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Any Interest In Rubin's Essential Phone?
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What's up guys? MKBHD here, today I have a dbrand skin, with an essential phone attached.
gotta pay for all that expensive audio/video equipment......oh and the Tesla.....
If I could make the money he does from doing it I think I would as well, I am not even going to lie
I am possibly curious about it enough to check it out even if it is not on display, I doubt I would keep it though for $699.
I am not interested in the camera quality and battery life seems low though. We will see if I even do buy it and try it.
I am not interested in the camera quality and battery life seems low though. We will see if I even do buy it and try it.
Hahahaha that's perfect. I think dbrand has sponsored virtually everyone with a youtube account that holds a smartphone for any length of time in a video. I get what they do but damn if I want to spend even a minute fiddling around with an adhesive wrap on my phone.
I also noticed the dbrand thing. It would be pretty damn weird to buy a fancy ceramic phone and then stick some adhesive PVC on it. If anyone is so worried about fingerprints, just keep it in a pouch, which has the added benefit of cleaning the fingerprints when you insert/remove the phone. Works for me.
Dude. How my brain registered their instructions the first time I watched one of their "How to" videos:
"It's really simple! All you'll need is a flat surface area, a hair dryer, surgical gloves, natural lighting, a freshly cleaned baby, three Gregorian Monks chanting the phone's name, a pinch of turmeric, and 5 hours to obsess over whether each corner is equally applied and even then believing you f*cked it up anyway - and boom - you're all set! Then the following day just set aside 5 minutes to realize you did indeed apply it wrong, rip it off, and be convinced your phone is now "sticky"."
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Man, “sticky” is a feature, not a bug. Just get your phone sticky, roll it in the dirt a little bit, and voila you have a skin. That’s what you wanted in the first place, right?
For those wondering about the camera...
https://www.xda-developers.com/essential-phone-camera-quality-fix/
Confirms what I have been saying about the camera. It has potential especially considering the Google camera isn't taking advantage of the mono sensor. Now if only the software team at essential can get their crap together and improve their software support for the camera. Time will tell...
https://www.xda-developers.com/essential-phone-camera-quality-fix/
Confirms what I have been saying about the camera. It has potential especially considering the Google camera isn't taking advantage of the mono sensor. Now if only the software team at essential can get their crap together and improve their software support for the camera. Time will tell...
I'm a huge skin fan, put one on the back of every phone I've owned in the past 4 or 5 years. I get the transparent matte ones, gives me better grip and doesn't hide the beauty of the phone. Just way too many opportunities to scratch or just put swirls on the back of the phone for me to risk it.
With that said, personally I think Dbrand skins suck. They are wayyyyy too thick, reminds me of that vinyl crap my parents used to put over the cupboard shelves when I was a kid, actually even thicker than that. They work well with larger things like my surface pro, although even on that I find myself rubbing against the thickness and being annoyed that I cheapened my product. Plus they peel up at the corners easily, but they stick almost too well in the flat spots and you can literally cause damage pulling them off (ask me how I know).
OK, back on topic.
Potentially...it might be a good camera. But that is dependent on essential getting the right algorithm and software to make it that way. Something they haven't been able to do all this time with all the delays. i would think they had every resource available to them to make this right......and they haven't been able to do it so far.
And keep in mind it took Google years to get it right. I'm not sure I'm confident Essential can do it in weeks or months or even years.
An update from me. My PH-1 was delivered yesterday and I've had a brief time with it.
-gorgeous build quality and the screen is very good looking
-size is perfect, but I'm wondering now if I'd rather have a V30 or Note 8 size phone to get that extra screen real estate
-essential made camera app is slow but not as slow as MKBHD showed in his video, albeit, I've spent far less time with it
-google ported camera (XDA) is very quick and has nice quality, but I only took a few sample pics. If the essential camera app is disappointing to you, I think the google camera will be a good go to, you'll just miss out on the monochrome sensor
-no blue light filter, which is a big bummer for me. even this app won't install via the play store (which is supposed to unlock the built in nougat blue light filter) and others reported side loading it didn't work either
-I was getting some scrolling jitters here and there and my S8 is actually smoother at the moment, but it could need to be used for a longer period of time
It's a beautiful phone and no doubt a keeper for a bunch of people, I'm on the fence whether I'll hang on to it for a little while or not. Lack of blue light filter (3rd party apps don't work well with the nav bar and the status bar near the camera), camera sensor (based off other reviews, not mine... haven't had it long enough), and how Essential has handled things so far makes me want to return it.
-gorgeous build quality and the screen is very good looking
-size is perfect, but I'm wondering now if I'd rather have a V30 or Note 8 size phone to get that extra screen real estate
-essential made camera app is slow but not as slow as MKBHD showed in his video, albeit, I've spent far less time with it
-google ported camera (XDA) is very quick and has nice quality, but I only took a few sample pics. If the essential camera app is disappointing to you, I think the google camera will be a good go to, you'll just miss out on the monochrome sensor
-no blue light filter, which is a big bummer for me. even this app won't install via the play store (which is supposed to unlock the built in nougat blue light filter) and others reported side loading it didn't work either
-I was getting some scrolling jitters here and there and my S8 is actually smoother at the moment, but it could need to be used for a longer period of time
It's a beautiful phone and no doubt a keeper for a bunch of people, I'm on the fence whether I'll hang on to it for a little while or not. Lack of blue light filter (3rd party apps don't work well with the nav bar and the status bar near the camera), camera sensor (based off other reviews, not mine... haven't had it long enough), and how Essential has handled things so far makes me want to return it.
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Which is what I stated. Whether the software comes from Essential or not the hardware is there and there is at least one current solution to the quality issues.
Exactly! They are new at this and based on their early track record....I don't have a lot of confidence they will get this done any time soon.
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But to be honest the solution to use alternative camera apps does not bring the picture quality to flagship levels. it just brings up to passable levels. At $700 it is priced at a flagship level...same at the HTC U11 ($650) with a great camera.
I have seen the pics people are posting on the AC Essential threads. They are not very good.
If I were to go away from iOS back to Android, this would seem to be the way for me (apart from the Pixels), so I hope it succeeds in the long run... it is a great looking device (at least from afar)
I do too. I do like the screen to body ratio and IMO, they did it better than Samsung. I don't have to worry about edge false touches on this phone like I do my S8. Sometimes just picking up my S8, I launch random apps because the side of my finger will touch the edge. With how the essential was built (thickness and use of materials) and a very tiny bezel all around, it actually works a lot better in that sense. They just need to iron out some of the other shortcomings... and work on their customer relations.