SD Cards are analogous to floppy disks and are on their way out. Even today, most people rarely use them anymore, contrary to a vocal minority on comment boards.
Your analogy is flawed. Floppy disks are several magnitude slower than HDD, and much smaller than HDD as well. I am comparing the speed and size when floppies were available. However, SD card is comparable in size and speed to internal storage.
Fully agree. On my S4, internal is 27/35 MBs write/read, and my external is 10/34 MBs write/read. So its same read speed, similar write speed, and I have only 16GB internal (9GB usable), compared to 64GB external. And I have some 20GB of maps and navigation app on external SD.
That is why I think that Anand is *wrong* to just say "we will not penalize phones not having MicroSD". What that means is he will not reward phone with external SD option in his review even in "all else being equal" - and that is plain wrong.
Just to make it clear, I agree with all other Anand's points : external SD is not as good or as valuable as internal flash, partially due to performance, but mostly due to OS not fully supporting external SD. I can put some big apps on external SD (like iGO), but large games mostly could NOT be moved to external SD (even if they say they moved, 'obb' folder remains on internal). But still: external SD is valuable.
So only (big) issue that I have with Anand's approach here is if he ignore if phone has support for external SD in reviews, where I think that should give bonus points. It definitely was important for me, back when I selected S4 over HTC One.
If your phone is rooted, you can use the FolderMount App to map the game or other data to external storage. Once setup, the app just remembers the mapping information. It won't lost across reboot. I have been using for a couple of months without any issue.
I really find this article disappointing. I feel as though the authors are so far into their viewpoint that they're incapable of evaluating the other side fairly.
I would (almost certainly) never buy a phone or laptop with a non-removable battery. If you drop your phone in a puddle, and your battery is non-removable, you're pretty much done. Likewise if you get liquid in your laptop. If you can pop out the battery, you may well be able to save the device.
Likewise, I can't grasp how expandable storage could possibly be considered a downside. Even if we could start convincing manufacturers to put in reasonable amounts of storage for reasonable prices, how can it be a good thing that you can't add more if you need it?
I love AnandTech and I consider your reviews and articles to be about as fair and impartial as one could hope for. Reading what comes across as an apology for manufacturers' cost-cutting decisions is, frankly, kind of depressing.
It's more of a "call to arms" for manufacturers to drop prices of internal storage to benefit the consumer. He said he won't penalize anyone for using or not using removable storage/batteries. He DID NOT say he would commend anyone either based on those factors either. All phones would benefit from having (at the time of this article) 128GB of fast internal storage and not having to deal with slower removable media. It's easier for the "normal" consumer, who these manufacturers are selling to. The techies out there who know how to root phones and know about only storing large files on removable media account for less that 10% of their business. Anand is trying to help the majority of end users out there by asking manufacturers to stop marking up internal storage prices.
I totally agree with you. Both removable battery and storage is a huge plus when it comes to privacy. This article maybe the worst ever written by Anand. There's a definite feel that its written not for the convenience of consumer but for the manufacturer.
capacity is all i care about - once i have loaded my music onto my memory card it stays there - i only have to do it once
if phones had 256g/512gb of storage and diddnt cost a shedload it would be fine but with the small amount of space phones have (around 64gb) i need microsd cards to hold my movies and music
i currently have 1 64gb with movies/tv shows and another 64gb for music as well as internal storage which i use for games and taking pictures/videos
current storage capacity for phones is too low for my usage
I am sorry but this article is horribly written. Seriously this is a major blow to the reputation of anandtech. An honest review site can easily deal with all these issues within a review without submitting to bias.
Removable batteries and storage are plain and simple major bonuses to a phone.
This article completely doesn't even bother to discuss all the down sides of sealed batteries or upsides of removable, and the same with storage. Guess what most people have capped data plans now days. So what are we going to do when we are forced to pay extra money to sync with a cloud service both because the cloud doesn't offer enough space and because our data plans run over. Oh you say goto wifi right? Well wait but you said half the reason for this trend was simplicity. So you are going to tell me that someone who is too ignorant to figure out how to use removable storage finds it perfectly logical to differentiate between the cloud and local as well as cell data vs. Wi-Fi? Sorry it doesn't add up.
Also does anyone here find it ironic that over the last several years we have seen a movement to move toward sealed batteries and lack of expandable storage. Of course and anandtech even comments on it, but wait they conveniently ignored the other trend we have seen in the same time frame. Guess what that is? Its Samsung's rise to power that has resulted in complete domination of their competitors in the android space. So if one were to simply look at correlation one could make a claim that removable batteries and expandable storage as a part of a larger well done package have resulted in Samsung crushing all their competition.
Also flipping out batteries mid day, I don't do it, I buy an extended battery. Wake me up when a phone exists that can promise I can do 13 hour day without losing its charge. Until then I will rely on extended batteries, and guess what, an extended battery is thinner than a funny daisy chain battery case which is what most people are forced to.
Planned obsolescence wow the term wasn't even said once.
In addition, in a moving vehicle, like a train, you can often lack access to *both* 3G and wifi. Another reason that the forced lack of SD is disappointing. I don't like Samsung phones that much but I totally agree that if they're the only ones offering SD and removable batteries on their major lines, they deserve to dominate (sadly as I prefer more competition obviously).
If Samsung's success is any indication, it only means the current trend IS removable batteries and external storage (advertising often works for the first purchase, not the second, but most of their success comes from "understanding" their market).
Lots of contradictions and misinformation in the article. The value of cheaper, more efficient internal storage is easily negated with the higher costs of repairs/after-market-value, due to sealed design (the only exception being the iPhone for the sole reason of the brand, not the tech). External storage is re-usable even after a new purchase, and removable batteries are much more affordable and easier to replace than sealed ones (especially for those who buy off contract), in addition to having the ability to change their capacity (like the use-case above).
It seems that the authors think paying more in the longer run is the "smarter choice". Not everyone has an unlimited plan, and/or not everyone is an enthusiast. Or simply put, not everyone "wants" to.
This site is too synthetic in their expectations of technology as apposed to consumer *needs*. A good analogy would be benchmarks (since I used the word "synthetic"). Synthetic benchmarks are great for having a better idea of what to expect (in some independent regards), with some being way off in what they should be testing (browser benchmarks as CPU performance measures come to mind), and most being absolutely horrible compared to real-world usage (with that being key to my analogy). Yes, cheaper, faster, more efficient NAND is a huge plus, but what's wrong with having that in addition to external storage? Most devices are big enough to accommodate both, and then some for a removable battery.
Another contradiction comes from saying that sealed design allows for a larger battery.... HTC One VS SGS4 anyone???
People want cheaper/reusable storage and cheaply repairable devices that have decent build quality and market value. Lots of them love fashionable devices, but not most mind you, the former being the VAST majority of the market.
I suggest this site stick to what they do best; analyzing and comparing tech. Market and trend metrics NOT being one of them. They shouldn't be pulling an Apple and dictate their preferences on their readers when it comes to said tech. Give consumers the info, and let them make the decision. It's what made this site successful in the first place. Your use-cases/preferences are NOT identical with everyone else's.
Apple doesn't do sealed design because it's best. They want to increase their margins as much as possible on higher storage options. Likewise, Google doesn't want to "simplify" storage access, they want you to use their services (which coincides with their bread and butter)...
Now Fearsome, the piece isn't "horribly written" on any objective basis. The issue you and other power users who demand expandable storage have with the piece is that Anand and Brian disagree with your perspective from a technical perspective.
From where you sit and other power users sit, expandable storage and removable batteries are something you demand because it suits your desire to control your respective user experiences. You are entitled to want greater control over your experiences with your phones, including being able to root your phones, flash new ROMs, or even be able to carry five batteries around with you at all times. You are also entitled to carry a 64-gig MicroSD card if you want. There are phones out there that provide that kind of experience. But most casual smartphone buyers -- who make up most of the market -- don't care one way or another about any kind of customization or about removable batteries or about expandable versus internal storage. They want a reliable phone that looks good (or good enough) and serves their needs for two years. So the expandable-versus-internal storage debate among power users is a nonfactor to them. If Samsung offered a phone without expandable storage or removable batteries, they would just as quickly by that as one with all of those features because they know the Samsung brand name (from all the other consumer products the company makes) and because the company makes reliable phones. [This fact, by the way, is why arguing that Samsung is dominant because it provides phones with expandable meory and removable batteries doesn't wash. It doesn't factor in Samsung's natural market strength as one of the biggest players in consumer electronics, or consider that the competition, including LG and HTC, either are considered second-tier consumer electronics firms or are solely phone makers, the latter being an increasingly endangered corporate species in the smartphone market of today.]
Even some of us who are power users, including myself, have other considerations in mind; I, for one, want a high-quality phone that is well-designed, that has a mostly-metal body (because I like the feel of aluminum and steel). I have my own cloud server and can upload just about everywhere in the world where I go, and have an array of battery packs that I can use if needed. So the HTC One was the best choice for my wants. And I know other power users (including several in my own family, all who are in the tech field) who have made similar choices; my mother, who has been in tech since the days of the first IBM PC, is an Apple fan, and my sister-in-law, who runs IT services for one firm, is also an HTC One user.
Ultimately, all of us have a choice regardless of the objective facts. You can choose phones with expandable memory and removable batteries, or choose something different. Anandtech isn't saying that you shouldn't have choice. It is laying out the technical facts that you may choose to ignore or consider. And if you really don't like what Anand and Brian have said, you can also just stop reading Anandtech and read some other site.
+1! I understand all the complaints from many of the power users (a site which Anand caters to!), but lets face it, money talks!
We all want a device tailored to our needs, but we need to understand all the driving forces, and this article addresses the major forces.
I agree I'd prefer a replaceable battery and upgradable storage over a sealed brick, but in the end I'd prefer an affordable device which doesn't require both! As power users, we're the last to get our cake and eat it too, else we pay for our cake!
Having a cloud server is useles unless you have a very expensive data plan. Many people like premium design, including myself. I could be called a samsung hater for that matter. But HTC One is the best example for not taking advntage from better internal design and structure due to the lack of micro sd slot and removable batery. It.s just a huge premium brick with small screen and small baterry when you consider external dimensions.
The galaxy line has outsold the htcs by a considerable margin. If u think removable battery and expandable storage played no role in this massive upset think again. The consumer has spoken loud and clear htc is just to stupid to hear it.
If you are going to write an article about such a massive issue that has been drawn to your attention by your readers, at least address the down sides of non removable batteries and memory. I mean for instance, 1 water droplet can render you £400 HTC One worthless to you, and you don't mind that? Hmm... Do you consider all Anandtech readers as fortunately wealthy as you?
And yeah, how on earth did Samsung rise as the largest smart phone manufacturer, when all of it's flagship devices be it budget phone, smart phone, or phablet, have ALL had micro SD cards, and removable storage?
Again, Steven, as I mentioned, Samsung is also one of the world's largest consumer electronics firms. Plenty of people have a Samsung television or other device in their homes, and the devices largely work. So when someone walks into a Sprint store or Best Buy, they already have a familiar relationship with Samsung, and chances are, have also bought at least one of its phones already. When you are already dominant in the rest of the consumer electronics market, playing a dominant role in the cellphone arena -- which increasingly is part of the consumer electronics landscape -- becomes relatively easy to do. Samsung could offer a phone without removable batteries or expandable storage and still dominate because of its already-massive reach.
On the other hand, firms solely focused on telephony have been taking beatings, largely because their focus on one market, along with mindsets that didn't embrace smartphones as consumer electronics, doomed them. This was seen with Ericsson a few years ago and Nokia as well. HTC is now paying the price for its failures a few years ago to expand into consumer electronic; the flop that was the HTC Flyer is one example, while the failure to buy a firm like Vizio is another. HTC could offer a phone with removable batteries and expandable storage (and through both the Desire line and the One Max, already does) and it would still be struggling against Samsung because the HTC name isn't as well known to the average consumer as its bigger rival.
I know some folks like to use didactic logic in justifying their positions. But in the context of the conversation about the pros and cons of cellphone makers not offering removable batteries or expandable storage, simply offering up a market share example to prove one's point when there are other factors at play just makes you look a tad illogical.
The rise of samsung exactly coincided with other manufacturers decision to drop removable batteries and sd card support. Many people who went samsu g were firmly in the htc camp before htc screwed their customers. Htc screwed up big time. Alot of people bought phones based on recommendations from tech people. No tech person would recommend a phone without a removable battery and no sd card support. The resale value of ur two year old phone with a dieing battery and woefully inadequate storage is significantly reduced.
Slower? I got a 64gb samsung class 10 micro sd that does ~70 mb/s read and ~22 mb/s write, which is faster than the internal storage of most phones on the market today.
The problem here is that mobile devices aren't actually providing "internal robust SSDs". If, as you say "it's not even close", then why is the write speed of the reviewer's darling, the HTC one a mere 20MB/s? That's slower than a good class 10 sd card which goes to 22MB/s write, 70MB/s read.
If manufacturers are going to take away external storage, then for god's sake at least deliver on those promises that make up the premise of "internal is better." Make internal storage demonstrably more robust, demonstrably faster, and more importantly bigger.
Really dumb analogy. Both internal storage and microSDs are FLASH memory. They are the same exact thing. Like saying floppy disks are going obsolete, to be replaced by...floppy disks. The only difference between the two is microSDs tend to be cheap whereas internal flash uses a high quality controller and higher quality memory. But that's the whole point of microSDs. You don't need anything fast to playback sequential video and picture files, and those files are huge, so bigger and more storage is more important than speed. Just like on a PC, your C drive where you open apps and run things can be a blazing fast 15000rpm hard drive (or SSD) that's only a few hundred GB, but your main media drive is a slower 7200rpm drive that has 4TB of storage.
Keep 2 or 3 large games, all your apps and documents that require faster read and write in phone and your videos and music which don't need that much speed in sd card. That is the dumbest thing a human can do. You are so right.
SD cards come with 10 years of warranty, this is more than 99% of the hard drives on the market, most of which come with only 3 years warranty.
I have a samsung 64 gb sd card that does 70 mb/sec read, which is more than enough for anything you might want to do on a mobile device.
If there is someone dumb, around here I'd put my money on it being you. One glance at your screen name says it all - a sad, pathetic retarded apple fanboy.
I'd like Anandtech to start curating the comment section of readers that hurl insults in such a gratuitous manner. Come on, we don't need that on such a technical site.
The flash in SD cards (let alone the controller that runs the slot) is indeed MUCH slower than the internal storage. Internal NAND bears no relation to an SD card other than they're both non-volatile and solid state. That doesn't mean they're based on the same technology or design.
Anandtech's review of the Nexus 7 2013 shows internal storage to be at up to 27MB/s sequential read. That's slower than many microSD cards. It's possible to buy a 64GB card that's 3 times as fast for around $100, or $50 if you want only a little over twice as fast. Sure there are faster eMMC solutions, the one used in the Dell Venue 8 Pro for example is faster than an microSD card I know of, but still, the difference isn't huge.
Are you joking? The microSD is the best place to keep my music and movies. When I'm traveling abroad do you suggest to use cloud storage? With these costs of the 3G data when roaming?
They are only on the way out once phone manufacturers start offering phones with 64GB or more of storage as standard. If I buy a new phone now, I want to put my apps on there (couple GB of data right there if it's games or some nav software), a decent sized mp3 collection of 10-20GB (no, the mp3 I usually listen to are not available via spotify etc. and I'd like to listen to music without eating up my data allowance anyway) plus some stuff to read (ebooks and comics - my current comic collection on the SD card of my Galaxy S4 is about 30GB). Yes, I do of course not NEED all that stuff at the same time, but not having to think about what you want to read today and then copy that stuff around at home (and instead just having everything available) is nice. I would not buy a new phone with less than 64GB of storage, so any current phone without a microSD slot is simply not an option for me.
I understand that Google wants people to use cloud storage, because it binds the customers to them (and probably allows them to run some nice analysis on the data, too), but having the data available locally is faster, more convenient (no copying to/from the cloud all the time, can simply exchange SD cards to switch data depending on needs, data is available even at places where you have no connectivity), cheaper (does not eat up the data plan) and safer (regarding privacy).
The main reason for myself using a microSD card is that if my phone were completely damaged beyond usability (liquid, smashed, etc), the microSD card would probably still be usable. I put all pictures and user storage on the card, the rest is on internal. Of course I do periodic backups over wifi, but still, there's always the chance I'll have a day where I'm out and took a bunch of photos that my phone gets damaged before I can back it up. Would rather have removable storage than not have it.
That's seriously an excellent advantage to the technology that they are utterly disregarding. But of course from their perspective your data should be backed up to the cloud, because we all have unlimited always-on reliable data connections. Don't we? ...guys?
NO, you are highly wrong. As long as people use cell phones as a MP3 player SD cards will still have a major roll in the mobile space. Considering thanks to phones, there aren't many non-apple choices in the MP3 market that are competitive enough.
It's more like SSDs (onboard) vs. HDDs (microSD) nowadays, and we know for a fact Anand is an advocate of this heterogenous storage model on the desktop PC because it simply makes sense. SSD for the boot OS and high demand applications. Cheaper HDD for mass storage and low demand usage scenarios.
But yes, uninformed Sheeple don't use microSD, simply because they don't have the choice. High-end informed users do make great use of them however, which is why it is a frequently cited differentiator in product buying decisions.
The big attraction in removable batteries to me is the ability to replace one that is losing runtime. Replacing with a fresh battery can increase runtime back to original levels, which in my experience can be up to 4x what the old battery could do.
I think most people that care about battery life enough to look online to buy one are closer to the enthusiast who typically upgrades to a new phone every year than someone trying to squeeze every last ounce out of their 3yr old device. This doesn't excuse lower income markets who hold on to their devices longer, or pass them down to someone else, but again, we are talking about the minority (at least in the US).
Looking back, I realize there are a lot of exceptions to my answer, but I believe these demographics are the most common and profitable that OEM's target.
I feel this the replacement to deal with an aging cell doesn't need it to be a "removable" battery. I just want to be able to get at it without glue and plastic clips that break. Good clips and a few screws and it is replaceable for the case that covers a ton of users.
Your point may be true for the US or EU markets. But for developing markets the category that you considered minority is actually the majority. This market is hugely dominated by Samsung and by some amount sony and local manufacturers. Apple and htc are almost non-existant. Again I am saying what I see around me and your perspective is from a different level.
1) You're confusing removable batteries with user-replaceable batteries.
2) Anand and Brian's comments work the same for your use case. Even though there are some that want to do that, very few ever do.
3) Now when it comes to boosting the usage of a device within a given day there are plenty of solutions that work micro-USB and Apple's well worn and common port interfaces that allow you to do this without ever having to shut off the device or take it apart to get it recharge. They even allow for dual-charging instead of the musical chairs that those of us had to go through before power interfaces were standardized enough to have viable solutions and batteries were removable.
Even my old flip phones from 8 years ago still hold half of their charge with the original battery. I would expect most people to upgrade at least within that time frame, if not the usual 2 years. Battery wear and tear is overrated, especially newer batteries with much better endurance. It's the thing that separates a high quality OEM battery from a Chinese knockoff battery. The endurance is awful and the mah rating is completely false on the latter.
There are too many compromises on phones with removable batteries. They are far thicker and bulkier/heavier with much smaller batteries (think Nokia), or have extremely cheap and thin back covers that never stay flush with the phone (think Samsung). A back that can pop out doesn't do much for durability, nor do breakable clips and covers that never quite SNAP into place no matter how hard you push or no matter how many angles you try to insert it in.
This ceased to be an issue with the move from LiON to LiPo batteries a few years ago. It also ended my last argument in favor of user replaceable batteries. LiPo batteries simply do not lose capacity quickly like LiON do, although they do have lower energy density. Due to the additional space from integrated batteries that loss is more or less negated.
These days the more common reasons for shorter battery life over time are newer versions of the OS, or the 'cruft' that can build up over time(especially on Android devices) of background processes chewing up cycles and expending more power.
1. People are more turned off by the attitude presented towards MicroSD slots and the people who want them (specifically the snark), and that's not something you guys can rationalize away.
2. The cloud is *not ready yet.* The infrastructure simply is not there, and that's before you even take carrier bandwidth charges into account. You have vendors pushing cloud storage when cloud storage itself is heavily gated simply by the fact that oftentimes a good data signal simply isn't available. You could be in a sparsely populated area with virtually no connectivity, or a densely populated area (like a hotel) where the connectivity is just hammered.
3. We're losing MicroSD card functionality *before* onboard capacity has caught up. In some ways, people have actually been *losing* storage capacity in their devices over time because MicroSD is going the way of the dodo. During that same period, high definition video continues to become ever more prevalent, and more people want to bring their media collections with them. It would be one thing if MicroSD took a dirt nap because we were finally shipping phones with 32GB of onboard storage or better standard, at the lowest rung, but we're not. The Nexus 5 tops out at 32GB. Most everything else is 16GB standard.
It's the nature of the industry to push things before they're really ready (Sandy Bridge ultrabooks, etc.) But I can understand why some people are irritated by the lack of MicroSD in modern flagship phones and our snark about it in reviews. I honestly think we need to rein it in and try to continue to do one of the things we're supposed to be the best at: looking at things from the consumer's perspectives.
Not much else to say but +1. Brian is snarky. It's something I like about him, but I can definitely understand why it's not always appreciated by those who would like microSD slots.
Also, "This brings up a separate discussion about mobile network operators and usage based billing, but the solution there is operator revolution" made me wince a bit... sounds like wishful thinking.
Given that data contracts have regressed in generosity in the last 5 years in my home region of the UK (a vastly more competitive market than the USA!) I can say that this is a problem which will not magically go away through wishful thinking in tech articles.
If you want an SD card-equipped phone, buy one. Most people don't seem to want them or they'd all have them. It's like optical drives on notebooks, if people decide they've rather it be slightly smaller and not have one that that's from the manufacturers are going to produce.
The problem is that while the Android market has a ton of options, none of them are comprehensively feature-filled powerhouses. You've got a Nexus line that will always get the best development but are value-focused. Then you've got Galaxy phones that have all the hardware you could possibly want, but completely closed sources so non-TouchWiz ROMs are unstable and slow. Finally you have ask the other phones, which are a little more expensive for what you get, or lack some major features (SD slot, good display, reasonable size, efficient chipset, plus-sized battery, etc).
That's the major difference between mobile devices and PCs. You actually can get any PC configuration in any form-factor you want if you're willing to pay a price. But you can't Galaxy-style hardware in a Nexus-shell and with the Nexus community,
Google Play Edition just solves the bloatware complaint. The other problems, namely closed-source drivers, slow and time-limited updates that turn out to be much buggier than the initially-released version, still apply.
Probably too big for most people. I have the 5.5" LG Optimus Pro G with SD card slot and removable battery, and feel that that is already a little too big. It's real nice to use, but transporting it around could be easier.
Totally agree with Dustin Sklavos, but this is also a very important point.
There is an odd mindset among the Anandtech reviewers - on the one hand, they present us with "inevitable industry trends", saying "that ship has sailed" etc., implicitly abandoning their own responsibility to try to influence those trends. On the other hand, we are told, "if you care, you have options, go buy a Samsung" etc.
But even ardent advocates of removeable/user-replaceable batteries, and SD-cards, will admit that this is only one factor amongst many that goes into their choice of smartphone. Nexus phones are by far preferred by tech enthusiasts on the grounds of timely updates, lack of bloatware, and software customisation potential, yet these phones are the most crippled flagships around, always lacking in some major area such as camera, offered with very little built-in storage, and yes, no expandability (Nexus 4 didn't even have USB-OTG without engaging in a humungous hardware hack for external power injection with a Y-cable), and limited service life due to the non-removeable battery.
Anandtech loves to talk about the producer interest, banging on about how manufacturers have such a terrible time designing a sturdy removeable back cover, how they can shave cents off their production or warranty costs, but this site is primarily read by consumers of technology, and it is an enthusiast site. Enthusiasts have always wanted expandability, open hardware standards, and have always hated walled gardens, vendor lock-in, price gouging on upgrades for proprietary parts. This stuff is absolutely the DNA of computer technology going back to the struggles of Apple, Commodore, IBM, Microsoft, and Digital Research, and in my opinion Anand & Co. should absolutely be advocating for this group of enthusiast users, regardless of whether they be in a small minority.
N.B. For batteries, user-replaceability is what I most want rather than instant swapability, but there is little doubt that if a battery is removeable, it will be much easier both to buy a replacement and also to fit it.
It really isn't the same at all. The proportion of a notebook taken up by an optical drive is huge vs. the proportion of a mobile phone taken up by an SD slot, while nobody is going to have an optical drive with greater capacity than their non-removable built-in storage.
Glad to see common sense hasn't left AT's staff completely Dustin, thanks for the comments and perspective from someone who probably isn't provided an endless free supply of flagship smartphones.
Spot on Dustin, and I would just add that these kinds of issues are usually looked at from a first world perspective on tech sites including this one. My last three personal phones have been from the Nexus line, and I haven't been bothered by the lack of micro SD cards or non-replaceable batteries (in the Nexus4/5). However, I am cognizant of the fact that my upgrade pattern is *not* the norm, and would seem like an absurd waste to many people in developing countries. The majority of the population is pretty cost conscious, and they also have a reasonable expectation that their devices should last several years. That makes things like expandable storage and replaceable batteries pretty damn important for them. So while i get tired of people spamming every smartphone thread that lacks expandable storage or replaceable batteries, I also think the outlook from the reviewers needs to go beyond a first world/upgrade every year or two perspective.
"I would just add that these kinds of issues are usually looked at from a first world perspective on tech sites including this one."
Yes, and the phones for which this battery/microSD issue exists is largely for "first world" phones, which is a point you and many others might be missing here. Some of the key benefits of the omission of these features is reduced thickness (smaller size), and that is a major selling point for the class of elite-power phones and the markets that permit purchasing a phone annually (first world nations as you say).
Look to the third world with cheaper phones that aren't striving towards the thinnest form factors (and users that are replacing their phones less regularly) and it's not an issue.
Lenovo, for example, presents the perfect example. They offer a broad range of Android phones for China and other third-world-ish markets ( http://shopap.lenovo.com/in/en/smartphones/index.h... ). The broad range of users there drives Lenovo's product differentiation, and you see a whole range of phones from the elite: hyper thin first-world territory phones with no user replaceable battery or microSD, all the way down to the budget with both those things. And, the range inbetween offers a mix of the two depending on the segment targeted. I think this is a perfect example that shows that these features are market driven.
Thank you very much Dustin for this thoughtful comment. It's a reminder of what made Anandtech the go-to site, an impartial, fact-based, thorough analysis based on real-word testing and thinking about what's best for the consumer, rather than spending time in reviews talking about the intimate conversations with industry insiders.
What was sad to read recently is that following Brian's (phrasing this honestly) boasting about pushing for the megapixel camera race to be abandoned and his supposed success in seeing HTC release the One, his follow up in the Max admits that the tradeoff introduced wasn't what he expected, and that performance suffered. Pushing for better standards, or improved diversity, or different thinking as a reviewer is a good thing. Boasting about getting things changed, and then having to admit your ideas were a net loss to the consumer is a little embarrassing for all concerned.
"All else being equal, removable storage and user replaceable batteries aren't inherently bad things."
That's one way of saying it. But of course you could have said they are great things, which they are (all things being equal). All else being equal a user replaceable screen would be great. Also a shell, SOC, ram, etc...
Switching to a Nexus 5, the thing I miss the most is getting back home (or reaching in my pocket), swapping out a fully charged thin battery and being back to 100% in 20 seconds. My friends on iPhones worry about where or how to charge up next. Not a knock on iPhone, just that geek android users like myself are generally more savvy about conserving power.
YMMV. I live in a major city and am always on the go versus when I lived in the burbs and sat on my butt most of the time. So lifestyles play a huge part in this decision. I hope my next phone has a removable back!
You miss getting home, disassembling your phone thereby having it turned off (regardless or what you were doing) just so you put in another battery instead of charging it up? Not to mention you then need a separate charging device for those batteries which are usually too unique and therefore need to put back into the original device so they can be charged up which then requires doubling up on the “musical chairs” game you claim you miss so much. Do you know framed up that sounds?
It's much easier to just bring a cheap, external charger for the rare* occasion you need to boost your battery pack, and if you have a common phone you can then buy one that doubles as a case. Many of these can charge both batteries at once from a single cable, but all can charge both batteries at the same time without requiring you to get up in the middle of the night to switch battery packs.
* Rare is of course dependent on usage requirements and if you choose a device with both a good quality battery and good battery life for its power needs.
It takes 10 second to change a phone battery. Another 20-30 to reboot your device. All less than minute.
The charging device I have to charge phone batteries is universal and was uber cheap on Amazon (look up Anker).
I guarantee you carrying a slim phone battery is better than an obtrusive portable charger that needs to be connected to tour phone with a wire. I know at this point it just sounds like me trying to convince you, but I've done both and it worked out great and for many others on the go.
Personally I wouldn't trust a random battery charger that directly hooks into your phone's battery. There are already possible problems with USB chargers and that's a standard...
That and your use case accounts for something smaller than a blimp on the OEMs' radar. It's not even visible from there.
Been doing it for over 2 years on my previous phone batteries. Never a problem.
Say what you want about people not needing replaceable batteries. Not everyone wants the same thing in a phone, hence the reason this article was written in the first place.
You also probably think rebooting your phone 10x a day is normal but it's not.
And I have no idea what you mean about an obtrusive portable charger or something that needs to be connected to your phone with a wire. This is what I used I used to have with my early iPhones when I traveled. When I got low on power I'd pop that on while it's in my pocket or bag and it would charge back up rather quickly, yet I didn't have the additional bulk of doubly protected battery packs and cheap doors on phones to take apart just to something as simple as charge a battery. • http://www.amazon.com/Kensington-Battery-Extender-...
With the newer iPhones they last all day even when LTE because they didn't jump the gun with power sucking LTE chips.
PS: How exactly do you charge up all your internal batteries at once?
Let's keep it civil please and stop assuming. I rarely reboot my phone and it normally lasts all day. Those weekends where I'm out most of the time and away from a charger, or for something like an all-day festival, a spare battery is a godsend.
I really like the charger you linked (compared to the bulky wired ones), but would prefer to not add more real-estate to my phone. I only need one other battery for those instances when I need more power and use this to keep it charged: http://amzn.com/B009USAJCC
Having a big non-replaceable 3000 mAh battery in the LG G2 is nice but having (2) 2600 mAh batteries for 5200 total for something like the GS4 is more appealing/useful for many. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to have a single internal battery that would last all weekend with LTE and constant use, but we're not there yet (unless you have something like a Note3 or Droid Maxx).
ou want to carry around an additional internal battery so you can stop what you're doing midday to turn OFF your phone to replace a battery which you then have to go again after you get home to charge up the dead battery you have no depleted or carry around a big bulky universal internal battery charger that frankly looks pretty shoddy?
Suit yourself but I'd rather that once every few months occurrence when I'm traveling to pop the item I showed onto my phone in my bag or pocket for a couple minutes to get it to charge up the internal battery so I don't have the issues you mention, never once having to turn OFF my phone or take it apart. I've grown past wanting to build my own PCs, too. I really just want things to work as smoothly as possible, not come with a bunch of parts I can play with it.
Just curious but why are you putting the word "off" in caps every time? I just rebooted my phone and it took 22 seconds to get back to the home screen. Not really a big deal for me...
The dude's handle is solipsism, I don't think you're going to convince him that a way of doing things he doesn't agree with is in any way meaningful or relevant.
And every time you switch your battery your phone is turned OFF. It's perfectly fine if you're OK with powering down, taking apart, switching components, and turning your phone back on in order to get a decent battery life, as well as having to buy an additional component you need to travel with just to charge the battery or else do your "musical batteries" maneuver twice to charge the other battery in the middle of the night, but this is not the simplest or most common action make or want. You need to accept that your method, while perfectly fine for you, is as archaic as one of the asshats on AT saying that people that don't build their own PCs shouldn't own one.
Haha and "YOU" need to "ACCEPT" that just because tons of other people do something that "YOU" don't do it's not weird or archaic. Or are you just playing up to your username?
Can't you just buy one of those cases with large integrated batteries? I mean, if you have to carry extra batteries around, I don't see why not just integrate it all together. Nowadays, 90% of the phone is nothing but the battery anyway. You won't need to deal with removing the back cover and wearing it down or the phone, you won't have to worry about losing your spare batteries, and you won't have to deal with the whole physical operation or having to turn off your phone and swapping batteries and waiting for your phone to turn on again, saving precious minutes of busy city life. No downtime. Your phone will always be on.
Less than a minute to get your phone back to 100% battery life vs having it attached to the wall (or carry around a wired charger)? Not sure where you're seeing the benefit in the latter.
Been doing that to two Android devices for years previously and nothing ever broke. And never lost a battery either. Would prefer not to add bulk to my phone with a thick battery case.
As someone who does cyanogenmod nightlies, i have a need for the micro sd slot, constant nandroid and titanium backups destroy my storage, and i have had to reformat my internal 5 times so far just because i keep losing it, i can just put important things on the external, format, and be on my way, although removable batteries i could care less about as i have a portable 7000mAH charger if needed
If you can get like a 20% increase in battery life, for internal, and unremoval batteries, I'd rather have a exchangeable battery. That'll be 200% battery charge compared to the 120%. Now Anand's claim that laptop batteries have moved on to be non-exchangeable is quite sensible, I think Anand missed the size of the batteries of phones and laptops. Phone batteries are quite small. And I think due to this smallness, people like me might want to keep extra batteries in our backpacks just in case. Unlike laptops, phones are more essential in daily life. You need these things to make emergency calls(like tell someone you'll be running 4 minutes late, etc). Laptops aren't used for such emergency (well not as much)
So, yeah, I think in conclusion I prefer exchangable batteries.
But again, non-exchangeable batteries do seem to make the phone more well made... More sturdy, firm, and perhaps results in a better finish. I myself got a nexus 5, and because the nexus 5 does have some great form I'm happy with it. But being a former galaxy nexus user, and since I had kept spare batteries in my backpack, the fear of drying out of battery in the middle of nowhere does give me the spooks....
"I'm personally more interested in seeing the price of internal storage decrease, and the performance increase. We stand to gain a lot more from advocating that manufacturers move to higher capacities at lower price points and to start taking random IO performance more seriously."
The authors' logic is overall sound and well taken, but at the end, what incentive or gain (do the authors reason or forsee) exists for manufacturers to lower the price of additional internal storage?
Are there any? It'd be nice to know. Or is this more of just a whimsical wish? (And are we customers doomed to be fleeced for higher corporate profit margins?)
If the author's wish of the SD card going the way of the dodo comes true then there will be no incentive whatsoever for that to happen because there will be 0 competition. It is a whimsical wish. If there was any desire for these companies to compete with each other they'd have started already. As it is, the indication is that since the arrival of the iPhone, every manufacturer has struggled to find a way to raise their prices rather than lower them.
I'm curious as to how SDcard performance really matters. How fast does a card need to be to load a 25mb app into memory? If I can stream my HD video or off line sat nav maps does it really need to be any faster?
I'm also curious as to the "trends" you mentioned. It would be interesting to see a break down of phone numbers sold with/without sdcards rather than just saying that there's more models being made without SDcard slots (that may well have appalling sales figures).
The thing is all things are not equal. Apple charges $200 for a 48GB increase in internal storage. A new class 10 microSD card costs $42 for a 64GB increase in storage. That's a huge value proposition for consumers and if there was more of an end-consumer focus on this site, microSD support wouldn't be just a 'nice' feature, but a praised 'must-have' feature UNTIL manufactures stop abusing customers. There's too much no man's land in your comments - microSD isn't needed but manufactures don't offer reasonable alternatives today.
And those buying large capacity iPhones I'd bet are generally filling up the extra storage with the exact type of media that is ideal for microSD - music, movies, and photos.
Reviewers seem to sometimes live in their own world - if the world operated within their reality distortion field, the HTC One would be the best selling Android phone in the world. Instead, HTC is losing money and no longer a top 5 manufacturer.
First, this article and its arguments have somewhat put to rest my DIY foolishness and the resulting resentment that I can't open my N4 up in any way. Not mentioned but supporting the point about carrying replacement batteries around is that there are now many good universal rechargeable batteries on the market. People can exercise that option without being able to open their phones. Also, I particularly liked the witty toss away, "but the solution there is operator revolution." Well done!
On the Note for Battery. How much more Battery life could we squeeze out? Since Battery Capacity just simply isn't improving. Assuming we could have CPU running 4x more powerful at the current lowest state of battery level. Which means most of the multi tasking in background should no longer sucks up much battery life. Assuming we get even better Display Screen Tech in the pipeline and those extreme efficient LED, assuming Stacked Memory comes in, assuming better LTE controller and state of art Antenna system.
Even with all of these aren't going to get us double the battery life. More like 30 - 40% max. And some of these are theoretical.
So I think the answer in the short term isn't about getting bigger battery. Is that Battery needs to recharge superfast that makes most battery problem non issue. If you could fully charge a battery in less then a minute?
Non-techie persons like my wife's co-teachers find it easier to swap music and videos using SD card on their Android devices. My wife is envious as she's using an iPhone and cannot get how to put music on her phone. She is non-techie well..
How on earth can somebody find it easy to put files between two drives but find it hard to manage one? I mean, I don't think its hard to manage two drives at all. My thirteen year old sister gets it. But the idea that its easier than one? That makes no sense...
It might be easier or harder because of the OS, but not because of the number of drives...
You're physically swapping the "box" your "stuff" is in, rather than managing an abstract file location. I get what you're saying but I can also see why a non-technical person might find the former easier than the latter.
One can't really compare MicroSD storage to internal storage. It's the same as popping an SD card into your computer and relying on that for every day use. It's going to be slow, unreliable and just isn't the best solution. Otherwise everyone would be doing this on their PCs and laptops with cheap USB flash drives and what not. It is sub optimal and that isn't what these devices are truly made to do, marketing aside. I'm not contesting that internal storage upgrades aren't overpriced but the fact is that the microSD card in phones is on life support and will only hang around where performance isn't an issue. No manufacturer wants their flagship feeling slow because the knockoff class 4 SD card in it is locking up the controller and giving flaky performance. They can't control the experience and only a small subset of the population are the ones making the most noise about this without much of a dent in sales so the choice becomes clear.
Also, I've never met one person who carried an extra battery for a phone since perhaps 2005 on a blackberry. The only thing that I've ever used them for is doing a hard reboot and I've replaced a couple of batteries that have died. Not to say that the replacement can't be done easily on something like an iPhone with the right tools anyways. Also the rumor about draining the battery completely is not accurate any more. The charge controllers do a great job at managing the chemistry. I've been opportunistically charging for about 5 years and my phone almost never dies.
If you haven't met anyone who carries an extra battery, then I guess we haven't met.
Unlike my iPhone-toting friends, I do not drag a charger everywhere with me and sprint around airports like a madman looking for an open outlet. I do not whine "noooooooo!" when my phone runs out of juice. I just swap in a spare.
If your "iPhone toting friends" aren't able to plan ahead and buy a $20 external battery pack that works with any device, then why do you think they'd be capable of planning ahead enough to buy a second battery if it were easily swappable?
I don't personally swap batteries anymore because I now use a phone with an inaccessible battery, but it's not that hard to realize that having a battery pack handy and attaching it for 30-60 minutes is not anywhere nearly as convenient as swapping out the battery in 30-60 seconds when you're out of juice.
Except today you can buy relatively cheap, fast storage for your computer in sizes 2 orders of magnitude larger than available on phones. So trying to compare them is a bit foolish.
One of the first posters nailed it - it's not that microSD is here for the long term. But as long as manufactures don't offer larger storage options and/or abuse you on price, microSD support can be very compelling. A Sandisk class 10 64GB card costs $42 on Amazon.
And I find it amusing when people continue to make comments that only a small subset care, yet Samsung phones dominate the Android phone market. But hey - it's working out great for HTC.
HTC has bigger problems beyond micro SD cards and removable batteries. I wouldn't want to compete against Samsung. They are ruthless in their pursuit of market domination. I also don't agree that the removable battery and micro SD card are to credit for anything more than a few percent of sales. Nobody abuses anyone on price in the handset market except the carriers because of the enormous selection and competition. But I agree that 8-16 GB on a phone isn't enough. I get minimum 32 on my iPhones. I don't like paying the extra money but as an engineer I would have made the same choice if designing a premium/flagship device. I've known more people who have had SD card failures (5) than who have not bought a phone because of an SD card.
No you are not. I am speaking for the developing market where one of the major question is how large a memory card one can insert. And if the seller says there is no expandable memory, you understand what the reaction would be.
Part of it may be due to who the authors of this article are. They aren't your typical consumer, they have a biased point of view.
I am in south Korea at the moment. 90% of people have Samsung. Most people (yes most) on the subway watch videos etc on their phone. Yesterday I saw someone switch out their battery on the subway on their Samsung phone.
In the "real world" people don't use their phones like Anand and Brian do. Their use cases are remarkably different I would speculate.
You're saying most people use an SD card and swap batteries?!
I've literally never seen someone swap a battery, and barely see SD cards. Most people I see (nj/nyc) just have iPhones. I have a Droid DNA, GF has a nexus. We just carry chargers around... no non-nerds ever carry batteries around.
I fully understand the need for both of these, but some seriously high % of people don't give a crap and never notice either way. Its techies that talk on sites like this that will fight about it. A new smartphone is at least 16GB... more than enough for most people's music collection.
You realize that same argument applies in a reverse way to lonyo's argument?
Anecdotal evidence ALWAYS sucks. And unless somebody has hardcore statistics, we have to assume that marketing experts at these companies know what they're doing.
Apple has no microSD, Samsung does. Both companies are very very successful. Its not as simple as "well Samsung has microSD and HTC doesn't" because one could easily say that Apple has no microSD yet sells more flagship phones than Samsung.
My argument isn't that everyone uses SD cards and swaps batteries. My argument is that Anand and Brian aren't everyone, and in the real world there are people who use SD cards and swap batteries. Hence the entire point of people arguing with Anand/Brian in the first place.
They have their own opinions which are likely not based on (global) facts and use cases, and hence they have a biased point of view, although Anand certainly does travel, such as to trade shows, he's still US based and focused.
Maybe there's a reason Samsung still has removable batteries and MicroSD cards on pretty much all their phones.
I'm mostly in agreement. I'd like to be able to take apart a phone and replace the battery if it could be done in 20 minutes or less for repair purposes. We have all see when a phone battery door won't stay on. My daughter has one like that. That doesn't happen to iPhones. However, plenty of other things happen to iPhones.
The cost of NAND in phones is ridiculous and the performance sucks. I hate restoring from backups. Apple, your storage is too slow. I have a 32 GB device and can't imagine the time suck of restoring a 128 GB device that is full.
I think as the devices get bigger, I am more likely to expect the external storage ports. Tablets and up.
SD cards are beneficial for increasing storage and being able to move data from one device to another, by simply moving the SD card. Another benefit of SD cards is that they do not suffer the excessive price bumps that internal storage does.
With regard to removable batteries, I do not use multiple batteries, I use a much bigger battery. I went from a standard 2600mAh S4 bettery to a 7500mAh ZeroLemon battery. It lasts incredibly long. Two days to a full charge, and less than 7 hours to fully charge. I have yet to ever wonder where the next outlet for my charger is going to be.
I will take my SD card and extended battery over a unibody design with limited storage and battery life.
> Another benefit of SD cards is that they do not suffer the excessive price bumps that internal storage does.
That's really the OEM's fault, and the consumer's for accepting it. It has nothing to do with cost. Internal storage costs just as much as a class 10 microSD card. It's just that OEM's want to nickle and dime us for even a little extra internal storage. We need to start protesting against that.
Next year all high-end devices should START with 32 GB as default, with an option for 64 GB for $100 more, and in 2015, they should start at 64 GB and an option for 128 GB for $100. I've seen the prices. If they do this, they would be making at least half of that in profit. Most people only think it's not possible because Apple charges an outrageous $300 more for 128 GB, when in fact it costs them only $60 to add it.
The question is, how does the consumer not accept that situation without either: a) Not buying a phone (vote lost) b) Buying a phone with Micro SD storage and using that?
That's why this article is very, very blinkered in its attitude.
I had a Dell Latitude D810 laptop with a spare battery that fit into the DVD slot. So I could swap between an extra battery or DVD drive. I loved that and usually had the battery in. The extra battery over an optical drive was a good trade off. I rarely use the optical drive, but I do need it on occasion. A USB bus powered optical drive would be ideal for me.
