m signing out [ Applause, ] [ Applause, ] .