Re:Microsoft announces new Surface Duo phone
by subjectsigma on Wednesday October 02, 2019 @03:22PM
(#21139889)
There's an interesting subtlety in Westworld devices that I didn't notice until now, though - they're insanely durable. Dust, blood, hard impacts, slamming the device closed, etc don't seem to damage or impede them at all which simply wouldn't be true of real devices. I think foldable devices are inherently more fragile than smartphones which are already too fragile IMO and thus they'll never work, but few people seem to care about that right now.
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Re:Microsoft announces new Surface Duo phone
by eduren on Wednesday October 02, 2019 @03:27PM
(#21139925)
Definitely. In order for WW style tablets, I think the biggest hurdles would be material science.
It's also sci-fi and the rule of cool. If someone wanted to parody WW, then a fun scene would be the tech support at HQ. Imagine seeing main characters treating them as disposable and regularly having to pick up new ones.
Re:Microsoft announces new Surface Duo phone
by sterlind on Wednesday October 02, 2019 @03:44PM
(#21140065)
Thin-film electronics would probably be the starting point. As far as I can tell, that industry is very concentrated on display, solar and "gimmick" electronics (think electronic tamper seals or marketing strategies.)
To make this device, you'd need: - A battery breakthrough (hard) - Flexible OLED and peripherals (easier) - Flexible chips (hard but optional) - High power efficiency or microfluidic cooling (hard depending on thickness.)
Depending on where you let the device be folded, if you had a small enough SoC, you could protect it from bending and hide it in the panel sections that don't have a seam. The trickier bit is raw power and thermals, which will be the bottleneck for the next few years.