That's the only reason why I want a microSD. I can get a 32GB for $20. That's 48GB if you count the included 16GB onboard. 16GB alone is woefully small, made even smaller by the few GB taken by the system files and cache. And phonemakers make it extremely hard to ditch microSDs when they are so stingy and use 16GB as their only available size. 32GB and 64GB are always unavailable, and if they are, the availability is limited and price is extortion level. Some phonemakers, like HTC, make it extremely hard to want their phones if they insist on making unibody designs with no expansion but only have 16GB models available. The most hilarious one is the Nexus 4, which only came with 8GB on the $299 model. Like Anand said, the NAND prices needed to come down, but even at current rates, it's not cost prohibitive. More like phonemakers have been following Apple's high profit margin business strategy for too long, and won't concede on the memory. How long have we been stuck with 16GB as the standard? Memory prices have definitely dropped since then.
I think phones can't be compared to laptops for three reasons when it comes to external batteries:
1. External chargers make multiple battery management easier. This is great for the one or two really long days a year when carrying a spare in the pocket is worth it, like on vacations. Also saves wear on the charging port.
2. We rely on our phone more. Your laptop dies and maybe an deadline is missed. Your phone dies and you can be lost or worse.
3. Use while charging with a laptop is much nicer. Being tethered to the wall at the end of a long day sucks. An external battery is smaller in the pocket than a power pack.
I think the desire for Micro SD slots typically boils down to a combination of three things.
1) Cost. As the author pointed out upgrading the storage on any phone is at least several times more expensive than what an MicroSD card costs. Apple may be one of the worst of the bunch charging $100 to upgrade from 16 to 32gbs of storage. A 16 micro SD card cost 10-15$. The author did a pretty good on pointing this out.
2) Total storage. A Micro SD slot lets you add a 64gb card which is as big or bigger than the internal storage options available on many phones. On top of that you can carry multiple cards if you really need more space and larger cards are possible just not readily available at this point. The author kinda covers this with his 32/64/128gb sizes but doesn't really highly that in particular.
3) Future expandability. Most of the US at least is still stuck with 2 year contracts as the norm or paying ridiculous prices to upgrade more frequently. Sure X may be enough right now but I can't necessarily predict how things might change in the next 2 years. With no micro sd slot you are stuck with what you've got. This would be less of an issue if 1 wasn't such a big issue too. Personally I just got an iPhone 5s and had to think about what size I wanted for a while. I never filled up the 10gb of combined storage on my t-mobile g2 so I figured the base 16gbs would be enough but still wondered about upgrading. Ultimately, #1 lead me to stick with the base size as I just couldn't stomach spending $100 for 16gb more space just because I might need it at some point in the future.
The notion that a microSD slot must negatively affect design is false. GSM phones which are unibody without a removable battery all have SIM slots that are externally accessible, all that's needed is a similar slot for microSD. While there are other factors, I'm pretty sure profit is the main motivator, and I fully agree that if storage increases were priced sanely there would be a lot less griping, but paying $50 for 16GB of NAND is offensive.
OK I love you guys, I do, but you really need to take a step back before you write these articles: "Once you start looking at it through the lens of a manufacturer trying to balance build quality, internal volume optimization and the need for external storage, it becomes a simpler decision to ditch the slot"
The problem with your site is that it's read by people who are not tech idiots. The "lens" of the manufacturer is pretty clearly more about margins than anything else. Otherwise we'd not even be having this discussion.
I 100% agree with you on the battery thing. People can and should buy battery extenders if they really run out of juice that much. The ability to put a bigger battery in the phone is a win.
The SD slot though is all a lie until we stop getting hosed $200 for 48 GB of extra storage.
Manufacturers have found ways to add slots for Micro SD. They just choose margins.
Also Windows Phone handles SD cards pretty well. You just set the SD card as the default save for your media and you never know you have a card in. But heaven forbid you mention Windows Phone.
Not exactly with you on the choosing margins comment. What I feel it comes down to is actually looking at customer's usage. How many people use microSD cards in their smartphones? If you look at 100% of the smartphone user base, what percent of that base would actually have a microSD card in and use it? 20%? 40%? 5%? I highly doubt more than 40%, which I will present the following points/issues.
1. You have to add the microSD card spot/reader to the device. (slight BoM increase) 2. You also have to pay a licensing fee w/M$ for the usage of fat32.
Considering that less than half of your targeted customer base will use one, why should manufacturers add microSD storage to every device? Things are just fine the way they are now. Most budget phones with microSD (so a manufacturer can gimp internal storage to save money - also explains another user comment about usage in a country other than America), and only 1 in 4 flagships on average with it (mimicking the actual user base).
The whole removable battery is moot to me. Too many external universal portable battery solutions to meet anyone's needs and as stated battery tech has increased endurance over time. But to say anything is on it's way out isn't reality. Companies will look at their demographic and cater their product lineup to eat as much of that profit pie that they can.
Sammy's overall numbers account for a much broader customer base as they sell various models for various budgets. Not a fanboy here, I have a N5. Every phone - and I mean every phone - I had owned prior to my N5 had a microsd slot (even going back 5-6 years when I was rocking a Nokia E63). Can't say that I miss it too much, but I do have the 32 gig N5.
It's amazing that the authors won't talk about the most important reason from the manufacturer's point of view not to have external storage - margins. C'mon, if Apple were feeling generous they would charge $20 for upgrading to 32GB vs $100 they charge now and still have a 50% incremental margin. But no, they gotta rob you and everyone else sees that and they want to rob you too. why not!
"Once you start looking at it through the lens of a manufacturer trying to balance build quality, internal volume optimization and the need for external storage, it becomes a simpler decision to ditch the slot" Just talk about the margins buddy. that is more important than all the reasons you have mentioned above.
About the removable battery, yes, build considerations come into play, but definitely not for removable storage. That's just a margin play!
I like how the battery argument is structured - perhaps a 125% capacity integrated battery & sleeker profile vs. 100% capacity removable one. I see your point here.
However, for external storage, I feel a bit differently. There are too many devices shipping with 16GB configs and SDXC can easily add 64GB or soon 128GB. In this case, instead of a 25% gain for not having SDXC, it feels like a 3x-8x penalty to me. The UI issues are valid, but it is just software and can be overcome. I think google and others are against it because they are pushing for the cloud for everything.
That was a rather snarky and condescending article. Some of the comments here are even worse; some even going so far as to tell other people what they should be doing. Please stop.
Anyway, back on topic.
There are several reasons for both removable batteries and storage.
Batteries - You can go from next to no charge, to full charge in a matter of seconds. - You have greater capacity in total. - Larger capacity batteries can be added.
Yes, you do need to charge the extra batteries. There are ample third party chargers out there though, if there isn't a decent first party one. Getting an plug with two USB ports is a good idea.
There are people for whom a larger non-replaceable battery would be beneficial, but I have some issues with this: - I haven't seen any significantly greater capacities as a result - I have seen many people asking for a charger, - I have witnessed on multiple ocassions people charging their phones where they were not welcome
An external battery pack is good, but it doesn't provide an instant full charge and as a result will end up leaving you with a cable dangling from your phone.
Storage: - Current internal capacities aren't enough for some people - Internal storage is ridiculously priced - Allows for a greater capacity to be carried - provides an alternative option for data transfer
Please don't point to cloud storage. Availability, speed, cost and battery drain all go against it. Only really in urban areas is it reliable, but then there are the congestion issues.
The article is snarky and condescending, but perhaps it is frustration because many of the commenters and folks who raise this as an issue miss the point.
All the points you raise are largely correct (though I would disagree with the "greater capacity in total, as the article shows, within a phone's original design spec (that part is key), a nonremovable battery wins on capacity), but they still inevitably miss the point.
Engineering or design or making a product is always about trading off and balancing competing considerations. Like I said before, the majority of the points you raise are true, but you feature no discussion of their drawbacks. Just because the drawbacks are trivial to you does not mean they are trivial in the marketing and sales of a phone. Furthermore, when determining what design compromises to make, phone manufacturers will look to their target market and what the market wants.
In this regard, it appears that the market has largely spoken. While a minority of hardcore enthusiasts/hobbyists prefer the removable battery and microSD (and I think they are great too), Apple made a gamble a long time ago that people would largely not miss them... and by the vast sales of iOS devices (and we are talking total user base, not phone to phone as the GS3/GS4 have been quite competitive), it is evident that consumers largely do not miss these feature and will take smaller size and cleaner/more attractive design.
Who cares about Apple? Apple is relentlessly promoting a view of the personal computer which is never opened, upgraded or in any way modified by the user. And they push for the same thing in the phone arena.
I would have thought AT members are precisely the kind of people who like to upgrade their computers, open them up, tinker with them, and so on. We may or might not represent a user majority, but that's besides the point.
Anand and Brian are trying to sell us the moral equivalent of a completely closed computer system, in which all the components are soldered inside a sealed shell. Which is ironic, considering that if computers would have been like this from the beginning, Anand would not have had a site at all.
Anand it is sad to see you reiterating the same biased viewpoint as Brian with regard to removable batteries and microSD cards.
I really think you are both out of line here as I can guarantee you the overwhelming % of your readers do not get free smart phones to review to the point it becomes tedium for you, or have product review budgets that allow for top-of-the-line, storage to the max, price-be-damned flagship units without exception. Dismissing these important, differentiating features that clearly add value to a product does your readership a great disservice, imo.
-Battery: Would I rather have an insignificant 15% more battery life that tethers me to an outlet throughout the day, or 100% or more swappable battery life with the ability to charge 2 batteries simultaneously (1 on phone, 1 on charger)? I would go with 2 batteries, especially if I needed 24 hours of uninterrupted usage while on business travel or on vacation. 1 battery on me, charging when I can, 1 battery charging in the office, hotel, etc. Best of both worlds.
-MicroSD: Would I like to spend 50-100% ($100-$200 on contract) more on a phone for 48GB more storage? Or would I rather spend $35-50 for 64GB more storage that is compatible with thousands of other devices also? Sure it is slower, but I know for a fact you are a proponent of this very same heterogenous storage configuration on desktop PCs (fast SSD + slower HDD), why do you feel smartphone users are too stupid to grasp and adopt this simple usage pattern?
-Flagship devices and microSD cards: I keep seeing you and Brian repeat microSD going the way of the dodo, but all I see are more devices adopting it to alienate the few that choose not to include a microSD slot. Virtually all non-Apple or non-Google devices in their respective markets are adding microSD, especially in the tablet space (both Android and Windows devices). In the flagship smartphone market, you just did a review on the HTC One Max that deviated from previous HTC designs by *ADDING* microSD. Do you think the 2014 successor to the HTC One will have a microSD slot or not?
In summary, I am really not sure what your motives are when you interject your own preferences over those of your readership. Failing to empathize with your readers only serves to alienate when you should be speaking up for what we want. Take a step back and think about it, if you didn't review tech for a living, would you want to pay these exorbitant prices for something that for all intents and purposes, does just as well for a fraction of the price?
Normally I'd be inclined to agree, but in this case these two guys on the internet do have a greater voice and direct access to mfgs and OEMs. It really is a shame they take their own insulated viewpoints and usage patterns as gospel.
Which is again, a flawed analysis if you are starting with the entire smartphone market. Why concern yourself with what entry-level users prefer on a flagship device that's only targeting the top 15-20% of the market? Similarly, why bother adding enthusiast features like K chips, Turbo, SLI etc. if you are going to claim only a tiny % of the CPU/GPU market is interested in these features?
If they want to speak for the mass market, make that clear and leave that discussion out of high-end flagship device reviews. But we know that's not the case, we know AT can't be bothered to review anything less than upper tier smartphones, anything less wouldn't justify Klug reaching into his pocket and pulling out his SIM card removal tool.
The mass market is buying high-end flagship mobile devices though, that's the thing. Apple's annual iteration of the iPhone is both mass-market and is unquestionably high end (the PowerVR GPU used in iOS devices dominated the GPUs available in Android devices for years, until possibly recently, and even then, it's a push, and the same goes for the CPU in terms of performance and efficiency--the latest Apple A7 SoC with its 64-bit ISA and 6-wide design).
And it appears the market has spoken, Apple devices (iPhones, iPads, iPod Touches) have a huge portion of the market, and Android devices are split amongst those with removable batteries and MicroSD cards.
I won't bother to research/estimate how many there are in each camp, but suffice it to say that if not a majority of devices lack SD slots/batteries, then at least half do, and that's probably a safe enough reason not to penalize companies that decide to omit them. ("Where reasonable minds differ....")
And it seems that thinness is just as much an important "high end" *and* mass market spec as removable batteries and SD cards.
You will never see Apple products described as flagship, they are decidedly mid-range devices carrying a huge luxury tax with 1 or 2 features that justify that tax to their targeted end-users (ex: "Retina" screen resolution, A7 SoC in latest iPhone).
The rest of the device is 1 or 2 generations back, if not more. Apple's lustre is not it's cutting-edge flagship status, it is it's ease of use which is precisely the market that is disinterested in advanced features like microSD and removable batteries and obviously not the one targeted by flagship device makers.
So no, the mass market isn't buying flagship phones, they are buying free with contract phones or last year's iPhone offered free or at a discount. Of course Apple has a huge marketshare as the 1st smartphone maker but that share has also dwindled and never catered to users who demanded more functionality to begin with.
Once you take Apple out of the equation, you see who dominates the high-end flagship smartphone market. Samsung's S and Note series flagships are clearly head of the class. Even though HTC's One was often reviewed as well or better than the S4, it still lagged in sales with the lack of microSD and removable battery cited as major reasons as to why it lost to the S4. And now, as a reactionary measure, HTC released the One Max with removable battery and microSD slot, coincidence? I think not.
Also, if you are going to start bringing in other aesthetics or usable features, then surely you must bring screen size into the discussion? Sure thinness matters, but so does screen size right? ;)
If you cannot concede that Apple iOS devices are state of the art and are by far flagship technology smartphones, we can't have a conversation. In multiple, multiple places in Android and iOS reviews, the AnandTech staff have pointed out the superiority of iPhone hardware, and Android developers are just beginning to catch up in some areas (and still fall short in others). And this is coming from a guy who has never owned an iPhone and exclusively uses Android devices. When the Tegra 3 was released, it only had 1/5th the GPU power of the current iOS SoC. The current Apple A7 blows away any other ARM SoC and even outclasses Intel x86 Atom CPUs with its super wide instruction crunching design.
So seriously, if you can't admit that 1) Apple offers class leading designs and hardware, 2) that they (currently) sell and (historically) have sold incredibly well, and 3) lack a removable battery and microSD, then you're not arguing from a position of intellectual honesty.
Finally, the Galaxy S series and the Note have done quite well, this is true, but when you look at the whole ecosystem, they're far from a majority or even half of devices. Definitely not a "mandate" by consumers, and so, one would be justified in not penalizing mfrs in reviews for not having one.
I don't care about removable batteries, but I have over 100 GB of music in my collection, and I'd like to be able to carry most, if not all, of that on my smartphone. Right now, I carry both a 160GB iPod classic and a Droid 4, but it would be nice to reduce that to a single device.
That's one of many reasons why I'm leaning toward the Note 3 for my next phone. (Along with performance, display size, multitasking features, and the stylus.)
Sure, I'd rather have 128GB internal than 64GB internal + 64GB micro SD, but who offers a 128GB internal Android phone? Ideally, I'd like to have a 256GB internal Android phone, but that may be a couple years away.
First article I've laughed at -- quite a few silly arguments (all things equal when they're not -- you pay 150$ for 32->64GB of storage, and almost no phones offer higher than that, performance arguments when external storage is largely used for constant bitrate video.
And realistically that's the usage case right now. How many people have more than 32GB of apps that they need on high performance NAND? Great. They can go buy a high-performance SD card at significant discount from a manufacturer internal upgrade.
And if they just need slow storage for their music they can get a 20$ 32GB card.
I don't generally think there's a winning argument on battery, though admittedly after a 200$ repair bill to replace a faulty battery (probably 40$ if it was user replaceable) maybe I'm a bit sour.
Some relevant quotes reading the comments. What an embarrassment of an article -- regardless of your stance.
"Part of it may be due to who the authors of this article are. They aren't your typical consumer, they have a biased point of view.
Anand it is sad to see you reiterating the same biased viewpoint as Brian with regard to removable batteries and microSD cards.
That was a rather snarky and condescending article. Some of the comments here are even worse; some even going so far as to tell other people what they should be doing. Please stop.
OK I love you guys, I do, but you really need to take a step back before you write these articles. You are embarassing your site"
"The move away from removable batteries allows for better use of internal volume, which in turn increases the size of battery you can include at the same device size. There are potential build quality benefits here as well since the manufacturer doesn't need to deal with building a solid feeling removable door/back of some sort."
Thats a cop out excuse. They just need to think outside the box and design a phone around the removable battery. the only time it would save volume is if the phone has big rounded corners, and even then, custom batteries with rounded corners can be made.
The back casing and battery could be made into once piece and covered in metal, it doesn't have to be plastic. you can also design the battery pack in a way that is seamless. Just innovate.
Regarding removable storage, build it into the phone like a sim card like nvidia shield and a hand full of tablets do. the micro sd storage chip is near the same size as the nano sim, so it can be done, apple and others just refuse to do this to sell you expensive upgrades that line their pockets with more money.
internal storage of all phones is just too small for my usage - i need at LEAST a 64GB memory card slot as well as the internal storage and i usually have multiple cards handy ready to use
speed and size of phone just doesnt matter as much to me as having a large amount of storage, if having a microsd card slot means i have to have a phone thats a few mm thicker then i can easily live with that
I'm not sure that I completely follow the logic that an integrated battery automatically means higher capacity. The Galaxy S4 has a higher capacity battery than an HTC One. And surely absolute battery capacity can't be that important... the iPhones have significantly smaller batteries than the Galaxies and how often is that a negative consideration in a purchase decision?
I understand both sides of this argument. What I don't understand though is the need for people to store tons of music on their phone. Use Xbox music, Spotify, or google music... Then you literally only need maybe a gig or so to cache enuf for offline periods like plane rides.
can someone explain this?
I used to have a 16 gig iPhone and I was always annoyed hoe i couldn't fit my music on it so I was really happy to get a Lumia 920 for the same price with 32 gigs. But I never use all the space because I don't store much music on it at all because I can get my whole collection any time with Xbox music.
what about movies? i dont have much of a data plan and i would probably use all 2gb of it up in a day of watching movies and listening to music, im NOT going to pay for a higher plan to watch my movies and listen to music when i can just get a phone with a sd card and store it all on there, MUCH cheaper
You'll use your whole data plan in one netflix movie. It uses a heck of a lot of battery to stream content which then requires a bigger battery when all you needed was a tiny little SD slot. I love streaming music, but it isn't a solution for a whole lot of users who don't have LTE or good connections and huge batteries. And streaming video is pretty much out except for the occasional youtube video.
yeah I dont watch videos. i dont have a netflix account or hulu or anything like that nor do I have cable and I rarely watch movies anywhere but in the theater... so I'm a weirdo.
What phone doesnt have LTE now days?
And for battery, my Lumia 920 only has a 2000mA battery and it doesnt mind streaming music all the time
I was the same and now mostly stream my music too however to do that you need both an unlimited data plan and good reception. Its pretty obvious why this would be a barrier for many people.
I also have my 64GB microSD card loaded with music for when I can't stream. Best of both worlds.
It's not just music, but there are bound to be times you don't have good wireless or wifi coverage that you will want locally stored music.
Another big usage benefit is video, not just commercial videos, but video you capture in every day life. Full 1080p/30 video takes up a lot of storage, on devices with only 16GB after OS and no removable storage, you can't really take much video without shuffling files around after a few videos. With 64GB you can take videos without even worrying about it.
Perhaps because we don't know in advance what media we will want to consume, so have all that we might want on our phones?
As for streaming:
- Reception is generally patchy in most countries outside urban and areas and in urban areas the networks are often overburdened and reception poor in buildings. - Decent quality requires at least 3G, which I'm pretty sure uses more power than streaming from a microSD card. - If you already own a lot of music, then streaming services are an added cost. - You don't need to plan (or do as much) planning of what media you are going to consume. - Streaming services can go down.
If your not going to penalize review scores for lack of expandable storage, then you need to start penalizing them on cost and cost of upgrades. This is the first time anand has really started to talk about apple's insane nand upgrade pricing, and i think their over-pricing deserves at least a paragraph in the reviews as a CON.
Right. I sure don't remember them talking about it in their REVIEWS when they praised them for how awesome they are and how worth it they are. They're only talking about it now after someone else lit this fire about storage prices.
Either way, I guess it's good that momentum is rising and people are finally starting to question them. The fact that Apple hasn't added 32 GB versions for the same price as last year, along with 2 GB of RAM in all of the new devices is only done out of PURE GREED, and getting that extra buck in profit - compared to last year, which was already insane profit.
Anyone who tries to defend them is just stuck in the reality distortion field. It has nothing to do with "draining battery life" or whatever. They are just BS excuses that "sound true", but they are not the MAIN reason why they did it - by far.
While I don't disagree with you about their pricing, invoking the G word is a bit much. It's a business, not a charity. They will price it at what their customers are willing to pay. And most of them are okay with it because they make a good product.
well as a person who gets a ipad every year, i have to tell ya, i sold my ipad 4th gen planning to get the newest ipad when it came out, but i never bought it due to me realizing it was gonna cost me $800 for a LTE ipad mini retina with 64GB. $800 for a mini tablet.........
The hilarious thing is that in the iPad review, Anand framed Apple's charge for the upgrade to 128Gb as "comparatively good value". I laughed 'til I cried.
microSD is never about design , the volume required is tiny compared to the volume of the entire phone and phones do have sim trays,some more than one ,if you have that you can have microSD too. It is about greed and sometimes phone makers might be forced into it by other players with leverage (way odd how few US phones have microSD). You also look at it from your POV only , most of the world doesn't have free wifi everywhere and no matter how much internal storage a device has,it is better to have a few microSDs in your pocket, at least until we have hundreds of GBs internal storage. I wouldn't even mind phones with 2 microSD slots that can be set up in RAID, that's so very doable and not all microSD cards are slow. Cloud storage is also NSA enabled. You defending a corrupted and greedy bunch of players in the industry does make one wonder about your motives. What's next advocating for non repleacable storage in PCs?
High end laptops don't have user replaceable storage already. My ultrabook doesn't, and I am ok with that. I prefer its small sleek form factor than one bigger with doors to get to internal components I'll never use.
First, there are several uses of removable batteries besides simply carrying around a bunch of extra batteries (something I don't do because both my Samsung Moment and Galaxy S4 are able to easily make it through my day). Samsung's S View cover are great examples of this, as they are essentially a battery door with an attached flip cover. Another is the ability to replace the battery once it starts degrading. As someone who used my past phone for over 3 years this came in handy when the original battery started degrading so I bought a new one for $5 and was good to go for another year until the GS4 came out.
And as for microSD card slots, it seems that everybody's making a huge deal about how they're slower than internal NAND but to be honest, in the past four years I've never had one instance that I wished I used internal storage instead. Not one. In my usage, the only two instances I'd ever notice a slowdown is if a) I was using the device's camera heavily (something I don't do because I prefer my NEX-3); or b) if I installed game data to the external card (again something I don't need to worry about because since all my media is on my microSD card, the internal storage has more than enough space for game data).
There's also been numerous instances where I needed to physically remove the microSD card from my device and insert into another, something not possible if microSD card slots were phased out of devices.
I wanted to write the exact same thing as your last paragraph.
"Hey bro, you shot some videos yesterday in our picnic. Can I have them in my laptop?" -"No. Get off you idiot, I will have to sit here for an hour giving them to you via blue tooth. I have better things to do like cleaning my storage to take some pictures of myself in the washroom."
As someone whose previous phone had both replaceable battery AND mircoSD (Nokia N900) I can say in my experience, the need for a (user) replaceable battery is negligible given the ubiquity of USB ports - that is remember to carry a USB cable with you (mine was 10cm long -small enough to always be plugged into the phone and not take too much space) and you're always close enough to power to charge enough for that call or email.
Having the ability to swap cards is wonderful and the ease of doing this made other people change their ideas on how to transfer media; I'd have the internal memory for apps (32GB) and the card (32GB) for music and videos. To my liking the only downside was the inability to change the default destination for photos from the internal storage to the card - this would have made media transfers even easier.
Currently I have a Nokia N9 (64GB) and I miss the ability to change cards. If it were a 16GB version I would have to change to a phone with >32GB OR took (mini or) micro SD cards
We like iPhones, so features it's missing simply don't count.
1. Why would internal storage prices ever decrease when you're already willing to pay exorbitant upgrade fees? By campaigning against microSD, you are ACTIVELY asking to be bent over a barrel now and for all time. 2. You seem to live in a world where Samsung, the largest smartphone OEM in the world, doesn't include these features on nearly every phone. Sure if you throw out the largest statistical outlier, any feature can be viewed as insignificant. 3. How can you NOT view expandable storage and user replaceable batteries as added value, and not count it as a strike against models missing these features? This dismissive attitude is not commensurate with the high level of detail I've come to expect from Anandtech. 4. Build Quality? You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. 5. Bringing up the speed of microsSD while advocating the merits of cloud storage is...ironic. Are you also on a planet where you get perfect data signal at all times and have no data caps?
All things being equal, it's not that your arguments don't have merit. It's just that you are being so dismissive about the other side, which lets be clear, is the dominant one!
Yeah. This piece is outrageous, well as outrageous as a hurriedly written piece in a tech blog can be. It's strange because it's basically a position statement when one wasn't necessary and that's throwing a lot of the readers off. What's the purpose of codifying in Anandtech review law that removable batteries and microSD cards are not desirable? It's supported by half-hearted arguments and the fact that two people co-wrote it makes it sort of sad. It's also irrational. The desirability of any feature in a phone is determined by how it affects the usability of the phone and whether it adds value. Anything else is a matter of taste.
Are you reading different page and commenting on this page? If you don't see usability and added value being mentioned in the article, then you must be searching the exact words and unable to find it.
I have come to accept that on this site, "build quality" is a subjective assessment referring to how far a device deviates from the norms prescribed by Apple.
I see the points of having both removable batteries and storage. But like usual the die hard fans of them just completely ignore all the negatives of them. And will pull out the good old B word like usual, oh you so bias.
My post will mainly be about sd cards. What I have not seen mentioned at all in the comments are some of the hugest draw backs to them. Yes they are good and useful to be used at media storage. For anything else they are complete pain in the you know what.
As Brian and Anand pointed out it is not officially supported by google. While that alone doesn't mean much the result is a mess. You will install some apps that will automatically move stuff aka install to sd. If you then swap out the card your app is screwed. This is also disaster for the average user to go through their app list and look for and then move the apps that allow it to the sd card. You will also loose the widgets for said apps once you do so. It is just a flat out mess period to deal with all that nonsense.
Also I see some folks are stuck on carrying around massive amounts of data. You're a very small minority people. Hardly anybody wants to carry around 100s of gb of data on their mobile device. You dont need 20k mp3s on your device. Nor do you need your entire movie collection. You are really just digital hoarders.
While there is definitely a need for expandable storage a device like a Samsung phone with 16gb on internal, That really ends up about half of that thanks to touchwiz. If you install your apps and game or two you could easily run out of space for media. Once you get up to a device with 32gb internal that really goes away for the most part.
Yet the few that are the most vocal are the ones that want to walk around with multiple sd cards caring over 100gb of data always with them seem to make the biggest fuss. Your usage case is really rare for cell phone.
Also you die hard fans of sd cards no exactly what they can and cant do with android. The average consumer has no clue. They will see the spec list at the store or on the box and see the expandable to 64gb via micro sd or whatever but have no idea how it actually works. Most will think their device will then perform as if it was a 64gb device. Which of course its not.
In closing it seems that no matter what the die hard fans of sd cards just will never except or will completely ignore all the drawbacks of them on android. Then there is also that fact the OEMs want to reduce as many things as possible the general public can break. There are some very good reasons to have a micro sd slot / card for some users. There are also very good reasons to not include them as well.
But for telling it like it is in the real world this crowd tosses around the B word and nonsense that the site is this and that.
I have always used microSD cards in my phone, I don't know why people can't wrap their heads around a simple fact: If DON'T have to use a card. If it looks complicated to you don't use it. Why do you not want the phone to even have a slot
Debunking: - No apps automatically install to SD, name one - Only google camera app does not support it. All apps (including file manager and gallery apps) support SD - I want to carry my music and movies , all 100 GBs of it. Why do you have a problem with that ?
Your argument ar non sense. Samsung use micro SD and removeable batteries and their smarpthones (like the Galaxy Note 3) have very good stock batteries without increasing the size (when compared to Xperia Z1 or HTC One Max). You have your theories, but in the real world, you don't have to choose between removeable battery and longer battery life.
I think it's very short-sighted to be using fixed batteries and no external storage options. Maybe if you are the kind of person that replaces their phones every year or two to have the latest thing, it doesn't matter to you.
My mother has an old iPhone 3GS - it was handed down to her when my sister upgraded to a 4s. The phone is in excellent condition and does everything that she needs - there's no reason at all for her to upgrade to something newer. But the battery is failing and often runs out before the end of the day now. Apple no longer services these phones and has just offered her a deal on buying a new phone instead. When the only thing wrong with the device is the battery, this just seems so wasteful. (I know you can do a DIY repair, but I don't trust those cheap Chinese batteries)
Another example would be when I recently repaired an original MacBook which had problems with its backlight turning off, and the battery lasting less than an hour. I swapped out the inverter cable (a $5 part) which fixed the backlight, and calibrated the display so while it's not the brightest screen, it looks better than new. I swapped out the 60GB hard drive with a 1TB SSHD, maxed out the RAM (I think it was 2GB) and bought a new battery for it. After cleaning it up and polishing the case, it almost looks as good as new, and is a surprisingly responsive computer now. There's plenty of storage for media playback with the SSHD, and using the YouTube5 extension in Safari to replace Flash, it can even handle high quality YouTube videos just fine. Without spending much money on it, that 7 year old computer is now faster than when it was new, and totally serviceable for lightweight tasks, rather than being more plastic junk sitting in a landfill.
You won't be able to do that to any of the new MacBooks with their soldered-on components and non-serviceable batteries.
Especially with tablets, but also phones, there's no real reason they couldn't have a micro sd slot. The cellular iPads already have a slot for a sim card, so you could just replace that with an SD slot on the other models, and make it a bit larger to accommodate a sim and a microsd card on the others.
The internal flash is typically not actually that fast on these devices anyway, but even so, 8-16GB of faster NAND is more than enough to store all my apps on. The reason most people buy high capacity devices is for media storage, not apps. The current limit of 64GB in a phone, and 128GB in a tablet is nowhere near enough for all my media. I have hundreds of gigabytes of music because I buy CDs and rip to lossless files. (and I have successfully ABX'ed between high bitrate lossy and lossless in Foobar, before you tell me just to compress everything)
Even with a MicroSD slot, a 64GB phone (a $200 upgrade over 16GB) and a 64GB MicroSD card ($40) still has less capacity than the old 160GB iPod classic I have to carry around.
Something else to consider is that while we may only have 64GB cards today, SDXC supports up to 2TB. Simply as a music player, things like upgraded processors are not important, so with an SDXC slot, in a few years time you could potentially upgrade to a 128GB or even 256GB card instead of replacing the whole device.
Maybe it's because you get free devices to review and do not have to pay for your own that an $850 device (64GB iPhone 5s) is disposable to you when the battery dies in a couple of years, or you need more storage, but for many of us that is not the case.
Even if it were not a financial issue, I am fundamentally opposed to the amount of waste this generates.
Very very true. I cannot believe that Anand and Brian are in favour of anti-consumer and anti-environmental practices such as fused storage/batteries/parts in any computing device. It's further saddening that much of their focus seems to be on "what's good for the OEM". While ignoring business and financial realities for OEMs in the face of fanciful user expectations, totally ignoring what's good for the consumer in favour of ways in which OEMs can price gouge consumers or enforced obsolesence is a terrible stance to take.
Turning electronic devices which are expensive to design, require high tech fabrication facilities, exotic rare and expensive raw ingredients, and worldwide distribution chains into sealed, disposable items with a fixed shelf life of a couple of years is fundamentally wrong, and is not something that enthusiasts techies of any sort should support.
What galls me is that Brian knows that cellphone batteries have a limited life in terms of maximum charge cycles, that each plug/unplug counts as a charge cycle, and that sealed batteries mean that a dead battery effectively means a dead phone/laptop, and yet he still touts sealed/soldered batteries and "opportunistic charging" as good practice.
You can also compare the Galaxy S4 to the Nexus 5. The Galaxy S4 has an SD slot and a removeable battery. It has also a bigger screen, a smaller size, a (far) longer stock battery life.
Just look at the facts and not at the marketing bullshit of the manufacturers.
"The tradeoff for removable vs. integrated battery is one of battery capacity/battery life on a single charge. Would you rather have a longer lasting battery or a shorter one with the ability the swap out batteries? "
This stood out to me. What are we looking at here realistically in a best case scenario? <5%? <10%? If you tell me I can get 25% improved batterylife then okay, maybe, but the chances are its a very small boost to overall batterylife. In which case I'd much rather carry around a small replaceable battery (only when it is more convenient) than have that tiny extra capacity which means little in the real world.
The arguments against seem misjudged to me. Aren't Samsung by far the highest selling Android phones? Don't all their devices off removable storage and Micro SD? That tells me the market has spoken and other OEM's aren't listening. Apple doesn't count as you only have 1 option with an Iphone. Oh and you don't carry around a "stack" of batteries. You could if you want but really you only carry one and it slips into your pocket like it isn't even there. Then at any point you can go from an almost dead phone to a fully charged phone in under a minute. While I don't have to do this that often, when I do (a number of times very recently) it is super convenient.
Not to mention these new phones which huge batteries take about 3 hours to charge. Thats a long time to have your phone tethered to the wall/batterypack.
I don't really care about microSDs - but I DO care about internal storage, and it's very annoying to see OEM's are very slowly dragging their feet with adding more internal storage, even though prices have dropped dramatically over the past few years.
I don't want 4 GB of free storage with 1 TB of "free cloud storage for 2 years". I want 32-64 GB of internal storage on mid-range to high-end devices, as the MINIMUM (as I said, you'd be surprised how much prices have fallen; it's very doable). If they want to offer me some extra cloud storage, that's fine, too, but I couldn't care less about it.
I would like to see an Iphone with expandable storage and removable battery hit the market with the mentioned "limitations". That would be the best way to see what people really want.
I have to wonder just how many people would buy the smallest capacity available and just make up the difference with a cheap microSD card. For better or for worse.
the authors must be rich really, or they just have all phones for free.
In a real world... whatever...
I now you are apple fan's so you must be fine with non-removable battery and low storage. You have grown your habits out of it.
"It took a while for this to sink in, but Brian's recommendation to charge opportunistically finally clicked with me. I used to delay charging my smartphone battery until it dropped below a certain level and I absolutely needed to, but plugging in opportunistically is a change I've made lately that really makes a lot of sense to me now."
you never used a spare battery... you dont know the power of it. It's like i dont care about my usage, i just use and that's it. If it's almost over. 30 seconds, 100%. Why do i want to "opportunistically" charge or whatever.
And for people saying they can carry an external charger. Really? 10 seconds of your brain time in thinking mode. Really that's all you need it. People can use it. It's free, and rewarding. I am sorry if i am being agressive, it's on purpose, maybe people will starting using their brains... Nothing, i mean nothing beat the power of brains. Even removable batteries...
120% non-removable or 100% removable? 100% all way... you can get 200%, 300% vs 120%...
In weekdays normaly i dont need to charge the phone during the day, but when i am on vacation, traveling, or on weekends if i am using my phone a lot, i just use the spare battery. It's so covenient, really. Kids just have to wait 30 seconds, they dont need to stop using it, or having an external charger near them.
Micro SD. Why spend 40 for a 64 Samsung fast micro SD when we can pay the triple or more for an internal storage phone 64gb? As lots of people said music and movies even HD, dont need an card to be really fast. But there are fast cards. Samsung has really reliable and fast 64gb cards.
The same about laptops...
My sister has 2007 toshiba laptop. She was saying it was slow, Windows Vista. Ok, i said i will fix it. I put an SSD 64GB and Windows 7. It's as insanely fast. She have now 2 external disk and dont find it confusing having that... Then she said, i need to buy a new computer, my battery is dead. I said just bought an 40$ ebay battery. Is as good as new. No need to throw away a functional computer just because battery is dead... The same with phones... Are we all rich that we can just throw our phones to garbage because battery is really bad... Maybe we are...
In the end, i am not saying that removable batteries it's better for all people. There are people who prefer unibody and disposable hardware. I just want the authors to get a touch with reality, the entire one, not just their one. And most of it, i want people to stop saying nonsense...
What really bothers me is the argument that people don't "need" the storage allowed by microSD cards.
Smartphones are computers in your pocket. There is no good reason why you shouldn't have the option as a consumer with this being one of your primary computing devices during your day.
Do you "need" the cloud storage that use? I bet the people against microSD cards are the same people the use multiple cloud services like google drive, dropbox, box.net, etc yet are bothered by the fact that a microSD card slot takes away from a super thin. unibody design.
There's definitely a volume and packaging argument for fixed batteries, but no such argument exists for microSD, as much as you want to believe it.
On my Motorola DROID RAZR MAXX HD, the microSD is behind a pin removed tray which contains the microSIM. All you've done there is double the width of the tray cover. You have pretty much left the look of the device completely unaffected.
After a couple of years of heavy use, my phone battery died. I've ordered a new one with a higher capacity for cheap and replaced it in 30 seconds. Also could have gone with a double capacity one and a bulkier cover if I wanted to. EOD
It is sad to read "A Pipeline Story" that feeds the hype of throwawayitis, and fuels the dumbness of marketing BS with poor arguments that should be below the level of sites that inform. I just bought a 12 dollar battery to replace an old one in a Garmin-Asus A50. A phone that navigates the world with NO use of need to download data, a phone that´s slow but STILL does all my wants. It has a SD card as do my mid 2012 MBA with a Toshiba 128 SSD (still working, thank you very much save for Apple).
This has got to be one of the WORST articles I've ever seen on a TECHNOLOGY website. Arguments for slim phones over more advanced features is what I'd expect on either fashion blogs/websites or mainstream sites. I'm beginning to think the whole world is just getting dumber. MICROSD 1. A SMARTPHONE should be able to handle multiple storage volumes very very easily. Anything anyone says, especially otherwise is as a result of stupidity and/or laziness. My ancient symbian - is it or isn't it- smartphone could handle it with ease. My Nokia N8 came by default with 2 volumes - a small ~512mb volume for the OS which had 200-300 free depending on the ROM and a 16gb volume. It had a microsd slot so I could add even more and it also had USB-OTG so I could connect external usb drives (mice, keyboard etc also work). I've had situations where my File Manager showed almost 150gb of storage. And get this, I could install apps on all the volumes save the USB and the phone gracefully handles any unavailability. What sorcery is this? What special sauce did they use to conjure up such magical behaviour? This is on a defunct os running a discontinued phone and I'd expect that any "modern" phone should be more advanced and trump its capabilities.
2. The build quality claims are atrociously asinine seeing as how all gsm phones have SIM slots which are basically the same size with microsd slots. Really? No arguments for integrated sims? I'm sure you'd be happy if the whole world went cdma and placed all of our fates in the hands of the carriers, emblems of all that's good in the tech world.
3. There is no performance argument for its intended usage case. No one is asking for microsd slots to install apps. Keep your paltry 8/16/32gb for that. For media etc a relatively inexpensive class 10 microsd is more than enough not to mention far cheaper. I'm not even going to start on the price gouging. Other posters have gone into that.
BATTERIES 1. The arguments for this are a little more nuanced and could swing either way but we haven't seen increased battery capacity due to them being integrated. That's a blatant lie. There are plenty of removable batteries that offer high capacities. Improvements come from the minor advances in battery tech we've had these last few years. The only benefit is ~25% reduction in battery volume by going integrated.
2.The convenience of being able to switch out a battery in seconds cannot be overstated and guess what, you can still use external battery packs or portable chargers *EVEN WITH* a removable battery. You are held beholden to them if you have integrated batteries but its only an option with removables. I thought choice was good?
COMPARISON TO PC Its funny you guys mention this seeing as how you had no qualms with the recent solderiazition of components. I'm guessing you would have no problem with a future PC market that's exactly like the current phone market. RAM, SSD, CPU, wireless card etc all non replaceable. Everything on 1 board. Intel have already announced that Broadwell processors will come integrated with the motherboard. Must be joyous news for you guys. The last things I look @ when purchasing a new PC are storage and RAM because at anytime, I can easily upgrade those components at little cost, time and energy. On phones the only easily replaceable/upgradeable parts are the battery and storage. I wouldn't mind it all being integrated if I lose little to nothing in the process. If batteries start lasting for 3 days with relatively heavy usage and I can get gobs of memory without eye watering prices, I would be happy. I fully expect that everything will become integrated in the future and that's perfectly fine by me. Problem is that I have nothing to gain by going fully integrated right now. The galaxy s3 and s4 both have removable batteries, microsd slots, large screens, good battery life and are also very thin. Apple can do whatever they want. I have no interest in them because of such money grabbing practices. On the android side, I believe its a (minor) combination of laziness from Google and (major) the benefit they gain from people using their cloud services for every single thing. They gain more by having every byte of your life pass through them. This article makes it quote clear you people have very narrow vision of the world and its extremely sad
Maybe has already been said but the problem with internal storage is that often you pay a ridiculous price for additional 16 GB of storage. Personally I think below 32 GB is just too little and nexus 4 and 5 only have as much.
With laptops, user replaceable battery is a must. I like my already aged x220. I have a small and large battery and depending on what I will do I can chose the one I will take along. Plus they tend to break faster (before end of live, use capacity quickly) )and laptops are replaced less often than smartphones.
Non removable batteries are bigger? Note 3 has a removable battery and it is what, only 3200mAh? Puny indeed. Htc One has a 2300 NON removable battery. Non removable batteries seem to be bigger for sure!!
Wtf--- The tradeoff for removable vs. integrated battery is one of battery capacity/battery life on a single charge. Would you rather have a longer lasting battery or a shorter one with the ability the swap out batteries?
This whole line of reasoning assumes that we will never keep a device over 1-2 years. Yes, a bigger internal battery might last longer on a brand new device that you test in the lab, but after a couple of years when it lasts half as long, you don't have the option of just popping on a new one. Not to mention extreme cases where you'd want 1-2 days of full GPS usage without charging, a spare battery can do that for you.
It's probably been said before in the 128+ comments, but just in case it's not: the lack of an SD card option e.g. on iPhones is the exact reason they can get away with charging insane amounts for internal memory upgrades! Without pressure from alternatives, there's no way they'd ever let go of this.
1) Every phone I've ever broken (usually involving water immersion or meeting a road at high speed) has still allowed me to pop the SD card out and recover data to set up the next one.
2) My phone is critical equipment for my cycling. I don't want to be limited by the crap life of one battery or the need to bring along a generic USB charging battery (that must remain connected in order to work). I want to simply carry a spare, and pop it in if/when needed. This has saved my life before, when I got lost in the Australian bush and needed the phone's GPS for much longer than anticipated.
3) Phones have been thin enough for me for some time now. I don't care if the above require an extra couple of mm thickness.
Thus, I will never buy a phone without a removable data card (even if it's hidden within, eg. under the battery) or without a removable battery.
I hope the smartphone vendors don't cut off a significant part of their market by phasing them out, like the laptop vendors did by phasing out 16:10 high res (eg. 1920x1200) displays a few years ago. That would be equally idiotic. Which is sadly no guarantee of anything...
I don't have any basic problem with fixed, internal storage. But you are speaking of THEORETICAL prices for it. The fact is that handset makers pretty much screw you over for internal storage, and some - like the Verizon Moto X - come with a miserable 16G and NO way to upgrade it. The argument I hear is hey, you have cloud storage! Or you can stream! But in these days of tiered data plans, streaming your music and video can get damned expensive very quickly. Maybe three or four years ago that argument would have been valid. It's not anymore. In fact, if you follow the money, I'm willing to bet that one reason removable storage has been eliminated is just to drive up the sales of larger data plans.
I remember HTC saying something about not adding the SD card slot to the One based on space requirements. But the Asian version had one. So I'm not very confident that "no room" excuse is a valid one.
1st, Build in battery still need a hard shell else if when it burst, it will kill you straight! so more room theory is BS!
To prevent shaky battery, yes. You need build in. To total secure it at place.
main reason is so that you will change your phone every one and a half or two years.
2nd, expansion memory. It's always always not hard to find space for it in today phone where bigger is better. And to assign memory allocation are peanuts stuff...
Data (storage,transport etc) is the next century gold mines.. This is the thing that you are afraid to speak out. It is okay if you are in coverage where access of data are easy. The other thing is.. these thing is so small and phones are getting way too advance where sensitive data or codes can be access, transport and execute very easy. So that's why there are resistant coming in against it.
