Samsung is holding an event on February 20th where the company is expected to unveil the Galaxy S10 and S10+ smartphones, among other things.
Thanks to a few recent Samsung announcements, we’re already pretty sure that the phones will ship with an Exynos 9820 processor in some market (and most likely a Snapdragon 855 chip in others), and they may be available with up to 1TB of UFS 2.1 storage.
Now the folks at 91mobiles claim to have image that shows what the Galaxy S10+ will look like.
Update:Â And WinFuture also has pictures of the front and back of both the Galaxy S10+ and GalaxyS10. And Slashleaks has some more.
What we’re looking at seems to be a phone with three rear cameras, two front-cameras, and slim bezels around all sides of the screen. Those front-facing cameras appear to hang out in a hole in the upper right corner of the screen, in what Samsung calls an “Infinity O” design.
I can’t help but think that’s going to look silly when you’re watching full-screen video, playing full-screen games, or looking at images unless Samsung adds a black bar to the top of the phone. When using most apps, it’s likely that the top of the phone will be used for notifications, much as it is on current phones with “notch” displays.
There’s no visible fingerprint sensor on the front or back of the phone, which is in line with rumors that have suggested the phone will have an in-display fingerprint sensor. That’s a feature that’s become increasingly common on Chinese smartphones, but which hasn’t really been widely used in phones sold in the US and Europe yet. The phone will also likely have some sort of face unlock and/or Iris scanning capabilities for folks who would rather use those.
One trend Samsung doesn’t seem ready to adopt is the move toward button-free phones. Not only does the Galaxy S10+ have volume and power buttons, but there seems to be a Bixby button as well.
We may have to wait until February 20th for official confirmation of the design and specs, but 91Mobiles expects the phone to have 6GB f RAM, a 2960 x 1440 pixel display, 16MP + 16MP + 13MP rear cameras, 8MP + 5MP front cameras, a 4,000 mAh battery, and a USB Type-C port.
Update: The images posted to Slashleaks and WinFuture show that the Galaxy S10 looks a lot like its bigger sibling, but it’s smaller and has only a single front camera instead of two.
I honestly don’t think the corner cutout is any more silly or annoying than the corner logos everyone appears to have gotten used to when watching network and cable TV over the last decade. At least there won’t be any annoying animations to go with it.
Full screen video wont be an issue since the 16:9 ratio requires black bars on these extended length screens anyway, and the cutout is tucked far enough into a corner that it won’t be much of an issue for games either, and where it is, no doubt there will be a mode to shift the edge of the screen inwards.
Aesthetically, the cutout or hole punch design looks a lot better than the notch to my eye, and most people who have notched phones say they get used to that, so my prediction is that until high quality under-screen cameras become a reality, smartphone screen design will converge on the corner cutouts, eschewing notches, popups, and sliders.
So you propose tv manufacturers create a need so that they too can put a black hole somewhere on your television. Hide pixels for a reason that doesn’t supersede the concept of a clear viewing space? Combine those notches with those rounded corners and how many pixels we gonna hide? You’re on board and that’s terrific.
Well, that makes as much sense as suggesting app makers start sticking permanent logos in the corner of their apps so people won’t confuse which app they’re running, or are you suggesting the TV markers start embedding cameras in their screens?
Either way, it makes no sense.
All I’m suggesting is that dumb ideas are dumb ideas. A lot of people flock to something because it’s new. Blocking pixels for cosmetics is stupid. Blocking pixels for cameras is stupid because a solution exists. They could in fact make the damn phone longer if it’s really such a crisis to have zero neutral areas. Like landscape video recording is just so much better with bezels removed.
Also many people see the corner logos when watching TV, and are forced to disregard it. But when changing channels or programs it disappears and you have the full image back: it is very temporary.
This implementation is a hardware one. You do not get the choice.
I hope these rumours are true and false. I hope they are true, that’s where the cameras are, floating next to the corner. I hope they are false, that they’re permanent, I hope when taking a selfie the cameras appear and the pixels-on-top become black and deactivate, but during regular use, the display is active full-scale and you don’t see the camera or a notch. That is the proper solution.
Now that we have the proper solution, when can we move back to a proper 16:9 aspect ratio? Also are we all collectively going to have amnesia and forget that front-firing stereo loudspeakers did exist? Are we forgetting about the 3.5mm headphone jack/aux port?