But mind you, not every corner of the earth are covered. You guys have been sitting or live warmly without thinking some of us that have to leave to go out there, set up factory, plunder resources, transporting them, fighting unknown war.. just so you can have a good life back home.
Be neutral, just say these stuff are useless because this is what you think, yours opinions. You are you alone, you can't represent the other people. Don't say that these things are useless cause the industry think so, the whole world user behavior decide so... who are you? the industry? the world? You know jacks about industry. just that you get some interview with those crooks and you understand the industry? those are eye candy, man.. In the very inner parts of them, they are trying to capitalize you in every ways and every single drops of you. egoism will kill you one day.
This article is a joke. "Nothing inherently wrong with user replaceable batteries and microSD slots"? Glad to see you're taking the consumer-first approach here. That whole stance is so backwards it hurts. Why are we sacrificing actual usability for apparently totally critical things like "feel" and "POTENTIAL build quality benefits"?
What a complete and utter joke this site has become. Keep shilling for Apple and justifying their anti-consumer NAND pricing schemes and planned obsolescence. I'm done with this site
Floppies would probably still be around if they held 4x more data than the average hard drive.
It's a complete load of crap that companies sell the phone or tablet for whatever price and that price comes with 16GB of space. (12 of which you get to use on average). Then, if you need more It's another 100 bucks to get to 32GB, another 100 for 64GB and god knows what to get to 128.
Meanwhile, I can buy a 64GB card for a all of $29 (got an ad yesterday).
$200 to go to 64 internal (only adding 48) vs 30 bucks to add a full 64 externally. One side that is gouging big time. To me that's the benefit of the card right now. It puts more power (so to speak) in the consumer's hand by not forcing them to be gouged for storage space. I keep 20+ GB on my 32GB card. Not everyone wants to stash all their pictures and music on the cloud. Not everyone works where there's a great cell signal.
As noted in the article. The only way to get rid of the card is if manufacturer's do the unthinkable and not gouge people for storage space. Don't offer 16GB devices, start at 32 and make the price to the next level FAIR. No one wants to pay an extra $100 to add 16gb and go to a store or site and see 64gb sd cards for far less. It's offensive and drives home the gouged feeling.
You are right about the advantages of internal battery and flash. But today these advantages are largely theoretical. For example, if we compare the HTC one with the Samsung Galaxy S4: The HTC One has everything internal with a marvelous unibody design. But the battery is 2300mAh only vs 2600mAh on the SGS4. HTC did not take advantage of having more control over the design to add a bigger battery. On the SD-card side it is more of a price thing. I got a 32GB SGS4 with a 64GB SDcard inside. The upgrade from 16 to 32 GB was more expensive than the 64GB SDcard.
As long as this remains the same I will firmly stay in the removable battery / SDcard camp.
In addition, all these phones are fragile enough (glass screen !) the I protect them with a case. In a case the advantage of a nice unibody design become irrelevant. What will change this is new, scatter proof screens, maybe the new bendable phones, as shown by LG, will get there.
That's not really fair though, most people who get the Galaxy S3 or S4 are not hard core users. My little sister has an S3 cause it was free on contract, she doesn't even know the difference between internal storage and Sd card storage. Just because a product is popular does not mean it does everything right, or even what consumers would prefer. It just sells well because Samsung spends more than any other company on advertisements
Which also seems to indicate that casual users aren't necessarily asking for these features to disappear. Does your sister complain about the S3 having a flimsy back door? Or that the MicroSD card has a slower write speed then the internal flash? My guess is she honestly doesn't care as long as it's pulling in a decent 4G connection for Facebooking/Tweeting/InstaSocialWhatevering.
If the casual users don't care one way or the other and the enthusiasts are upset about the features disappearing, the it sounds to me like you can make both camps happy by just leaving them in.
I think you may want to consider rewriting your post. Sounds like you are very one sided and overly biased. From the way it sounds, i would say you are getting paid by google or apple to help change peoples view on the topic.
How does a card slot present any more of a structural body design issue than the SIM slots all phones already have?
Don't get me wrong, I agree with most of the rationalizations and why the industry is headed where it is... Doesn't even particularly bother me as long as I can get 32GB+ for a reasonable price (got a N5 atm, first phone I've had without removable storage, second without removable battery).
If you were given the option between a N5 as is for $350 or a 16GB N5 with a card slot for $400 what would you choose tho? Most of the scenarios that require lots of storage are still ideally suited for removable storage, which gets cheaper all the time.
That's besides the point though, the real issue seems to be AT's treatment of the subject. Not penalizing or praising phones for going in either direction is fine IMO, it is what it is, people that need/want removable know which phones feature it.
There's still two things AT can do for it's readers though, cut the snark about microSD slots and actually praise/penalize phones based on internal storage. A company that charges $100 for a 16GB bump should get called out over it MUCH more.
Likewise, anyone that goes 32GB as base capacity should get some praise. If enough of those comments go around maybe we'll see some change.
Ultimately money and sales speak louder, but it shouldn't mean journalistic editorial comment concedes to every industry trend. Your opinions can change many others, and turn sales, and inflict change.
Personally I couldn't care less about the snark but it just leads to pointless comment section clutter... No snark = not having the same arguments cluttering the comments sections (at least not nearly as much) and eclipsing other more interesting topics.
I do think internal capacity price and options should be featured and talked about much more prominently though. It's usually an afterthought on phone reviews whereas it's typically one of the large concluding points on a laptop review, and I can't think how the two scenarios differ in any way (other than laptops costing 2-3x as much and lasting 3-4x as long).
Anand, you talk about tradeoffs. I agree, that is really the point. Would I trade a removable battery for killer looks? No, I would not. Would I trade a removable battery for water resistance? Yes I would. There are a lot of opportunities that Apple and HTC are missing, but you still give them credit for getting a stunning and beautiful device. But I thought we this blog was about technology, not about fashion. And at the same time, you do not promote those that are trying to let users upgrade their own devices, which is something truly commendable.
I do not carry a spare battery with me, but I switched the 2300 battery on my S3 for a 4200 one, and now my phone last a whole heavy usage weekend in a charge. It is not as slim as it was, but I can't for the life of me deplete the battery in a single day, and that is a really great tradeoff.
As for microsd cards, I think you (those in Anandtech, and probably 99% of the tech journalist) have far too easy access to wifi/LTE, or you just have the money to burn on roaming. But most of us can not afford using Spotify abroad, or are unable to connect to Netflix while commuting. And it is very clear that Anantech is positioning itself in the industry side in this matter, but most of your readers are users, not industry moguls.
The responses to this piece are mostly appalling. Show of hands here, how many people who believe microSD cards and spare batteries are the solution to the problem have engineering degrees?
In a perfect world, even entry level smartphones would currently ship with the fastest available 128GB eMMC solution and a battery that would last 99.9% of users a full day. Unfortunately the laws of physics and economics prevent this from being a reality.
Removable batteries and microSD card slots require interior volume to implement. For a larger device, that trade-off may work out to the consumer's benefit, but in a smaller device probably not. Once device size and battery capacity increase to a certain point, the likelihood of an end user carrying a spare approaches a very small number. There are also very real reasons why Google and Apple are less than enthusiastic about the mixed storage paradigm, and those reasons are not simply "pure greed".
The best solution to the storage situation is for OEMs to offer appropriate levels of storage at reasonable price tiers. Right now, I think most people would be happy if that came in the form of 32, 64 and 128 GB at $50 increments. For larger phones and tablets, it would be nice to see serious OS level support for microSD cards to alleviate some of the drawbacks and allow those who are so inclined to make use of them.
As for batteries, I think everyone would much rather make it through a day on one charge than carry a spare. This is what OEMs should focus on. I seriously wonder about those who argue for carrying spare batteries. First of all, the environmental impact of everyone owning and eventually disposing of two batteries per device is a horrifying prospect. Also, I use my phone CONSTANTLY and the number of times I run out of juice is maybe a few days in a year. I understand that everyone uses their devices differently, but I seriously think this is more of an issue with behavior or perhaps device choice. If you charge while you're sleeping and showering you should be able to make it through the rest of your waking hours with maybe an occasional top up when you're sitting next to an available USB port or power outlet anyway. If you're inconvenienced by charging then either your device sucks, or you're doing it wrong.
Sealed batteries will always be the most efficient use of space. Improvements in battery chemistry are much harder to come by, so the best way to improve the situation is by making devices more power efficient and using the largest battery possible. Sealed batteries are better, but OEMs that go that route should absolutely offer simple and affordable battery replacement programs.
The bottom line is that most people who advocate for microSD card slots do so because they feel OEMs don't offer sufficient storage or reasonable pricing for the higher storage tiers. I find it interesting that saving what amounts to essentially one month's phone bill at the time of purchase is such a big deal. I'd much rather drop $300 extra on a phone with 128 GB of really performant storage and pay $30 less a month to my mobile operator. Of course people tend to be vocal about certain things and totally miss the bigger picture. Sort of like advocating that OEMs use smaller batteries just so those who are incapable of minor behavioral adjustments can swap them out instead of thinking more about their power usage habits in the first place.
If the battery has issues, you just replace the battery. If you're not comfortable doing so yourself, get someone else to do it. Sealed batteries are replaceable as long as you have the right tools, parts and know-how. As I said, "Sealed batteries are better, but OEMs that go that route should absolutely offer simple and affordable battery replacement programs." If you could walk into any retailer and have your battery replaced in 10 minutes for $40 or so, I don't think anyone would consider the sealed battery an issue.
Furthermore, most of the phones that are disposed of each year are already less than 3 years old. Due to damage, upgrade cycles and whatnot, I believe 18-24 months is the typical lifespan these days.
Apple charges $79 for iPhone battery replacement, $85.95 if shipping is required, and only if the device is no longer under warranty or covered by AppleCare. As I said, the problem is not with the sealed battery, but with the service options the OEMs bother to provide.
Encouraging OEMs to use batteries that make less efficient use of space so they can be more easily swapped out by the end user when they fail is not the solution. If anything it's something they will tout as a feature while reducing BOM cost by using a smaller battery that is rated for fewer charge/discharge cycles.
." If you could walk into any retailer and have your battery replaced in 10 minutes for $40 or so, I don't think anyone would consider the sealed battery an issue."
That doesn't help when you have a battery that is nearly empty, which is my issue. I go to festivals at least once a year and take multiple short wkend breaks away too. The ability to just instantly swap out a dead battery for a fully charged one instead of tethering your phone to a battery pack for a few hours is incredibly useful. In fact I find it so useful that right now a phone lacking that simple ability is a non-starter for me. I don't even consider them.
To each their own. I understand many people don't even think about buying a spare battery, I do and I will support that choice while I have the option. Phone thickness, feel and looks rank low in my buying priorities. Function > form.
However, if your internal battery was twice the volume to begin with, you would still have more than half a charge left at the same point that the normal one was nearly empty. You wouldn't have to pay for and carry around a separate battery and charger. It would be always be with your phone, never forgotten, and less likely to get lost or damaged. You wouldn't have to power down, switch batteries and boot back up again. The whole setup would weigh less, consume fewer resources, be more portable and provide more than twice the juice all the time. Encouraging OEMs to sell certain device models with much larger batteries that are a couple mm thicker is by far the better solution, even if those batteries are sealed. I believe the RAZR MAXX demonstrated that this could be a rather popular option.
Of course there will always be corner cases where even that isn't enough to get through a situation where one is unable to charge for an extended period. At a certain point, carrying a ginormous battery (or stack of smaller ones) around all the time is less attractive than the alternatives, i.e. remembering to plug in when you can, learning to become a better opportunistic charger, or carrying a solar or hand-winding charger.
I honestly think there is a phobia associated with the idea of having a dead phone battery and nowhere to charge it. I can imagine that swappable batteries do more to allay that fear for those that have it, but from a logical standpoint it's not the best way to solve the problem.
People may upgrade smartphones, but that doesn't mean their device has to go in the bin. A phone with replaceable battery/cover/storage allows for the device to be passed on to children, friends, relatives etc.
Actually, even smartphones with sealed batteries that lack microSD card slots can be passed on to others. In fact, judging by the second hand market, some such models retain value significantly better than their user replaceable battery and upgradable storage contemporaries.
Of course none of this changes the observed average service life of mobile phones. Cracked screens, exposure to liquids, and operator subsidies which encourage buyers to believe that all new smartphones cost less than $200 are what cause most handsets to end up in the bin prematurely.
No Anand, the microSD ship hasn't sailed. And yes, you should absolutely penalize devices for not having these features.
Every best selling Smart Phone (in every major size category) for the past many cycles, including the current cycle, has both microSD expansion and a user-swappable battery. Every. Single. One.
Many of us will gladly trade a few grams of weight and a single mm of thickness for those features. Really, that's all we're talking about. A single mm of thickness, a few grams of weight. It's incredibly odd that you find such a trade-off to be so objectionable and unrealistic.
As many readers have observed, Anand and Brian seem to have become overt advocates for the mobile industry, rather than being advocates for their readers.
One can understand why the marketing people in the mobile companies are willing to sacrifice features in favor of looks. It's difficult to understand why Andantech should embrace fashion over function.
Listen to your readers. We want these features. Given the maturity of the mobile space, there will certainly be device makers willing to cater to our needs.
In addition, it's a tremendous cop-out that Anandtech doesn't penalize devices for not having these features. You regularly penalize devices for their outer casing, but for real, actual, hardware features like microSD and swappable batteries. No words - pro or con. No benchmarks of microSD transfer speed.
Please stop spending so much time fetishizing metal cases and focus on these actual features.
Although you argue about manufacturers making design/cost decisions based around "the mainstream" usage of smartphones, for some reason Brian wants to believe that "the mainstream" wants manufacturers to spend more space and cost on implementing a high end camera. In virtually every podcast (when they actually happen), he complains incessantly about the cameras and thinks everyone else out there actually cares like he does. For some reason he thinks his complaints are valid, while dismissing complaints about removable batteries and microSD cards. That is pretty conceited to believe your personal opinion is "right".
I have stated for some time that microSD is a requirement as long as manufacturers are shipping phones with 8 to 16GB of storage. It's hard to believe that people as well-traveled as Anand and Brian can actually depend on cloud storage. I guess you're only travelling to areas with non-roaming data or dependable WiFi. Take a trip across North America into areas like northern Canada, or eastern Kentucky. The cloud doesn't exist there. I actually purchased a Nexus 5, but only because there was a 32GB model. 32GB is the sweet spot for me where I can store enough locally to not have to depend on the cloud, but I'm not going to try to argue that it is enough for everyone. I agree with others that microSD can go away once 32GB becomes the entry, and we aren't charged $50 for each extra 16GB.
As for the argument about "extra battery life" vs "removable battery", I am willing to bet that you are talking about a low-single-digit percentage difference in battery life. It's not like there's any evidence even in your own reviews to show that there was a significant increase in battery life for phone models that utilize a non-removable battery. In terms of cost savings, once again you are talking about fractions of a dollar. These are not things being done for the ultimate benefit of the end user. They are being done strictly to shave off every last possible penny from the BOM. My particular usage model is such that I do not absolutely require a removable battery, but again I would never argue that my usage model is "the right one, and everyone else is wrong".
Ego and arrogance of the site owners/editors/writers is exactly why I stopped visiting Toms Hardware and HardOCP. Brian is walking a very fine line right now.
I think the battery replaceable vs not replaceable makes sense in the conclusion.
I disagree completely on the micro SD card slot.
It is easy enough to design it intelligently so it doesn't particularly compromise the design of the phone. For instance, have in in the side/top/bottom of the phone behind a small flap/door. I've seen a number of designs where this works fine and likely wouldn't/doesn't compromise the internal layout of the device.
I also think it is a mistake to not set it up as a seperate drive in the storage space.
I think most people are smart enough to figure out that one storage space is on the phone itself and one is the removable micro SD card.
There are many advantages to removable storage. One of which is cheaper storage. Another is many manufacturers don't have options other than 16/32GB. Or if they do have more options, they are all expensive.
There are other perks too, like if you are shooting with a REAL camera, you can use a micro SD card in an SD card adapter and then pop the card out and stick it in your phone to upload the files, as an example. Or if you want to use a nice high speed micro SD card, you can pop it out, stick it in a USB 3.0 card reader and toss a ton of stuff on it real fast and then stick it back in your phone. Instead of having to physically connect your phone to your computer or do it over Wifi. A few songs, a few pictures a small movie, it probably doesn't make much difference. Want to load 50GB of movies to your 64GB micro SD card though before a big trip? I am thinking the difference in transfer speeds would be much appreciated...and you also might not want to sit there for an hour with your phone physically tethered to your computer transfering the files.
I know the post was about phones, but I think this goes double for tablets. ALL DEVICES SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST A MICRO SD CARD SLOT! TABLETS SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST A MICRO SD CARD SLOT AND PREFERABLY A FULL SD CARD SLOT!
Removable batteries I understand. The trade-off of a solid, unibody shell is a big trade-off for the benefit of being able to swap out batteries. Plus, I believe companies are incentivized to put in the best battery they can into their flagships because this is something that many people focus on.
MicroSD (removable storage), on the other hand, I completely disagree with. You can keep a unibody case without sacrificing too much. And, companies usually charge a high premium for higher amounts of storage because reviews hardly ever focus on the amount of storage you're getting for your money. Arguably the kind of person who would spend money to buy the 64GB edition of a phone/tablet over the 32GB is comfortable with managing multiple drives and slower I/O of microSD.
Yeas and no :-) I know many people who can not use the drive d: because they just can not... in PC environment. Too comples. If you thik that it is even a little bit harder in phone environment, then it is not usefull feature... Anyone in this forum know how to use drive d: in PC and external storage in their mobilephone, but we are not the big important majority... What I won't understand is that when OS could show all storages as on one big storage to user who really don't understand aenything about storage system, why it is not implemented. Normally the main reason is that user can not know where his or her pictures are, if there are multible storages... *sigh* is is hard to compete agains the minimum factor reality....
don't iphones, the 'epitome' of industrial design, have removable SIMs. This is as much of a "tradeoff" as putting in a micro sd slot no? If they can have a removable sim and maintain build quality, they can have a removable SD, and this goes for Android also. I can understand how a batter can compromise the structure, but a micro SD card will not provide the same sacrifice in build.
Anand's approach is reasonable. As long as the review states that the phone has an sd card slot (which I think would be mentioned in any review on this site) if it does, let the person reading the review decide if its relevant. Admittedly, I'm coming from an iOS perspective, but I just know that the advertised price is wrong and mentally add the extra $200-300 I need to get the device I would want that has the storage I want on my devices (and of course thats way overpriced for what I get, but I dont set the prices).
I also just got an nVidia Shield, which is my first Android device. I wish the internal volume had more than 16 GB of storage. I have 2 microSD cards I use for the device, because of limitations on what can be run from the microSD card slot. One is used for media, the other for apps. It is not an ideal solution. If there had been even a 64 GB solution, thats the one I would have gone for.
The point is, we as consumers should be more focused on ensuring larger capacities are brought down in price going forward, so that microSD cards arent necessary even if they happen to be something some of us prefer. This is very similar to the ssd problem on desktops.
its not about wrong or right as there may be manifold views on the pros and cons of this subject. two thoughts that i often miss in such discussions are: - flexibility: my usage-pattern may change, i might not want to pay the extra for the memory-upgrade but 8 months later i found i should have done so. no need to base decisions on the maximum of what might be needed or even replace your phone, just get a bigger µ-sd for cheap and move on. - sustainability: my 3 last phones first technical failures were the remaining battery capacity and i simply see no point in spending several hundred dollars plus unnecessarily produce even more electronic waste when one can simply replace the battery and continue to use their phone for a longer time. i admit that i would for sure welcome a more recent and faster phone but basically my HTC Vision (aka Desire Z) still does its job running its 3rd battery since last summer (and i still would not really want to miss the pysical keyboard comforts. sadly, non of the current phones' generations seem to address such demands...). cheers!
Although I can see the point of non-replaceable batteries, I actually find the objections posted by the OP regarding Micro SD cards slightly elitist and maybe even a little condescending. Not all of us can afford or perhaps want to spend £500 or £600 on a smartphone. That normally leaves us with 8GB or 16GB models to choose from and since I use mine as an MP3 player as well it's usually just not enough. My relatively cheap 16GB smartphone can accept a 64GB Micro SD card for a paltry £40. I know this is actually down to the manufacturer's but it's not helped by posts like these. Some of us really do want external storage.
"What we really need to see here are 32/64/128GB configurations, with a rational increase in price between steps."
Amen!
Seriously, do we need to start a web petition or something? Pray to idols? Preach from the mount?
In particular there shouldn't even be a 16 GB option on "premium" phones (*cough* iPhone 5s!), they should start at 32 GB and have reasonable prices for one or two higher capacities. It doesn't make too much sense to go with expensive upgrades when you are replacing every two years, but I expect each device to have plenty of room for apps, a few big games, and several years of casual taking pictures and videos. It also doesn't make any sense for there to be a 32 GB iPhone 5c and yet 16 GB iPhone 5s, the top tier of the "c" line should be the same as the base for the "s" line.
Once you start looking at it through the lens of a corporation eager to milk as much cash as possible from its mentally diluted fanbase, it makes very good sense not to go for a sd card slot and ask the customer to pay 100$ extra for memory that costs 20$ to get as an sd card.
The arguments about build quality are next to retarded, a micro sd card slot takes miniscule amount of space, you can build an amazing product with even 10 sd card slots, you can build a crappy product void of sd card slot. Got to love those apple-ass-kissing publications from AT... not to mention the mind-boggling comments from sad die-hard iDiots.
I would love to see the price of internal storage increase. If you look on the tablet side of life, outside of the ipad, it seems to be, the jumps on the nexus, fire, and such seem to be running $20-30 per jump, vs apple's $50 or $100 per jump cost.
I really have no qualms with an non-replaceable battery, except I would like to see the manufacturers guarantee for 2 years due to the length of contracts.
I think you can have a uni-body phone very easilly with micro-sd. The Droid Razr family is an easy example of this. Any 4G/GSM phone is another example, it has to have a slot for the SIM card, and they do that without the uni-body being destroyed. I think the memory part is pretty much pure greed on the manufacturers, they saw Apple could charge a premium for it, and followed suit.
what is the point of this article? is there anyone who is unaware of the tradeoffs between having removable batteries/internal storage vs. not having them?
Wanted to say the same thing but I was afraid I would've sounded trollish. Now I'll hide like a coward behind you and say " this man speaketh the truth".
Don't be afraid, if AT didn't want people to acknowledge their schemes, they'd do it in a more subtle fashion. But no, they want their bias to be obvious, to shine brightly through the sentences. And it is not just AT, other outfits such as engadged are no better, US websites in general race to kiss apple ass. Yes, that is what I implied, from a fairly reputable website AT has sunk to the level of engadget.
Honestly I think that after using idevices for so long(getting used with its compromises at a personal level), AT staff simply can't relate anymore to the genuine usefulness of user accessible hardware/software.
Even if not as known in the states, gsmarena has always listed "no file system"/"expandable storage"/"itunes dependency" as cons at every ios device review. But then again they're not an US based review site.
Brian has been making smug remarks on Twitter about what he regards as a vocal minority of Anandtech review commentators that keep harping on about SD cards and removeable batteries.
Brian apparently knows better than they what they ought to want, or rather because they are a minority, they have no right to expect anything from the industry, which he believes justifiably caters only for the masses, who generally wouldn't even know how to use an SD card.
There was a thread in the forums on the topic that picked up on Brian's latest bout of SD hate in the HTC One Max review comments, but apparently it is beneath the editors dignity actually to join forum debates, so instead they have fed us the editorial line in this article. (The debate was also picked up on Reddit.)
I don't mean this to sound as rude as it does, but that is the background to this article as I understand it.
So to sum up, Brian and Anand actually understand the design trade-offs involved and the what the root of the problem is.
We all want larger, faster and cheaper storage and all-day battery life from out mobile devices. Encouraging OEMs to include microSD slots and removable batteries doesn't get us there. It's just a workaround that makes other poor design decisions more bearable for those who choose to carry a spare battery and swap microSD cards, and the whole device less efficient for the majority of folks who don't bother.
I think you are right that that is how they look at things, but as people keep pointing out, there is no reason to expect that the industry will provide cheap storage unless people can buy the storage themselves as an accessory - see the whole history of computing.
Furthermore, there are many use-cases for removeable storage identified in this thread that would not be catered for, even if phones all magically came with ample internal storage.
True, but as to the first point, people will often seek out the cheapest available solution, which is certainly not always the optimal solution from a user experience standpoint. While many people are convinced that Google and Apple limit end user choice strictly to maximize profits in the short term, there is a solid argument that they are more interested in preventing the end user from making bad choices and thus negatively impacting their overall experience.
Also, if built-in storage options were amenable across the board, the situations where removable storage would still be desirable would become corner cases that might well be better served by solutions other than microSD cards.
"Corporations are interested in the best user experience".
Strange how the "best" user experience in their view is also the most *profitable* user experience. It's almost as if profit levels, and the experience they choose to provide, are somehow interlinked....
But we all know that publicly listed corporations put their users first and profits last so your point is thankfully irrefutable.
Usually one puts quotation marks around something that was actually stated in the referenced material—you know, like a quote.
And, given the profit margins demanded by the shareholders are met, why would producing the best user experience possible not be a wise course of action for a company operating in a highly competitive market? Of course you could just pour money into marketing instead. I wonder how much better the Samsung user experience is for the $14B they spent on marketing this year... http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/11/28/samsung-m...
What makes you think they understand the design trade-offs so very well when they misstate them so spectacularly? What makes you think the rest of us are clueless?
Brian and Anand spend a fair number of their waking hours thinking about and testing mobile devices. They also have engineering backgrounds and longstanding relationships with many of the manufacturers. This site is the best site in existence for the general public to get in depth reviews and extensive empirical test data on these types of devices.
I read through almost all of the now 274 comments on this piece, and the number of cogent arguments presented by those with dissenting viewpoints is alarmingly low. It is very clear that most of them come from people who have little to no engineering or design background and have never taken the time to really think through the trade-offs involved. For the most part, the comments are from a vocal minority hell bent on protecting their current usage model in order to avoid having to change their behavior. Your response is classic; you're clearly upset, but in the absence of any compelling argument to the contrary, the best you can do is tell me to expletive off.
microSD card slots require interior volume to implement. Sealed batteries can make better use of interior volume than those designed to be easily swapped by the end user. Removable battery covers generally reduce overall device rigidity and can become loose over time. Most smartphone users do not swap batteries or use microSD cards. In general, the market is better served by devices with sufficient and affordable internal storage options, the largest possible battery, and the most durable chassis design. Surely OEMs will continue to produce devices with microSD card slots and user swappable batteries, and surely there will be customers that insist that they require such things. There is no reason, however, for a site such as Anandtech to encourage OEMs to cater a vocal minority instead of doing what is best for the majority of end users.
Furthermore, many of the comments I read smack of entitlement, cheapness, and a general refusal to accept change. While many of us have media libraries that are larger than 64 GB, very few of us need to carry the whole damn thing on our phone. Most of the microSD argument is one of convenience, rather than necessity. The other side of it is that despite paying for a flagship smartphone and an operator contract to go with it, apparently it is a total affront to pay as much as $200 extra for 64 GB of storage, despite that being an astonishingly small percentage of the TCO of that device. If you use that device for 2 years, would the convenience of having 32 GB vs 16 GB be worth an extra $4 / month? Would 64 GB be worth $8 / month additional? I think a lot of the resentment towards storage being the sole differentiator between price tiers stems from the operator subsidy model, where the additional cost becomes up front rather than subsidized. Making devices that provide less battery life for everyone so that those who insist on saving $150 on storage is ridiculous though.
Catering to the battery swappers also misses the point. The way to make a better device is to make the device as efficient as possible and the battery as large as you can. If you can't make it through your waking hours on a single charge, perhaps you should choose a more efficient device, use your current device more efficiently, or learn to plug the darn thing in when you can. Once again, this is generally a matter of convenience rather than necessity. The argument that everyone should have a less durable and efficient device so that a vocal minority can consume additional resources in order to not have to think about something as basic as their own battery usage is ridiculous. Anandtech goes bonkers doing really solid battery life testing; maybe people should spend more time looking at those numbers when shopping for a device rather than just picking the one with the most "cores" and the highest clockspeeds.
Why would I want to pay a $200 mark-up to obtain more storage every time I buy a new device, especially as it will be a pain to transfer my data from internal storage?
What if i want to use my data on both a tablet and a phone without carrying them both around and trying to join a wireless network so I can actually see my data on the other device?
I'm sorry but it is not good enough t say "these guys have engineering backgrounds" and sneer at everybody else, especially when people have gone to the trouble of spelling out some real benefits of removeable batteries and SD cards, whereas the elite engineers as far as I can see have merely asserted that there are huge challenges and implementation costs of these features, yet have provided absolutely no evidence to back that up.
Meanwhile, many devices have shipped with SD cards and removeable batteries that do not appear to suffer in any significant way by comparison to devices without these features.
Maybe because you're paying for NAND flash memory that actually costs money and has value?
There are very real and tangible benefits to both user upgradeable storage and replaceable batteries. Neither Anand nor Brian denied this. However, do those benefits outweigh the very real compromises that come along with these features? Of course the answer will be different depending on the OEM, device, or user in question. Any of the OEMs could make their devices 3mm thicker and offer best in class battery life, but none of them has made that move. Despite the gargantuan size of some of the phones/phablets out there, mobility/portability still matters—a lot. These features have direct, measurable trade-offs with either device volume or battery life. How much evidence do you need that physics applies to smartphones?
Every device that has shipped with a microSD card slot and removable battery could have had longer battery life or been smaller and lighter without them. This is actually true.
@repoman27 I don't think posters in the comments here are unaware that NAND costs money or that there are engineering tradeoffs inherent in user-replaceable features such as batteries.
While you say it is "actually true" that giving up user-replaceable batteries and microSD slots could have larger batteries or be smaller and lighter, the real-world examples that we can see clearly indicate that OEMs have either chosen not to do so, or the extra volume saved is not significant from the point of view of getting a larger battery into the device. You might get a very very slightly larger battery into the same space if you make it sealed, but not *significantly* larger.
As to the argument that devices must always be thinner,lighter, sleeker etc; if that is your position then you are wholly ignoring the single most fundamental engineering fact:
Humans.
Any device created must be able to interact with a human hand. Take the Galaxy S2. In its default configuration, it is already so thin and light it barely registers in the hand. For anyone with even slightly above average sized hands, it is actually too thin (and narrow) to use comfortably. Since it was released, devices have become *thicker* and *wider*, not thinner and narrower. Therefore, no matter what happens in the future with sealed batteries or internal storage, the fundamental design characteristics of any mobile device are effectively fixed: not by technological considerations, or manufacturing, but by human ergonomics. Devices must be a minimum size so that we can interact with them effectively. They cannot be larger than a given maximum size or else we will be unable to move them around. These are the engineering constraints that matter, and a few mm here and there on a battery cover are insignificant gains.
Hence, as many have pointed out, the phones with sealed batteries and no expandable storage tend to be a) more expensive and b) don't gain any significant battery capacity or storage speed as a result. What they do is introduce a culture of disposable high technology (with associated unnecessary environmental cost and economic wastage), and gouge the consumer for money.
Neither of those things is a positive development, and reviews should absolutely call out OEMs who indulge in these negative practices.
OEMs designing the best device possible for the majority of their customers is not a negative practice. Neither is producing devices which cater to a niche audience that happen to have different preferences than the masses.
The point of the original post, which seems lost on pretty much everyone commenting here, is that Anandtech is not taking sides when it comes to these features because either way the manufacturer is addressing the desires of a certain subset of their customer base. All these cries of "You so bias!" basically boil down to "You aren't actively supporting my particular bias in this instance." In this case, a vocal minority is trying to argue that it's somehow a bad thing that most smartphone users have different usage patterns than they do, and that some OEMs make phones that are better suited towards the general population.
And btw, the human hand has been able to manage business cards, credit cards, post cards, pieces of paper, etc. just fine, all of which are considerably thinner than any smartphone to date. Also, feel free to draw up a chart demonstrating some sort of correlation between the ASP of smartphones and their use of sealed batteries or omission of microSD card slots (hint: if an OEM reduces the BOM cost and maintains the same gross profit margin, the device will be less expensive). Instead of mindlessly arguing a point, you should try thinking about what the limiting factors of mobile device design really are, reading about the design process, or talking to engineers who actually have experience in this field.
You have postulated some manufacturing advantages of designing phones without removable storage or removable batteries, namely a small potential increase in installed battery capacity, and a reduced production cost.
You then seem to be arguing that because many consumers do not use SD cards, or replace their batteries, that these small advantages justify a design that precludes that possibility entirely.
However, there are many reasons to believe that, in aggregate, there may be consumer detriment that arises from this design choice, even if the majority of consumers do not base their individual purchasing decisions on this factor.
For example, many have cited the issue of electronic waste, which has a direct economic cost in terms of the obsolescence of devices that, apart from their worn battery, would otherwise continue to serve valuable purposes. This will also lead to increased waste in the literal sense, and I should add that the toxicity of batteries in the environment is a further argument for designing them so that they can be removed.
It is also likely that if there were greater prevalence of devices with removable batteries and storage, there would in turn be greater consumer awareness of the benefits that these features provide, and therefore more people who would enjoy those benefits.
As regards storage, non-expandable storage is also likely to lead consumers to overpay for internal storage, as we see in the market, and obviously forces them to pay more often than would be necessary if storage could be switched between devices. It also increases their reliance on unreliable, sometimes expensive-to-access, and data-mined cloud storage.
I need hardly add that Anandtech is a site largely read by technology enthusiasts, and it is an influential site in the industry. It is very probable that its readership values these features more than the population in general; therefore, Brian and Anand's stance on this issue is very irritating.
Arguing that one size fits all when it comes to smartphones is illogical. It is ridiculous to insist that everyone make the same trade-offs you are willing to just because they are the "right" ones for your usage pattern.
Devices have had removable batteries and microSD card slots for many years now. The trend towards sealed batteries was more recently enabled by the development of batteries that are rated for many more charge / discharge cycles than was previously possible. microSD card usage is not going to suddenly flourish when the #2 smartphone OS offers zero support for them and the #1 OS has limited native support and comes from a developer that is actively trying to deprecate their usage.
The e-waste argument is also entirely bunk. The more perceived value an item has, the less likely it is to be permanently disposed of, and the more likely it is to be sold, gifted or recycled by the owner. All iPhones have sealed batteries and lack microSD card slots, yet they retain their value better than almost all smartphones with removable batteries and upgradeable storage.
I don't think the cloud is the best solution at the moment, and it certainly isn't "there yet" for a lot of us. However, when Brian talks about "that ship has sailed", it boils down to the OEMs responding to the way customers actually use their devices. Arguing the benefits of removable batteries and microSD card slots is like arguing the benefits of carburetors when the whole industry was moving towards electronic fuel injection.
There seems to be a fear that without vocal support from review sites, OEMs will drop these features entirely, and irritation that Anandtech is not willing to take sides and help defend the minority position. In reality, it's just the nature of a market where smartphones are now mainstream and no longer solely the domain of enthusiasts and executives. I'm pretty sure there will always be OEMs that make devices which cater to the niches, and in reality, there are probably just as many smartphones on the market now with removable batteries and microSD card slots as there ever were at any other point in history.
I didn't argue that no device should be made with a sealed battery or non-removable storage.
I am saying that removable batteries and storage do have inherent advantages that would benefit many people, and have positive externalities in terms of lowering the price of storage for everyone, reducing electronic waste, and adding option value to the product.
I'm all for removable batteries and storage when it comes to phones and MP3-players, aswell as any other device like a notebook.
I couldn't care less if this results in 10-20% less battery-capacity per charge, as the battery is usually the first part to fail anyways, and the ability to replace it by myself for a few bucks makes the value of the device as a whole alot better. I don't need to change my phone every two years, if it's working fine, and we're at a point where we simply don't need more power in a smartphone anyways.
And microSDHC-slots are simply convenient, as I can have my whole music-library with me all the time this way, which exceeds 64GB by far, so the option to simply change microSD-cards is very welcome.
The upcoming http://www.jolla.com">Jolla will be probably the last smartphone for me to buy in a very long while, if the device doesn't see any other malfunctions than a failing battery. Oh... and I don't need to deal with Apple, Google or Microsoft either :)
It is interesting to read a good and argumented opinion. I must admit, all points are valid, but, IMHO, there are a few key points missing. Regarding the batteries: I have a 2.5 years old smartphone with a half-dead battery. In my case it is replaceable, so I have a choice. I might upgrade anyway, but only because smartphones today are ions ahead of those from 2 years ago in terms of performance. I also happen to have a 3 years old laptop, and while still usable, the battery barely reaches 3hrs of real use (was more then 6hrs new). My laptop is definitely not something I'm looking to replace: improvements in the last 3 years are nice but hardly something worth the money for a brand new laptop. Your mileage may vary, but then again, if you update your laptop/smartphone every 2 years, then the whole point about replaceable batteries is moot. Now, this is a standard Dell laptop. I would be kicking myself, really hard, if I had forked 2Kusd for a fancy unibody laptop which now I'd have to consider changing. So, for laptops, sorry, but non-replaceable batteries is a deal breaker. For smartphones, frankly, I still value replaceable batteries, but I can see the benefits of a non replaceable one ... still, but not for much longer.
Regarding SD storage ... the sturdiness argument doesn't hold at all. Just think about SIM cards. You could do a "door" just as effective for an SD card. Regarding the experience ... I have been using an SD card on a phone which has 1GB of internal storage (did I mention it is 2.5 years old?). I had to go and move some apps on the SD card, something that with a more modern phone with 8GB of storage shouldn't happen. But my 14GB of MP3 and divx (to entertain the kids during car trips) frankly help a lot. CanI buy a 32GB phone? Sure. Will it be faster? Probably, but do you really need to fork 50usd more for 16GB increment (this is what it costs on the Nexus 5, for example), when 32GB of MicroSD cost 20usd on Newegg?
User experience is fine, but come on, money doesn't grow on trees, right?
I can agree with most of what was said, but even OEMs that don't include uSD cards are skimping on intrernal storage. Give me the option for expanded storage until I can buy a phone with a reasonable amount of space. Build quality isn't compromised any more for a uSD than it already is for phones with a SIM card.
To me this is a question of repairability and expandability. Three month ago, I was glad that my bulging battery was replaceable for < $10, instead of throwing away a device still worth $250 or having it repaired by the manufacturer for $40 shipping & insurance + the repair costs (likely > $100). Also, as software does constantly expand on footprint (storage and power consumption) and mobile software especially has no Long Term Releases that get bug fixes and security fixes, the ability to expand storage is an important feature. I'd love for manufacturers to offer 5yr. warranties for the battery and the storage of their devices, incl. shipping and proper data transfer to a replacement device. And I'd love for manufacturers to produce battery options that hold a charge for more than 3-4 h when the device is used. And certainly it is a good trend, in the absence of replaceable batteries and storage to have prices for storage upgrades become reasonable.
Your points are all valid. But you hardly ever convey them as such in your reviews. Brian particularly is very condescending when talking about removable batteries and mSD storage.
Opportunistic charging also seems to be detrimental to battery longevity (which is even more important in sealed battery designs). Since we are now approaching the age of "good enough" performance from smartphones, expecting them to work longer than 2 years is not uncommon (I'm fairly happy with my Galaxy Nexus, my wife is fine with her now 1 year old S3 knock off). Doing opportunistic charging is certain to first decrease your battery capacity over the life of the device and kill it more quickly making the device completely useless. Also, you need to carry around a charger/battery pack vs. carrying around a new battery. Not sure how one thing is better than the other.
As for mSD slots: why not put them in the same vicinity as the SIM card slot? If you have a unibody design but need to input a SIM card anyway, can't the same door be used to input the mSD card without incurring structural losses or hugely increasing design difficulty? And why you bring up performance is beyond me. Especially since there isn't a big tradeoff there anyway (yet). I hear very few people (mostly some on Chinese hardware with 4GB onboard NAND) ask for mSD storage as a means to access programs. Most people are fine using it for pictures, music and video files. And they are plenty fast for that. Looking at this stuff through the lens of a manufacturer? Seriously? Aren't you supposed to be consumer advocates? Doing what you asks, I can justify exploiting my workers and ripping off consumers. Doesn't mean that's something that should be happening or that should be accepted or praised by reviewers. Also, your stance on this is not very consistent. Brian whines about not having a 17" Macbook, while the same arguments you are making here can apply (no market for it, he should just live with the tradeoff being made, the lineup gets too complicated...). Or Anand whines about not getting Crystalwell in more notebooks. It's a tradeoff guys, live with it and shut up! :P
I travel. not always to first world countries. enough said. ability to load music and movies on the fly is awesome. no electricity for a day? I got a spare battery. I was a Nokia fanboy until they went unibody. I sacrificed expandable storage for a galaxy nexus. but ain't touching an lg unibody. nowadays sony and huawei still make some phones I want.
disappointed that manufacturers come out with 4-5 phones a year but they ignore our demographic
Removable batteries are a necessity these days because of poor security on the baseband processors for privacy. Since baseband radios will execute the code which is supplied by cell phone towers, this is what enables three letter agencies to turn your baseband on and listen in and track your phone even if the CPU is off. If you want to make sure your phone is off and truly off, you need to be able to remove the battery.
The price difference charged currently in the market is ridiculous. I personally could care less about either removable battery or removable storage (i.e. SD). Both my current phones have both, and I can't remember the last time I removed either.
Sure, both are selling points for a very small minority of buyers, but I don't think from the perspective of reviews and commentary BY this site that either should be a minus or plus when it comes to THIS SITE'S OPINION on a particular phone.
I won't buy a mobile device without external storage. I don't care about a removable battery, but the phone or tablet MUST have some sort of external storage support. And I mean what I say. I will not buy a device without it. Why? Because OEMs don't ship enough storage space on their mobile devices to hold my movies and music. Streaming is not okay when you have bandwidth caps and streaming doesn't always work when you need it. Connections are sometimes slow, or don't exist at all such as on an airplane. I cannot watch netflix on an airplane because there is no connection. I cannot watch netflix in my hotel room because my bandwidth is capped at 4GB for the month. I MUST have external storage on my tablet and smartphone in order to watch a movie while on the road. And it must be a lot of storage so I have a selection of what I want to watch, in full glorious 1080p with a decent bitrate. This is actually why I love the Surface. It has something called a USB slot. Maybe you've heard of this little invention? It allows me to connect any stupid SD card or USB storage device that I own and play my own content that is on my physical media.
Frankly I am mystified that Anand and Brian don't get this. This is the most basic of features. Some customers are okay without this and they can go buy an iphone. But for the rest of us who actually use our phones as real computing devices access to some sort of external storage is a must have feature. Brian and Anand should absolutely push for more stock storage at reasonable prices and should campaign against data caps on our cell service, but guys, the reality is that us users are faced with these problems and need to find solutions to them in the real world. And for me that is external storage and my Galaxy S4 and Surface do both of those things very well.
I find this AT post borderline unprofessional and fanboyish. We get it that the guys are quickly turning into Apple fans but still...
Starting with "All else being equal, removable storage and user replaceable batteries aren't inherently bad things". The choice of words says it all. It must be obvious to anyone that "All else being equal, removable storage and user replaceable batteries are great things" If one does not need a memory card - does not use one. All else will be equal, what's there to complain about?
People already covered most major flaws in AT arguments. I just want to add a few more. Although not explicitely covered in this article we know that the authors prefer not just unibody design but aluminum unibody design (apple anybody?) Let's see what this designmeans in terms of tradeoffs: * hard to fit NFC antenna * hard to fit wireless charging * hard to fit multiple antennas (hence no simultaneous voice and LTE data on Verizon and Sprint iPhones) * with unibody design, the phone has to have a slot for SIM card. Good luck waterproofing this thing. When do you think will we see a waterpoofed iPhone? (Answer - never) yet Samsung has an excellent water/dust proofed phone in Galaxy S4 Active.
Apparently such tech lovers like Brian and Anand do not care about theselittle things. OK. Of course when it comes to iPhones the issue of SD cards is rather irrelevant. iOS does not have a user-exposed file system anyways.
Also let's look at the modularity offered by nonunibody design. Samsung offers Note 3 owners a choice of 4 backs: * regular back * S View flip cover * regular back with wireless charging * S View flip cover with wireless charging
Then we can add third party backs with extended batteries. iPhone has none of this. No wonder Samsung outsells Apple in smartphones by 2 to 1.
And by the way, according to FixYa's Black Friday Smartphone Report "the top grievance among iPhone 5S users was battery life". Perhaps at least some iPhone users would appreciate the ability to swap the battery.
Samsung isn't just dominating the Android market. Samsung sells more phones then the next top 4 handset makers combined, including Apple.
The authors are undoubtedly aware of this fact, which is why it's so stunning so see just how out of touch they are with this particular situation. How they can couch such a clear majority as some kind of a minority to be easily dismissed is really insulting to the readers intelligence. And reeks of a clear bias, unfortunately.
You didn't raise the battery end of life argument at all. Lithium Ion batteries have a limited shelf life. Regardless of how much they're used. At around 2 years old the cells degrade, no matter how much you've used them. That, by itself, is reason enough to include removable batteries. Because if you don't once the device is 3 years old you've got half the battery life you used to. The user NEEDS to able to replace that battery every 2 years or so. It's a lot less wasteful and expensive than replacing the entire device.
I don't think the "C drive" vs "D drive" problem really applies. From my experience, most people are far more malleable into adapting to technologies on their phones than on their computers, and everyone can very well distinguish "internal" from "external" memory. Even my, somewhat stuck in the 90's, parents "know" that it's better to have the camera putting the photos in the card, saving the internal storage for the system. As for me, if my smartphone is really to be the "do all anywhere" device that it is supposed to be, i just NEED a big, cheap, chunk of memory (i.e. sdcard) where to put all my files. Else, I can't give up my good old multi-gigabyte ipod, or my notebook, in which case i don't really need a smartphone anyway... But I fully understand Apple and Google on this one: Why offer an option that would kill those sweet $100 charged per 16GB/32GB increment... And if that's not enough, you can always buy some bit of their respective clouds, giving even more money to the carriers on the way to access it.
I've been using the same phone for over 4 years now. If I didn't have a removable battery I'd have to throw it away when the battery is dead for good. Long as this thing works I'm keeping it. It's a shame so many phones are so disposable and only kept a year or two.
If a microSD card fails, replace it. If internal storage fails, the entire phone is scrapped. If a user removable battery fails, replace it. If a built in battery fails, dig out the tools and a heat gun to remove it; then start hunting for a replacement. Your warrantee is toast!
For the moment, monolithic build really mans "Intensionally Disposable Product - Designed for Landfill!". Terrible for end users and the environment. Both the iPhone and Nexus 5 are clear cases of this policy at work.
As an end user. I wonder who these writers really care about or represent.
I have to disagree with Anand on this. I have two very simple use cases:
1. Quick battery swap. I always keep an extra battery in my charger. **Some nights I forget to plug my phone into the charger**. Next morning I just swap batteries. Plus, when I'm travelling, I take along the extra battery -- sometimes when out and about, spending lots of time in conference rooms, etc., my battery is dying by dinner time -- precisely when I need my phone the most.
2. ** These phones are cameras ** -- for most people their primary and most used camera (still and video!). Would you buy a camera that only had internal storage?? (And as many have pointed out, where the manufacturer charged you $100 for an extra 16Gb!?).
Why does a slot for a microSD card compromise the build quality but a slot for a SIM card presumably doesn't? If a unibody design can accommodate one it can accommodate the other.
As for the battery, I do carry a spare. Also if the battery life starts to degrade over time I can get it back as new with a new battery.
From a handset design perspective, SIM cards are not desirable either, but they are required for GSM devices. There has been a steady push to make them ever smaller and reduce their voltage requirements, which is why we went from full-size SIM, to mini-SIM, to micro-SIM, and now to nano-SIM. microSD card slots require at least 212 mm^3 of interior volume and 137 mm^2 of PCB real estate. Apple's nano-SIM tray has a volume of right around 200 mm^3 and occupies about 148 mm^2 of PCB, so very similar footprint, but that's for an externally accessible tray and receptacle. And if you look at a picture of the logic board, you'll see why this is such an issue—it's actually the single largest component on the entire board: http://d3nevzfk7ii3be.cloudfront.net/igi/UXZEPCS1l...
The volume of an iPhone 5 battery is 9207 mm^3. Adding a second tray that could accommodate a microSD card and enough additional logic board to mount it on would consume some 540 mm^3 of internal volume, which is 5.9% of the volume occupied by the battery. By comparison, the volume of the SGS4 battery is ~13681 mm^3 with the microSD slot taking up nearly 600 mm^3, yet only representing 4.4% of the battery volume. Even though the penalty is lesser on a larger device, it is still a significant trade-off.
While quoting the numbers looks good, adding an extra few mm to the thickness/width of the device would easily make up for the volume lost to the SD and Sim slots. Furthermore, where do you see these manufacturers jumping for the extra 5.9% battery volume? And assuming they do, gaining a significant real-world advantage in battery life?
Fractured and overloaded mobile networks have a much bigger effect on mobile battery life than the loss of volume you're lamenting. For an easy example, switch off mobile data on your device and see how much longer it lasts (don't use any data applications for the same time period for a control test).
The iPhone5 would be far better served by being a little bit wider and accommodating a larger battery that way, than the relatively insignificant size of adding an SD card slot. Who would lose? Nobody. Who would gain? Consumers currently being charged quadruple the going rate for a memory upgrade.
I didn't quote those numbers, per se. I actually made some measurements and did a few calculations. If I had quoted them, the volumes probably would have been stated more properly using ml rather than mm^3 for units.
And you are absolutely right; adding a few mm to the thickness of a device can create the necessary interior volume for any number of additional features. However, all smartphones could accommodate a battery that could last for 3 days on a single charge if they were just a tad thicker and a bit heavier. Nobody would complain if their smartphone ran for 3 days off a single charge. However, no OEM has shipped a flagship smartphone with a battery that lasts this long. Why is that?
There is a direct correlation between the volume of a battery and the maximum amount of energy it can provide. Using the most power efficient components in a device and tweaking the OS may allow you to get better milage or get by with a smaller gas tank, but the battery size / battery life correlation remains the same regardless. If the battery stays the same, microSD card slots inherently increase the size, weight and cost of a device. If the size and weight stay the same at the expense of battery volume, microSD card slots inherently reduce battery life. Most users of smartphones that ship with an empty microSD card slot never install a microSD card. Therefore most users would suffer from reduced portability or decreased battery life if, for instance, the iPhone 5 had a microSD card slot.
The notion that consumers are simply being charged 4x the going rate for higher capacity storage in smartphones is a bit simplistic. If you took the BOM cost of the NAND flash memory modules shipped in all the current smartphones, and added the average gross margin for their respective OEMs, what sort of price tiers would you expect to see? They would obviously be much higher in terms of cost/GB than the cheapest microSD cards on the market, but also pretty far from the typical $50 or $100 steps we tend to see with smartphone pricing. On the other hand, is it inherently bad that the base model is generally subsidized by the fatter margins on the higher tiers in order to hit that entry level price point? And don't the street prices for the higher storage tiers end up being even more outrageous for smartphones with microSD card slots? The benefits of microSD card slots are that they allow the user to defer spending on additional storage, reuse storage modules for multiple devices, potentially add more capacity than available via configurations offered by the OEM, save money by using lower quality or lower performance memory, buy modules on the open market where sellers might take considerably lower margins, take advantage of pricing opportunities created by the volatility of the NAND flash memory market, and take advantage of Moore's law delivering a halving of price or doubling of capacity every 24 months. The downside is that they can also be a cop out for OEMs looking to reduce SKUs and not build as many devices with more costly, higher capacity NAND flash modules for those customers who are willing to pay for storage that offers higher performance, increased reliability, and tighter integration.
"However, no OEM has shipped a flagship smartphone with a battery that lasts this long. Why is that?"
Because OEM's are a) Nickel and diming on parts b) Using artifically limited battery capacities to make a killing on "optional" extras like charging stations/"battery covers" etc. c) Not very focused on what consumers actually ask for. Pick any or all of the three. All are far more likely than an OEM saying "Oh woe is me, if only I didn't have to let users replace their batteries, I could save that huge rectangular space and fit in some extra battery that I couldn't possibly get anywhere else, especially not, say, by increasing the overall depth of the device by a single millimetre."
"The notion that consumers are simply being charged 4x the going rate for higher capacity storage in smartphones is a bit simplistic." Good thing it's not easily demonstrated by publicly available facts, then.
"The downside is that they can also be a cop out for OEMs looking to reduce SKUs and not build as many devices with more costly, higher capacity NAND flash modules for those customers who are willing to pay for storage that offers higher performance, increased reliability, and tighter integration."
Did you miss the many, many, many posts which pointed out the easily researched fact that microSD cards are actually *faster* than the storage in top of the range premium phones/small tablets? And have higher capacities? Are you just ignoring these easily verifiable facts?
You should a) look at the effect on the BOM cost that a larger battery would make and weigh that against the impact of battery life on unit sales b) look at the balance sheet of any handset OEM to see how that "killing" on optional extras compares to the profit from sales of the primary device c) not even joke about focus groups being a good idea
Why don't you take a minute to click on the "Bench" link up at the top of this page and take a gander at the Android smartphone storage benchmarks.
Let's start with the Samsung Galaxy Note 3, which posts sequential reads of 107.24 MB/s, which is faster than the UHS-I interface. In fact, everything released in the past year is north of 48 MB/s. Then let's look at the 4 KB random read performance, which across the board shames every microSD card on the market because they simply aren't designed for it. Then let's look at 4 KB random writes, where the Galaxy Note 3 and Moto X both exceed 500 IOPS, something that no microSD card can boast. And finally you come to the sequential writes, which are in fact disappointing on most smartphones, however this is one of the metrics that is targeted for optimization on SD cards.
Feel free to compile a list of 32 and 64 GB microSD cards that exceed the performance of the NAND modules in flagship smartphones in any metric other than sequential write speed. Make sure to note the retail price of those cards as well. What is the rated endurance of the NAND they use? How robust are the wear leveling algorithms or encryption protocols they incorporate?
I own Sandisk Extreme and Lexar 600x cards, so I'm pretty familiar with both the performance and pricing of the fastest microSD cards on offer. My last 3 phones all came with 64 GB of integrated storage, but I've yet to come across a 128 GB microSDXC card, and only recently has the performance of 64 GB microSDXC cards caught up with what you've been able to get in phones for years.
Since this is Anandtech, all opinion from Anand/Brian must have been right.
Wait, Samsung is still selling phones with fully swappable micro-sd & batteries and they are the no.1 Android phone maker in the world. So Samsung must listen to Anand because only Anand could be right.
Message to Moto, modular phone idea is stupid according to Anand, you must stop your project right now, cause all phones must be uni-body design.
Yes, Anand and Brian's opinions are right BECAUSE THEY ARE OPINIONS, just as if you stated your opinion was preferring SD-cards, dual-headphone jacks, and having an eInk display on the backside of your device. Since it's an opinion you have a right to it no matter how silly it is, but for you to sarcastically suggest that Anand and Brian's opinions mean they are wrong to have factually shows you don't quite understand what an opinion is.
Evidence: GS4 - slim, larger, longer battery life includes an sd card slot as well. I don't see any other non-replaceable battery phones having a significantly longer battery life
Reality: Given two batteries of equal energy density and differing volumes, the larger battery will provide more energy. Sealed batteries are more volumetrically efficient than those that are user replaceable. Therefore, given the same volume and chemistry, the sealed battery will have a higher energy density and provide more energy.
More reality: All microSD card slots require interior volume in a device. That volume is equivalent to 4-6% of the volume of the batteries found in the current flagship smartphones.
Hypothetical: If you asked all smartphone users whether they would rather have 4-6% longer battery life or a microSD card slot in their next device, what would you fancy the outcome of that poll would be? What if you then asked them if they would like to have both but in a slightly larger device?
Improving screen technology so that they suck less power, and changing the way mobile networks are deployed would instantly gain far more battery life than either of the sacrifices you're talking about.
Would you rather lose 4% battery life and gain cheap storage and a phone that isn't bricked because a single replaceable component failed, or gain 100% battery life with a better designed screen?
Neither screen nor mobile network technology is relevant to the argument pertaining to microSD card slots and removable batteries; they are simply red herrings. Furthermore, no smartphone has ever shipped with a screen that was 50% less power efficient than any screen of similar size, pixel density, maximum brightness and color gamut available in production quantity at that time. Also, no handset OEM directly controls the deployment of any mobile network.
The total increase in battery life achievable by using sealed batteries and omitting microSD card slots is realistically in the 10% range, and potentially higher than that. If the on-board NAND flash memory fails, the device will be non-functional regardless of whether there is a microSD card installed or not. Thankfully, failures of this nature are incredibly rare. If a sealed battery fails, or the maximum charge level falls below a reasonable percentage of the original capacity, you can have it replaced. A device with a failed user replaceable battery is just as bricked if you don't own a second battery. Most owners of smartphones with removable batteries never purchase a second battery for their phone.
You claim that a 5% increase in potential battery volume is significant enough to warrant ditching expandability, but claim that any other measure to increase battery life is "irrelevant"? Are you really going to set out a stall on "this needs to be done to increase battery life" and then ignore factors which influence battery life to a much greater extent based on simple physics on the basis they're "red herrings"?
And when did your volume estimates for ditching these factors jump from ~5% to 10%? Did you calculate incorrectly the first time? Or are you just fishing for random numbers to back up an argument that didn't stack up the first time?
Note that I never claimed "Phone A shipped with a screen 50% more efficient than Phone B". I said, very clearly, that if an engineer is given a choice between ditching SD cards and gaining 5% battery capacity, or working on improved screen technology to lower battery drain by 50%, one is very much a larger benefit than the other.
If you choose to ignore that, then you're not much of an engineer.
Until phones are powered by unicorns, the size of the battery determines how long a given device can function. Every OEM makes their devices as efficient as is technically possible while still ticking all the feature boxes and trying to get the best scores possible in the benchmarks. Then they fit it with the smallest battery they can get away with before people start massively complaining about how bad the battery life is, so that they can tout how thin and light their device is compared to the competition. In fact, the less power the screen or radios draw, the bigger impact a given reduction in battery volume will have on device run time.
Clearly when I said, "The total increase in battery life achievable by using sealed batteries and omitting microSD card slots is realistically in the 10% range," I added the effect of doing both (see how I used the words "total" and "and"). Does something appear incorrect about my estimate? Why don't you go ahead and do the maths yourself. If you do, you'd realize that if making the battery on the iPhone 5 non-user removable allowed Apple to increase its overall size by as little as 150 µm in each dimension, the result would be a greater than 5% improvement in battery life.
And I'll note that you made the rather specious claim that it was possible for a smartphone to, "gain 100% battery life with a better designed screen." That would only be possible if such screens existed in the supply chain in sufficient quantity and at a reasonable cost during the same time period that the device was slated for assembly. Do you really think the screen suppliers are sandbagging and just holding out on some new super low-power tech? Considering that Samsung and LG both make screens themselves, and a supply contract for an iPhone screen is a 3 comma deal, I find it highly unlikely that they're just not bothering with display power optimizations.
"Then they fit it with the smallest battery they can get away with before people start massively complaining about how bad the battery life is, so that they can tout how thin and light their device is compared to the competition."
According to you, this is presumably a good thing, and we should all be grateful that OEMs pay so much attention to the bottom line. You keep going on about BOM and whether x or y missing feature is going to lead to a loss of profit.
Some people are actually more interested in the usefulness of a device, and I think the arguments in these comments show that there are many useful things one can do with SD cards and removeable batteries.
In fact, it is precisely Anand's and Brian's excessive concentration on the producer interest that is annoying everyone here.
Of course, there is the absurd figleaf that we can collectively rectify the poor value offered to consumers by "demanding" that phones come with more internal storage and a reduced markup on additional storage tiers. While we're at it, let's all demand that OEMs make thicker phones with bigger batteries - oh wait: "Then they fit it with the smallest battery they can get away with."
I think you've missed my point when it comes to the BOM. The battery is the least expensive item on any smartphone bill of materials. OEMs could double the size of the battery they include and it wouldn't even move the needle on their margins, yet they would trounce their competitors when it comes to run time. There is clearly a belief that keeping these devices as thin and light as possible will result in better sales than longer battery life will.
I'm not saying we should be grateful to the OEMs for being good bean counters, or looking out for their profits, I'm merely saying that if you want to understand their design considerations, the bottom line is a good place to start. I don't believe Brian and Anand want their readers to empathize with the manufacturers either, they're simply pointing out that if you look at it from the OEMs perspective, it's easier to see why we are where we are, and where we're likely headed.
So do you propose that things will get better if we encourage every OEM to stick with 16GB of NAND and a battery that lasts 3 hours as the baseline, as long as there's a microSD slot and the battery is swappable? So that those who are so inclined can buy and carry additional microSD cards and batteries to correct the shortcomings inherent in the device? I'm much more of the opinion that this site, and we as consumers, should reward the companies willing to deliver a better package—one that comes with a reasonable amount of storage and a decent battery in the first place.
"So do you propose that things will get better if we encourage every OEM to stick with 16GB of NAND and a battery that lasts 3 hours as the baseline, as long as there's a microSD slot and the battery is swappable?"
No, what I would suggest is that, among a variety of different offerings, including completely sealed devices for the unibody/monocoque fetishists, there is room for non-Samsung devices to come with:
(i) A removeable battery of at least 2500 mAh as standard, with official and aftermarket replaceable back covers giving options for larger batteries; (ii) Fast internal flash offered at different price points for 16/32/64/128GB (iii) Hot-swappable microSD slot up to 128GB (iv) USB 3.0 OTG, allowing simultaneous charging and attachment of HDMI out, and USB hubs, both powered and unpowered
Actually, the burden is on you. You'll need to either show that Brian and Anand's premises are untrue, or that their argument is invalid if you want to disprove them. I have not seen anything in these comments that refutes so much as a single statement they made.
I challenge you to disprove any of their conclusions.
All of Anand and Brian's criticisms about removeable storage/parts list "potential tradeoffs" or "potential compromises".
The truth is that the difference between a well-engineered device and a poorly engineered device in terms of "in hand feel" is likely nothing to do with replaceable parts and far more to do with an overall cost-cutting approach in terms of materials and construction methods. Talking about "potential" this and "possible" that goes both ways.
"Potentially" the OEM's are exaggerating these challenges and compromises to favoured reviewers in order to get them on side so that anti-consumer price gouging can continue. Does a HTC One feel better in the hand than the Galaxy S3? Sure. Is that down to a micro SD slot? No, blatently not.
Here's a simple conundrum for you: If battery doors, MicroSD slots, GSM sized SIMs and replaceable parts lead to unacceptable engineering tradeoffs and lower device quality, why did Apple have to spin that users were "holding it wrong" when their poor engineering decisions around the antenna for the 4 were revealed?
Bad engineers, cost cutting regimes, poor quality control, and pressures of time to market are all more significant factors in creating devices with poor build quality and reliability than any of the "issues" raised by Anand and Brian in this article.
No. Anand and Brian primarily cite incontrovertible compromises inherent to two very specific features of smartphones, whereas their critics cite potential benefits or use cases which make the trade-offs involved preferable. (Which is not to say that there are not valid points raised by both sides.)
Your simple conundrum is a non sequitur mixed with bait for any Apple fanbois. It is also largely irrelevant to the topics addressed by the original post.
What "incontrovertible" claims do they make about replacement batteries and SD card slots?
" The move away from removable batteries allows for better use of internal volume, which in turn increases the size of battery you can include at the same device size. There are potential build quality benefits here as well since the manufacturer doesn't need to deal with building a solid feeling removable door/back of some sort. That's not to say that unibody designs inherently feel better, it's just that they can be."
Directly quoting from the article, if the words "can" and "potential" are confusing to you, perhaps you should stop analysing other people's posts.
Are you suggesting that the Nokia 3310 was a phone with poor build quality based on its removable battery and full size SIM card?
My conundrum is very simple, you're correct. Apple produced a device with none of the "tradeoffs" you, Anand and Brian deride as detrimental to the quality of a device, but made a severe balls of a very simple engineering problem, ie radio attenuation. Apple made a "tradeoff" between aesthetics, materials and physics. Unfortunately, they chose the first two over the third, and the third spanked them for it. If you don't like the apple example, pick another manufacturer. They've all made various engineering design mistakes over the years, but the number which can be pinned on SD cards is absolutely minimal.
The build quality of a device does not have any meaningful relationship to the inclusion of user-replaceable batteries, and the companies who are suggesting that it does are, very simply, telling porkies. Replaceable batteries and expandable storage were never issues for well over a decade. Their denigration as features has come at a time when, coincidentally, some manufacturers have discovered that removing them results in the ability to price-gouge consumers on basic additions like storage capacity and charging "features".
I love how you selected a quote that perfectly illustrates my point and then tried to claim that the words "can" or "potential" are somehow problematic. The first sentence is based on deductive reasoning that is both valid and sound, and neither you nor any other commenter here has done anything to disprove it. The second sentence presents an inferential claim based on inductive reasoning that is both strong and reliable. The third sentence is poorly written, but is merely meant to underscore that the second sentence does not imply that all unibody designs feel better than all non-unibody designs.
You then go on to provide an example that justifies Anand's inclusion of that third sentence. His point was that while there are obviously examples of well made phones with removable backs, it's still easier to make a solid feeling phone if you don't have to worry about that aspect of the design.
Apple's antenna design on the iPhone 4 resulted in excessive signal attenuation for many users. That has zero bearing on the tradeoffs that come with incorporating microSD card slots or user removable batteries in a smartphone. What exactly is your argument here? That because no one has yet to completely bollox a design specifically through the inclusion of a microSD card slot, therefore all smartphones should have them?
I just feel bad that my Note2 and Korean LG G2 are having swappable batteries, yet I could easily use the stock battery to last for more than 1day. This must be violating Anand's golden rule that non-swappable batteries must last longer than swappable ones. According to Anand, you couldn't have a phone with long last battery while it is also swappable. I feel Samsung is not playing up to Anand's rule, and by Anand's logic Samsung must be punished.
1. A decent speed microSD with 64 gigs cost me about 45 dollars (15mb/s write, 35 read). Never, ever will manufacturers charge you just 45 dollars to go from 16 gig to 80 gig. They want to earn money.
2. My data plan is capped at 3 gig. Previously I had a much larger cap and thus was using Spotify to stream, accumulating well over 10 gig data per month. So, I download playlists I follow now on Wifi. I don't wanna think about how much storage I need for that.
3. I don't see how an SD slot is ruining my Z1's body design.
4. If you don't want to put in an SD card, just don't do it. The cost to put in a slot is so little it is dumb to omit it.
5. Where are all those tradeoffs this article talks about to be seen IN REALITY, on those devices that have SD slots?
Another design/construction issue is wireless charging: devices with battery doors, removable backs, etc. are generally more likely to give me the option of dropping in a receiver coil for Qi or whatever charge system I want. Hopefully the industry will soon be to the point where most devices have a widely accepted wireless charging receiver built in regardless of battery/SD card options, but as it stands right now 'sealed' devices are mostly left with clunky external coils built into oversized cases as the only option for wireless charger compatibility.
I simply cannot live with a replaceable battery. I use extended batteries which last all day regardless how I use my phone and I swap it with another fully charged battery when I choose. I never have to worry about charging my phone because I am always charging my batteries. A phone should never have to be charged, but the batteries should.
Never have I seen an AT commentary getting this much flak and for the right reasons, especially with that lame as hell rebuttal of "it's just our opinion".
So how is the vaunted Apple build quality doing so much good where nearly everyone is covering up their iDevices for fear of scratches? Or that impossible combination of a waterproof, well buily Android phone with an SD slot? *snicker*
"Similar to our position on removable batteries, devices aren't penalized in our reviews for having/not-having a removable microSD card slot." But they should be penalized if there aren't 64GB/128GB options available at prices similar to microSD cards.
A very badly written article with just hearsay and not data to back it up.
- Samsung has been able to make thinner and lighter phones with better battery life than the competition. So what were you saying about efficient usage of space again ? - SDs are being forced on their way out by manufacturers, not cause no one wants them - Google/OEMs just want you to pay more citing BS such as difficult to manage, slower, etc. People have been using SDs since the time of feature phones. It's just the Apple crowd which doesn't want to use them. - SDs stay out of the way, until you need your 64 GB of music/movies/pictures. Speed and reliability is not even a concern - Removable batteries, similarly, give the option to the user. - The only argument I can accept is that Nexus devices are half priced so they can get away with not having either. I still won't buy them
My case: I ride a motorcycle. I need a removable battery cause on long rides with GPS on, I can simple swap the battery and charge the depleted one. Similarly, I can review videos taken on my GoPro on the road by swapping the microSD. The only OEM that satisfies my requirements is Samsung. As long as they keep providing removable batteries and microSD, I will keep buying.
Bait: GS4 is the best device there is , Nexus phones suck
I don't want to increase the thickness of the phone. I only need the extra battery when I go on trips. Plus with the spare charger, I can charge the spare battery even when I am on my motorcycle
Out of curiosity, do you ride with your phone in a mount? And if so, aren't there SGS4 mounts that can provide charging power? (I do the boat thing, not the motorcycle thing, so I have no idea.)
And doesn't the new version of the GoPro App allow you to view and share your videos on your SGS4 via an ad-hoc Wi-Fi network? (Once again, I have no idea. This might totally suck compared to just sticking the microSD card in there.)
I ride with my phone in my pocket, with GPS directions via bluetooth headset, if required.] I would never keep anything else along with the phone, like an external power pack, even if I had the space (which I don't). I just stick the depleted battery into the Samsung external charger and stow it below my seat.
As for the GoPro, I have a Hero2 without wifi. Again, I would never go in for overpriced solutions to the fake problems manufacturers themselves create. The popularity of external power packs shows that people more battery life than what is available to them
What an external microSD/SD card allows you to do is bring allow your private pron collection without ever 'forgetting' that its in phone memory. If you ever have to give away or sell your phone, one of the first things people do is yank the memory card out.
Except that the "quick swap" isn't that quick. And, from my experience, you also have to have a good external charger to make sure that the external batteries, be they OEM or non-OEM, are fully charged. You can end up with a secondary battery that isn't fully charged and will lose that charge quickly after taking a bunch of photos.
Again, everyone has a choice of phones with removable batteries and phones without them. If you want the former, then buy phones that offer that option and vice versa.
Except that it isn't, especially if you are in conditions such as airports or in the middle of remote areas where you can't really just stop, turn off the phone, search for the battery, take the cover off the phone, and then do the swap. To you, that's quick. To me as a power user, and to most mainstream users, that's a lot of time for not much gain.
In the long run, the best solution is for better battery development, better software development (in order for power to be used more efficiently) and even better decisions by power users when it comes to operating smartphones. The last point is also true for storage. If so many power users weren't engaging in what can be best called digital hording, holding on to every megabyte instead of backing up data properly and deleting that which is no longer useful or necessary, then the storage given (especially when one gets 32 gigs to work with) would be more than enough.
I'm sorry but this post reeks of arrogance. There are pros and cons to both sides and as the sales figures show people prefer removable batteries and expandable storage to locked down devices. It's no surprise the enthusiasts agree as well. We want more control over our devices. The benefits to removable batteries and sd slot are too obvious to state here but I will say that this, the hard stance that Anandtech and Anand himself has taken on this biased view has hurt my opinion of the site irreparably. It shows a lack of journalistic integrity and whatever the cause, be it personal bias or a thinly veiled anti-Samsung stance it doesn't matter. You have done a massive disservice to the community and have betrayed your user base.
I strongly disagree with almost all points here. Anand might be drinking a bit too much Apple cool-aid these days :/
1) Removable batteries do not dictate form factor 2) Protection circuitry is necessary regardless of removable vs not, and battery-level protection circuits are very small in size 3) Costs for removable batteries are already hugely inflated by manufacturers, and integrated battery replacement costs are even worse. $80 to replace a tiny battery? The batteries cost far less than $10 to produce. Ridiculous. 4) I'd love to see a standardised small form factor Lithium-based battery. You know, like AA. And usable cross-device. That way, I could take a battery from my camera, stick it in my phone, flashlight etc, all using readily-available chargers. This also encourages competition.
On MicroSD, again, I disagree that the "better" solution is cheaper inbuilt upgrade prices. The better solution is *both*, and, ideally, upgradable inbuilt storage!
In a year's time, there's a good chance that 64GB card will cost less than it does now. I've got $200 to spend right now. I'd rather spend it on a phone with fast CPU and good camera, but with small storage, than spend it on a lesser phone with a large NAND. That way, a year down the track I've got a better phone with an extra 64GB of storage (for the obvious stuff - music, video, and photo).
It's also really damn handy to have a removable card - that way if I want to go and print a photo, for example, I can just pop the card out of my phone, and plug it in to one of those photo print stations. No cables. Or pop it into an SD adaptor and use it with my dSLR or video camera, then pop it back into my phone (or tablet, let's not forget tablets here) and view that content on a larger screen while I'm out and about.
I think the important thing to remember here is that for 80% of people, high-performance NAND is not something that gives any real benefit - the majority of their storage requirements are serially-accessed media files anyway! Who cares if the bits in my photos can't be randomly accessed super quickly :/
I'd also just like to reiterate that the whole C vs D drive thing is crap. You can get around it very easily by saying that MicroSD cards can be used for media files only. All the media player apps have metadata libraries that simply point to the actual storage location anyway.
You forgot the part how your phone can't play MP3s and load images from your crappy SD card with *only* 10MB/s reads which apparently is too slow for consumers according to AT.
Anand/Brian, Love the site and agree with the removable battery argument (even though I've put in a bigger battery for my phone). But saying removable storage is not important because there SHOULD be sufficient space is a fallacy. Its like saying console games should be cheaper so lets continue paying the current price -how are OEMs to know what we what, especially the masses who don't frequent sites like this (and leave comments), or know what is possible with current tech. I'm a frequent flyer so I need that extra space, and sadly I'll only get it caked in when (no offence to ye) review sites stop bigging up pixel density and phone dimensions / thinness (improvements in these are academic now anyway) and focus on storage space and battery life. And yes ordinary users want these too, I got my Mum a smartphone and she was really pissed her phone didn't last a week on standby like her old phone did. To her the technology wasn't ready if she had to compromise on this; she only wanted a touch screen -apps mean nothing to her.
In this long comment section, the authors has not seen cause to react or respond, even a little, to protests from users on the acclaimed benefits of: 1. not making user-replaceable batteries in smartphones 2. not making SD expandable file storage in smartphones.
When Brian Klug ventured this road a while back alone, at least he tried responding, -initially !
The present double-authored fashion statement on the BAT/SD issue, stands as is.
Anandtech has become the ANA (American Humane Association — the grantor of the familiar “No Animals Were Harmed” trademark accreditation seen at the end of film and TV credits) of tech, and curled up with (some of) the producers.
It's sad to see mainstream consumers limiting options for power users because they're willing to settle for these things. Just like 1366x768 laptops dominating the marketplace, these "good enough for watching movies" products are designed to a price only. These non-in-the-field replacable battery phones are not yielding any significant battery life advantage and in most phones, do not take up any more space with the battery than removable battery phones do. And even if they were able to squeeze in a 25% larger battery, that's still a far cry from the practically limitless supply one gets with replaceable batteries. More importantly, batteries wear out, and run-time shortens over time. Pretty soon that 125% battery is lasting 1/2 as long, and a $5 30second fix wont solve it. Not only do batteries wear out, but so does flash memory. Why would I want to worry about constantly rewriting to internal flash memory over and over and slowly killing the phone, when I could be saving files to easy-to-replace micro SD cards instead. The same micro SD cards that I can ready in many other devices and not have to rely on the phone even having power to access, or worry about losing access to important documents if other parts of the phone died.
I don't buy items to throw in a land fill in 6 months, I'd rather buy quality products that will last me a lifetime. I don't want to "use it up, and replace it." And I'm sure I'm not alone in the willingness to pay extra for some insured longevity and durability.
Then again, I'm also part of the minority that insists on a physical keyboard too, I may never be able to buy a new phone again the way things are going.
With the current stance on phones w/o batteries or micro SD slots, the continual reinforcement that current SSD NAND wear is good enough, even with tri-level-cell packages, and even the most recent statement where they thought the WD Black^2 would have been better off as a caching hybrid drive rather than discrete segmented areas Anandtech has pretty much jumped the shark for enthusiasts and power users. Walled garden Apple and Microsoft sycophants can come here to see the latest gotta-gave gadget every month to replace their phone with a larger screen every month instead.
I am currently using a Galaxy S2. The life of the original battery was pretty poor so I got the official extended battery and now I am more than happy with the life :) I have a 32gig SD card full of MP3s, books and magazines. I (originally) got this phone because of the options it afforded me. I also have a Transformer Prime tablet, it has served me well since I got it, I use it every day. One of the things I love about it is the fact it has so much expandable memory capabilities. I have 16gig in the tablet and 32 gig in the dock. I'm waiting for the new Nexus 10 to see if I will upgrade. If it doesn't come with a 128gig version then I'm gonna stick with the Prime. 64gig for my tablet is just about enough for me, I do like having the card options though. I have a large book / magazine library and I watch one or two movies / tv episodes on my daily commute by train. If I had a tablet with limited storage it would be extremely tiresome having to change files on a regular basis. Cloud storage is all well and good if you have access to a fast home broadband connection or can afford to have a 4G connection with a large allowance. I have neither, I live in a rural location and am lucky if I get 2meg download speeds on my ADSL and just about get a mobile signal so a device with expandable storage is essential for me.
"Similar to our position on removable batteries, devices aren't penalized in our reviews for having/not-having a removable microSD card slot."
Ok, I accept that, but you must accept that you aren't praising this feature as a benefit and a *USEFUL* feature to many. You (Anandtech) are taking a very clouded view upon what I see as a deal breaker in picking my next phone and shunning it as a token feature, that's not worth your time of day.
You may well be more interested in seeing the price of internal storage decrease, but in the meantime, a lot of people are suffering from *INFLATION* and the *RISING COSTS OF LIVING,* so day dreaming about NAND memory prices all of a sudden falling is a fantasy you need to GET OVER. I mean Apple charge in the UK nearly £100 for 16GB memory, the most of any manufacturer, and they will do all they can to preserve these 1000%+ profit margins so long as you keep telling people they're worth it. If you want to pay £100 for 16GB of memory, you can, but I'll protest those extortionate costs and ridiculous mark up in my option NOT TO BUY THEIR PRODUCTS, thank you.
. I bought a Nokia 520 ($150 unlocked) BECAUSE it had micro-SD. So in one tiny device I have all the phone necessities, minor alarm / calculator etc apps, AND a personal entertainment system. I have several 32GB chips and can swap in movies, tv shows, a large music collection, audiobooks, and ebooks. It also has a snap-in battery, so I have the option of carrying a spare on long trips AND have no concern over when the original no longer takes a charge.
--> Anandtech tells me that none of these things actually matter.
The phone case is perfectly solid, and thin enough for me.
--> Anandtech tells me that I should demand more in build quality and form factor.
I can only go by my own experience. I have owned 6 cell phones. I have had to replace the batteries in every one of them. I tend to keep my phones longer than most do, and the phones always seem to last an entire day for the first year or so, then they need to be charged part way through the day. I travel a lot also. Carrying a spare battery "just in case" is nice also. Fading batteries is not brand specific. I have owned Motorolas, HTCs, and a Samsung. I will consider buying a phone without a microSD card slot (if it has 128 GB of storage) but until they stop making cell phones without removable batteries I will always buy cell phones that have replacable batteries. Even if I have to go gray market "world" phones.
I think the battery argument is flawed as well. It is true that you can have potentially better battery life in a fully integrated system, but I don't believe its necessarily that big of a deal to scrap removable batteries all-together. Take the Samsung Note 3... for having a ridiculously large, bright screen it gets pretty dang good battery life. Easily enough to get you through a full day. I don't believe having better overall battery performance than say the Note 3 is worth the trade-off of basically having to landfill your non-user replaceable phone in a few years just because it won't hold a charge anymore.
Anandtech was ahead of the curve when they posited years ago that off-contract services would gain more traction and that would lead to people purchasing phones out-right instead of running a subsidized contract. I agree with that, and with that I believe people who buy their phones outright are LESS likely to want to replace them in 2 years, just like most people don't replace their computers every 2 years. Therefore, not having a removeable battery basically guarantees you will have to, even if you don't want to.
Yup, that is it, no battery replacement and you're guaranteed disposable phones and how much quality goes into anything inherently disposable and obsoletable every two years? Batteries have a cycle rate, of which the percentage to full charge is less every time. Sorry physics.
Someone else wrote here, "I really find this article disappointing. I feel as though the authors are so far into their viewpoint that they're incapable of evaluating the other side fairly." I feel the same way. Anand and company are so embedded with apple in their personal life choices they are incapable of an unbiased opinion. Too bad. BTW, where's the Nexus5 review?
Removable batteries have many advantages other than being able to carry a spare one and swap out (which I've never done, a universal, external battery is more convenient).
-If you keep your phone for more than 12-18 months, the battery will begin to deteriorate. A fresh $25 battery will give you phone a new lease of life
-If you don't mind having a slightly thicker phone, you can install a third party battery. For the Galaxy S3 I have, Samsung even sell an official 3000 mAh battery. It only adds a few millimeters to the thickness but increases battery life by 50%. If you're extremely demanding about battery life, there are some ludicrously oversized batteries you can buy. It gives you choice, which is why we go with Android over Apple in the first place.
-Non user replaceable batteries is planned obsolescence at its worst. Your phone is literally designed to stop being usable after 12-18 months.
Its still a mixed feeling as i explained in my recent article about this topic (http://www.techjaja.com/tech-all-news/do-you-reall... but i feel we still need a big leap forward in battery technology and more cheaper inbuilt memory.
what if your phone breaks or you soft brick or brick your phone and you didn't back up your device? For me this is why sd cards are crucial. Regardless of performance or not I don't backup my stuff every single day and what if I have no access to "Cloud" services. This is the main reason Phones should have sd slots. Peace of mind.
Cell phones do not cease functioning when powered-off. Many housekeeping choirs are going on, including reporting your tower location. To trully turn off, you must remove power source (battery).
I recently had the USB charging port on my phone fail. Without a way to charge nor a way to mount the phone on a computer, I had no way to easily retrieve my valuable files from my phone. When I received a replacement phone from my carrier, I was able to charge a battery with the replacement phone, move the battery into my damaged phone, and to copy the entire contents of my internal storage onto a 32gb MicroSD card. This is not even an argument or a discussion for me. I will not buy a device that has a unibody design. I have thoroughly learned the value of removable power and removable storage. I consider these things necessities. As for more an faster internal storage options? Yes, please, bring it on! I routinely fill my 32gb cards up. I'd love to have a 128gb storage capacity onboard, and a pair of Micro SDXC slots! Also, note that the first thing I do after I decide that I'm going to keep a new device is to buy the highest capacity extended battery that I can find. Having the option to upgrade my device is essential to me.
Ok, there are obvious reasons why the manufacturers would opt for internal storage only, but you always end to a consumer losing. A device with external storage is dynamically a device that will serve the end user to the terabyte territory. The rule is that we are more attached to the content of our devices than the devices themselves. Such a device would generally last for inappropriately long time compared to the companies' sale cycle. Now we wouldn't want that , would we? A failing battery may be a decision for device changing, but having the option for easy battery replacement would generally lead to a longer time using the device. We wouldn't want this too, would we? Then there's the need for catering for the cloud thingy. If the end user is indepedent storage wise , then how will all these companies sell petty storage for gold?
What about the ridiculous difficulty of transferring files between PC and phone? My experience is limited but on a Samsung device the procedure is deeply flawed. You have to install a crappy bloated media player on your PC and then you can transfer a limited range of media file types only (no .avi). For other filetypes they don't seem to want to let you do it. I just want to transfer any file I choose in either direction in a straightforward way. So I just pull out the sd card and plug it into the PC.
Well, there is none kind of issue with the Google Nexus 5 smart phones. It is working perfect. As it comes with 16 GB memory, I don't need any more space. It is enough for me.
Ho hum. 1)You can buy a sealed PC with 0.5TB, 1TB and 1.5TB harddrives for 200, 300 and 400 bucks 2) Or you can but a open PC with no HD for $200 where you can swap, add HDs as much as you want. Like a 2TB HD for a $100. Except you _may_ experience HD compatability issues if the HD manufacturers dont get their act together
I guess most people who come to this site (including me) prefer the second option I guess most phone manufacturers want to/are selling to the first group
Personally, I would not choose a phone without external sim, mSD and battery access unless it was so cheap I could use for a year and throw away like chewing gum.
The day will come when people can rely totally on internal storage, if and only if manufacturer stops charging sky-high premium price for a simple storage increase namely 16GB to 32 GB to 64GB to 126GB and all of us know the GB/$ is way cheaper than how they price their product.
This by far one of the dumbest articles on anandtech. Apparently not of the authors has had a phone with a removable battery and actually bothered to get a extra battery and a external charger. When u have a way to get u phone from totally dead to 100 percent full in 20 seconds using a nonremovable battery let me know. The argument about more capacity is laughable the phones ive seen with unremovable batteries actually had less capacity. Compare the htc one to the galaxy s4 capacity. What are u going to do when ur battery loses its charge? When u cant replace the battery. They only last so many charge cycles u know. As far as u know what consumers want apparently u dont have a clue. Compare the sales of phones that do have removable batteries and sd card slots with the android phones that dont. Consumers have spoken loud and clear.
this argument is wrong for smartphonesw -the entire point of a replaceable battery is convenience, and those manufacturers like apple with non replaceable batteries do in fact gouge their loyal customers and do NOT deliver more battery life than those manufacturers who do provide replaceable batteries.
SDCard are also meant for convenience - and to protect oneself from being gouged for additional memory, again as in apple's memory prices. The SD Card is for convenience, offload sub critical apps, photos, docs etc and keep internal memory available for higher priority items.
The argument makes no sense at all - since most manufacturers would love to gouge their customers for memory and battery replacement - we do not live in an ideal world.
People want cheaper/reusable storage and cheaply repairable devices that have decent build quality and market value. Lots of them love fashionable devices, but not most mind you, the former being https://www.bestoffertou.com
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Streamlined - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
SD Cards are analogous to floppy disks and are on their way out. Even today, most people rarely use them anymore, contrary to a vocal minority on comment boards.edwpang - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Your analogy is flawed. Floppy disks are several magnitude slower than HDD, and much smaller than HDD as well. I am comparing the speed and size when floppies were available. However, SD card is comparable in size and speed to internal storage.dylan522p - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
SD cards take a lot more space and they are significantly slower when compared on devices with good NAND and controller.SoC-IT2ME - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Who cares if they are slower than internal memory?Aslong as the phone has 32GB fast internal storage like on the Note 3 then I'm happy.
I have a 64GB class 10+ mSD card and that is used for bulk storage (music, videos, nandroids). I don't need it to be superfast, 10MB/s is fine.
If manufacturers want to ditch SD slots, then bloody supply phone with a 128GB option at a fair bloody price.
Nenad - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Fully agree. On my S4, internal is 27/35 MBs write/read, and my external is 10/34 MBs write/read. So its same read speed, similar write speed, and I have only 16GB internal (9GB usable), compared to 64GB external. And I have some 20GB of maps and navigation app on external SD.That is why I think that Anand is *wrong* to just say "we will not penalize phones not having MicroSD". What that means is he will not reward phone with external SD option in his review even in "all else being equal" - and that is plain wrong.
Nenad - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Just to make it clear, I agree with all other Anand's points : external SD is not as good or as valuable as internal flash, partially due to performance, but mostly due to OS not fully supporting external SD. I can put some big apps on external SD (like iGO), but large games mostly could NOT be moved to external SD (even if they say they moved, 'obb' folder remains on internal). But still: external SD is valuable.So only (big) issue that I have with Anand's approach here is if he ignore if phone has support for external SD in reviews, where I think that should give bonus points. It definitely was important for me, back when I selected S4 over HTC One.
edwpang - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
If your phone is rooted, you can use the FolderMount App to map the game or other data to external storage. Once setup, the app just remembers the mapping information. It won't lost across reboot. I have been using for a couple of months without any issue.psyside1 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
N E X U S 5R E W I E W?
psyside1 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
R E V I E W*julandorid - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Personally, I'll be happy EVEN with Nexus 5 REWIEW ;)julandorid - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Yes, I have the same question, bloody *ell! What's wrong with Nexus 5? If there is some ongoing investigation, let us know, maybe in separate article!Don't ignore us! :)
Old_Fogie_Late_Bloomer - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
I really find this article disappointing. I feel as though the authors are so far into their viewpoint that they're incapable of evaluating the other side fairly.I would (almost certainly) never buy a phone or laptop with a non-removable battery. If you drop your phone in a puddle, and your battery is non-removable, you're pretty much done. Likewise if you get liquid in your laptop. If you can pop out the battery, you may well be able to save the device.
Likewise, I can't grasp how expandable storage could possibly be considered a downside. Even if we could start convincing manufacturers to put in reasonable amounts of storage for reasonable prices, how can it be a good thing that you can't add more if you need it?
I love AnandTech and I consider your reviews and articles to be about as fair and impartial as one could hope for. Reading what comes across as an apology for manufacturers' cost-cutting decisions is, frankly, kind of depressing.
splatter85 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
It's more of a "call to arms" for manufacturers to drop prices of internal storage to benefit the consumer. He said he won't penalize anyone for using or not using removable storage/batteries. He DID NOT say he would commend anyone either based on those factors either. All phones would benefit from having (at the time of this article) 128GB of fast internal storage and not having to deal with slower removable media. It's easier for the "normal" consumer, who these manufacturers are selling to. The techies out there who know how to root phones and know about only storing large files on removable media account for less that 10% of their business. Anand is trying to help the majority of end users out there by asking manufacturers to stop marking up internal storage prices.PVG - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Much more "profit making" than "cost cutting" decisions. ;)madpiyal - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
I totally agree with you. Both removable battery and storage is a huge plus when it comes to privacy. This article maybe the worst ever written by Anand. There's a definite feel that its written not for the convenience of consumer but for the manufacturer.Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Word. Why is this so difficult for people to understand?f0d - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
for me i dont care how fast it iscapacity is all i care about - once i have loaded my music onto my memory card it stays there - i only have to do it once
if phones had 256g/512gb of storage and diddnt cost a shedload it would be fine but with the small amount of space phones have (around 64gb) i need microsd cards to hold my movies and music
i currently have 1 64gb with movies/tv shows and another 64gb for music as well as internal storage which i use for games and taking pictures/videos
current storage capacity for phones is too low for my usage
fearsome - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I am sorry but this article is horribly written. Seriously this is a major blow to the reputation of anandtech. An honest review site can easily deal with all these issues within a review without submitting to bias.Removable batteries and storage are plain and simple major bonuses to a phone.
This article completely doesn't even bother to discuss all the down sides of sealed batteries or upsides of removable, and the same with storage. Guess what most people have capped data plans now days. So what are we going to do when we are forced to pay extra money to sync with a cloud service both because the cloud doesn't offer enough space and because our data plans run over. Oh you say goto wifi right? Well wait but you said half the reason for this trend was simplicity. So you are going to tell me that someone who is too ignorant to figure out how to use removable storage finds it perfectly logical to differentiate between the cloud and local as well as cell data vs. Wi-Fi? Sorry it doesn't add up.
Also does anyone here find it ironic that over the last several years we have seen a movement to move toward sealed batteries and lack of expandable storage. Of course and anandtech even comments on it, but wait they conveniently ignored the other trend we have seen in the same time frame. Guess what that is? Its Samsung's rise to power that has resulted in complete domination of their competitors in the android space. So if one were to simply look at correlation one could make a claim that removable batteries and expandable storage as a part of a larger well done package have resulted in Samsung crushing all their competition.
Also flipping out batteries mid day, I don't do it, I buy an extended battery. Wake me up when a phone exists that can promise I can do 13 hour day without losing its charge. Until then I will rely on extended batteries, and guess what, an extended battery is thinner than a funny daisy chain battery case which is what most people are forced to.
Planned obsolescence wow the term wasn't even said once.
Ton of other issues with the article.
JNo - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Harsh, but I agree with your line of reasoning.In addition, in a moving vehicle, like a train, you can often lack access to *both* 3G and wifi. Another reason that the forced lack of SD is disappointing. I don't like Samsung phones that much but I totally agree that if they're the only ones offering SD and removable batteries on their major lines, they deserve to dominate (sadly as I prefer more competition obviously).
lilmoe - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
+1If Samsung's success is any indication, it only means the current trend IS removable batteries and external storage (advertising often works for the first purchase, not the second, but most of their success comes from "understanding" their market).
Lots of contradictions and misinformation in the article. The value of cheaper, more efficient internal storage is easily negated with the higher costs of repairs/after-market-value, due to sealed design (the only exception being the iPhone for the sole reason of the brand, not the tech). External storage is re-usable even after a new purchase, and removable batteries are much more affordable and easier to replace than sealed ones (especially for those who buy off contract), in addition to having the ability to change their capacity (like the use-case above).
It seems that the authors think paying more in the longer run is the "smarter choice". Not everyone has an unlimited plan, and/or not everyone is an enthusiast. Or simply put, not everyone "wants" to.
This site is too synthetic in their expectations of technology as apposed to consumer *needs*. A good analogy would be benchmarks (since I used the word "synthetic"). Synthetic benchmarks are great for having a better idea of what to expect (in some independent regards), with some being way off in what they should be testing (browser benchmarks as CPU performance measures come to mind), and most being absolutely horrible compared to real-world usage (with that being key to my analogy). Yes, cheaper, faster, more efficient NAND is a huge plus, but what's wrong with having that in addition to external storage? Most devices are big enough to accommodate both, and then some for a removable battery.
Another contradiction comes from saying that sealed design allows for a larger battery.... HTC One VS SGS4 anyone???
People want cheaper/reusable storage and cheaply repairable devices that have decent build quality and market value. Lots of them love fashionable devices, but not most mind you, the former being the VAST majority of the market.
I suggest this site stick to what they do best; analyzing and comparing tech. Market and trend metrics NOT being one of them. They shouldn't be pulling an Apple and dictate their preferences on their readers when it comes to said tech. Give consumers the info, and let them make the decision. It's what made this site successful in the first place. Your use-cases/preferences are NOT identical with everyone else's.
Apple doesn't do sealed design because it's best. They want to increase their margins as much as possible on higher storage options. Likewise, Google doesn't want to "simplify" storage access, they want you to use their services (which coincides with their bread and butter)...
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Word. This read as an apology to people who already agree with them for how daft the rest of us who disagree are.sevenmack - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Now Fearsome, the piece isn't "horribly written" on any objective basis. The issue you and other power users who demand expandable storage have with the piece is that Anand and Brian disagree with your perspective from a technical perspective.From where you sit and other power users sit, expandable storage and removable batteries are something you demand because it suits your desire to control your respective user experiences. You are entitled to want greater control over your experiences with your phones, including being able to root your phones, flash new ROMs, or even be able to carry five batteries around with you at all times. You are also entitled to carry a 64-gig MicroSD card if you want. There are phones out there that provide that kind of experience. But most casual smartphone buyers -- who make up most of the market -- don't care one way or another about any kind of customization or about removable batteries or about expandable versus internal storage. They want a reliable phone that looks good (or good enough) and serves their needs for two years. So the expandable-versus-internal storage debate among power users is a nonfactor to them. If Samsung offered a phone without expandable storage or removable batteries, they would just as quickly by that as one with all of those features because they know the Samsung brand name (from all the other consumer products the company makes) and because the company makes reliable phones. [This fact, by the way, is why arguing that Samsung is dominant because it provides phones with expandable meory and removable batteries doesn't wash. It doesn't factor in Samsung's natural market strength as one of the biggest players in consumer electronics, or consider that the competition, including LG and HTC, either are considered second-tier consumer electronics firms or are solely phone makers, the latter being an increasingly endangered corporate species in the smartphone market of today.]
Even some of us who are power users, including myself, have other considerations in mind; I, for one, want a high-quality phone that is well-designed, that has a mostly-metal body (because I like the feel of aluminum and steel). I have my own cloud server and can upload just about everywhere in the world where I go, and have an array of battery packs that I can use if needed. So the HTC One was the best choice for my wants. And I know other power users (including several in my own family, all who are in the tech field) who have made similar choices; my mother, who has been in tech since the days of the first IBM PC, is an Apple fan, and my sister-in-law, who runs IT services for one firm, is also an HTC One user.
Ultimately, all of us have a choice regardless of the objective facts. You can choose phones with expandable memory and removable batteries, or choose something different. Anandtech isn't saying that you shouldn't have choice. It is laying out the technical facts that you may choose to ignore or consider. And if you really don't like what Anand and Brian have said, you can also just stop reading Anandtech and read some other site.
ATC9001 - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
+1!I understand all the complaints from many of the power users (a site which Anand caters to!), but lets face it, money talks!
We all want a device tailored to our needs, but we need to understand all the driving forces, and this article addresses the major forces.
I agree I'd prefer a replaceable battery and upgradable storage over a sealed brick, but in the end I'd prefer an affordable device which doesn't require both! As power users, we're the last to get our cake and eat it too, else we pay for our cake!
handynick - Friday, December 13, 2013 - link
Having a cloud server is useles unless you have a very expensive data plan.Many people like premium design, including myself. I could be called a samsung hater for that matter. But HTC One is the best example for not taking advntage from better internal design and structure due to the lack of micro sd slot and removable batery. It.s just a huge premium brick with small screen and small baterry when you consider external dimensions.
aknotts - Thursday, March 27, 2014 - link
The galaxy line has outsold the htcs by a considerable margin. If u think removable battery and expandable storage played no role in this massive upset think again. The consumer has spoken loud and clear htc is just to stupid to hear it.Steven JW FCK - Monday, December 2, 2013 - link
I 100% agree with you, fearsomeIf you are going to write an article about such a massive issue that has been drawn to your attention by your readers, at least address the down sides of non removable batteries and memory. I mean for instance, 1 water droplet can render you £400 HTC One worthless to you, and you don't mind that? Hmm... Do you consider all Anandtech readers as fortunately wealthy as you?
And yeah, how on earth did Samsung rise as the largest smart phone manufacturer, when all of it's flagship devices be it budget phone, smart phone, or phablet, have ALL had micro SD cards, and removable storage?
sevenmack - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
Again, Steven, as I mentioned, Samsung is also one of the world's largest consumer electronics firms. Plenty of people have a Samsung television or other device in their homes, and the devices largely work. So when someone walks into a Sprint store or Best Buy, they already have a familiar relationship with Samsung, and chances are, have also bought at least one of its phones already. When you are already dominant in the rest of the consumer electronics market, playing a dominant role in the cellphone arena -- which increasingly is part of the consumer electronics landscape -- becomes relatively easy to do. Samsung could offer a phone without removable batteries or expandable storage and still dominate because of its already-massive reach.On the other hand, firms solely focused on telephony have been taking beatings, largely because their focus on one market, along with mindsets that didn't embrace smartphones as consumer electronics, doomed them. This was seen with Ericsson a few years ago and Nokia as well. HTC is now paying the price for its failures a few years ago to expand into consumer electronic; the flop that was the HTC Flyer is one example, while the failure to buy a firm like Vizio is another. HTC could offer a phone with removable batteries and expandable storage (and through both the Desire line and the One Max, already does) and it would still be struggling against Samsung because the HTC name isn't as well known to the average consumer as its bigger rival.
I know some folks like to use didactic logic in justifying their positions. But in the context of the conversation about the pros and cons of cellphone makers not offering removable batteries or expandable storage, simply offering up a market share example to prove one's point when there are other factors at play just makes you look a tad illogical.
aknotts - Thursday, March 27, 2014 - link
The rise of samsung exactly coincided with other manufacturers decision to drop removable batteries and sd card support. Many people who went samsu g were firmly in the htc camp before htc screwed their customers. Htc screwed up big time. Alot of people bought phones based on recommendations from tech people. No tech person would recommend a phone without a removable battery and no sd card support. The resale value of ur two year old phone with a dieing battery and woefully inadequate storage is significantly reduced.ddriver - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Slower? I got a 64gb samsung class 10 micro sd that does ~70 mb/s read and ~22 mb/s write, which is faster than the internal storage of most phones on the market today.SoC-IT2ME - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I have that card in my Note 3. It sure doesn't write at 22 MB/s but its fast enough for me needs.James5mith - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
SD cards are in no way comparable to internal robust SSDs. The controllers, IOPS, wear leveling, even sequential throughput aren't even close.JlHADJOE - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
The problem here is that mobile devices aren't actually providing "internal robust SSDs". If, as you say "it's not even close", then why is the write speed of the reviewer's darling, the HTC one a mere 20MB/s? That's slower than a good class 10 sd card which goes to 22MB/s write, 70MB/s read.If manufacturers are going to take away external storage, then for god's sake at least deliver on those promises that make up the premise of "internal is better." Make internal storage demonstrably more robust, demonstrably faster, and more importantly bigger.
dawheat - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Your analogy would only hold true if floppy disks had 4X the storage of most computers and were nearly as fast as hard drives.greywolf0 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Really dumb analogy. Both internal storage and microSDs are FLASH memory. They are the same exact thing. Like saying floppy disks are going obsolete, to be replaced by...floppy disks. The only difference between the two is microSDs tend to be cheap whereas internal flash uses a high quality controller and higher quality memory. But that's the whole point of microSDs. You don't need anything fast to playback sequential video and picture files, and those files are huge, so bigger and more storage is more important than speed. Just like on a PC, your C drive where you open apps and run things can be a blazing fast 15000rpm hard drive (or SSD) that's only a few hundred GB, but your main media drive is a slower 7200rpm drive that has 4TB of storage.darwinosx - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
No you are dumb. SD cards are much slower and less reliable.chaosbloodterfly - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
That fact doesn't affect his argument in anyway. There's no reason 60 GB of music and videos needs to be fast and last for 10 years of read/writes.rituraj - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Keep 2 or 3 large games, all your apps and documents that require faster read and write in phone and your videos and music which don't need that much speed in sd card. That is the dumbest thing a human can do. You are so right.ddriver - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
SD cards come with 10 years of warranty, this is more than 99% of the hard drives on the market, most of which come with only 3 years warranty.I have a samsung 64 gb sd card that does 70 mb/sec read, which is more than enough for anything you might want to do on a mobile device.
If there is someone dumb, around here I'd put my money on it being you. One glance at your screen name says it all - a sad, pathetic retarded apple fanboy.
ananduser - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I'd like Anandtech to start curating the comment section of readers that hurl insults in such a gratuitous manner. Come on, we don't need that on such a technical site.diamondsw - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
The flash in SD cards (let alone the controller that runs the slot) is indeed MUCH slower than the internal storage. Internal NAND bears no relation to an SD card other than they're both non-volatile and solid state. That doesn't mean they're based on the same technology or design.ET - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Anandtech's review of the Nexus 7 2013 shows internal storage to be at up to 27MB/s sequential read. That's slower than many microSD cards. It's possible to buy a 64GB card that's 3 times as fast for around $100, or $50 if you want only a little over twice as fast. Sure there are faster eMMC solutions, the one used in the Dell Venue 8 Pro for example is faster than an microSD card I know of, but still, the difference isn't huge.So stop with the "much slower" bullshit.
nik64vid - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Are you joking?The microSD is the best place to keep my music and movies.
When I'm traveling abroad do you suggest to use cloud storage? With these costs of the 3G data when roaming?
jbm - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
They are only on the way out once phone manufacturers start offering phones with 64GB or more of storage as standard. If I buy a new phone now, I want to put my apps on there (couple GB of data right there if it's games or some nav software), a decent sized mp3 collection of 10-20GB (no, the mp3 I usually listen to are not available via spotify etc. and I'd like to listen to music without eating up my data allowance anyway) plus some stuff to read (ebooks and comics - my current comic collection on the SD card of my Galaxy S4 is about 30GB). Yes, I do of course not NEED all that stuff at the same time, but not having to think about what you want to read today and then copy that stuff around at home (and instead just having everything available) is nice. I would not buy a new phone with less than 64GB of storage, so any current phone without a microSD slot is simply not an option for me.I understand that Google wants people to use cloud storage, because it binds the customers to them (and probably allows them to run some nice analysis on the data, too), but having the data available locally is faster, more convenient (no copying to/from the cloud all the time, can simply exchange SD cards to switch data depending on needs, data is available even at places where you have no connectivity), cheaper (does not eat up the data plan) and safer (regarding privacy).
eSyr - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Oh really. http://www.legitreviews.com/transcend-64gb-sdxc-ul... http://www.anandtech.com/show/6073/the-google-nexu...abhaxus - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
The main reason for myself using a microSD card is that if my phone were completely damaged beyond usability (liquid, smashed, etc), the microSD card would probably still be usable. I put all pictures and user storage on the card, the rest is on internal. Of course I do periodic backups over wifi, but still, there's always the chance I'll have a day where I'm out and took a bunch of photos that my phone gets damaged before I can back it up. Would rather have removable storage than not have it.Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
That's seriously an excellent advantage to the technology that they are utterly disregarding. But of course from their perspective your data should be backed up to the cloud, because we all have unlimited always-on reliable data connections. Don't we? ...guys?1Angelreloaded - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
NO, you are highly wrong. As long as people use cell phones as a MP3 player SD cards will still have a major roll in the mobile space. Considering thanks to phones, there aren't many non-apple choices in the MP3 market that are competitive enough.Wolfpup - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Have you considered that if they are "on their way out" it may be because they're not supported, not because they aren't wanted?Who would choose spending $300 to upgrade internal flash when you can spend $45...were the option actually available?
These companies are getting rid of storage not because it's what people want, but because then they can sell it back to us at $50-100 per 'tier'.
JNo - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
This.chizow - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It's more like SSDs (onboard) vs. HDDs (microSD) nowadays, and we know for a fact Anand is an advocate of this heterogenous storage model on the desktop PC because it simply makes sense. SSD for the boot OS and high demand applications. Cheaper HDD for mass storage and low demand usage scenarios.But yes, uninformed Sheeple don't use microSD, simply because they don't have the choice. High-end informed users do make great use of them however, which is why it is a frequently cited differentiator in product buying decisions.
tfouto - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
minority? Of those 313 it's majority...tfouto - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
Of those 300+ comments is majority, and not minority...geezlouise14 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
The big attraction in removable batteries to me is the ability to replace one that is losing runtime. Replacing with a fresh battery can increase runtime back to original levels, which in my experience can be up to 4x what the old battery could do.tom1l21 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I think most people that care about battery life enough to look online to buy one are closer to the enthusiast who typically upgrades to a new phone every year than someone trying to squeeze every last ounce out of their 3yr old device. This doesn't excuse lower income markets who hold on to their devices longer, or pass them down to someone else, but again, we are talking about the minority (at least in the US).Looking back, I realize there are a lot of exceptions to my answer, but I believe these demographics are the most common and profitable that OEM's target.
Thrawn - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I feel this the replacement to deal with an aging cell doesn't need it to be a "removable" battery. I just want to be able to get at it without glue and plastic clips that break. Good clips and a few screws and it is replaceable for the case that covers a ton of users.rituraj - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Your point may be true for the US or EU markets. But for developing markets the category that you considered minority is actually the majority. This market is hugely dominated by Samsung and by some amount sony and local manufacturers. Apple and htc are almost non-existant. Again I am saying what I see around me and your perspective is from a different level.solipsism - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
1) You're confusing removable batteries with user-replaceable batteries.2) Anand and Brian's comments work the same for your use case. Even though there are some that want to do that, very few ever do.
3) Now when it comes to boosting the usage of a device within a given day there are plenty of solutions that work micro-USB and Apple's well worn and common port interfaces that allow you to do this without ever having to shut off the device or take it apart to get it recharge. They even allow for dual-charging instead of the musical chairs that those of us had to go through before power interfaces were standardized enough to have viable solutions and batteries were removable.
greywolf0 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Even my old flip phones from 8 years ago still hold half of their charge with the original battery. I would expect most people to upgrade at least within that time frame, if not the usual 2 years. Battery wear and tear is overrated, especially newer batteries with much better endurance. It's the thing that separates a high quality OEM battery from a Chinese knockoff battery. The endurance is awful and the mah rating is completely false on the latter.There are too many compromises on phones with removable batteries. They are far thicker and bulkier/heavier with much smaller batteries (think Nokia), or have extremely cheap and thin back covers that never stay flush with the phone (think Samsung). A back that can pop out doesn't do much for durability, nor do breakable clips and covers that never quite SNAP into place no matter how hard you push or no matter how many angles you try to insert it in.
Reflex - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
This ceased to be an issue with the move from LiON to LiPo batteries a few years ago. It also ended my last argument in favor of user replaceable batteries. LiPo batteries simply do not lose capacity quickly like LiON do, although they do have lower energy density. Due to the additional space from integrated batteries that loss is more or less negated.These days the more common reasons for shorter battery life over time are newer versions of the OS, or the 'cruft' that can build up over time(especially on Android devices) of background processes chewing up cycles and expending more power.
SoC-IT2ME - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Also the Galaxy S3 has the option of a 3000mAh official extended battery with adds 1mm of thickness - try that on a sealed phone - ha!LG G2 is a good example where I'd be happy with a sealed battery. It's big from the get go.
Also there is no need to have a removable back for sd slots - just make a bloody tray like they do for SIM cards.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Apparently this is a difficult concept to understand ;)Dustin Sklavos - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
The problems I think we're running into are:1. People are more turned off by the attitude presented towards MicroSD slots and the people who want them (specifically the snark), and that's not something you guys can rationalize away.
2. The cloud is *not ready yet.* The infrastructure simply is not there, and that's before you even take carrier bandwidth charges into account. You have vendors pushing cloud storage when cloud storage itself is heavily gated simply by the fact that oftentimes a good data signal simply isn't available. You could be in a sparsely populated area with virtually no connectivity, or a densely populated area (like a hotel) where the connectivity is just hammered.
3. We're losing MicroSD card functionality *before* onboard capacity has caught up. In some ways, people have actually been *losing* storage capacity in their devices over time because MicroSD is going the way of the dodo. During that same period, high definition video continues to become ever more prevalent, and more people want to bring their media collections with them. It would be one thing if MicroSD took a dirt nap because we were finally shipping phones with 32GB of onboard storage or better standard, at the lowest rung, but we're not. The Nexus 5 tops out at 32GB. Most everything else is 16GB standard.
It's the nature of the industry to push things before they're really ready (Sandy Bridge ultrabooks, etc.) But I can understand why some people are irritated by the lack of MicroSD in modern flagship phones and our snark about it in reviews. I honestly think we need to rein it in and try to continue to do one of the things we're supposed to be the best at: looking at things from the consumer's perspectives.
Egg - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Not much else to say but +1. Brian is snarky. It's something I like about him, but I can definitely understand why it's not always appreciated by those who would like microSD slots.Also, "This brings up a separate discussion about mobile network operators and usage based billing, but the solution there is operator revolution" made me wince a bit... sounds like wishful thinking.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Given that data contracts have regressed in generosity in the last 5 years in my home region of the UK (a vastly more competitive market than the USA!) I can say that this is a problem which will not magically go away through wishful thinking in tech articles.Flunk - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
If you want an SD card-equipped phone, buy one. Most people don't seem to want them or they'd all have them. It's like optical drives on notebooks, if people decide they've rather it be slightly smaller and not have one that that's from the manufacturers are going to produce.Hung - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
The problem is that while the Android market has a ton of options, none of them are comprehensively feature-filled powerhouses. You've got a Nexus line that will always get the best development but are value-focused. Then you've got Galaxy phones that have all the hardware you could possibly want, but completely closed sources so non-TouchWiz ROMs are unstable and slow. Finally you have ask the other phones, which are a little more expensive for what you get, or lack some major features (SD slot, good display, reasonable size, efficient chipset, plus-sized battery, etc).That's the major difference between mobile devices and PCs. You actually can get any PC configuration in any form-factor you want if you're willing to pay a price. But you can't Galaxy-style hardware in a Nexus-shell and with the Nexus community,
thesavvymage - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Google Play Edition Galaxy S4? Seems the best of both worldsIanCutress - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
HTC One max? Top end hardware, removable battery and MicroSDKlug4Pres - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Google Play Edition just solves the bloatware complaint. The other problems, namely closed-source drivers, slow and time-limited updates that turn out to be much buggier than the initially-released version, still apply.kmmatney - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Probably too big for most people. I have the 5.5" LG Optimus Pro G with SD card slot and removable battery, and feel that that is already a little too big. It's real nice to use, but transporting it around could be easier.Klug4Pres - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Totally agree with Dustin Sklavos, but this is also a very important point.There is an odd mindset among the Anandtech reviewers - on the one hand, they present us with "inevitable industry trends", saying "that ship has sailed" etc., implicitly abandoning their own responsibility to try to influence those trends. On the other hand, we are told, "if you care, you have options, go buy a Samsung" etc.
But even ardent advocates of removeable/user-replaceable batteries, and SD-cards, will admit that this is only one factor amongst many that goes into their choice of smartphone. Nexus phones are by far preferred by tech enthusiasts on the grounds of timely updates, lack of bloatware, and software customisation potential, yet these phones are the most crippled flagships around, always lacking in some major area such as camera, offered with very little built-in storage, and yes, no expandability (Nexus 4 didn't even have USB-OTG without engaging in a humungous hardware hack for external power injection with a Y-cable), and limited service life due to the non-removeable battery.
Anandtech loves to talk about the producer interest, banging on about how manufacturers have such a terrible time designing a sturdy removeable back cover, how they can shave cents off their production or warranty costs, but this site is primarily read by consumers of technology, and it is an enthusiast site. Enthusiasts have always wanted expandability, open hardware standards, and have always hated walled gardens, vendor lock-in, price gouging on upgrades for proprietary parts. This stuff is absolutely the DNA of computer technology going back to the struggles of Apple, Commodore, IBM, Microsoft, and Digital Research, and in my opinion Anand & Co. should absolutely be advocating for this group of enthusiast users, regardless of whether they be in a small minority.
N.B. For batteries, user-replaceability is what I most want rather than instant swapability, but there is little doubt that if a battery is removeable, it will be much easier both to buy a replacement and also to fit it.
unknownweirdo - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Think that's already happening. The top brand of android phones have removable batteries and microsd slots.The market has sort of spoken, but the tech press and industry seem to be deaf to it
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
It really isn't the same at all. The proportion of a notebook taken up by an optical drive is huge vs. the proportion of a mobile phone taken up by an SD slot, while nobody is going to have an optical drive with greater capacity than their non-removable built-in storage.chizow - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Glad to see common sense hasn't left AT's staff completely Dustin, thanks for the comments and perspective from someone who probably isn't provided an endless free supply of flagship smartphones.Bob Todd - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Spot on Dustin, and I would just add that these kinds of issues are usually looked at from a first world perspective on tech sites including this one. My last three personal phones have been from the Nexus line, and I haven't been bothered by the lack of micro SD cards or non-replaceable batteries (in the Nexus4/5). However, I am cognizant of the fact that my upgrade pattern is *not* the norm, and would seem like an absurd waste to many people in developing countries. The majority of the population is pretty cost conscious, and they also have a reasonable expectation that their devices should last several years. That makes things like expandable storage and replaceable batteries pretty damn important for them. So while i get tired of people spamming every smartphone thread that lacks expandable storage or replaceable batteries, I also think the outlook from the reviewers needs to go beyond a first world/upgrade every year or two perspective.NeoteriX - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
"I would just add that these kinds of issues are usually looked at from a first world perspective on tech sites including this one."Yes, and the phones for which this battery/microSD issue exists is largely for "first world" phones, which is a point you and many others might be missing here. Some of the key benefits of the omission of these features is reduced thickness (smaller size), and that is a major selling point for the class of elite-power phones and the markets that permit purchasing a phone annually (first world nations as you say).
Look to the third world with cheaper phones that aren't striving towards the thinnest form factors (and users that are replacing their phones less regularly) and it's not an issue.
Lenovo, for example, presents the perfect example. They offer a broad range of Android phones for China and other third-world-ish markets ( http://shopap.lenovo.com/in/en/smartphones/index.h... ). The broad range of users there drives Lenovo's product differentiation, and you see a whole range of phones from the elite: hyper thin first-world territory phones with no user replaceable battery or microSD, all the way down to the budget with both those things. And, the range inbetween offers a mix of the two depending on the segment targeted. I think this is a perfect example that shows that these features are market driven.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
+111Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
Thank you very much Dustin for this thoughtful comment. It's a reminder of what made Anandtech the go-to site, an impartial, fact-based, thorough analysis based on real-word testing and thinking about what's best for the consumer, rather than spending time in reviews talking about the intimate conversations with industry insiders.What was sad to read recently is that following Brian's (phrasing this honestly) boasting about pushing for the megapixel camera race to be abandoned and his supposed success in seeing HTC release the One, his follow up in the Max admits that the tradeoff introduced wasn't what he expected, and that performance suffered. Pushing for better standards, or improved diversity, or different thinking as a reviewer is a good thing. Boasting about getting things changed, and then having to admit your ideas were a net loss to the consumer is a little embarrassing for all concerned.
Ev1lAsh - Friday, November 29, 2013 - link
@Dustin +1. Points 1-3 very nicely putTHX - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
"All else being equal, removable storage and user replaceable batteries aren't inherently bad things."That's one way of saying it. But of course you could have said they are great things, which they are (all things being equal). All else being equal a user replaceable screen would be great. Also a shell, SOC, ram, etc...
Switching to a Nexus 5, the thing I miss the most is getting back home (or reaching in my pocket), swapping out a fully charged thin battery and being back to 100% in 20 seconds. My friends on iPhones worry about where or how to charge up next. Not a knock on iPhone, just that geek android users like myself are generally more savvy about conserving power.
YMMV. I live in a major city and am always on the go versus when I lived in the burbs and sat on my butt most of the time. So lifestyles play a huge part in this decision. I hope my next phone has a removable back!
solipsism - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
You miss getting home, disassembling your phone thereby having it turned off (regardless or what you were doing) just so you put in another battery instead of charging it up? Not to mention you then need a separate charging device for those batteries which are usually too unique and therefore need to put back into the original device so they can be charged up which then requires doubling up on the “musical chairs” game you claim you miss so much. Do you know framed up that sounds?It's much easier to just bring a cheap, external charger for the rare* occasion you need to boost your battery pack, and if you have a common phone you can then buy one that doubles as a case. Many of these can charge both batteries at once from a single cable, but all can charge both batteries at the same time without requiring you to get up in the middle of the night to switch battery packs.
* Rare is of course dependent on usage requirements and if you choose a device with both a good quality battery and good battery life for its power needs.
THX - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It takes 10 second to change a phone battery. Another 20-30 to reboot your device. All less than minute.The charging device I have to charge phone batteries is universal and was uber cheap on Amazon (look up Anker).
I guarantee you carrying a slim phone battery is better than an obtrusive portable charger that needs to be connected to tour phone with a wire. I know at this point it just sounds like me trying to convince you, but I've done both and it worked out great and for many others on the go.
Friendly0Fire - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Personally I wouldn't trust a random battery charger that directly hooks into your phone's battery. There are already possible problems with USB chargers and that's a standard...That and your use case accounts for something smaller than a blimp on the OEMs' radar. It's not even visible from there.
THX - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Been doing it for over 2 years on my previous phone batteries. Never a problem.Say what you want about people not needing replaceable batteries. Not everyone wants the same thing in a phone, hence the reason this article was written in the first place.
solipsism - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
You also probably think rebooting your phone 10x a day is normal but it's not.And I have no idea what you mean about an obtrusive portable charger or something that needs to be connected to your phone with a wire. This is what I used I used to have with my early iPhones when I traveled. When I got low on power I'd pop that on while it's in my pocket or bag and it would charge back up rather quickly, yet I didn't have the additional bulk of doubly protected battery packs and cheap doors on phones to take apart just to something as simple as charge a battery. • http://www.amazon.com/Kensington-Battery-Extender-...
With the newer iPhones they last all day even when LTE because they didn't jump the gun with power sucking LTE chips.
PS: How exactly do you charge up all your internal batteries at once?
THX - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Let's keep it civil please and stop assuming. I rarely reboot my phone and it normally lasts all day. Those weekends where I'm out most of the time and away from a charger, or for something like an all-day festival, a spare battery is a godsend.I really like the charger you linked (compared to the bulky wired ones), but would prefer to not add more real-estate to my phone. I only need one other battery for those instances when I need more power and use this to keep it charged: http://amzn.com/B009USAJCC
Having a big non-replaceable 3000 mAh battery in the LG G2 is nice but having (2) 2600 mAh batteries for 5200 total for something like the GS4 is more appealing/useful for many. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to have a single internal battery that would last all weekend with LTE and constant use, but we're not there yet (unless you have something like a Note3 or Droid Maxx).
THX - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Wrong link sorry! http://amzn.com/B0058XGN7Isolipsism - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
@ THX,ou want to carry around an additional internal battery so you can stop what you're doing midday to turn OFF your phone to replace a battery which you then have to go again after you get home to charge up the dead battery you have no depleted or carry around a big bulky universal internal battery charger that frankly looks pretty shoddy?
Suit yourself but I'd rather that once every few months occurrence when I'm traveling to pop the item I showed onto my phone in my bag or pocket for a couple minutes to get it to charge up the internal battery so I don't have the issues you mention, never once having to turn OFF my phone or take it apart. I've grown past wanting to build my own PCs, too. I really just want things to work as smoothly as possible, not come with a bunch of parts I can play with it.
THX - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Just curious but why are you putting the word "off" in caps every time? I just rebooted my phone and it took 22 seconds to get back to the home screen. Not really a big deal for me...Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
The dude's handle is solipsism, I don't think you're going to convince him that a way of doing things he doesn't agree with is in any way meaningful or relevant.solipsism - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
@ THX,And every time you switch your battery your phone is turned OFF. It's perfectly fine if you're OK with powering down, taking apart, switching components, and turning your phone back on in order to get a decent battery life, as well as having to buy an additional component you need to travel with just to charge the battery or else do your "musical batteries" maneuver twice to charge the other battery in the middle of the night, but this is not the simplest or most common action make or want. You need to accept that your method, while perfectly fine for you, is as archaic as one of the asshats on AT saying that people that don't build their own PCs shouldn't own one.
THX - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Haha and "YOU" need to "ACCEPT" that just because tons of other people do something that "YOU" don't do it's not weird or archaic. Or are you just playing up to your username?Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Dude, blimps are huge. ;)greywolf0 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Can't you just buy one of those cases with large integrated batteries? I mean, if you have to carry extra batteries around, I don't see why not just integrate it all together. Nowadays, 90% of the phone is nothing but the battery anyway. You won't need to deal with removing the back cover and wearing it down or the phone, you won't have to worry about losing your spare batteries, and you won't have to deal with the whole physical operation or having to turn off your phone and swapping batteries and waiting for your phone to turn on again, saving precious minutes of busy city life. No downtime. Your phone will always be on.THX - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Less than a minute to get your phone back to 100% battery life vs having it attached to the wall (or carry around a wired charger)? Not sure where you're seeing the benefit in the latter.Been doing that to two Android devices for years previously and nothing ever broke. And never lost a battery either. Would prefer not to add bulk to my phone with a thick battery case.
To each his own...
solipsism - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
He mentions an extended battery and you talk about caring around a wall charger? WTF?!Tams80 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Battery cases add bulk and unless you have an iPhone, or one of the very few Android devices with one, then there just aren't any.yelped - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Great article!gunsman - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
As someone who does cyanogenmod nightlies, i have a need for the micro sd slot, constant nandroid and titanium backups destroy my storage, and i have had to reformat my internal 5 times so far just because i keep losing it, i can just put important things on the external, format, and be on my way, although removable batteries i could care less about as i have a portable 7000mAH charger if neededheartinpiece - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
If you can get like a 20% increase in battery life, for internal, and unremoval batteries, I'd rather have a exchangeable battery. That'll be 200% battery charge compared to the 120%.Now Anand's claim that laptop batteries have moved on to be non-exchangeable is quite sensible, I think Anand missed the size of the batteries of phones and laptops. Phone batteries are quite small. And I think due to this smallness, people like me might want to keep extra batteries in our backpacks just in case. Unlike laptops, phones are more essential in daily life. You need these things to make emergency calls(like tell someone you'll be running 4 minutes late, etc). Laptops aren't used for such emergency (well not as much)
So, yeah, I think in conclusion I prefer exchangable batteries.
But again, non-exchangeable batteries do seem to make the phone more well made... More sturdy, firm, and perhaps results in a better finish.
I myself got a nexus 5, and because the nexus 5 does have some great form I'm happy with it.
But being a former galaxy nexus user, and since I had kept spare batteries in my backpack, the fear of drying out of battery in the middle of nowhere does give me the spooks....
thesavvymage - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I find it awesome how in south korea nearly every phone has a removable back and comes with a spare battery and an extra charger for itgnx - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
"I'm personally more interested in seeing the price of internal storage decrease, and the performance increase. We stand to gain a lot more from advocating that manufacturers move to higher capacities at lower price points and to start taking random IO performance more seriously."The authors' logic is overall sound and well taken, but at the end, what incentive or gain (do the authors reason or forsee) exists for manufacturers to lower the price of additional internal storage?
Are there any? It'd be nice to know. Or is this more of just a whimsical wish? (And are we customers doomed to be fleeced for higher corporate profit margins?)
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
If the author's wish of the SD card going the way of the dodo comes true then there will be no incentive whatsoever for that to happen because there will be 0 competition. It is a whimsical wish. If there was any desire for these companies to compete with each other they'd have started already. As it is, the indication is that since the arrival of the iPhone, every manufacturer has struggled to find a way to raise their prices rather than lower them.WelshBloke - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I'm curious as to how SDcard performance really matters. How fast does a card need to be to load a 25mb app into memory?If I can stream my HD video or off line sat nav maps does it really need to be any faster?
I'm also curious as to the "trends" you mentioned. It would be interesting to see a break down of phone numbers sold with/without sdcards rather than just saying that there's more models being made without SDcard slots (that may well have appalling sales figures).
dawheat - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
The thing is all things are not equal. Apple charges $200 for a 48GB increase in internal storage. A new class 10 microSD card costs $42 for a 64GB increase in storage. That's a huge value proposition for consumers and if there was more of an end-consumer focus on this site, microSD support wouldn't be just a 'nice' feature, but a praised 'must-have' feature UNTIL manufactures stop abusing customers. There's too much no man's land in your comments - microSD isn't needed but manufactures don't offer reasonable alternatives today.And those buying large capacity iPhones I'd bet are generally filling up the extra storage with the exact type of media that is ideal for microSD - music, movies, and photos.
Reviewers seem to sometimes live in their own world - if the world operated within their reality distortion field, the HTC One would be the best selling Android phone in the world. Instead, HTC is losing money and no longer a top 5 manufacturer.
A5 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Samsung isn't winning because they make the best phone.Drumsticks - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
@Dawheat: I never get this argument. Samsung doesn't make the best phones. Note the better selling iPhone without microSD or removable batteries.Both companies who make good, but not *clearly* the best phones, who have taken completely opposite routes and ended up pretty similar.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Word.stotticus - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
First, this article and its arguments have somewhat put to rest my DIY foolishness and the resulting resentment that I can't open my N4 up in any way. Not mentioned but supporting the point about carrying replacement batteries around is that there are now many good universal rechargeable batteries on the market. People can exercise that option without being able to open their phones.Also, I particularly liked the witty toss away, "but the solution there is operator revolution." Well done!
iwod - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
On the Note for Battery. How much more Battery life could we squeeze out? Since Battery Capacity just simply isn't improving. Assuming we could have CPU running 4x more powerful at the current lowest state of battery level. Which means most of the multi tasking in background should no longer sucks up much battery life. Assuming we get even better Display Screen Tech in the pipeline and those extreme efficient LED, assuming Stacked Memory comes in, assuming better LTE controller and state of art Antenna system.Even with all of these aren't going to get us double the battery life. More like 30 - 40% max. And some of these are theoretical.
So I think the answer in the short term isn't about getting bigger battery. Is that Battery needs to recharge superfast that makes most battery problem non issue. If you could fully charge a battery in less then a minute?
powchie - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Non-techie persons like my wife's co-teachers find it easier to swap music and videos using SD card on their Android devices. My wife is envious as she's using an iPhone and cannot get how to put music on her phone. She is non-techie well..powchie - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
...non- techie as well.Drumsticks - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
How on earth can somebody find it easy to put files between two drives but find it hard to manage one? I mean, I don't think its hard to manage two drives at all. My thirteen year old sister gets it. But the idea that its easier than one? That makes no sense...It might be easier or harder because of the OS, but not because of the number of drives...
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
You're physically swapping the "box" your "stuff" is in, rather than managing an abstract file location. I get what you're saying but I can also see why a non-technical person might find the former easier than the latter.Devfarce - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
One can't really compare MicroSD storage to internal storage. It's the same as popping an SD card into your computer and relying on that for every day use. It's going to be slow, unreliable and just isn't the best solution. Otherwise everyone would be doing this on their PCs and laptops with cheap USB flash drives and what not. It is sub optimal and that isn't what these devices are truly made to do, marketing aside. I'm not contesting that internal storage upgrades aren't overpriced but the fact is that the microSD card in phones is on life support and will only hang around where performance isn't an issue. No manufacturer wants their flagship feeling slow because the knockoff class 4 SD card in it is locking up the controller and giving flaky performance. They can't control the experience and only a small subset of the population are the ones making the most noise about this without much of a dent in sales so the choice becomes clear.Also, I've never met one person who carried an extra battery for a phone since perhaps 2005 on a blackberry. The only thing that I've ever used them for is doing a hard reboot and I've replaced a couple of batteries that have died. Not to say that the replacement can't be done easily on something like an iPhone with the right tools anyways. Also the rumor about draining the battery completely is not accurate any more. The charge controllers do a great job at managing the chemistry. I've been opportunistically charging for about 5 years and my phone almost never dies.
mtalinm - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
If you haven't met anyone who carries an extra battery, then I guess we haven't met.Unlike my iPhone-toting friends, I do not drag a charger everywhere with me and sprint around airports like a madman looking for an open outlet. I do not whine "noooooooo!" when my phone runs out of juice. I just swap in a spare.
steven75 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
If your "iPhone toting friends" aren't able to plan ahead and buy a $20 external battery pack that works with any device, then why do you think they'd be capable of planning ahead enough to buy a second battery if it were easily swappable?This argument is incredibly old and tired.
soydeedo - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I don't personally swap batteries anymore because I now use a phone with an inaccessible battery, but it's not that hard to realize that having a battery pack handy and attaching it for 30-60 minutes is not anywhere nearly as convenient as swapping out the battery in 30-60 seconds when you're out of juice.dawheat - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Except today you can buy relatively cheap, fast storage for your computer in sizes 2 orders of magnitude larger than available on phones. So trying to compare them is a bit foolish.One of the first posters nailed it - it's not that microSD is here for the long term. But as long as manufactures don't offer larger storage options and/or abuse you on price, microSD support can be very compelling. A Sandisk class 10 64GB card costs $42 on Amazon.
And I find it amusing when people continue to make comments that only a small subset care, yet Samsung phones dominate the Android phone market. But hey - it's working out great for HTC.
Devfarce - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
HTC has bigger problems beyond micro SD cards and removable batteries. I wouldn't want to compete against Samsung. They are ruthless in their pursuit of market domination. I also don't agree that the removable battery and micro SD card are to credit for anything more than a few percent of sales. Nobody abuses anyone on price in the handset market except the carriers because of the enormous selection and competition. But I agree that 8-16 GB on a phone isn't enough. I get minimum 32 on my iPhones. I don't like paying the extra money but as an engineer I would have made the same choice if designing a premium/flagship device. I've known more people who have had SD card failures (5) than who have not bought a phone because of an SD card.Gigaplex - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
The only reason I got my S4 was due to microSD support. Then again I guess I'm just in the minority.rituraj - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
No you are not. I am speaking for the developing market where one of the major question is how large a memory card one can insert. And if the seller says there is no expandable memory, you understand what the reaction would be.Lonyo - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Part of it may be due to who the authors of this article are. They aren't your typical consumer, they have a biased point of view.I am in south Korea at the moment. 90% of people have Samsung. Most people (yes most) on the subway watch videos etc on their phone. Yesterday I saw someone switch out their battery on the subway on their Samsung phone.
In the "real world" people don't use their phones like Anand and Brian do. Their use cases are remarkably different I would speculate.
Insomniator - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
You're saying most people use an SD card and swap batteries?!I've literally never seen someone swap a battery, and barely see SD cards. Most people I see (nj/nyc) just have iPhones. I have a Droid DNA, GF has a nexus. We just carry chargers around... no non-nerds ever carry batteries around.
I fully understand the need for both of these, but some seriously high % of people don't give a crap and never notice either way. Its techies that talk on sites like this that will fight about it. A new smartphone is at least 16GB... more than enough for most people's music collection.
Gigaplex - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
So basically you're saying that South Korea and NJ/NYC can't possibly have different demographics and only your anecdotal observations count?Drumsticks - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
You realize that same argument applies in a reverse way to lonyo's argument?Anecdotal evidence ALWAYS sucks. And unless somebody has hardcore statistics, we have to assume that marketing experts at these companies know what they're doing.
Apple has no microSD, Samsung does. Both companies are very very successful. Its not as simple as "well Samsung has microSD and HTC doesn't" because one could easily say that Apple has no microSD yet sells more flagship phones than Samsung.
Lonyo - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
My argument isn't that everyone uses SD cards and swaps batteries. My argument is that Anand and Brian aren't everyone, and in the real world there are people who use SD cards and swap batteries. Hence the entire point of people arguing with Anand/Brian in the first place.They have their own opinions which are likely not based on (global) facts and use cases, and hence they have a biased point of view, although Anand certainly does travel, such as to trade shows, he's still US based and focused.
Maybe there's a reason Samsung still has removable batteries and MicroSD cards on pretty much all their phones.
Mayuyu - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Hmm? While there are a lot of Samsung in Korea. It's definitely not 90%. iPhones are more popular among the youth.ThisIsChrisKim - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I rarely see iPhones here. Usually, I only see foreigners with iPhones. Otherwise, it's basically all Note 2 and 3 here.eanazag - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I'm mostly in agreement. I'd like to be able to take apart a phone and replace the battery if it could be done in 20 minutes or less for repair purposes. We have all see when a phone battery door won't stay on. My daughter has one like that. That doesn't happen to iPhones. However, plenty of other things happen to iPhones.The cost of NAND in phones is ridiculous and the performance sucks. I hate restoring from backups. Apple, your storage is too slow. I have a 32 GB device and can't imagine the time suck of restoring a 128 GB device that is full.
I think as the devices get bigger, I am more likely to expect the external storage ports. Tablets and up.
DavidBrees - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
SD cards are beneficial for increasing storage and being able to move data from one device to another, by simply moving the SD card. Another benefit of SD cards is that they do not suffer the excessive price bumps that internal storage does.With regard to removable batteries, I do not use multiple batteries, I use a much bigger battery. I went from a standard 2600mAh S4 bettery to a 7500mAh ZeroLemon battery. It lasts incredibly long. Two days to a full charge, and less than 7 hours to fully charge. I have yet to ever wonder where the next outlet for my charger is going to be.
I will take my SD card and extended battery over a unibody design with limited storage and battery life.
Krysto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
> Another benefit of SD cards is that they do not suffer the excessive price bumps that internal storage does.That's really the OEM's fault, and the consumer's for accepting it. It has nothing to do with cost. Internal storage costs just as much as a class 10 microSD card. It's just that OEM's want to nickle and dime us for even a little extra internal storage. We need to start protesting against that.
Next year all high-end devices should START with 32 GB as default, with an option for 64 GB for $100 more, and in 2015, they should start at 64 GB and an option for 128 GB for $100. I've seen the prices. If they do this, they would be making at least half of that in profit. Most people only think it's not possible because Apple charges an outrageous $300 more for 128 GB, when in fact it costs them only $60 to add it.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
The question is, how does the consumer not accept that situation without either:a) Not buying a phone (vote lost)
b) Buying a phone with Micro SD storage and using that?
That's why this article is very, very blinkered in its attitude.
eanazag - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I had a Dell Latitude D810 laptop with a spare battery that fit into the DVD slot. So I could swap between an extra battery or DVD drive. I loved that and usually had the battery in. The extra battery over an optical drive was a good trade off. I rarely use the optical drive, but I do need it on occasion. A USB bus powered optical drive would be ideal for me.greywolf0 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
That's the only reason why I want a microSD. I can get a 32GB for $20. That's 48GB if you count the included 16GB onboard. 16GB alone is woefully small, made even smaller by the few GB taken by the system files and cache. And phonemakers make it extremely hard to ditch microSDs when they are so stingy and use 16GB as their only available size. 32GB and 64GB are always unavailable, and if they are, the availability is limited and price is extortion level. Some phonemakers, like HTC, make it extremely hard to want their phones if they insist on making unibody designs with no expansion but only have 16GB models available. The most hilarious one is the Nexus 4, which only came with 8GB on the $299 model. Like Anand said, the NAND prices needed to come down, but even at current rates, it's not cost prohibitive. More like phonemakers have been following Apple's high profit margin business strategy for too long, and won't concede on the memory. How long have we been stuck with 16GB as the standard? Memory prices have definitely dropped since then.poofyhairguy - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I think phones can't be compared to laptops for three reasons when it comes to external batteries:1. External chargers make multiple battery management easier. This is great for the one or two really long days a year when carrying a spare in the pocket is worth it, like on vacations. Also saves wear on the charging port.
2. We rely on our phone more. Your laptop dies and maybe an deadline is missed. Your phone dies and you can be lost or worse.
3. Use while charging with a laptop is much nicer. Being tethered to the wall at the end of a long day sucks. An external battery is smaller in the pocket than a power pack.
kpb321 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I think the desire for Micro SD slots typically boils down to a combination of three things.1) Cost. As the author pointed out upgrading the storage on any phone is at least several times more expensive than what an MicroSD card costs. Apple may be one of the worst of the bunch charging $100 to upgrade from 16 to 32gbs of storage. A 16 micro SD card cost 10-15$. The author did a pretty good on pointing this out.
2) Total storage. A Micro SD slot lets you add a 64gb card which is as big or bigger than the internal storage options available on many phones. On top of that you can carry multiple cards if you really need more space and larger cards are possible just not readily available at this point. The author kinda covers this with his 32/64/128gb sizes but doesn't really highly that in particular.
3) Future expandability. Most of the US at least is still stuck with 2 year contracts as the norm or paying ridiculous prices to upgrade more frequently. Sure X may be enough right now but I can't necessarily predict how things might change in the next 2 years. With no micro sd slot you are stuck with what you've got. This would be less of an issue if 1 wasn't such a big issue too. Personally I just got an iPhone 5s and had to think about what size I wanted for a while. I never filled up the 10gb of combined storage on my t-mobile g2 so I figured the base 16gbs would be enough but still wondered about upgrading. Ultimately, #1 lead me to stick with the base size as I just couldn't stomach spending $100 for 16gb more space just because I might need it at some point in the future.
MadMan007 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
The notion that a microSD slot must negatively affect design is false. GSM phones which are unibody without a removable battery all have SIM slots that are externally accessible, all that's needed is a similar slot for microSD. While there are other factors, I'm pretty sure profit is the main motivator, and I fully agree that if storage increases were priced sanely there would be a lot less griping, but paying $50 for 16GB of NAND is offensive.Drumsticks - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
How can it be unibody if you're removing a piece? Honestly curious o.OMadMan007 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Dunno. Maybe GSM phones with SIM slots aren't actually unibody then?Vi0cT - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Don't confuse Unibody with Monocoque.Braumin - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
OK I love you guys, I do, but you really need to take a step back before you write these articles:"Once you start looking at it through the lens of a manufacturer trying to balance build quality, internal volume optimization and the need for external storage, it becomes a simpler decision to ditch the slot"
The problem with your site is that it's read by people who are not tech idiots. The "lens" of the manufacturer is pretty clearly more about margins than anything else. Otherwise we'd not even be having this discussion.
I 100% agree with you on the battery thing. People can and should buy battery extenders if they really run out of juice that much. The ability to put a bigger battery in the phone is a win.
The SD slot though is all a lie until we stop getting hosed $200 for 48 GB of extra storage.
Manufacturers have found ways to add slots for Micro SD. They just choose margins.
Also Windows Phone handles SD cards pretty well. You just set the SD card as the default save for your media and you never know you have a card in. But heaven forbid you mention Windows Phone.
anactoraaron - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Not exactly with you on the choosing margins comment. What I feel it comes down to is actually looking at customer's usage. How many people use microSD cards in their smartphones? If you look at 100% of the smartphone user base, what percent of that base would actually have a microSD card in and use it? 20%? 40%? 5%? I highly doubt more than 40%, which I will present the following points/issues.1. You have to add the microSD card spot/reader to the device. (slight BoM increase)
2. You also have to pay a licensing fee w/M$ for the usage of fat32.
Considering that less than half of your targeted customer base will use one, why should manufacturers add microSD storage to every device?
Things are just fine the way they are now. Most budget phones with microSD (so a manufacturer can gimp internal storage to save money - also explains another user comment about usage in a country other than America), and only 1 in 4 flagships on average with it (mimicking the actual user base).
The whole removable battery is moot to me. Too many external universal portable battery solutions to meet anyone's needs and as stated battery tech has increased endurance over time. But to say anything is on it's way out isn't reality. Companies will look at their demographic and cater their product lineup to eat as much of that profit pie that they can.
chaosbloodterfly - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
"only 1 in 4 flagships on average with it (mimicking the actual user base)"Well that's skewing the numbers, because that one flagship is the Samsung Galaxy S4, and happens to outsell the other flagships combined.
anactoraaron - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Not quite. I was also taking the Note 3 into consideration. About 1 in 4 comprised of - iPhone 5s, S4*, Note 3*, Nexus 5, HTC One, LG G2, Nokia 1520*, HTC 8x, and Moto X (yes 2 WP8 phones are in there). And BTW the iPhone outsells all other phones. Sources: http://techcrunch.com/2013/10/07/iphone-5s-5c-sale...http://www.latinospost.com/articles/30122/20131020... Use facts when you post from now on.
Sammy's overall numbers account for a much broader customer base as they sell various models for various budgets. Not a fanboy here, I have a N5. Every phone - and I mean every phone - I had owned prior to my N5 had a microsd slot (even going back 5-6 years when I was rocking a Nokia E63). Can't say that I miss it too much, but I do have the 32 gig N5.
Vi0cT - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
You can add the Xperia Z1 and Xperia Z Ultra to the list too.Vi0cT - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Sorry forgot to elaborate, both of those have a MicroSD slot.ancientarcher - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It's amazing that the authors won't talk about the most important reason from the manufacturer's point of view not to have external storage - margins. C'mon, if Apple were feeling generous they would charge $20 for upgrading to 32GB vs $100 they charge now and still have a 50% incremental margin. But no, they gotta rob you and everyone else sees that and they want to rob you too. why not!"Once you start looking at it through the lens of a manufacturer trying to balance build quality, internal volume optimization and the need for external storage, it becomes a simpler decision to ditch the slot"
Just talk about the margins buddy. that is more important than all the reasons you have mentioned above.
About the removable battery, yes, build considerations come into play, but definitely not for removable storage. That's just a margin play!
robl - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
I like how the battery argument is structured - perhaps a 125% capacity integrated battery & sleeker profile vs. 100% capacity removable one. I see your point here.However, for external storage, I feel a bit differently. There are too many devices shipping with 16GB configs and SDXC can easily add 64GB or soon 128GB. In this case, instead of a 25% gain for not having SDXC, it feels like a 3x-8x penalty to me. The UI issues are valid, but it is just software and can be overcome. I think google and others are against it because they are pushing for the cloud for everything.
Tams80 - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
That was a rather snarky and condescending article. Some of the comments here are even worse; some even going so far as to tell other people what they should be doing. Please stop.Anyway, back on topic.
There are several reasons for both removable batteries and storage.
Batteries
- You can go from next to no charge, to full charge in a matter of seconds.
- You have greater capacity in total.
- Larger capacity batteries can be added.
Yes, you do need to charge the extra batteries. There are ample third party chargers out there though, if there isn't a decent first party one. Getting an plug with two USB ports is a good idea.
There are people for whom a larger non-replaceable battery would be beneficial, but I have some issues with this:
- I haven't seen any significantly greater capacities as a result
- I have seen many people asking for a charger,
- I have witnessed on multiple ocassions people charging their phones where they were not welcome
An external battery pack is good, but it doesn't provide an instant full charge and as a result will end up leaving you with a cable dangling from your phone.
Storage:
- Current internal capacities aren't enough for some people
- Internal storage is ridiculously priced
- Allows for a greater capacity to be carried
- provides an alternative option for data transfer
Please don't point to cloud storage. Availability, speed, cost and battery drain all go against it. Only really in urban areas is it reliable, but then there are the congestion issues.
NeoteriX - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
The article is snarky and condescending, but perhaps it is frustration because many of the commenters and folks who raise this as an issue miss the point.All the points you raise are largely correct (though I would disagree with the "greater capacity in total, as the article shows, within a phone's original design spec (that part is key), a nonremovable battery wins on capacity), but they still inevitably miss the point.
Engineering or design or making a product is always about trading off and balancing competing considerations. Like I said before, the majority of the points you raise are true, but you feature no discussion of their drawbacks. Just because the drawbacks are trivial to you does not mean they are trivial in the marketing and sales of a phone. Furthermore, when determining what design compromises to make, phone manufacturers will look to their target market and what the market wants.
In this regard, it appears that the market has largely spoken. While a minority of hardcore enthusiasts/hobbyists prefer the removable battery and microSD (and I think they are great too), Apple made a gamble a long time ago that people would largely not miss them... and by the vast sales of iOS devices (and we are talking total user base, not phone to phone as the GS3/GS4 have been quite competitive), it is evident that consumers largely do not miss these feature and will take smaller size and cleaner/more attractive design.
AnitaPeterson - Friday, November 29, 2013 - link
Who cares about Apple? Apple is relentlessly promoting a view of the personal computer which is never opened, upgraded or in any way modified by the user. And they push for the same thing in the phone arena.I would have thought AT members are precisely the kind of people who like to upgrade their computers, open them up, tinker with them, and so on. We may or might not represent a user majority, but that's besides the point.
Anand and Brian are trying to sell us the moral equivalent of a completely closed computer system, in which all the components are soldered inside a sealed shell. Which is ironic, considering that if computers would have been like this from the beginning, Anand would not have had a site at all.
chizow - Monday, November 25, 2013 - link
Anand it is sad to see you reiterating the same biased viewpoint as Brian with regard to removable batteries and microSD cards.I really think you are both out of line here as I can guarantee you the overwhelming % of your readers do not get free smart phones to review to the point it becomes tedium for you, or have product review budgets that allow for top-of-the-line, storage to the max, price-be-damned flagship units without exception. Dismissing these important, differentiating features that clearly add value to a product does your readership a great disservice, imo.
-Battery: Would I rather have an insignificant 15% more battery life that tethers me to an outlet throughout the day, or 100% or more swappable battery life with the ability to charge 2 batteries simultaneously (1 on phone, 1 on charger)? I would go with 2 batteries, especially if I needed 24 hours of uninterrupted usage while on business travel or on vacation. 1 battery on me, charging when I can, 1 battery charging in the office, hotel, etc. Best of both worlds.
-MicroSD: Would I like to spend 50-100% ($100-$200 on contract) more on a phone for 48GB more storage? Or would I rather spend $35-50 for 64GB more storage that is compatible with thousands of other devices also? Sure it is slower, but I know for a fact you are a proponent of this very same heterogenous storage configuration on desktop PCs (fast SSD + slower HDD), why do you feel smartphone users are too stupid to grasp and adopt this simple usage pattern?
-Flagship devices and microSD cards: I keep seeing you and Brian repeat microSD going the way of the dodo, but all I see are more devices adopting it to alienate the few that choose not to include a microSD slot. Virtually all non-Apple or non-Google devices in their respective markets are adding microSD, especially in the tablet space (both Android and Windows devices). In the flagship smartphone market, you just did a review on the HTC One Max that deviated from previous HTC designs by *ADDING* microSD. Do you think the 2014 successor to the HTC One will have a microSD slot or not?
In summary, I am really not sure what your motives are when you interject your own preferences over those of your readership. Failing to empathize with your readers only serves to alienate when you should be speaking up for what we want. Take a step back and think about it, if you didn't review tech for a living, would you want to pay these exorbitant prices for something that for all intents and purposes, does just as well for a fraction of the price?
jwcalla - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It's just the opinion of a couple of guys on the internet.chizow - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Normally I'd be inclined to agree, but in this case these two guys on the internet do have a greater voice and direct access to mfgs and OEMs. It really is a shame they take their own insulated viewpoints and usage patterns as gospel.NeoteriX - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Honestly, it looks like they are merely expressing the preferences of the larger market, and not the more minority enthusiast/hobbyist market.chizow - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Which is again, a flawed analysis if you are starting with the entire smartphone market. Why concern yourself with what entry-level users prefer on a flagship device that's only targeting the top 15-20% of the market? Similarly, why bother adding enthusiast features like K chips, Turbo, SLI etc. if you are going to claim only a tiny % of the CPU/GPU market is interested in these features?If they want to speak for the mass market, make that clear and leave that discussion out of high-end flagship device reviews. But we know that's not the case, we know AT can't be bothered to review anything less than upper tier smartphones, anything less wouldn't justify Klug reaching into his pocket and pulling out his SIM card removal tool.
NeoteriX - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
The mass market is buying high-end flagship mobile devices though, that's the thing. Apple's annual iteration of the iPhone is both mass-market and is unquestionably high end (the PowerVR GPU used in iOS devices dominated the GPUs available in Android devices for years, until possibly recently, and even then, it's a push, and the same goes for the CPU in terms of performance and efficiency--the latest Apple A7 SoC with its 64-bit ISA and 6-wide design).And it appears the market has spoken, Apple devices (iPhones, iPads, iPod Touches) have a huge portion of the market, and Android devices are split amongst those with removable batteries and MicroSD cards.
I won't bother to research/estimate how many there are in each camp, but suffice it to say that if not a majority of devices lack SD slots/batteries, then at least half do, and that's probably a safe enough reason not to penalize companies that decide to omit them. ("Where reasonable minds differ....")
And it seems that thinness is just as much an important "high end" *and* mass market spec as removable batteries and SD cards.
chizow - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
You will never see Apple products described as flagship, they are decidedly mid-range devices carrying a huge luxury tax with 1 or 2 features that justify that tax to their targeted end-users (ex: "Retina" screen resolution, A7 SoC in latest iPhone).The rest of the device is 1 or 2 generations back, if not more. Apple's lustre is not it's cutting-edge flagship status, it is it's ease of use which is precisely the market that is disinterested in advanced features like microSD and removable batteries and obviously not the one targeted by flagship device makers.
So no, the mass market isn't buying flagship phones, they are buying free with contract phones or last year's iPhone offered free or at a discount. Of course Apple has a huge marketshare as the 1st smartphone maker but that share has also dwindled and never catered to users who demanded more functionality to begin with.
Once you take Apple out of the equation, you see who dominates the high-end flagship smartphone market. Samsung's S and Note series flagships are clearly head of the class. Even though HTC's One was often reviewed as well or better than the S4, it still lagged in sales with the lack of microSD and removable battery cited as major reasons as to why it lost to the S4. And now, as a reactionary measure, HTC released the One Max with removable battery and microSD slot, coincidence? I think not.
Also, if you are going to start bringing in other aesthetics or usable features, then surely you must bring screen size into the discussion? Sure thinness matters, but so does screen size right? ;)
NeoteriX - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
If you cannot concede that Apple iOS devices are state of the art and are by far flagship technology smartphones, we can't have a conversation. In multiple, multiple places in Android and iOS reviews, the AnandTech staff have pointed out the superiority of iPhone hardware, and Android developers are just beginning to catch up in some areas (and still fall short in others). And this is coming from a guy who has never owned an iPhone and exclusively uses Android devices. When the Tegra 3 was released, it only had 1/5th the GPU power of the current iOS SoC. The current Apple A7 blows away any other ARM SoC and even outclasses Intel x86 Atom CPUs with its super wide instruction crunching design.So seriously, if you can't admit that 1) Apple offers class leading designs and hardware, 2) that they (currently) sell and (historically) have sold incredibly well, and 3) lack a removable battery and microSD, then you're not arguing from a position of intellectual honesty.
Finally, the Galaxy S series and the Note have done quite well, this is true, but when you look at the whole ecosystem, they're far from a majority or even half of devices. Definitely not a "mandate" by consumers, and so, one would be justified in not penalizing mfrs in reviews for not having one.
RoninX - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I don't care about removable batteries, but I have over 100 GB of music in my collection, and I'd like to be able to carry most, if not all, of that on my smartphone. Right now, I carry both a 160GB iPod classic and a Droid 4, but it would be nice to reduce that to a single device.That's one of many reasons why I'm leaning toward the Note 3 for my next phone. (Along with performance, display size, multitasking features, and the stylus.)
Sure, I'd rather have 128GB internal than 64GB internal + 64GB micro SD, but who offers a 128GB internal Android phone? Ideally, I'd like to have a 256GB internal Android phone, but that may be a couple years away.
Sp12 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
First article I've laughed at -- quite a few silly arguments (all things equal when they're not -- you pay 150$ for 32->64GB of storage, and almost no phones offer higher than that, performance arguments when external storage is largely used for constant bitrate video.And realistically that's the usage case right now. How many people have more than 32GB of apps that they need on high performance NAND? Great. They can go buy a high-performance SD card at significant discount from a manufacturer internal upgrade.
And if they just need slow storage for their music they can get a 20$ 32GB card.
I don't generally think there's a winning argument on battery, though admittedly after a 200$ repair bill to replace a faulty battery (probably 40$ if it was user replaceable) maybe I'm a bit sour.
Sp12 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Some relevant quotes reading the comments. What an embarrassment of an article -- regardless of your stance."Part of it may be due to who the authors of this article are. They aren't your typical consumer, they have a biased point of view.
Anand it is sad to see you reiterating the same biased viewpoint as Brian with regard to removable batteries and microSD cards.
That was a rather snarky and condescending article. Some of the comments here are even worse; some even going so far as to tell other people what they should be doing. Please stop.
OK I love you guys, I do, but you really need to take a step back before you write these articles. You are embarassing your site"
Morawka - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
"The move away from removable batteries allows for better use of internal volume, which in turn increases the size of battery you can include at the same device size. There are potential build quality benefits here as well since the manufacturer doesn't need to deal with building a solid feeling removable door/back of some sort."Thats a cop out excuse. They just need to think outside the box and design a phone around the removable battery. the only time it would save volume is if the phone has big rounded corners, and even then, custom batteries with rounded corners can be made.
The back casing and battery could be made into once piece and covered in metal, it doesn't have to be plastic. you can also design the battery pack in a way that is seamless. Just innovate.
Regarding removable storage, build it into the phone like a sim card like nvidia shield and a hand full of tablets do. the micro sd storage chip is near the same size as the nano sim, so it can be done, apple and others just refuse to do this to sell you expensive upgrades that line their pockets with more money.
f0d - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
others have said it and i will toointernal storage of all phones is just too small for my usage - i need at LEAST a 64GB memory card slot as well as the internal storage and i usually have multiple cards handy ready to use
speed and size of phone just doesnt matter as much to me as having a large amount of storage, if having a microsd card slot means i have to have a phone thats a few mm thicker then i can easily live with that
jwcalla - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I'm not sure that I completely follow the logic that an integrated battery automatically means higher capacity. The Galaxy S4 has a higher capacity battery than an HTC One. And surely absolute battery capacity can't be that important... the iPhones have significantly smaller batteries than the Galaxies and how often is that a negative consideration in a purchase decision?skiboysteve - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I understand both sides of this argument. What I don't understand though is the need for people to store tons of music on their phone. Use Xbox music, Spotify, or google music... Then you literally only need maybe a gig or so to cache enuf for offline periods like plane rides.can someone explain this?
I used to have a 16 gig iPhone and I was always annoyed hoe i couldn't fit my music on it so I was really happy to get a Lumia 920 for the same price with 32 gigs. But I never use all the space because I don't store much music on it at all because I can get my whole collection any time with Xbox music.
jwcalla - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
You stream music over your cell data connection?skiboysteve - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Oh yeah all the time. Works flawlessly. I even only have a 2GB plan and that's fine.skiboysteve - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I should point out I typically only listen to music on cell when I'm commuting to and from work which is like an hour total a dayf0d - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
what about movies?i dont have much of a data plan and i would probably use all 2gb of it up in a day of watching movies and listening to music, im NOT going to pay for a higher plan to watch my movies and listen to music when i can just get a phone with a sd card and store it all on there, MUCH cheaper
Hubb1e - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
You'll use your whole data plan in one netflix movie. It uses a heck of a lot of battery to stream content which then requires a bigger battery when all you needed was a tiny little SD slot. I love streaming music, but it isn't a solution for a whole lot of users who don't have LTE or good connections and huge batteries. And streaming video is pretty much out except for the occasional youtube video.skiboysteve - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
yeah I dont watch videos. i dont have a netflix account or hulu or anything like that nor do I have cable and I rarely watch movies anywhere but in the theater... so I'm a weirdo.What phone doesnt have LTE now days?
And for battery, my Lumia 920 only has a 2000mA battery and it doesnt mind streaming music all the time
Runadumb - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I was the same and now mostly stream my music too however to do that you need both an unlimited data plan and good reception. Its pretty obvious why this would be a barrier for many people.I also have my 64GB microSD card loaded with music for when I can't stream. Best of both worlds.
chizow - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It's not just music, but there are bound to be times you don't have good wireless or wifi coverage that you will want locally stored music.Another big usage benefit is video, not just commercial videos, but video you capture in every day life. Full 1080p/30 video takes up a lot of storage, on devices with only 16GB after OS and no removable storage, you can't really take much video without shuffling files around after a few videos. With 64GB you can take videos without even worrying about it.
Tams80 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Perhaps because we don't know in advance what media we will want to consume, so have all that we might want on our phones?As for streaming:
- Reception is generally patchy in most countries outside urban and areas and in urban areas the networks are often overburdened and reception poor in buildings.
- Decent quality requires at least 3G, which I'm pretty sure uses more power than streaming from a microSD card.
- If you already own a lot of music, then streaming services are an added cost.
- You don't need to plan (or do as much) planning of what media you are going to consume.
- Streaming services can go down.
Morawka - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
If your not going to penalize review scores for lack of expandable storage, then you need to start penalizing them on cost and cost of upgrades. This is the first time anand has really started to talk about apple's insane nand upgrade pricing, and i think their over-pricing deserves at least a paragraph in the reviews as a CON.Krysto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Right. I sure don't remember them talking about it in their REVIEWS when they praised them for how awesome they are and how worth it they are. They're only talking about it now after someone else lit this fire about storage prices.Either way, I guess it's good that momentum is rising and people are finally starting to question them. The fact that Apple hasn't added 32 GB versions for the same price as last year, along with 2 GB of RAM in all of the new devices is only done out of PURE GREED, and getting that extra buck in profit - compared to last year, which was already insane profit.
Anyone who tries to defend them is just stuck in the reality distortion field. It has nothing to do with "draining battery life" or whatever. They are just BS excuses that "sound true", but they are not the MAIN reason why they did it - by far.
Hubb1e - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
While I don't disagree with you about their pricing, invoking the G word is a bit much. It's a business, not a charity. They will price it at what their customers are willing to pay. And most of them are okay with it because they make a good product.Morawka - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
well as a person who gets a ipad every year, i have to tell ya, i sold my ipad 4th gen planning to get the newest ipad when it came out, but i never bought it due to me realizing it was gonna cost me $800 for a LTE ipad mini retina with 64GB. $800 for a mini tablet.........I've bought trucks for less than $800
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
The hilarious thing is that in the iPad review, Anand framed Apple's charge for the upgrade to 128Gb as "comparatively good value". I laughed 'til I cried.jjj - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
microSD is never about design , the volume required is tiny compared to the volume of the entire phone and phones do have sim trays,some more than one ,if you have that you can have microSD too. It is about greed and sometimes phone makers might be forced into it by other players with leverage (way odd how few US phones have microSD).You also look at it from your POV only , most of the world doesn't have free wifi everywhere and no matter how much internal storage a device has,it is better to have a few microSDs in your pocket, at least until we have hundreds of GBs internal storage.
I wouldn't even mind phones with 2 microSD slots that can be set up in RAID, that's so very doable and not all microSD cards are slow.
Cloud storage is also NSA enabled.
You defending a corrupted and greedy bunch of players in the industry does make one wonder about your motives.
What's next advocating for non repleacable storage in PCs?
skiboysteve - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
High end laptops don't have user replaceable storage already. My ultrabook doesn't, and I am ok with that. I prefer its small sleek form factor than one bigger with doors to get to internal components I'll never use.f0d - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
thats the same reason i wouldnt buy an ultrabook - if i cant upgrade the storage then im just not interestedpiroroadkill - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Fuck that. If the drive fails, I want to replace it.Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
You take your missing 5mm of case depth and I'll take my ability to not throw away my entire sodding notebook when the storage kicks the bucket.Tehk17 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Couple things I want to point out here.First, there are several uses of removable batteries besides simply carrying around a bunch of extra batteries (something I don't do because both my Samsung Moment and Galaxy S4 are able to easily make it through my day). Samsung's S View cover are great examples of this, as they are essentially a battery door with an attached flip cover. Another is the ability to replace the battery once it starts degrading. As someone who used my past phone for over 3 years this came in handy when the original battery started degrading so I bought a new one for $5 and was good to go for another year until the GS4 came out.
And as for microSD card slots, it seems that everybody's making a huge deal about how they're slower than internal NAND but to be honest, in the past four years I've never had one instance that I wished I used internal storage instead. Not one. In my usage, the only two instances I'd ever notice a slowdown is if a) I was using the device's camera heavily (something I don't do because I prefer my NEX-3); or b) if I installed game data to the external card (again something I don't need to worry about because since all my media is on my microSD card, the internal storage has more than enough space for game data).
There's also been numerous instances where I needed to physically remove the microSD card from my device and insert into another, something not possible if microSD card slots were phased out of devices.
I could write more but I think I made my point.
Tehk17 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Hmm, some text went missing. One sentence should read "Samsung's Flip and S View Covers..."rituraj - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I wanted to write the exact same thing as your last paragraph."Hey bro, you shot some videos yesterday in our picnic. Can I have them in my laptop?"
-"No. Get off you idiot, I will have to sit here for an hour giving them to you via blue tooth. I have better things to do like cleaning my storage to take some pictures of myself in the washroom."
rfa - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
As someone whose previous phone had both replaceable battery AND mircoSD (Nokia N900) I can say in my experience, the need for a (user) replaceable battery is negligible given the ubiquity of USB ports - that is remember to carry a USB cable with you (mine was 10cm long -small enough to always be plugged into the phone and not take too much space) and you're always close enough to power to charge enough for that call or email.Having the ability to swap cards is wonderful and the ease of doing this made other people change their ideas on how to transfer media; I'd have the internal memory for apps (32GB) and the card (32GB) for music and videos. To my liking the only downside was the inability to change the default destination for photos from the internal storage to the card - this would have made media transfers even easier.
Currently I have a Nokia N9 (64GB) and I miss the ability to change cards. If it were a 16GB version I would have to change to a phone with >32GB OR took (mini or) micro SD cards
Tams80 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I used to use a N900 and always had a couple of spare batteries on me. I could go a full weekend though.bleh0 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
The benefits of external memory and replaceable batteries just plain outweigh the need for a unibody ultra thin design.Reclaimer77 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Article Translation:We like iPhones, so features it's missing simply don't count.
1. Why would internal storage prices ever decrease when you're already willing to pay exorbitant upgrade fees? By campaigning against microSD, you are ACTIVELY asking to be bent over a barrel now and for all time.
2. You seem to live in a world where Samsung, the largest smartphone OEM in the world, doesn't include these features on nearly every phone. Sure if you throw out the largest statistical outlier, any feature can be viewed as insignificant.
3. How can you NOT view expandable storage and user replaceable batteries as added value, and not count it as a strike against models missing these features? This dismissive attitude is not commensurate with the high level of detail I've come to expect from Anandtech.
4. Build Quality? You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
5. Bringing up the speed of microsSD while advocating the merits of cloud storage is...ironic. Are you also on a planet where you get perfect data signal at all times and have no data caps?
All things being equal, it's not that your arguments don't have merit. It's just that you are being so dismissive about the other side, which lets be clear, is the dominant one!
Erid - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Yeah. This piece is outrageous, well as outrageous as a hurriedly written piece in a tech blog can be. It's strange because it's basically a position statement when one wasn't necessary and that's throwing a lot of the readers off. What's the purpose of codifying in Anandtech review law that removable batteries and microSD cards are not desirable? It's supported by half-hearted arguments and the fact that two people co-wrote it makes it sort of sad. It's also irrational. The desirability of any feature in a phone is determined by how it affects the usability of the phone and whether it adds value. Anything else is a matter of taste.Malih - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Are you reading different page and commenting on this page?If you don't see usability and added value being mentioned in the article, then you must be searching the exact words and unable to find it.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
I have come to accept that on this site, "build quality" is a subjective assessment referring to how far a device deviates from the norms prescribed by Apple.Brian Z - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I see the points of having both removable batteries and storage. But like usual the die hard fans of them just completely ignore all the negatives of them. And will pull out the good old B word like usual, oh you so bias.My post will mainly be about sd cards. What I have not seen mentioned at all in the comments are some of the hugest draw backs to them. Yes they are good and useful to be used at media storage. For anything else they are complete pain in the you know what.
As Brian and Anand pointed out it is not officially supported by google. While that alone doesn't mean much the result is a mess. You will install some apps that will automatically move stuff aka install to sd. If you then swap out the card your app is screwed. This is also disaster for the average user to go through their app list and look for and then move the apps that allow it to the sd card. You will also loose the widgets for said apps once you do so. It is just a flat out mess period to deal with all that nonsense.
Also I see some folks are stuck on carrying around massive amounts of data. You're a very small minority people. Hardly anybody wants to carry around 100s of gb of data on their mobile device. You dont need 20k mp3s on your device. Nor do you need your entire movie collection. You are really just digital hoarders.
While there is definitely a need for expandable storage a device like a Samsung phone with 16gb on internal, That really ends up about half of that thanks to touchwiz. If you install your apps and game or two you could easily run out of space for media. Once you get up to a device with 32gb internal that really goes away for the most part.
Yet the few that are the most vocal are the ones that want to walk around with multiple sd cards caring over 100gb of data always with them seem to make the biggest fuss. Your usage case is really rare for cell phone.
Also you die hard fans of sd cards no exactly what they can and cant do with android. The average consumer has no clue. They will see the spec list at the store or on the box and see the expandable to 64gb via micro sd or whatever but have no idea how it actually works. Most will think their device will then perform as if it was a 64gb device. Which of course its not.
In closing it seems that no matter what the die hard fans of sd cards just will never except or will completely ignore all the drawbacks of them on android. Then there is also that fact the OEMs want to reduce as many things as possible the general public can break. There are some very good reasons to have a micro sd slot / card for some users. There are also very good reasons to not include them as well.
But for telling it like it is in the real world this crowd tosses around the B word and nonsense that the site is this and that.
vortexmak - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
I have always used microSD cards in my phone,I don't know why people can't wrap their heads around a simple fact: If DON'T have to use a card. If it looks complicated to you don't use it. Why do you not want the phone to even have a slot
Debunking:
- No apps automatically install to SD, name one
- Only google camera app does not support it. All apps (including file manager and gallery apps) support SD
- I want to carry my music and movies , all 100 GBs of it. Why do you have a problem with that ?
Borh - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Your argument ar non sense. Samsung use micro SD and removeable batteries and their smarpthones (like the Galaxy Note 3) have very good stock batteries without increasing the size (when compared to Xperia Z1 or HTC One Max).You have your theories, but in the real world, you don't have to choose between removeable battery and longer battery life.
User.Name - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I think it's very short-sighted to be using fixed batteries and no external storage options.Maybe if you are the kind of person that replaces their phones every year or two to have the latest thing, it doesn't matter to you.
My mother has an old iPhone 3GS - it was handed down to her when my sister upgraded to a 4s.
The phone is in excellent condition and does everything that she needs - there's no reason at all for her to upgrade to something newer.
But the battery is failing and often runs out before the end of the day now. Apple no longer services these phones and has just offered her a deal on buying a new phone instead.
When the only thing wrong with the device is the battery, this just seems so wasteful. (I know you can do a DIY repair, but I don't trust those cheap Chinese batteries)
Another example would be when I recently repaired an original MacBook which had problems with its backlight turning off, and the battery lasting less than an hour.
I swapped out the inverter cable (a $5 part) which fixed the backlight, and calibrated the display so while it's not the brightest screen, it looks better than new.
I swapped out the 60GB hard drive with a 1TB SSHD, maxed out the RAM (I think it was 2GB) and bought a new battery for it.
After cleaning it up and polishing the case, it almost looks as good as new, and is a surprisingly responsive computer now. There's plenty of storage for media playback with the SSHD, and using the YouTube5 extension in Safari to replace Flash, it can even handle high quality YouTube videos just fine.
Without spending much money on it, that 7 year old computer is now faster than when it was new, and totally serviceable for lightweight tasks, rather than being more plastic junk sitting in a landfill.
You won't be able to do that to any of the new MacBooks with their soldered-on components and non-serviceable batteries.
Especially with tablets, but also phones, there's no real reason they couldn't have a micro sd slot.
The cellular iPads already have a slot for a sim card, so you could just replace that with an SD slot on the other models, and make it a bit larger to accommodate a sim and a microsd card on the others.
The internal flash is typically not actually that fast on these devices anyway, but even so, 8-16GB of faster NAND is more than enough to store all my apps on. The reason most people buy high capacity devices is for media storage, not apps.
The current limit of 64GB in a phone, and 128GB in a tablet is nowhere near enough for all my media. I have hundreds of gigabytes of music because I buy CDs and rip to lossless files. (and I have successfully ABX'ed between high bitrate lossy and lossless in Foobar, before you tell me just to compress everything)
Even with a MicroSD slot, a 64GB phone (a $200 upgrade over 16GB) and a 64GB MicroSD card ($40) still has less capacity than the old 160GB iPod classic I have to carry around.
Something else to consider is that while we may only have 64GB cards today, SDXC supports up to 2TB.
Simply as a music player, things like upgraded processors are not important, so with an SDXC slot, in a few years time you could potentially upgrade to a 128GB or even 256GB card instead of replacing the whole device.
Maybe it's because you get free devices to review and do not have to pay for your own that an $850 device (64GB iPhone 5s) is disposable to you when the battery dies in a couple of years, or you need more storage, but for many of us that is not the case.
Even if it were not a financial issue, I am fundamentally opposed to the amount of waste this generates.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Thank you! This is a HUGE deal. The praises of non-user-serviceable components are sung while the landfills stack ever higher.Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
Very very true. I cannot believe that Anand and Brian are in favour of anti-consumer and anti-environmental practices such as fused storage/batteries/parts in any computing device. It's further saddening that much of their focus seems to be on "what's good for the OEM". While ignoring business and financial realities for OEMs in the face of fanciful user expectations, totally ignoring what's good for the consumer in favour of ways in which OEMs can price gouge consumers or enforced obsolesence is a terrible stance to take.Turning electronic devices which are expensive to design, require high tech fabrication facilities, exotic rare and expensive raw ingredients, and worldwide distribution chains into sealed, disposable items with a fixed shelf life of a couple of years is fundamentally wrong, and is not something that enthusiasts techies of any sort should support.
What galls me is that Brian knows that cellphone batteries have a limited life in terms of maximum charge cycles, that each plug/unplug counts as a charge cycle, and that sealed batteries mean that a dead battery effectively means a dead phone/laptop, and yet he still touts sealed/soldered batteries and "opportunistic charging" as good practice.
Shame on all concerned.
Borh - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
You can also compare the Galaxy S4 to the Nexus 5. The Galaxy S4 has an SD slot and a removeable battery. It has also a bigger screen, a smaller size, a (far) longer stock battery life.Just look at the facts and not at the marketing bullshit of the manufacturers.
Runadumb - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
"The tradeoff for removable vs. integrated battery is one of battery capacity/battery life on a single charge. Would you rather have a longer lasting battery or a shorter one with the ability the swap out batteries? "This stood out to me. What are we looking at here realistically in a best case scenario? <5%? <10%? If you tell me I can get 25% improved batterylife then okay, maybe, but the chances are its a very small boost to overall batterylife. In which case I'd much rather carry around a small replaceable battery (only when it is more convenient) than have that tiny extra capacity which means little in the real world.
The arguments against seem misjudged to me. Aren't Samsung by far the highest selling Android phones? Don't all their devices off removable storage and Micro SD? That tells me the market has spoken and other OEM's aren't listening. Apple doesn't count as you only have 1 option with an Iphone.
Oh and you don't carry around a "stack" of batteries. You could if you want but really you only carry one and it slips into your pocket like it isn't even there. Then at any point you can go from an almost dead phone to a fully charged phone in under a minute.
While I don't have to do this that often, when I do (a number of times very recently) it is super convenient.
Not to mention these new phones which huge batteries take about 3 hours to charge. Thats a long time to have your phone tethered to the wall/batterypack.
Krysto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I don't really care about microSDs - but I DO care about internal storage, and it's very annoying to see OEM's are very slowly dragging their feet with adding more internal storage, even though prices have dropped dramatically over the past few years.I don't want 4 GB of free storage with 1 TB of "free cloud storage for 2 years". I want 32-64 GB of internal storage on mid-range to high-end devices, as the MINIMUM (as I said, you'd be surprised how much prices have fallen; it's very doable). If they want to offer me some extra cloud storage, that's fine, too, but I couldn't care less about it.
Runadumb - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I would like to see an Iphone with expandable storage and removable battery hit the market with the mentioned "limitations". That would be the best way to see what people really want.I have to wonder just how many people would buy the smallest capacity available and just make up the difference with a cheap microSD card. For better or for worse.
tfouto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
the authors must be rich really, or they just have all phones for free.In a real world... whatever...
I now you are apple fan's so you must be fine with non-removable battery and low storage. You have grown your habits out of it.
"It took a while for this to sink in, but Brian's recommendation to charge opportunistically finally clicked with me. I used to delay charging my smartphone battery until it dropped below a certain level and I absolutely needed to, but plugging in opportunistically is a change I've made lately that really makes a lot of sense to me now."
you never used a spare battery... you dont know the power of it. It's like i dont care about my usage, i just use and that's it. If it's almost over. 30 seconds, 100%. Why do i want to "opportunistically" charge or whatever.
And for people saying they can carry an external charger. Really? 10 seconds of your brain time in thinking mode. Really that's all you need it. People can use it. It's free, and rewarding. I am sorry if i am being agressive, it's on purpose, maybe people will starting using their brains... Nothing, i mean nothing beat the power of brains. Even removable batteries...
120% non-removable or 100% removable? 100% all way... you can get 200%, 300% vs 120%...
In weekdays normaly i dont need to charge the phone during the day, but when i am on vacation, traveling, or on weekends if i am using my phone a lot, i just use the spare battery. It's so covenient, really. Kids just have to wait 30 seconds, they dont need to stop using it, or having an external charger near them.
Micro SD. Why spend 40 for a 64 Samsung fast micro SD when we can pay the triple or more for an internal storage phone 64gb? As lots of people said music and movies even HD, dont need an card to be really fast. But there are fast cards. Samsung has really reliable and fast 64gb cards.
The same about laptops...
My sister has 2007 toshiba laptop. She was saying it was slow, Windows Vista. Ok, i said i will fix it. I put an SSD 64GB and Windows 7. It's as insanely fast. She have now 2 external disk and dont find it confusing having that...
Then she said, i need to buy a new computer, my battery is dead. I said just bought an 40$ ebay battery. Is as good as new. No need to throw away a functional computer just because battery is dead... The same with phones... Are we all rich that we can just throw our phones to garbage because battery is really bad... Maybe we are...
In the end, i am not saying that removable batteries it's better for all people. There are people who prefer unibody and disposable hardware. I just want the authors to get a touch with reality, the entire one, not just their one. And most of it, i want people to stop saying nonsense...
Malih - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
"This isn't to say that some users don't prefer having a removable battery and are fine carrying multiple batteries"Please read, you're basically saying the same thing with:
"In the end, i am not saying that removable batteries it's better for all people."
bleh0 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
What really bothers me is the argument that people don't "need" the storage allowed by microSD cards.Smartphones are computers in your pocket. There is no good reason why you shouldn't have the option as a consumer with this being one of your primary computing devices during your day.
Do you "need" the cloud storage that use? I bet the people against microSD cards are the same people the use multiple cloud services like google drive, dropbox, box.net, etc yet are bothered by the fact that a microSD card slot takes away from a super thin. unibody design.
piroroadkill - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
There's definitely a volume and packaging argument for fixed batteries, but no such argument exists for microSD, as much as you want to believe it.On my Motorola DROID RAZR MAXX HD, the microSD is behind a pin removed tray which contains the microSIM. All you've done there is double the width of the tray cover. You have pretty much left the look of the device completely unaffected.
Touche - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
After a couple of years of heavy use, my phone battery died. I've ordered a new one with a higher capacity for cheap and replaced it in 30 seconds. Also could have gone with a double capacity one and a bulkier cover if I wanted to. EODTouche - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
And the lack of SD slot and internal battery sure didn't help HTC.HansCPH - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It is sad to read "A Pipeline Story" that feeds the hype of throwawayitis, and fuels the dumbness of marketing BS with poor arguments that should be below the level of sites that inform.I just bought a 12 dollar battery to replace an old one in a Garmin-Asus A50.
A phone that navigates the world with NO use of need to download data, a phone that´s slow but STILL does all my wants.
It has a SD card as do my mid 2012 MBA with a Toshiba 128 SSD (still working, thank you very much save for Apple).
Informants with bias = It´s sad...sad.
aatroxed - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
No mention of security benefits of removable batteries? Big omission given current day context.AnitaPeterson - Friday, November 29, 2013 - link
Excellent point!!!!Samunosuke - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
This has got to be one of the WORST articles I've ever seen on a TECHNOLOGY website. Arguments for slim phones over more advanced features is what I'd expect on either fashion blogs/websites or mainstream sites. I'm beginning to think the whole world is just getting dumber.MICROSD
1. A SMARTPHONE should be able to handle multiple storage volumes very very easily. Anything anyone says, especially otherwise is as a result of stupidity and/or laziness. My ancient symbian - is it or isn't it- smartphone could handle it with ease. My Nokia N8 came by default with 2 volumes - a small ~512mb volume for the OS which had 200-300 free depending on the ROM and a 16gb volume. It had a microsd slot so I could add even more and it also had USB-OTG so I could connect external usb drives (mice, keyboard etc also work). I've had situations where my File Manager showed almost 150gb of storage. And get this, I could install apps on all the volumes save the USB and the phone gracefully handles any unavailability. What sorcery is this? What special sauce did they use to conjure up such magical behaviour? This is on a defunct os running a discontinued phone and I'd expect that any "modern" phone should be more advanced and trump its capabilities.
2. The build quality claims are atrociously asinine seeing as how all gsm phones have SIM slots which are basically the same size with microsd slots. Really? No arguments for integrated sims? I'm sure you'd be happy if the whole world went cdma and placed all of our fates in the hands of the carriers, emblems of all that's good in the tech world.
3. There is no performance argument for its intended usage case. No one is asking for microsd slots to install apps. Keep your paltry 8/16/32gb for that. For media etc a relatively inexpensive class 10 microsd is more than enough not to mention far cheaper. I'm not even going to start on the price gouging. Other posters have gone into that.
BATTERIES
1. The arguments for this are a little more nuanced and could swing either way but we haven't seen increased battery capacity due to them being integrated. That's a blatant lie. There are plenty of removable batteries that offer high capacities. Improvements come from the minor advances in battery tech we've had these last few years. The only benefit is ~25% reduction in battery volume by going integrated.
2.The convenience of being able to switch out a battery in seconds cannot be overstated and guess what, you can still use external battery packs or portable chargers *EVEN WITH* a removable battery. You are held beholden to them if you have integrated batteries but its only an option with removables. I thought choice was good?
COMPARISON TO PC
Its funny you guys mention this seeing as how you had no qualms with the recent solderiazition of components. I'm guessing you would have no problem with a future PC market that's exactly like the current phone market. RAM, SSD, CPU, wireless card etc all non replaceable. Everything on 1 board. Intel have already announced that Broadwell processors will come integrated with the motherboard. Must be joyous news for you guys. The last things I look @ when purchasing a new PC are storage and RAM because at anytime, I can easily upgrade those components at little cost, time and energy. On phones the only easily replaceable/upgradeable parts are the battery and storage. I wouldn't mind it all being integrated if I lose little to nothing in the process. If batteries start lasting for 3 days with relatively heavy usage and I can get gobs of memory without eye watering prices, I would be happy.
I fully expect that everything will become integrated in the future and that's perfectly fine by me. Problem is that I have nothing to gain by going fully integrated right now. The galaxy s3 and s4 both have removable batteries, microsd slots, large screens, good battery life and are also very thin.
Apple can do whatever they want. I have no interest in them because of such money grabbing practices. On the android side, I believe its a (minor) combination of laziness from Google and (major) the benefit they gain from people using their cloud services for every single thing. They gain more by having every byte of your life pass through them.
This article makes it quote clear you people have very narrow vision of the world and its extremely sad
beginner99 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Maybe has already been said but the problem with internal storage is that often you pay a ridiculous price for additional 16 GB of storage. Personally I think below 32 GB is just too little and nexus 4 and 5 only have as much.With laptops, user replaceable battery is a must. I like my already aged x220. I have a small and large battery and depending on what I will do I can chose the one I will take along. Plus they tend to break faster (before end of live, use capacity quickly) )and laptops are replaced less often than smartphones.
adityarjun - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Non removable batteries are bigger?Note 3 has a removable battery and it is what, only 3200mAh? Puny indeed.
Htc One has a 2300 NON removable battery.
Non removable batteries seem to be bigger for sure!!
Wtf--- The tradeoff for removable vs. integrated battery is one of battery capacity/battery life on a single charge. Would you rather have a longer lasting battery or a shorter one with the ability the swap out batteries?
ecuador - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
This whole line of reasoning assumes that we will never keep a device over 1-2 years. Yes, a bigger internal battery might last longer on a brand new device that you test in the lab, but after a couple of years when it lasts half as long, you don't have the option of just popping on a new one. Not to mention extreme cases where you'd want 1-2 days of full GPS usage without charging, a spare battery can do that for you.MrSpadge - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It's probably been said before in the 128+ comments, but just in case it's not: the lack of an SD card option e.g. on iPhones is the exact reason they can get away with charging insane amounts for internal memory upgrades! Without pressure from alternatives, there's no way they'd ever let go of this.NeBlackCat - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
1) Every phone I've ever broken (usually involving water immersion or meeting a road at high speed) has still allowed me to pop the SD card out and recover data to set up the next one.2) My phone is critical equipment for my cycling. I don't want to be limited by the crap life of one battery or the need to bring along a generic USB charging battery (that must remain connected in order to work). I want to simply carry a spare, and pop it in if/when needed. This has saved my life before, when I got lost in the Australian bush and needed the phone's GPS for much longer than anticipated.
3) Phones have been thin enough for me for some time now. I don't care if the above require an extra couple of mm thickness.
Thus, I will never buy a phone without a removable data card (even if it's hidden within, eg. under the battery) or without a removable battery.
I hope the smartphone vendors don't cut off a significant part of their market by phasing them out, like the laptop vendors did by phasing out 16:10 high res (eg. 1920x1200) displays a few years ago. That would be equally idiotic. Which is sadly no guarantee of anything...
MikeLip - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I don't have any basic problem with fixed, internal storage. But you are speaking of THEORETICAL prices for it. The fact is that handset makers pretty much screw you over for internal storage, and some - like the Verizon Moto X - come with a miserable 16G and NO way to upgrade it. The argument I hear is hey, you have cloud storage! Or you can stream! But in these days of tiered data plans, streaming your music and video can get damned expensive very quickly. Maybe three or four years ago that argument would have been valid. It's not anymore. In fact, if you follow the money, I'm willing to bet that one reason removable storage has been eliminated is just to drive up the sales of larger data plans.I remember HTC saying something about not adding the SD card slot to the One based on space requirements. But the Asian version had one. So I'm not very confident that "no room" excuse is a valid one.
AbbyYen - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
blah blah.. total BS!1st, Build in battery still need a hard shell else if when it burst, it will kill you straight! so more room theory is BS!
To prevent shaky battery, yes. You need build in. To total secure it at place.
main reason is so that you will change your phone every one and a half or two years.
2nd, expansion memory. It's always always not hard to find space for it in today phone where bigger is better. And to assign memory allocation are peanuts stuff...
Data (storage,transport etc) is the next century gold mines.. This is the thing that you are afraid to speak out. It is okay if you are in coverage where access of data are easy. The other thing is.. these thing is so small and phones are getting way too advance where sensitive data or codes can be access, transport and execute very easy. So that's why there are resistant coming in against it.
But mind you, not every corner of the earth are covered. You guys have been sitting or live warmly without thinking some of us that have to leave to go out there, set up factory, plunder resources, transporting them, fighting unknown war.. just so you can have a good life back home.
Be neutral, just say these stuff are useless because this is what you think, yours opinions. You are you alone, you can't represent the other people. Don't say that these things are useless cause the industry think so, the whole world user behavior decide so... who are you? the industry? the world? You know jacks about industry. just that you get some interview with those crooks and you understand the industry? those are eye candy, man.. In the very inner parts of them, they are trying to capitalize you in every ways and every single drops of you. egoism will kill you one day.
owan - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
This article is a joke. "Nothing inherently wrong with user replaceable batteries and microSD slots"? Glad to see you're taking the consumer-first approach here. That whole stance is so backwards it hurts. Why are we sacrificing actual usability for apparently totally critical things like "feel" and "POTENTIAL build quality benefits"?What a complete and utter joke this site has become. Keep shilling for Apple and justifying their anti-consumer NAND pricing schemes and planned obsolescence. I'm done with this site
cboath - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Floppies would probably still be around if they held 4x more data than the average hard drive.It's a complete load of crap that companies sell the phone or tablet for whatever price and that price comes with 16GB of space. (12 of which you get to use on average). Then, if you need more It's another 100 bucks to get to 32GB, another 100 for 64GB and god knows what to get to 128.
Meanwhile, I can buy a 64GB card for a all of $29 (got an ad yesterday).
$200 to go to 64 internal (only adding 48) vs 30 bucks to add a full 64 externally. One side that is gouging big time. To me that's the benefit of the card right now. It puts more power (so to speak) in the consumer's hand by not forcing them to be gouged for storage space. I keep 20+ GB on my 32GB card. Not everyone wants to stash all their pictures and music on the cloud. Not everyone works where there's a great cell signal.
As noted in the article. The only way to get rid of the card is if manufacturer's do the unthinkable and not gouge people for storage space. Don't offer 16GB devices, start at 32 and make the price to the next level FAIR. No one wants to pay an extra $100 to add 16gb and go to a store or site and see 64gb sd cards for far less. It's offensive and drives home the gouged feeling.
markus_b - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
You are right about the advantages of internal battery and flash. But today these advantages are largely theoretical. For example, if we compare the HTC one with the Samsung Galaxy S4: The HTC One has everything internal with a marvelous unibody design. But the battery is 2300mAh only vs 2600mAh on the SGS4. HTC did not take advantage of having more control over the design to add a bigger battery. On the SD-card side it is more of a price thing. I got a 32GB SGS4 with a 64GB SDcard inside. The upgrade from 16 to 32 GB was more expensive than the 64GB SDcard.As long as this remains the same I will firmly stay in the removable battery / SDcard camp.
In addition, all these phones are fragile enough (glass screen !) the I protect them with a case. In a case the advantage of a nice unibody design become irrelevant. What will change this is new, scatter proof screens, maybe the new bendable phones, as shown by LG, will get there.
Kaboose - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
That's not really fair though, most people who get the Galaxy S3 or S4 are not hard core users. My little sister has an S3 cause it was free on contract, she doesn't even know the difference between internal storage and Sd card storage. Just because a product is popular does not mean it does everything right, or even what consumers would prefer. It just sells well because Samsung spends more than any other company on advertisementsMr Perfect - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Which also seems to indicate that casual users aren't necessarily asking for these features to disappear. Does your sister complain about the S3 having a flimsy back door? Or that the MicroSD card has a slower write speed then the internal flash? My guess is she honestly doesn't care as long as it's pulling in a decent 4G connection for Facebooking/Tweeting/InstaSocialWhatevering.If the casual users don't care one way or the other and the enthusiasts are upset about the features disappearing, the it sounds to me like you can make both camps happy by just leaving them in.
drumm_22 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I think you may want to consider rewriting your post. Sounds like you are very one sided and overly biased. From the way it sounds, i would say you are getting paid by google or apple to help change peoples view on the topic.Impulses - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
How does a card slot present any more of a structural body design issue than the SIM slots all phones already have?Don't get me wrong, I agree with most of the rationalizations and why the industry is headed where it is... Doesn't even particularly bother me as long as I can get 32GB+ for a reasonable price (got a N5 atm, first phone I've had without removable storage, second without removable battery).
If you were given the option between a N5 as is for $350 or a 16GB N5 with a card slot for $400 what would you choose tho? Most of the scenarios that require lots of storage are still ideally suited for removable storage, which gets cheaper all the time.
That's besides the point though, the real issue seems to be AT's treatment of the subject. Not penalizing or praising phones for going in either direction is fine IMO, it is what it is, people that need/want removable know which phones feature it.
There's still two things AT can do for it's readers though, cut the snark about microSD slots and actually praise/penalize phones based on internal storage. A company that charges $100 for a 16GB bump should get called out over it MUCH more.
Likewise, anyone that goes 32GB as base capacity should get some praise. If enough of those comments go around maybe we'll see some change.
Ultimately money and sales speak louder, but it shouldn't mean journalistic editorial comment concedes to every industry trend. Your opinions can change many others, and turn sales, and inflict change.
Impulses - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Personally I couldn't care less about the snark but it just leads to pointless comment section clutter... No snark = not having the same arguments cluttering the comments sections (at least not nearly as much) and eclipsing other more interesting topics.I do think internal capacity price and options should be featured and talked about much more prominently though. It's usually an afterthought on phone reviews whereas it's typically one of the large concluding points on a laptop review, and I can't think how the two scenarios differ in any way (other than laptops costing 2-3x as much and lasting 3-4x as long).
mmatis - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
If your phone battery is NOT removable, do you care if the FedPigs can turn it on and listen without you knowing?apertotes - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Anand, you talk about tradeoffs. I agree, that is really the point. Would I trade a removable battery for killer looks? No, I would not. Would I trade a removable battery for water resistance? Yes I would. There are a lot of opportunities that Apple and HTC are missing, but you still give them credit for getting a stunning and beautiful device. But I thought we this blog was about technology, not about fashion. And at the same time, you do not promote those that are trying to let users upgrade their own devices, which is something truly commendable.I do not carry a spare battery with me, but I switched the 2300 battery on my S3 for a 4200 one, and now my phone last a whole heavy usage weekend in a charge. It is not as slim as it was, but I can't for the life of me deplete the battery in a single day, and that is a really great tradeoff.
As for microsd cards, I think you (those in Anandtech, and probably 99% of the tech journalist) have far too easy access to wifi/LTE, or you just have the money to burn on roaming. But most of us can not afford using Spotify abroad, or are unable to connect to Netflix while commuting. And it is very clear that Anantech is positioning itself in the industry side in this matter, but most of your readers are users, not industry moguls.
repoman27 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
The responses to this piece are mostly appalling. Show of hands here, how many people who believe microSD cards and spare batteries are the solution to the problem have engineering degrees?In a perfect world, even entry level smartphones would currently ship with the fastest available 128GB eMMC solution and a battery that would last 99.9% of users a full day. Unfortunately the laws of physics and economics prevent this from being a reality.
Removable batteries and microSD card slots require interior volume to implement. For a larger device, that trade-off may work out to the consumer's benefit, but in a smaller device probably not. Once device size and battery capacity increase to a certain point, the likelihood of an end user carrying a spare approaches a very small number. There are also very real reasons why Google and Apple are less than enthusiastic about the mixed storage paradigm, and those reasons are not simply "pure greed".
The best solution to the storage situation is for OEMs to offer appropriate levels of storage at reasonable price tiers. Right now, I think most people would be happy if that came in the form of 32, 64 and 128 GB at $50 increments. For larger phones and tablets, it would be nice to see serious OS level support for microSD cards to alleviate some of the drawbacks and allow those who are so inclined to make use of them.
As for batteries, I think everyone would much rather make it through a day on one charge than carry a spare. This is what OEMs should focus on. I seriously wonder about those who argue for carrying spare batteries. First of all, the environmental impact of everyone owning and eventually disposing of two batteries per device is a horrifying prospect. Also, I use my phone CONSTANTLY and the number of times I run out of juice is maybe a few days in a year. I understand that everyone uses their devices differently, but I seriously think this is more of an issue with behavior or perhaps device choice. If you charge while you're sleeping and showering you should be able to make it through the rest of your waking hours with maybe an occasional top up when you're sitting next to an available USB port or power outlet anyway. If you're inconvenienced by charging then either your device sucks, or you're doing it wrong.
Sealed batteries will always be the most efficient use of space. Improvements in battery chemistry are much harder to come by, so the best way to improve the situation is by making devices more power efficient and using the largest battery possible. Sealed batteries are better, but OEMs that go that route should absolutely offer simple and affordable battery replacement programs.
The bottom line is that most people who advocate for microSD card slots do so because they feel OEMs don't offer sufficient storage or reasonable pricing for the higher storage tiers. I find it interesting that saving what amounts to essentially one month's phone bill at the time of purchase is such a big deal. I'd much rather drop $300 extra on a phone with 128 GB of really performant storage and pay $30 less a month to my mobile operator. Of course people tend to be vocal about certain things and totally miss the bigger picture. Sort of like advocating that OEMs use smaller batteries just so those who are incapable of minor behavioral adjustments can swap them out instead of thinking more about their power usage habits in the first place.
tfouto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
First of all, the environmental impact of everyone owning and eventually disposing of two batteries per device is a horrifying prospect.And the environmental impact of disposable of a phone/laptop every 2-3 years because of bad batteries is what? wonderfull prospect?
repoman27 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
If the battery has issues, you just replace the battery. If you're not comfortable doing so yourself, get someone else to do it. Sealed batteries are replaceable as long as you have the right tools, parts and know-how. As I said, "Sealed batteries are better, but OEMs that go that route should absolutely offer simple and affordable battery replacement programs." If you could walk into any retailer and have your battery replaced in 10 minutes for $40 or so, I don't think anyone would consider the sealed battery an issue.Furthermore, most of the phones that are disposed of each year are already less than 3 years old. Due to damage, upgrade cycles and whatnot, I believe 18-24 months is the typical lifespan these days.
tfouto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Well, except when they charge you 200$ to change the battery as Apple do...repoman27 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Apple charges $79 for iPhone battery replacement, $85.95 if shipping is required, and only if the device is no longer under warranty or covered by AppleCare. As I said, the problem is not with the sealed battery, but with the service options the OEMs bother to provide.Encouraging OEMs to use batteries that make less efficient use of space so they can be more easily swapped out by the end user when they fail is not the solution. If anything it's something they will tout as a feature while reducing BOM cost by using a smaller battery that is rated for fewer charge/discharge cycles.
tfouto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
well it seems a lot when you can buy a new battery for 40$, and for that price i am talking of a good battery, not a cheap one...Lot's of people dont know how to change, or that's possible to change. They just assume, they need to buy a new phone.
Runadumb - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
." If you could walk into any retailer and have your battery replaced in 10 minutes for $40 or so, I don't think anyone would consider the sealed battery an issue."That doesn't help when you have a battery that is nearly empty, which is my issue. I go to festivals at least once a year and take multiple short wkend breaks away too. The ability to just instantly swap out a dead battery for a fully charged one instead of tethering your phone to a battery pack for a few hours is incredibly useful. In fact I find it so useful that right now a phone lacking that simple ability is a non-starter for me. I don't even consider them.
To each their own. I understand many people don't even think about buying a spare battery, I do and I will support that choice while I have the option. Phone thickness, feel and looks rank low in my buying priorities. Function > form.
repoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Right, totally different issue though.However, if your internal battery was twice the volume to begin with, you would still have more than half a charge left at the same point that the normal one was nearly empty. You wouldn't have to pay for and carry around a separate battery and charger. It would be always be with your phone, never forgotten, and less likely to get lost or damaged. You wouldn't have to power down, switch batteries and boot back up again. The whole setup would weigh less, consume fewer resources, be more portable and provide more than twice the juice all the time. Encouraging OEMs to sell certain device models with much larger batteries that are a couple mm thicker is by far the better solution, even if those batteries are sealed. I believe the RAZR MAXX demonstrated that this could be a rather popular option.
Of course there will always be corner cases where even that isn't enough to get through a situation where one is unable to charge for an extended period. At a certain point, carrying a ginormous battery (or stack of smaller ones) around all the time is less attractive than the alternatives, i.e. remembering to plug in when you can, learning to become a better opportunistic charger, or carrying a solar or hand-winding charger.
I honestly think there is a phobia associated with the idea of having a dead phone battery and nowhere to charge it. I can imagine that swappable batteries do more to allay that fear for those that have it, but from a logical standpoint it's not the best way to solve the problem.
Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
People may upgrade smartphones, but that doesn't mean their device has to go in the bin. A phone with replaceable battery/cover/storage allows for the device to be passed on to children, friends, relatives etc.repoman27 - Monday, December 2, 2013 - link
Actually, even smartphones with sealed batteries that lack microSD card slots can be passed on to others. In fact, judging by the second hand market, some such models retain value significantly better than their user replaceable battery and upgradable storage contemporaries.Of course none of this changes the observed average service life of mobile phones. Cracked screens, exposure to liquids, and operator subsidies which encourage buyers to believe that all new smartphones cost less than $200 are what cause most handsets to end up in the bin prematurely.
Dentons - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
No Anand, the microSD ship hasn't sailed. And yes, you should absolutely penalize devices for not having these features.Every best selling Smart Phone (in every major size category) for the past many cycles, including the current cycle, has both microSD expansion and a user-swappable battery. Every. Single. One.
Many of us will gladly trade a few grams of weight and a single mm of thickness for those features. Really, that's all we're talking about. A single mm of thickness, a few grams of weight. It's incredibly odd that you find such a trade-off to be so objectionable and unrealistic.
As many readers have observed, Anand and Brian seem to have become overt advocates for the mobile industry, rather than being advocates for their readers.
One can understand why the marketing people in the mobile companies are willing to sacrifice features in favor of looks. It's difficult to understand why Andantech should embrace fashion over function.
Listen to your readers. We want these features. Given the maturity of the mobile space, there will certainly be device makers willing to cater to our needs.
In addition, it's a tremendous cop-out that Anandtech doesn't penalize devices for not having these features. You regularly penalize devices for their outer casing, but for real, actual, hardware features like microSD and swappable batteries. No words - pro or con. No benchmarks of microSD transfer speed.
Please stop spending so much time fetishizing metal cases and focus on these actual features.
Tanclearas - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Although you argue about manufacturers making design/cost decisions based around "the mainstream" usage of smartphones, for some reason Brian wants to believe that "the mainstream" wants manufacturers to spend more space and cost on implementing a high end camera. In virtually every podcast (when they actually happen), he complains incessantly about the cameras and thinks everyone else out there actually cares like he does. For some reason he thinks his complaints are valid, while dismissing complaints about removable batteries and microSD cards. That is pretty conceited to believe your personal opinion is "right".I have stated for some time that microSD is a requirement as long as manufacturers are shipping phones with 8 to 16GB of storage. It's hard to believe that people as well-traveled as Anand and Brian can actually depend on cloud storage. I guess you're only travelling to areas with non-roaming data or dependable WiFi. Take a trip across North America into areas like northern Canada, or eastern Kentucky. The cloud doesn't exist there. I actually purchased a Nexus 5, but only because there was a 32GB model. 32GB is the sweet spot for me where I can store enough locally to not have to depend on the cloud, but I'm not going to try to argue that it is enough for everyone. I agree with others that microSD can go away once 32GB becomes the entry, and we aren't charged $50 for each extra 16GB.
As for the argument about "extra battery life" vs "removable battery", I am willing to bet that you are talking about a low-single-digit percentage difference in battery life. It's not like there's any evidence even in your own reviews to show that there was a significant increase in battery life for phone models that utilize a non-removable battery. In terms of cost savings, once again you are talking about fractions of a dollar. These are not things being done for the ultimate benefit of the end user. They are being done strictly to shave off every last possible penny from the BOM. My particular usage model is such that I do not absolutely require a removable battery, but again I would never argue that my usage model is "the right one, and everyone else is wrong".
Ego and arrogance of the site owners/editors/writers is exactly why I stopped visiting Toms Hardware and HardOCP. Brian is walking a very fine line right now.
ruzveh - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
removable battery is a must as we cant live without hanging issue, short battery life and bigger capacity battery replacement.azazel1024 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I think the battery replaceable vs not replaceable makes sense in the conclusion.I disagree completely on the micro SD card slot.
It is easy enough to design it intelligently so it doesn't particularly compromise the design of the phone. For instance, have in in the side/top/bottom of the phone behind a small flap/door. I've seen a number of designs where this works fine and likely wouldn't/doesn't compromise the internal layout of the device.
I also think it is a mistake to not set it up as a seperate drive in the storage space.
I think most people are smart enough to figure out that one storage space is on the phone itself and one is the removable micro SD card.
There are many advantages to removable storage. One of which is cheaper storage. Another is many manufacturers don't have options other than 16/32GB. Or if they do have more options, they are all expensive.
There are other perks too, like if you are shooting with a REAL camera, you can use a micro SD card in an SD card adapter and then pop the card out and stick it in your phone to upload the files, as an example. Or if you want to use a nice high speed micro SD card, you can pop it out, stick it in a USB 3.0 card reader and toss a ton of stuff on it real fast and then stick it back in your phone. Instead of having to physically connect your phone to your computer or do it over Wifi. A few songs, a few pictures a small movie, it probably doesn't make much difference. Want to load 50GB of movies to your 64GB micro SD card though before a big trip? I am thinking the difference in transfer speeds would be much appreciated...and you also might not want to sit there for an hour with your phone physically tethered to your computer transfering the files.
I know the post was about phones, but I think this goes double for tablets. ALL DEVICES SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST A MICRO SD CARD SLOT! TABLETS SHOULD HAVE AT LEAST A MICRO SD CARD SLOT AND PREFERABLY A FULL SD CARD SLOT!
geniekid - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Removable batteries I understand. The trade-off of a solid, unibody shell is a big trade-off for the benefit of being able to swap out batteries. Plus, I believe companies are incentivized to put in the best battery they can into their flagships because this is something that many people focus on.MicroSD (removable storage), on the other hand, I completely disagree with. You can keep a unibody case without sacrificing too much. And, companies usually charge a high premium for higher amounts of storage because reviews hardly ever focus on the amount of storage you're getting for your money. Arguably the kind of person who would spend money to buy the 64GB edition of a phone/tablet over the 32GB is comfortable with managing multiple drives and slower I/O of microSD.
haukionkannel - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Yeas and no :-)I know many people who can not use the drive d: because they just can not... in PC environment. Too comples. If you thik that it is even a little bit harder in phone environment, then it is not usefull feature...
Anyone in this forum know how to use drive d: in PC and external storage in their mobilephone, but we are not the big important majority...
What I won't understand is that when OS could show all storages as on one big storage to user who really don't understand aenything about storage system, why it is not implemented.
Normally the main reason is that user can not know where his or her pictures are, if there are multible storages... *sigh* is is hard to compete agains the minimum factor reality....
agent2099 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
don't iphones, the 'epitome' of industrial design, have removable SIMs. This is as much of a "tradeoff" as putting in a micro sd slot no? If they can have a removable sim and maintain build quality, they can have a removable SD, and this goes for Android also. I can understand how a batter can compromise the structure, but a micro SD card will not provide the same sacrifice in build.Aidic06 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Anand's approach is reasonable. As long as the review states that the phone has an sd card slot (which I think would be mentioned in any review on this site) if it does, let the person reading the review decide if its relevant. Admittedly, I'm coming from an iOS perspective, but I just know that the advertised price is wrong and mentally add the extra $200-300 I need to get the device I would want that has the storage I want on my devices (and of course thats way overpriced for what I get, but I dont set the prices).I also just got an nVidia Shield, which is my first Android device. I wish the internal volume had more than 16 GB of storage. I have 2 microSD cards I use for the device, because of limitations on what can be run from the microSD card slot. One is used for media, the other for apps. It is not an ideal solution. If there had been even a 64 GB solution, thats the one I would have gone for.
The point is, we as consumers should be more focused on ensuring larger capacities are brought down in price going forward, so that microSD cards arent necessary even if they happen to be something some of us prefer. This is very similar to the ssd problem on desktops.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
How do we do that without options? Yelling? :|antiplex - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
its not about wrong or right as there may be manifold views on the pros and cons of this subject.two thoughts that i often miss in such discussions are:
- flexibility: my usage-pattern may change, i might not want to pay the extra for the memory-upgrade but 8 months later i found i should have done so. no need to base decisions on the maximum of what might be needed or even replace your phone, just get a bigger µ-sd for cheap and move on.
- sustainability: my 3 last phones first technical failures were the remaining battery capacity and i simply see no point in spending several hundred dollars plus unnecessarily produce even more electronic waste when one can simply replace the battery and continue to use their phone for a longer time.
i admit that i would for sure welcome a more recent and faster phone but basically my HTC Vision (aka Desire Z) still does its job running its 3rd battery since last summer (and i still would not really want to miss the pysical keyboard comforts. sadly, non of the current phones' generations seem to address such demands...).
cheers!
BlueMoonRising - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Although I can see the point of non-replaceable batteries, I actually find the objections posted by the OP regarding Micro SD cards slightly elitist and maybe even a little condescending. Not all of us can afford or perhaps want to spend £500 or £600 on a smartphone. That normally leaves us with 8GB or 16GB models to choose from and since I use mine as an MP3 player as well it's usually just not enough. My relatively cheap 16GB smartphone can accept a 64GB Micro SD card for a paltry £40. I know this is actually down to the manufacturer's but it's not helped by posts like these. Some of us really do want external storage.kwrzesien - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
"What we really need to see here are 32/64/128GB configurations, with a rational increase in price between steps."Amen!
Seriously, do we need to start a web petition or something? Pray to idols? Preach from the mount?
In particular there shouldn't even be a 16 GB option on "premium" phones (*cough* iPhone 5s!), they should start at 32 GB and have reasonable prices for one or two higher capacities. It doesn't make too much sense to go with expensive upgrades when you are replacing every two years, but I expect each device to have plenty of room for apps, a few big games, and several years of casual taking pictures and videos. It also doesn't make any sense for there to be a 32 GB iPhone 5c and yet 16 GB iPhone 5s, the top tier of the "c" line should be the same as the base for the "s" line.
ddriver - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Once you start looking at it through the lens of a corporation eager to milk as much cash as possible from its mentally diluted fanbase, it makes very good sense not to go for a sd card slot and ask the customer to pay 100$ extra for memory that costs 20$ to get as an sd card.The arguments about build quality are next to retarded, a micro sd card slot takes miniscule amount of space, you can build an amazing product with even 10 sd card slots, you can build a crappy product void of sd card slot. Got to love those apple-ass-kissing publications from AT... not to mention the mind-boggling comments from sad die-hard iDiots.
Syran - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I would love to see the price of internal storage increase. If you look on the tablet side of life, outside of the ipad, it seems to be, the jumps on the nexus, fire, and such seem to be running $20-30 per jump, vs apple's $50 or $100 per jump cost.I really have no qualms with an non-replaceable battery, except I would like to see the manufacturers guarantee for 2 years due to the length of contracts.
I think you can have a uni-body phone very easilly with micro-sd. The Droid Razr family is an easy example of this. Any 4G/GSM phone is another example, it has to have a slot for the SIM card, and they do that without the uni-body being destroyed. I think the memory part is pretty much pure greed on the manufacturers, they saw Apple could charge a premium for it, and followed suit.
Syran - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Price of internal storage decrease (and size increase), sorry about that.tfouto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
so you are ok, with throwing a phone to garbage after 2/3 years, because battery end is life cycle?Krysto - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Since when does Apple add $50 increases for storage? It's always been $100. You must be thinking LTE or something.quorm - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
what is the point of this article? is there anyone who is unaware of the tradeoffs between having removable batteries/internal storage vs. not having them?ddriver - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
the point is apple pimpage ;) isn't that obviousananduser - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Wanted to say the same thing but I was afraid I would've sounded trollish. Now I'll hide like a coward behind you and say " this man speaketh the truth".ddriver - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Don't be afraid, if AT didn't want people to acknowledge their schemes, they'd do it in a more subtle fashion. But no, they want their bias to be obvious, to shine brightly through the sentences. And it is not just AT, other outfits such as engadged are no better, US websites in general race to kiss apple ass. Yes, that is what I implied, from a fairly reputable website AT has sunk to the level of engadget.ananduser - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Honestly I think that after using idevices for so long(getting used with its compromises at a personal level), AT staff simply can't relate anymore to the genuine usefulness of user accessible hardware/software.Even if not as known in the states, gsmarena has always listed "no file system"/"expandable storage"/"itunes dependency" as cons at every ios device review. But then again they're not an US based review site.
Klug4Pres - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Brian has been making smug remarks on Twitter about what he regards as a vocal minority of Anandtech review commentators that keep harping on about SD cards and removeable batteries.Brian apparently knows better than they what they ought to want, or rather because they are a minority, they have no right to expect anything from the industry, which he believes justifiably caters only for the masses, who generally wouldn't even know how to use an SD card.
There was a thread in the forums on the topic that picked up on Brian's latest bout of SD hate in the HTC One Max review comments, but apparently it is beneath the editors dignity actually to join forum debates, so instead they have fed us the editorial line in this article. (The debate was also picked up on Reddit.)
I don't mean this to sound as rude as it does, but that is the background to this article as I understand it.
repoman27 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
So to sum up, Brian and Anand actually understand the design trade-offs involved and the what the root of the problem is.We all want larger, faster and cheaper storage and all-day battery life from out mobile devices. Encouraging OEMs to include microSD slots and removable batteries doesn't get us there. It's just a workaround that makes other poor design decisions more bearable for those who choose to carry a spare battery and swap microSD cards, and the whole device less efficient for the majority of folks who don't bother.
Klug4Pres - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I think you are right that that is how they look at things, but as people keep pointing out, there is no reason to expect that the industry will provide cheap storage unless people can buy the storage themselves as an accessory - see the whole history of computing.Furthermore, there are many use-cases for removeable storage identified in this thread that would not be catered for, even if phones all magically came with ample internal storage.
repoman27 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
True, but as to the first point, people will often seek out the cheapest available solution, which is certainly not always the optimal solution from a user experience standpoint. While many people are convinced that Google and Apple limit end user choice strictly to maximize profits in the short term, there is a solid argument that they are more interested in preventing the end user from making bad choices and thus negatively impacting their overall experience.Also, if built-in storage options were amenable across the board, the situations where removable storage would still be desirable would become corner cases that might well be better served by solutions other than microSD cards.
Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
"Corporations are interested in the best user experience".Strange how the "best" user experience in their view is also the most *profitable* user experience. It's almost as if profit levels, and the experience they choose to provide, are somehow interlinked....
But we all know that publicly listed corporations put their users first and profits last so your point is thankfully irrefutable.
repoman27 - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
Usually one puts quotation marks around something that was actually stated in the referenced material—you know, like a quote.And, given the profit margins demanded by the shareholders are met, why would producing the best user experience possible not be a wise course of action for a company operating in a highly competitive market? Of course you could just pour money into marketing instead. I wonder how much better the Samsung user experience is for the $14B they spent on marketing this year... http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/11/28/samsung-m...
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
What makes you think they understand the design trade-offs so very well when they misstate them so spectacularly? What makes you think the rest of us are clueless?Fuck off. Just genuinely, fuck off.
repoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Brian and Anand spend a fair number of their waking hours thinking about and testing mobile devices. They also have engineering backgrounds and longstanding relationships with many of the manufacturers. This site is the best site in existence for the general public to get in depth reviews and extensive empirical test data on these types of devices.I read through almost all of the now 274 comments on this piece, and the number of cogent arguments presented by those with dissenting viewpoints is alarmingly low. It is very clear that most of them come from people who have little to no engineering or design background and have never taken the time to really think through the trade-offs involved. For the most part, the comments are from a vocal minority hell bent on protecting their current usage model in order to avoid having to change their behavior. Your response is classic; you're clearly upset, but in the absence of any compelling argument to the contrary, the best you can do is tell me to expletive off.
microSD card slots require interior volume to implement. Sealed batteries can make better use of interior volume than those designed to be easily swapped by the end user. Removable battery covers generally reduce overall device rigidity and can become loose over time. Most smartphone users do not swap batteries or use microSD cards. In general, the market is better served by devices with sufficient and affordable internal storage options, the largest possible battery, and the most durable chassis design. Surely OEMs will continue to produce devices with microSD card slots and user swappable batteries, and surely there will be customers that insist that they require such things. There is no reason, however, for a site such as Anandtech to encourage OEMs to cater a vocal minority instead of doing what is best for the majority of end users.
Furthermore, many of the comments I read smack of entitlement, cheapness, and a general refusal to accept change. While many of us have media libraries that are larger than 64 GB, very few of us need to carry the whole damn thing on our phone. Most of the microSD argument is one of convenience, rather than necessity. The other side of it is that despite paying for a flagship smartphone and an operator contract to go with it, apparently it is a total affront to pay as much as $200 extra for 64 GB of storage, despite that being an astonishingly small percentage of the TCO of that device. If you use that device for 2 years, would the convenience of having 32 GB vs 16 GB be worth an extra $4 / month? Would 64 GB be worth $8 / month additional? I think a lot of the resentment towards storage being the sole differentiator between price tiers stems from the operator subsidy model, where the additional cost becomes up front rather than subsidized. Making devices that provide less battery life for everyone so that those who insist on saving $150 on storage is ridiculous though.
Catering to the battery swappers also misses the point. The way to make a better device is to make the device as efficient as possible and the battery as large as you can. If you can't make it through your waking hours on a single charge, perhaps you should choose a more efficient device, use your current device more efficiently, or learn to plug the darn thing in when you can. Once again, this is generally a matter of convenience rather than necessity. The argument that everyone should have a less durable and efficient device so that a vocal minority can consume additional resources in order to not have to think about something as basic as their own battery usage is ridiculous. Anandtech goes bonkers doing really solid battery life testing; maybe people should spend more time looking at those numbers when shopping for a device rather than just picking the one with the most "cores" and the highest clockspeeds.
Klug4Pres - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Why would I want to pay a $200 mark-up to obtain more storage every time I buy a new device, especially as it will be a pain to transfer my data from internal storage?What if i want to use my data on both a tablet and a phone without carrying them both around and trying to join a wireless network so I can actually see my data on the other device?
I'm sorry but it is not good enough t say "these guys have engineering backgrounds" and sneer at everybody else, especially when people have gone to the trouble of spelling out some real benefits of removeable batteries and SD cards, whereas the elite engineers as far as I can see have merely asserted that there are huge challenges and implementation costs of these features, yet have provided absolutely no evidence to back that up.
Meanwhile, many devices have shipped with SD cards and removeable batteries that do not appear to suffer in any significant way by comparison to devices without these features.
repoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Maybe because you're paying for NAND flash memory that actually costs money and has value?There are very real and tangible benefits to both user upgradeable storage and replaceable batteries. Neither Anand nor Brian denied this. However, do those benefits outweigh the very real compromises that come along with these features? Of course the answer will be different depending on the OEM, device, or user in question. Any of the OEMs could make their devices 3mm thicker and offer best in class battery life, but none of them has made that move. Despite the gargantuan size of some of the phones/phablets out there, mobility/portability still matters—a lot. These features have direct, measurable trade-offs with either device volume or battery life. How much evidence do you need that physics applies to smartphones?
Every device that has shipped with a microSD card slot and removable battery could have had longer battery life or been smaller and lighter without them. This is actually true.
Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
@repoman27 I don't think posters in the comments here are unaware that NAND costs money or that there are engineering tradeoffs inherent in user-replaceable features such as batteries.While you say it is "actually true" that giving up user-replaceable batteries and microSD slots could have larger batteries or be smaller and lighter, the real-world examples that we can see clearly indicate that OEMs have either chosen not to do so, or the extra volume saved is not significant from the point of view of getting a larger battery into the device. You might get a very very slightly larger battery into the same space if you make it sealed, but not *significantly* larger.
As to the argument that devices must always be thinner,lighter, sleeker etc; if that is your position then you are wholly ignoring the single most fundamental engineering fact:
Humans.
Any device created must be able to interact with a human hand. Take the Galaxy S2. In its default configuration, it is already so thin and light it barely registers in the hand. For anyone with even slightly above average sized hands, it is actually too thin (and narrow) to use comfortably. Since it was released, devices have become *thicker* and *wider*, not thinner and narrower. Therefore, no matter what happens in the future with sealed batteries or internal storage, the fundamental design characteristics of any mobile device are effectively fixed: not by technological considerations, or manufacturing, but by human ergonomics. Devices must be a minimum size so that we can interact with them effectively. They cannot be larger than a given maximum size or else we will be unable to move them around. These are the engineering constraints that matter, and a few mm here and there on a battery cover are insignificant gains.
Hence, as many have pointed out, the phones with sealed batteries and no expandable storage tend to be a) more expensive and b) don't gain any significant battery capacity or storage speed as a result. What they do is introduce a culture of disposable high technology (with associated unnecessary environmental cost and economic wastage), and gouge the consumer for money.
Neither of those things is a positive development, and reviews should absolutely call out OEMs who indulge in these negative practices.
repoman27 - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
OEMs designing the best device possible for the majority of their customers is not a negative practice. Neither is producing devices which cater to a niche audience that happen to have different preferences than the masses.The point of the original post, which seems lost on pretty much everyone commenting here, is that Anandtech is not taking sides when it comes to these features because either way the manufacturer is addressing the desires of a certain subset of their customer base. All these cries of "You so bias!" basically boil down to "You aren't actively supporting my particular bias in this instance." In this case, a vocal minority is trying to argue that it's somehow a bad thing that most smartphone users have different usage patterns than they do, and that some OEMs make phones that are better suited towards the general population.
And btw, the human hand has been able to manage business cards, credit cards, post cards, pieces of paper, etc. just fine, all of which are considerably thinner than any smartphone to date. Also, feel free to draw up a chart demonstrating some sort of correlation between the ASP of smartphones and their use of sealed batteries or omission of microSD card slots (hint: if an OEM reduces the BOM cost and maintains the same gross profit margin, the device will be less expensive). Instead of mindlessly arguing a point, you should try thinking about what the limiting factors of mobile device design really are, reading about the design process, or talking to engineers who actually have experience in this field.
Klug4Pres - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
Your argument is illogical.You have postulated some manufacturing advantages of designing phones without removable storage or removable batteries, namely a small potential increase in installed battery capacity, and a reduced production cost.
You then seem to be arguing that because many consumers do not use SD cards, or replace their batteries, that these small advantages justify a design that precludes that possibility entirely.
However, there are many reasons to believe that, in aggregate, there may be consumer detriment that arises from this design choice, even if the majority of consumers do not base their individual purchasing decisions on this factor.
For example, many have cited the issue of electronic waste, which has a direct economic cost in terms of the obsolescence of devices that, apart from their worn battery, would otherwise continue to serve valuable purposes. This will also lead to increased waste in the literal sense, and I should add that the toxicity of batteries in the environment is a further argument for designing them so that they can be removed.
It is also likely that if there were greater prevalence of devices with removable batteries and storage, there would in turn be greater consumer awareness of the benefits that these features provide, and therefore more people who would enjoy those benefits.
As regards storage, non-expandable storage is also likely to lead consumers to overpay for internal storage, as we see in the market, and obviously forces them to pay more often than would be necessary if storage could be switched between devices. It also increases their reliance on unreliable, sometimes expensive-to-access, and data-mined cloud storage.
I need hardly add that Anandtech is a site largely read by technology enthusiasts, and it is an influential site in the industry. It is very probable that its readership values these features more than the population in general; therefore, Brian and Anand's stance on this issue is very irritating.
repoman27 - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
Arguing that one size fits all when it comes to smartphones is illogical. It is ridiculous to insist that everyone make the same trade-offs you are willing to just because they are the "right" ones for your usage pattern.Devices have had removable batteries and microSD card slots for many years now. The trend towards sealed batteries was more recently enabled by the development of batteries that are rated for many more charge / discharge cycles than was previously possible. microSD card usage is not going to suddenly flourish when the #2 smartphone OS offers zero support for them and the #1 OS has limited native support and comes from a developer that is actively trying to deprecate their usage.
The e-waste argument is also entirely bunk. The more perceived value an item has, the less likely it is to be permanently disposed of, and the more likely it is to be sold, gifted or recycled by the owner. All iPhones have sealed batteries and lack microSD card slots, yet they retain their value better than almost all smartphones with removable batteries and upgradeable storage.
I don't think the cloud is the best solution at the moment, and it certainly isn't "there yet" for a lot of us. However, when Brian talks about "that ship has sailed", it boils down to the OEMs responding to the way customers actually use their devices. Arguing the benefits of removable batteries and microSD card slots is like arguing the benefits of carburetors when the whole industry was moving towards electronic fuel injection.
There seems to be a fear that without vocal support from review sites, OEMs will drop these features entirely, and irritation that Anandtech is not willing to take sides and help defend the minority position. In reality, it's just the nature of a market where smartphones are now mainstream and no longer solely the domain of enthusiasts and executives. I'm pretty sure there will always be OEMs that make devices which cater to the niches, and in reality, there are probably just as many smartphones on the market now with removable batteries and microSD card slots as there ever were at any other point in history.
Klug4Pres - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
I didn't argue that no device should be made with a sealed battery or non-removable storage.I am saying that removable batteries and storage do have inherent advantages that would benefit many people, and have positive externalities in terms of lowering the price of storage for everyone, reducing electronic waste, and adding option value to the product.
jrs77 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I'm all for removable batteries and storage when it comes to phones and MP3-players, aswell as any other device like a notebook.I couldn't care less if this results in 10-20% less battery-capacity per charge, as the battery is usually the first part to fail anyways, and the ability to replace it by myself for a few bucks makes the value of the device as a whole alot better.
I don't need to change my phone every two years, if it's working fine, and we're at a point where we simply don't need more power in a smartphone anyways.
And microSDHC-slots are simply convenient, as I can have my whole music-library with me all the time this way, which exceeds 64GB by far, so the option to simply change microSD-cards is very welcome.
The upcoming http://www.jolla.com">Jolla will be probably the last smartphone for me to buy in a very long while, if the device doesn't see any other malfunctions than a failing battery.
Oh... and I don't need to deal with Apple, Google or Microsoft either :)
yankeeDDL - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
It is interesting to read a good and argumented opinion.I must admit, all points are valid, but, IMHO, there are a few key points missing.
Regarding the batteries: I have a 2.5 years old smartphone with a half-dead battery. In my case it is replaceable, so I have a choice. I might upgrade anyway, but only because smartphones today are ions ahead of those from 2 years ago in terms of performance.
I also happen to have a 3 years old laptop, and while still usable, the battery barely reaches 3hrs of real use (was more then 6hrs new). My laptop is definitely not something I'm looking to replace: improvements in the last 3 years are nice but hardly something worth the money for a brand new laptop. Your mileage may vary, but then again, if you update your laptop/smartphone every 2 years, then the whole point about replaceable batteries is moot.
Now, this is a standard Dell laptop. I would be kicking myself, really hard, if I had forked 2Kusd for a fancy unibody laptop which now I'd have to consider changing.
So, for laptops, sorry, but non-replaceable batteries is a deal breaker. For smartphones, frankly, I still value replaceable batteries, but I can see the benefits of a non replaceable one ... still, but not for much longer.
Regarding SD storage ... the sturdiness argument doesn't hold at all. Just think about SIM cards. You could do a "door" just as effective for an SD card.
Regarding the experience ... I have been using an SD card on a phone which has 1GB of internal storage (did I mention it is 2.5 years old?). I had to go and move some apps on the SD card, something that with a more modern phone with 8GB of storage shouldn't happen. But my 14GB of MP3 and divx (to entertain the kids during car trips) frankly help a lot. CanI buy a 32GB phone? Sure. Will it be faster? Probably, but do you really need to fork 50usd more for 16GB increment (this is what it costs on the Nexus 5, for example), when 32GB of MicroSD cost 20usd on Newegg?
User experience is fine, but come on, money doesn't grow on trees, right?
talonh - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
The best selling android phones generally do have SD slots.Yuriman - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I can agree with most of what was said, but even OEMs that don't include uSD cards are skimping on intrernal storage. Give me the option for expanded storage until I can buy a phone with a reasonable amount of space. Build quality isn't compromised any more for a uSD than it already is for phones with a SIM card.Conficio - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
To me this is a question of repairability and expandability.Three month ago, I was glad that my bulging battery was replaceable for < $10, instead of throwing away a device still worth $250 or having it repaired by the manufacturer for $40 shipping & insurance + the repair costs (likely > $100).
Also, as software does constantly expand on footprint (storage and power consumption) and mobile software especially has no Long Term Releases that get bug fixes and security fixes, the ability to expand storage is an important feature.
I'd love for manufacturers to offer 5yr. warranties for the battery and the storage of their devices, incl. shipping and proper data transfer to a replacement device. And I'd love for manufacturers to produce battery options that hold a charge for more than 3-4 h when the device is used.
And certainly it is a good trend, in the absence of replaceable batteries and storage to have prices for storage upgrades become reasonable.
Death666Angel - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Your points are all valid. But you hardly ever convey them as such in your reviews. Brian particularly is very condescending when talking about removable batteries and mSD storage.Opportunistic charging also seems to be detrimental to battery longevity (which is even more important in sealed battery designs). Since we are now approaching the age of "good enough" performance from smartphones, expecting them to work longer than 2 years is not uncommon (I'm fairly happy with my Galaxy Nexus, my wife is fine with her now 1 year old S3 knock off). Doing opportunistic charging is certain to first decrease your battery capacity over the life of the device and kill it more quickly making the device completely useless. Also, you need to carry around a charger/battery pack vs. carrying around a new battery. Not sure how one thing is better than the other.
As for mSD slots: why not put them in the same vicinity as the SIM card slot? If you have a unibody design but need to input a SIM card anyway, can't the same door be used to input the mSD card without incurring structural losses or hugely increasing design difficulty?
And why you bring up performance is beyond me. Especially since there isn't a big tradeoff there anyway (yet). I hear very few people (mostly some on Chinese hardware with 4GB onboard NAND) ask for mSD storage as a means to access programs. Most people are fine using it for pictures, music and video files. And they are plenty fast for that.
Looking at this stuff through the lens of a manufacturer? Seriously? Aren't you supposed to be consumer advocates? Doing what you asks, I can justify exploiting my workers and ripping off consumers. Doesn't mean that's something that should be happening or that should be accepted or praised by reviewers.
Also, your stance on this is not very consistent. Brian whines about not having a 17" Macbook, while the same arguments you are making here can apply (no market for it, he should just live with the tradeoff being made, the lineup gets too complicated...). Or Anand whines about not getting Crystalwell in more notebooks. It's a tradeoff guys, live with it and shut up! :P
piroroadkill - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Several devices do indeed use the same door/tray for the SIM and microSD.Shortened that would surely be µSD, not mSD, which would mean milliSD =D
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
"Brian whines about not having a 17" Macbook, while the same arguments you are making here can apply"Hahaha! Owned by logic.
LostPassword - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I travel. not always to first world countries. enough said.ability to load music and movies on the fly is awesome.
no electricity for a day? I got a spare battery.
I was a Nokia fanboy until they went unibody. I sacrificed expandable storage for a galaxy nexus. but ain't touching an lg unibody.
nowadays sony and huawei still make some phones I want.
disappointed that manufacturers come out with 4-5 phones a year but they ignore our demographic
efficacyman - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Removable batteries are a necessity these days because of poor security on the baseband processors for privacy. Since baseband radios will execute the code which is supplied by cell phone towers, this is what enables three letter agencies to turn your baseband on and listen in and track your phone even if the CPU is off. If you want to make sure your phone is off and truly off, you need to be able to remove the battery.repoman27 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Seriously, if you're worried about that type of thing, stick to pay phones, and don't even bother with smartphones.dgburns - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
The price difference charged currently in the market is ridiculous. I personally could care less about either removable battery or removable storage (i.e. SD). Both my current phones have both, and I can't remember the last time I removed either.Sure, both are selling points for a very small minority of buyers, but I don't think from the perspective of reviews and commentary BY this site that either should be a minus or plus when it comes to THIS SITE'S OPINION on a particular phone.
Hubb1e - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I won't buy a mobile device without external storage. I don't care about a removable battery, but the phone or tablet MUST have some sort of external storage support. And I mean what I say. I will not buy a device without it. Why? Because OEMs don't ship enough storage space on their mobile devices to hold my movies and music. Streaming is not okay when you have bandwidth caps and streaming doesn't always work when you need it. Connections are sometimes slow, or don't exist at all such as on an airplane. I cannot watch netflix on an airplane because there is no connection. I cannot watch netflix in my hotel room because my bandwidth is capped at 4GB for the month. I MUST have external storage on my tablet and smartphone in order to watch a movie while on the road. And it must be a lot of storage so I have a selection of what I want to watch, in full glorious 1080p with a decent bitrate. This is actually why I love the Surface. It has something called a USB slot. Maybe you've heard of this little invention? It allows me to connect any stupid SD card or USB storage device that I own and play my own content that is on my physical media.Frankly I am mystified that Anand and Brian don't get this. This is the most basic of features. Some customers are okay without this and they can go buy an iphone. But for the rest of us who actually use our phones as real computing devices access to some sort of external storage is a must have feature. Brian and Anand should absolutely push for more stock storage at reasonable prices and should campaign against data caps on our cell service, but guys, the reality is that us users are faced with these problems and need to find solutions to them in the real world. And for me that is external storage and my Galaxy S4 and Surface do both of those things very well.
lilo777 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I find this AT post borderline unprofessional and fanboyish. We get it that the guys are quickly turning into Apple fans but still...Starting with "All else being equal, removable storage and user replaceable batteries aren't inherently bad things". The choice of words says it all. It must be obvious to anyone that "All else being equal, removable storage and user replaceable batteries are great things" If one does not need a memory card - does not use one. All else will be equal, what's there to complain about?
People already covered most major flaws in AT arguments. I just want to add a few more. Although not explicitely covered in this article we know that the authors prefer not just unibody design but aluminum unibody design (apple anybody?) Let's see what this designmeans in terms of tradeoffs:
* hard to fit NFC antenna
* hard to fit wireless charging
* hard to fit multiple antennas (hence no simultaneous voice and LTE data on Verizon and Sprint iPhones)
* with unibody design, the phone has to have a slot for SIM card. Good luck waterproofing this thing. When do you think will we see a waterpoofed iPhone? (Answer - never) yet Samsung has an excellent water/dust proofed phone in Galaxy S4 Active.
Apparently such tech lovers like Brian and Anand do not care about theselittle things. OK. Of course when it comes to iPhones the issue of SD cards is rather irrelevant. iOS does not have a user-exposed file system anyways.
Also let's look at the modularity offered by nonunibody design. Samsung offers Note 3 owners a choice of 4 backs:
* regular back
* S View flip cover
* regular back with wireless charging
* S View flip cover with wireless charging
Then we can add third party backs with extended batteries. iPhone has none of this. No wonder Samsung outsells Apple in smartphones by 2 to 1.
And by the way, according to FixYa's Black Friday Smartphone Report "the top grievance among iPhone 5S users was battery life". Perhaps at least some iPhone users would appreciate the ability to swap the battery.
coooooookacoa - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
There is a reason why samsung is dominating the android market...Reclaimer77 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Samsung isn't just dominating the Android market. Samsung sells more phones then the next top 4 handset makers combined, including Apple.The authors are undoubtedly aware of this fact, which is why it's so stunning so see just how out of touch they are with this particular situation. How they can couch such a clear majority as some kind of a minority to be easily dismissed is really insulting to the readers intelligence. And reeks of a clear bias, unfortunately.
Hrel - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
You didn't raise the battery end of life argument at all. Lithium Ion batteries have a limited shelf life. Regardless of how much they're used. At around 2 years old the cells degrade, no matter how much you've used them. That, by itself, is reason enough to include removable batteries. Because if you don't once the device is 3 years old you've got half the battery life you used to. The user NEEDS to able to replace that battery every 2 years or so. It's a lot less wasteful and expensive than replacing the entire device.PVG - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I don't think the "C drive" vs "D drive" problem really applies. From my experience, most people are far more malleable into adapting to technologies on their phones than on their computers, and everyone can very well distinguish "internal" from "external" memory. Even my, somewhat stuck in the 90's, parents "know" that it's better to have the camera putting the photos in the card, saving the internal storage for the system.As for me, if my smartphone is really to be the "do all anywhere" device that it is supposed to be, i just NEED a big, cheap, chunk of memory (i.e. sdcard) where to put all my files. Else, I can't give up my good old multi-gigabyte ipod, or my notebook, in which case i don't really need a smartphone anyway...
But I fully understand Apple and Google on this one: Why offer an option that would kill those sweet $100 charged per 16GB/32GB increment... And if that's not enough, you can always buy some bit of their respective clouds, giving even more money to the carriers on the way to access it.
xerosleep - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I've been using the same phone for over 4 years now. If I didn't have a removable battery I'd have to throw it away when the battery is dead for good. Long as this thing works I'm keeping it. It's a shame so many phones are so disposable and only kept a year or two.plunder - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
If a microSD card fails, replace it. If internal storage fails, the entire phone is scrapped. If a user removable battery fails, replace it. If a built in battery fails, dig out the tools and a heat gun to remove it; then start hunting for a replacement. Your warrantee is toast!For the moment, monolithic build really mans "Intensionally Disposable Product - Designed for Landfill!". Terrible for end users and the environment. Both the iPhone and Nexus 5 are clear cases of this policy at work.
As an end user. I wonder who these writers really care about or represent.
cbf - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I have to disagree with Anand on this. I have two very simple use cases:1. Quick battery swap. I always keep an extra battery in my charger. **Some nights I forget to plug my phone into the charger**. Next morning I just swap batteries. Plus, when I'm travelling, I take along the extra battery -- sometimes when out and about, spending lots of time in conference rooms, etc., my battery is dying by dinner time -- precisely when I need my phone the most.
2. ** These phones are cameras ** -- for most people their primary and most used camera (still and video!). Would you buy a camera that only had internal storage?? (And as many have pointed out, where the manufacturer charged you $100 for an extra 16Gb!?).
TheWarOnPants - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I, too, would love to see fast, cheap, abundant internal storage. But until that day happens I'm going to buy Samsung phones.BugblatterIII - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Why does a slot for a microSD card compromise the build quality but a slot for a SIM card presumably doesn't? If a unibody design can accommodate one it can accommodate the other.As for the battery, I do carry a spare. Also if the battery life starts to degrade over time I can get it back as new with a new battery.
repoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
From a handset design perspective, SIM cards are not desirable either, but they are required for GSM devices. There has been a steady push to make them ever smaller and reduce their voltage requirements, which is why we went from full-size SIM, to mini-SIM, to micro-SIM, and now to nano-SIM. microSD card slots require at least 212 mm^3 of interior volume and 137 mm^2 of PCB real estate. Apple's nano-SIM tray has a volume of right around 200 mm^3 and occupies about 148 mm^2 of PCB, so very similar footprint, but that's for an externally accessible tray and receptacle. And if you look at a picture of the logic board, you'll see why this is such an issue—it's actually the single largest component on the entire board: http://d3nevzfk7ii3be.cloudfront.net/igi/UXZEPCS1l...The volume of an iPhone 5 battery is 9207 mm^3. Adding a second tray that could accommodate a microSD card and enough additional logic board to mount it on would consume some 540 mm^3 of internal volume, which is 5.9% of the volume occupied by the battery. By comparison, the volume of the SGS4 battery is ~13681 mm^3 with the microSD slot taking up nearly 600 mm^3, yet only representing 4.4% of the battery volume. Even though the penalty is lesser on a larger device, it is still a significant trade-off.
Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
While quoting the numbers looks good, adding an extra few mm to the thickness/width of the device would easily make up for the volume lost to the SD and Sim slots. Furthermore, where do you see these manufacturers jumping for the extra 5.9% battery volume? And assuming they do, gaining a significant real-world advantage in battery life?Fractured and overloaded mobile networks have a much bigger effect on mobile battery life than the loss of volume you're lamenting. For an easy example, switch off mobile data on your device and see how much longer it lasts (don't use any data applications for the same time period for a control test).
The iPhone5 would be far better served by being a little bit wider and accommodating a larger battery that way, than the relatively insignificant size of adding an SD card slot. Who would lose? Nobody. Who would gain? Consumers currently being charged quadruple the going rate for a memory upgrade.
repoman27 - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
I didn't quote those numbers, per se. I actually made some measurements and did a few calculations. If I had quoted them, the volumes probably would have been stated more properly using ml rather than mm^3 for units.And you are absolutely right; adding a few mm to the thickness of a device can create the necessary interior volume for any number of additional features. However, all smartphones could accommodate a battery that could last for 3 days on a single charge if they were just a tad thicker and a bit heavier. Nobody would complain if their smartphone ran for 3 days off a single charge. However, no OEM has shipped a flagship smartphone with a battery that lasts this long. Why is that?
There is a direct correlation between the volume of a battery and the maximum amount of energy it can provide. Using the most power efficient components in a device and tweaking the OS may allow you to get better milage or get by with a smaller gas tank, but the battery size / battery life correlation remains the same regardless. If the battery stays the same, microSD card slots inherently increase the size, weight and cost of a device. If the size and weight stay the same at the expense of battery volume, microSD card slots inherently reduce battery life. Most users of smartphones that ship with an empty microSD card slot never install a microSD card. Therefore most users would suffer from reduced portability or decreased battery life if, for instance, the iPhone 5 had a microSD card slot.
The notion that consumers are simply being charged 4x the going rate for higher capacity storage in smartphones is a bit simplistic. If you took the BOM cost of the NAND flash memory modules shipped in all the current smartphones, and added the average gross margin for their respective OEMs, what sort of price tiers would you expect to see? They would obviously be much higher in terms of cost/GB than the cheapest microSD cards on the market, but also pretty far from the typical $50 or $100 steps we tend to see with smartphone pricing. On the other hand, is it inherently bad that the base model is generally subsidized by the fatter margins on the higher tiers in order to hit that entry level price point? And don't the street prices for the higher storage tiers end up being even more outrageous for smartphones with microSD card slots? The benefits of microSD card slots are that they allow the user to defer spending on additional storage, reuse storage modules for multiple devices, potentially add more capacity than available via configurations offered by the OEM, save money by using lower quality or lower performance memory, buy modules on the open market where sellers might take considerably lower margins, take advantage of pricing opportunities created by the volatility of the NAND flash memory market, and take advantage of Moore's law delivering a halving of price or doubling of capacity every 24 months. The downside is that they can also be a cop out for OEMs looking to reduce SKUs and not build as many devices with more costly, higher capacity NAND flash modules for those customers who are willing to pay for storage that offers higher performance, increased reliability, and tighter integration.
Hairs_ - Monday, December 9, 2013 - link
"However, no OEM has shipped a flagship smartphone with a battery that lasts this long. Why is that?"Because OEM's are
a) Nickel and diming on parts
b) Using artifically limited battery capacities to make a killing on "optional" extras like charging stations/"battery covers" etc.
c) Not very focused on what consumers actually ask for.
Pick any or all of the three. All are far more likely than an OEM saying "Oh woe is me, if only I didn't have to let users replace their batteries, I could save that huge rectangular space and fit in some extra battery that I couldn't possibly get anywhere else, especially not, say, by increasing the overall depth of the device by a single millimetre."
"The notion that consumers are simply being charged 4x the going rate for higher capacity storage in smartphones is a bit simplistic."
Good thing it's not easily demonstrated by publicly available facts, then.
"The downside is that they can also be a cop out for OEMs looking to reduce SKUs and not build as many devices with more costly, higher capacity NAND flash modules for those customers who are willing to pay for storage that offers higher performance, increased reliability, and tighter integration."
Did you miss the many, many, many posts which pointed out the easily researched fact that microSD cards are actually *faster* than the storage in top of the range premium phones/small tablets? And have higher capacities? Are you just ignoring these easily verifiable facts?
repoman27 - Monday, December 16, 2013 - link
You shoulda) look at the effect on the BOM cost that a larger battery would make and weigh that against the impact of battery life on unit sales
b) look at the balance sheet of any handset OEM to see how that "killing" on optional extras compares to the profit from sales of the primary device
c) not even joke about focus groups being a good idea
Why don't you take a minute to click on the "Bench" link up at the top of this page and take a gander at the Android smartphone storage benchmarks.
Let's start with the Samsung Galaxy Note 3, which posts sequential reads of 107.24 MB/s, which is faster than the UHS-I interface. In fact, everything released in the past year is north of 48 MB/s. Then let's look at the 4 KB random read performance, which across the board shames every microSD card on the market because they simply aren't designed for it. Then let's look at 4 KB random writes, where the Galaxy Note 3 and Moto X both exceed 500 IOPS, something that no microSD card can boast. And finally you come to the sequential writes, which are in fact disappointing on most smartphones, however this is one of the metrics that is targeted for optimization on SD cards.
Feel free to compile a list of 32 and 64 GB microSD cards that exceed the performance of the NAND modules in flagship smartphones in any metric other than sequential write speed. Make sure to note the retail price of those cards as well. What is the rated endurance of the NAND they use? How robust are the wear leveling algorithms or encryption protocols they incorporate?
I own Sandisk Extreme and Lexar 600x cards, so I'm pretty familiar with both the performance and pricing of the fastest microSD cards on offer. My last 3 phones all came with 64 GB of integrated storage, but I've yet to come across a 128 GB microSDXC card, and only recently has the performance of 64 GB microSDXC cards caught up with what you've been able to get in phones for years.
stop-a - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Since this is Anandtech, all opinion from Anand/Brian must have been right.Wait, Samsung is still selling phones with fully swappable micro-sd & batteries and they are the no.1 Android phone maker in the world. So Samsung must listen to Anand because only Anand could be right.
Message to Moto, modular phone idea is stupid according to Anand, you must stop your project right now, cause all phones must be uni-body design.
solipsism - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Yes, Anand and Brian's opinions are right BECAUSE THEY ARE OPINIONS, just as if you stated your opinion was preferring SD-cards, dual-headphone jacks, and having an eInk display on the backside of your device. Since it's an opinion you have a right to it no matter how silly it is, but for you to sarcastically suggest that Anand and Brian's opinions mean they are wrong to have factually shows you don't quite understand what an opinion is.repoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Well, Anand and Brian are also right because their arguments are based on actual physics and valid logic.Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Please cite the valid logic you speak of and I'll cite a ton of counter evidence...vortexmak - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Evidence: GS4 - slim, larger, longer battery life includes an sd card slot as well. I don't see any other non-replaceable battery phones having a significantly longer battery liferepoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Reality: Given two batteries of equal energy density and differing volumes, the larger battery will provide more energy. Sealed batteries are more volumetrically efficient than those that are user replaceable. Therefore, given the same volume and chemistry, the sealed battery will have a higher energy density and provide more energy.More reality: All microSD card slots require interior volume in a device. That volume is equivalent to 4-6% of the volume of the batteries found in the current flagship smartphones.
Hypothetical: If you asked all smartphone users whether they would rather have 4-6% longer battery life or a microSD card slot in their next device, what would you fancy the outcome of that poll would be? What if you then asked them if they would like to have both but in a slightly larger device?
Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
Reality:Improving screen technology so that they suck less power, and changing the way mobile networks are deployed would instantly gain far more battery life than either of the sacrifices you're talking about.
Would you rather lose 4% battery life and gain cheap storage and a phone that isn't bricked because a single replaceable component failed, or gain 100% battery life with a better designed screen?
repoman27 - Monday, December 2, 2013 - link
Neither screen nor mobile network technology is relevant to the argument pertaining to microSD card slots and removable batteries; they are simply red herrings. Furthermore, no smartphone has ever shipped with a screen that was 50% less power efficient than any screen of similar size, pixel density, maximum brightness and color gamut available in production quantity at that time. Also, no handset OEM directly controls the deployment of any mobile network.The total increase in battery life achievable by using sealed batteries and omitting microSD card slots is realistically in the 10% range, and potentially higher than that. If the on-board NAND flash memory fails, the device will be non-functional regardless of whether there is a microSD card installed or not. Thankfully, failures of this nature are incredibly rare. If a sealed battery fails, or the maximum charge level falls below a reasonable percentage of the original capacity, you can have it replaced. A device with a failed user replaceable battery is just as bricked if you don't own a second battery. Most owners of smartphones with removable batteries never purchase a second battery for their phone.
Hairs_ - Monday, December 9, 2013 - link
What?You claim that a 5% increase in potential battery volume is significant enough to warrant ditching expandability, but claim that any other measure to increase battery life is "irrelevant"? Are you really going to set out a stall on "this needs to be done to increase battery life" and then ignore factors which influence battery life to a much greater extent based on simple physics on the basis they're "red herrings"?
And when did your volume estimates for ditching these factors jump from ~5% to 10%? Did you calculate incorrectly the first time? Or are you just fishing for random numbers to back up an argument that didn't stack up the first time?
Note that I never claimed "Phone A shipped with a screen 50% more efficient than Phone B". I said, very clearly, that if an engineer is given a choice between ditching SD cards and gaining 5% battery capacity, or working on improved screen technology to lower battery drain by 50%, one is very much a larger benefit than the other.
If you choose to ignore that, then you're not much of an engineer.
repoman27 - Monday, December 16, 2013 - link
Until phones are powered by unicorns, the size of the battery determines how long a given device can function. Every OEM makes their devices as efficient as is technically possible while still ticking all the feature boxes and trying to get the best scores possible in the benchmarks. Then they fit it with the smallest battery they can get away with before people start massively complaining about how bad the battery life is, so that they can tout how thin and light their device is compared to the competition. In fact, the less power the screen or radios draw, the bigger impact a given reduction in battery volume will have on device run time.Clearly when I said, "The total increase in battery life achievable by using sealed batteries and omitting microSD card slots is realistically in the 10% range," I added the effect of doing both (see how I used the words "total" and "and"). Does something appear incorrect about my estimate? Why don't you go ahead and do the maths yourself. If you do, you'd realize that if making the battery on the iPhone 5 non-user removable allowed Apple to increase its overall size by as little as 150 µm in each dimension, the result would be a greater than 5% improvement in battery life.
And I'll note that you made the rather specious claim that it was possible for a smartphone to, "gain 100% battery life with a better designed screen." That would only be possible if such screens existed in the supply chain in sufficient quantity and at a reasonable cost during the same time period that the device was slated for assembly. Do you really think the screen suppliers are sandbagging and just holding out on some new super low-power tech? Considering that Samsung and LG both make screens themselves, and a supply contract for an iPhone screen is a 3 comma deal, I find it highly unlikely that they're just not bothering with display power optimizations.
Klug4Pres - Thursday, December 19, 2013 - link
"Then they fit it with the smallest battery they can get away with before people start massively complaining about how bad the battery life is, so that they can tout how thin and light their device is compared to the competition."According to you, this is presumably a good thing, and we should all be grateful that OEMs pay so much attention to the bottom line. You keep going on about BOM and whether x or y missing feature is going to lead to a loss of profit.
Some people are actually more interested in the usefulness of a device, and I think the arguments in these comments show that there are many useful things one can do with SD cards and removeable batteries.
In fact, it is precisely Anand's and Brian's excessive concentration on the producer interest that is annoying everyone here.
Of course, there is the absurd figleaf that we can collectively rectify the poor value offered to consumers by "demanding" that phones come with more internal storage and a reduced markup on additional storage tiers. While we're at it, let's all demand that OEMs make thicker phones with bigger batteries - oh wait: "Then they fit it with the smallest battery they can get away with."
repoman27 - Friday, December 20, 2013 - link
I think you've missed my point when it comes to the BOM. The battery is the least expensive item on any smartphone bill of materials. OEMs could double the size of the battery they include and it wouldn't even move the needle on their margins, yet they would trounce their competitors when it comes to run time. There is clearly a belief that keeping these devices as thin and light as possible will result in better sales than longer battery life will.I'm not saying we should be grateful to the OEMs for being good bean counters, or looking out for their profits, I'm merely saying that if you want to understand their design considerations, the bottom line is a good place to start. I don't believe Brian and Anand want their readers to empathize with the manufacturers either, they're simply pointing out that if you look at it from the OEMs perspective, it's easier to see why we are where we are, and where we're likely headed.
So do you propose that things will get better if we encourage every OEM to stick with 16GB of NAND and a battery that lasts 3 hours as the baseline, as long as there's a microSD slot and the battery is swappable? So that those who are so inclined can buy and carry additional microSD cards and batteries to correct the shortcomings inherent in the device? I'm much more of the opinion that this site, and we as consumers, should reward the companies willing to deliver a better package—one that comes with a reasonable amount of storage and a decent battery in the first place.
Klug4Pres - Saturday, December 21, 2013 - link
"So do you propose that things will get better if we encourage every OEM to stick with 16GB of NAND and a battery that lasts 3 hours as the baseline, as long as there's a microSD slot and the battery is swappable?"No, what I would suggest is that, among a variety of different offerings, including completely sealed devices for the unibody/monocoque fetishists, there is room for non-Samsung devices to come with:
(i) A removeable battery of at least 2500 mAh as standard, with official and aftermarket replaceable back covers giving options for larger batteries;
(ii) Fast internal flash offered at different price points for 16/32/64/128GB
(iii) Hot-swappable microSD slot up to 128GB
(iv) USB 3.0 OTG, allowing simultaneous charging and attachment of HDMI out, and USB hubs, both powered and unpowered
repoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Actually, the burden is on you. You'll need to either show that Brian and Anand's premises are untrue, or that their argument is invalid if you want to disprove them. I have not seen anything in these comments that refutes so much as a single statement they made.I challenge you to disprove any of their conclusions.
Hairs_ - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
All of Anand and Brian's criticisms about removeable storage/parts list "potential tradeoffs" or "potential compromises".The truth is that the difference between a well-engineered device and a poorly engineered device in terms of "in hand feel" is likely nothing to do with replaceable parts and far more to do with an overall cost-cutting approach in terms of materials and construction methods. Talking about "potential" this and "possible" that goes both ways.
"Potentially" the OEM's are exaggerating these challenges and compromises to favoured reviewers in order to get them on side so that anti-consumer price gouging can continue. Does a HTC One feel better in the hand than the Galaxy S3? Sure. Is that down to a micro SD slot? No, blatently not.
Here's a simple conundrum for you:
If battery doors, MicroSD slots, GSM sized SIMs and replaceable parts lead to unacceptable engineering tradeoffs and lower device quality, why did Apple have to spin that users were "holding it wrong" when their poor engineering decisions around the antenna for the 4 were revealed?
Bad engineers, cost cutting regimes, poor quality control, and pressures of time to market are all more significant factors in creating devices with poor build quality and reliability than any of the "issues" raised by Anand and Brian in this article.
repoman27 - Monday, December 2, 2013 - link
No. Anand and Brian primarily cite incontrovertible compromises inherent to two very specific features of smartphones, whereas their critics cite potential benefits or use cases which make the trade-offs involved preferable. (Which is not to say that there are not valid points raised by both sides.)Your simple conundrum is a non sequitur mixed with bait for any Apple fanbois. It is also largely irrelevant to the topics addressed by the original post.
Hairs_ - Monday, December 9, 2013 - link
What "incontrovertible" claims do they make about replacement batteries and SD card slots?" The move away from removable batteries allows for better use of internal volume, which in turn increases the size of battery you can include at the same device size. There are potential build quality benefits here as well since the manufacturer doesn't need to deal with building a solid feeling removable door/back of some sort. That's not to say that unibody designs inherently feel better, it's just that they can be."
Directly quoting from the article, if the words "can" and "potential" are confusing to you, perhaps you should stop analysing other people's posts.
Are you suggesting that the Nokia 3310 was a phone with poor build quality based on its removable battery and full size SIM card?
My conundrum is very simple, you're correct. Apple produced a device with none of the "tradeoffs" you, Anand and Brian deride as detrimental to the quality of a device, but made a severe balls of a very simple engineering problem, ie radio attenuation. Apple made a "tradeoff" between aesthetics, materials and physics. Unfortunately, they chose the first two over the third, and the third spanked them for it. If you don't like the apple example, pick another manufacturer. They've all made various engineering design mistakes over the years, but the number which can be pinned on SD cards is absolutely minimal.
The build quality of a device does not have any meaningful relationship to the inclusion of user-replaceable batteries, and the companies who are suggesting that it does are, very simply, telling porkies. Replaceable batteries and expandable storage were never issues for well over a decade. Their denigration as features has come at a time when, coincidentally, some manufacturers have discovered that removing them results in the ability to price-gouge consumers on basic additions like storage capacity and charging "features".
repoman27 - Monday, December 16, 2013 - link
I love how you selected a quote that perfectly illustrates my point and then tried to claim that the words "can" or "potential" are somehow problematic. The first sentence is based on deductive reasoning that is both valid and sound, and neither you nor any other commenter here has done anything to disprove it. The second sentence presents an inferential claim based on inductive reasoning that is both strong and reliable. The third sentence is poorly written, but is merely meant to underscore that the second sentence does not imply that all unibody designs feel better than all non-unibody designs.You then go on to provide an example that justifies Anand's inclusion of that third sentence. His point was that while there are obviously examples of well made phones with removable backs, it's still easier to make a solid feeling phone if you don't have to worry about that aspect of the design.
Apple's antenna design on the iPhone 4 resulted in excessive signal attenuation for many users. That has zero bearing on the tradeoffs that come with incorporating microSD card slots or user removable batteries in a smartphone. What exactly is your argument here? That because no one has yet to completely bollox a design specifically through the inclusion of a microSD card slot, therefore all smartphones should have them?
stop-a - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
I just feel bad that my Note2 and Korean LG G2 are having swappable batteries, yet I could easily use the stock battery to last for more than 1day. This must be violating Anand's golden rule that non-swappable batteries must last longer than swappable ones. According to Anand, you couldn't have a phone with long last battery while it is also swappable. I feel Samsung is not playing up to Anand's rule, and by Anand's logic Samsung must be punished.rxzlmn - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
1. A decent speed microSD with 64 gigs cost me about 45 dollars (15mb/s write, 35 read). Never, ever will manufacturers charge you just 45 dollars to go from 16 gig to 80 gig. They want to earn money.2. My data plan is capped at 3 gig. Previously I had a much larger cap and thus was using Spotify to stream, accumulating well over 10 gig data per month. So, I download playlists I follow now on Wifi. I don't wanna think about how much storage I need for that.
3. I don't see how an SD slot is ruining my Z1's body design.
4. If you don't want to put in an SD card, just don't do it. The cost to put in a slot is so little it is dumb to omit it.
5. Where are all those tradeoffs this article talks about to be seen IN REALITY, on those devices that have SD slots?
Andrewv21 - Tuesday, November 26, 2013 - link
Another design/construction issue is wireless charging: devices with battery doors, removable backs, etc. are generally more likely to give me the option of dropping in a receiver coil for Qi or whatever charge system I want. Hopefully the industry will soon be to the point where most devices have a widely accepted wireless charging receiver built in regardless of battery/SD card options, but as it stands right now 'sealed' devices are mostly left with clunky external coils built into oversized cases as the only option for wireless charger compatibility.jmunjr - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
I simply cannot live with a replaceable battery. I use extended batteries which last all day regardless how I use my phone and I swap it with another fully charged battery when I choose. I never have to worry about charging my phone because I am always charging my batteries. A phone should never have to be charged, but the batteries should.StrangerGuy - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Never have I seen an AT commentary getting this much flak and for the right reasons, especially with that lame as hell rebuttal of "it's just our opinion".So how is the vaunted Apple build quality doing so much good where nearly everyone is covering up their iDevices for fear of scratches? Or that impossible combination of a waterproof, well buily Android phone with an SD slot? *snicker*
CSMR - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
"Similar to our position on removable batteries, devices aren't penalized in our reviews for having/not-having a removable microSD card slot."But they should be penalized if there aren't 64GB/128GB options available at prices similar to microSD cards.
Spunjji - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Precisely.vortexmak - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
A very badly written article with just hearsay and not data to back it up.- Samsung has been able to make thinner and lighter phones with better battery life than the competition. So what were you saying about efficient usage of space again ?
- SDs are being forced on their way out by manufacturers, not cause no one wants them
- Google/OEMs just want you to pay more citing BS such as difficult to manage, slower, etc. People have been using SDs since the time of feature phones. It's just the Apple crowd which doesn't want to use them.
- SDs stay out of the way, until you need your 64 GB of music/movies/pictures. Speed and reliability is not even a concern
- Removable batteries, similarly, give the option to the user.
- The only argument I can accept is that Nexus devices are half priced so they can get away with not having either. I still won't buy them
My case: I ride a motorcycle. I need a removable battery cause on long rides with GPS on, I can simple swap the battery and charge the depleted one. Similarly, I can review videos taken on my GoPro on the road by swapping the microSD. The only OEM that satisfies my requirements is Samsung. As long as they keep providing removable batteries and microSD, I will keep buying.
Bait: GS4 is the best device there is , Nexus phones suck
vortexmak - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
I don't want to increase the thickness of the phone. I only need the extra battery when I go on trips.Plus with the spare charger, I can charge the spare battery even when I am on my motorcycle
repoman27 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Out of curiosity, do you ride with your phone in a mount? And if so, aren't there SGS4 mounts that can provide charging power? (I do the boat thing, not the motorcycle thing, so I have no idea.)And doesn't the new version of the GoPro App allow you to view and share your videos on your SGS4 via an ad-hoc Wi-Fi network? (Once again, I have no idea. This might totally suck compared to just sticking the microSD card in there.)
vortexmak - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
I ride with my phone in my pocket, with GPS directions via bluetooth headset, if required.]I would never keep anything else along with the phone, like an external power pack, even if I had the space (which I don't). I just stick the depleted battery into the Samsung external charger and stow it below my seat.
As for the GoPro, I have a Hero2 without wifi.
Again, I would never go in for overpriced solutions to the fake problems manufacturers themselves create. The popularity of external power packs shows that people more battery life than what is available to them
repoman27 - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
Gotcha, makes sense now.RanDum72 - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
What an external microSD/SD card allows you to do is bring allow your private pron collection without ever 'forgetting' that its in phone memory. If you ever have to give away or sell your phone, one of the first things people do is yank the memory card out.vortexmak - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Ha ha... you got it bro!!sevenmack - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
Except that the "quick swap" isn't that quick. And, from my experience, you also have to have a good external charger to make sure that the external batteries, be they OEM or non-OEM, are fully charged. You can end up with a secondary battery that isn't fully charged and will lose that charge quickly after taking a bunch of photos.Again, everyone has a choice of phones with removable batteries and phones without them. If you want the former, then buy phones that offer that option and vice versa.
vortexmak - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
A quick swap really is quick. It takes me a minute to power off, replace and power on my phone.We have to be vocal, cause the manufacturers think that no one wants phones with removable batteries. Thank God Samsung still knows the market
sevenmack - Thursday, January 16, 2014 - link
Except that it isn't, especially if you are in conditions such as airports or in the middle of remote areas where you can't really just stop, turn off the phone, search for the battery, take the cover off the phone, and then do the swap. To you, that's quick. To me as a power user, and to most mainstream users, that's a lot of time for not much gain.In the long run, the best solution is for better battery development, better software development (in order for power to be used more efficiently) and even better decisions by power users when it comes to operating smartphones. The last point is also true for storage. If so many power users weren't engaging in what can be best called digital hording, holding on to every megabyte instead of backing up data properly and deleting that which is no longer useful or necessary, then the storage given (especially when one gets 32 gigs to work with) would be more than enough.
zmatt - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
I'm sorry but this post reeks of arrogance. There are pros and cons to both sides and as the sales figures show people prefer removable batteries and expandable storage to locked down devices. It's no surprise the enthusiasts agree as well. We want more control over our devices. The benefits to removable batteries and sd slot are too obvious to state here but I will say that this, the hard stance that Anandtech and Anand himself has taken on this biased view has hurt my opinion of the site irreparably. It shows a lack of journalistic integrity and whatever the cause, be it personal bias or a thinly veiled anti-Samsung stance it doesn't matter. You have done a massive disservice to the community and have betrayed your user base.spronkey - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
I strongly disagree with almost all points here. Anand might be drinking a bit too much Apple cool-aid these days :/1) Removable batteries do not dictate form factor
2) Protection circuitry is necessary regardless of removable vs not, and battery-level protection circuits are very small in size
3) Costs for removable batteries are already hugely inflated by manufacturers, and integrated battery replacement costs are even worse. $80 to replace a tiny battery? The batteries cost far less than $10 to produce. Ridiculous.
4) I'd love to see a standardised small form factor Lithium-based battery. You know, like AA. And usable cross-device. That way, I could take a battery from my camera, stick it in my phone, flashlight etc, all using readily-available chargers. This also encourages competition.
On MicroSD, again, I disagree that the "better" solution is cheaper inbuilt upgrade prices. The better solution is *both*, and, ideally, upgradable inbuilt storage!
In a year's time, there's a good chance that 64GB card will cost less than it does now. I've got $200 to spend right now. I'd rather spend it on a phone with fast CPU and good camera, but with small storage, than spend it on a lesser phone with a large NAND. That way, a year down the track I've got a better phone with an extra 64GB of storage (for the obvious stuff - music, video, and photo).
It's also really damn handy to have a removable card - that way if I want to go and print a photo, for example, I can just pop the card out of my phone, and plug it in to one of those photo print stations. No cables. Or pop it into an SD adaptor and use it with my dSLR or video camera, then pop it back into my phone (or tablet, let's not forget tablets here) and view that content on a larger screen while I'm out and about.
I think the important thing to remember here is that for 80% of people, high-performance NAND is not something that gives any real benefit - the majority of their storage requirements are serially-accessed media files anyway! Who cares if the bits in my photos can't be randomly accessed super quickly :/
spronkey - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
I'd also just like to reiterate that the whole C vs D drive thing is crap. You can get around it very easily by saying that MicroSD cards can be used for media files only. All the media player apps have metadata libraries that simply point to the actual storage location anyway.StrangerGuy - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
You forgot the part how your phone can't play MP3s and load images from your crappy SD card with *only* 10MB/s reads which apparently is too slow for consumers according to AT.Ev1lAsh - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
Anand/Brian,Love the site and agree with the removable battery argument (even though I've put in a bigger battery for my phone). But saying removable storage is not important because there SHOULD be sufficient space is a fallacy. Its like saying console games should be cheaper so lets continue paying the current price -how are OEMs to know what we what, especially the masses who don't frequent sites like this (and leave comments), or know what is possible with current tech.
I'm a frequent flyer so I need that extra space, and sadly I'll only get it caked in when (no offence to ye) review sites stop bigging up pixel density and phone dimensions / thinness (improvements in these are academic now anyway) and focus on storage space and battery life.
And yes ordinary users want these too, I got my Mum a smartphone and she was really pissed her phone didn't last a week on standby like her old phone did. To her the technology wasn't ready if she had to compromise on this; she only wanted a touch screen -apps mean nothing to her.
HansCPH - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
In this long comment section, the authors has not seen cause to react or respond, even a little, to protests from users on the acclaimed benefits of:1. not making user-replaceable batteries in smartphones
2. not making SD expandable file storage in smartphones.
When Brian Klug ventured this road a while back alone, at least he tried responding, -initially !
The present double-authored fashion statement on the BAT/SD issue, stands as is.
Anandtech has become the ANA (American Humane Association — the grantor of the familiar “No Animals Were Harmed” trademark accreditation seen at the end of film and TV credits) of tech, and curled up with (some of) the producers.
HansCPH - Thursday, November 28, 2013 - link
ANA should be AHAzyky - Saturday, November 30, 2013 - link
It's sad to see mainstream consumers limiting options for power users because they're willing to settle for these things. Just like 1366x768 laptops dominating the marketplace, these "good enough for watching movies" products are designed to a price only. These non-in-the-field replacable battery phones are not yielding any significant battery life advantage and in most phones, do not take up any more space with the battery than removable battery phones do. And even if they were able to squeeze in a 25% larger battery, that's still a far cry from the practically limitless supply one gets with replaceable batteries. More importantly, batteries wear out, and run-time shortens over time. Pretty soon that 125% battery is lasting 1/2 as long, and a $5 30second fix wont solve it. Not only do batteries wear out, but so does flash memory. Why would I want to worry about constantly rewriting to internal flash memory over and over and slowly killing the phone, when I could be saving files to easy-to-replace micro SD cards instead. The same micro SD cards that I can ready in many other devices and not have to rely on the phone even having power to access, or worry about losing access to important documents if other parts of the phone died.I don't buy items to throw in a land fill in 6 months, I'd rather buy quality products that will last me a lifetime. I don't want to "use it up, and replace it." And I'm sure I'm not alone in the willingness to pay extra for some insured longevity and durability.
Then again, I'm also part of the minority that insists on a physical keyboard too, I may never be able to buy a new phone again the way things are going.
With the current stance on phones w/o batteries or micro SD slots, the continual reinforcement that current SSD NAND wear is good enough, even with tri-level-cell packages, and even the most recent statement where they thought the WD Black^2 would have been better off as a caching hybrid drive rather than discrete segmented areas Anandtech has pretty much jumped the shark for enthusiasts and power users. Walled garden Apple and Microsoft sycophants can come here to see the latest gotta-gave gadget every month to replace their phone with a larger screen every month instead.
hrrmph - Sunday, December 1, 2013 - link
Want Micro-SDXC and removable battery in a 4" class device?
Unlocked Blackberry Z10 direct from the Blackberry USA store. Today only. $200.
http://store.shopblackberry.com/store?SiteID=bbrry...
nitram_tpr - Monday, December 2, 2013 - link
I am currently using a Galaxy S2. The life of the original battery was pretty poor so I got the official extended battery and now I am more than happy with the life :) I have a 32gig SD card full of MP3s, books and magazines. I (originally) got this phone because of the options it afforded me.I also have a Transformer Prime tablet, it has served me well since I got it, I use it every day. One of the things I love about it is the fact it has so much expandable memory capabilities. I have 16gig in the tablet and 32 gig in the dock. I'm waiting for the new Nexus 10 to see if I will upgrade. If it doesn't come with a 128gig version then I'm gonna stick with the Prime. 64gig for my tablet is just about enough for me, I do like having the card options though. I have a large book / magazine library and I watch one or two movies / tv episodes on my daily commute by train. If I had a tablet with limited storage it would be extremely tiresome having to change files on a regular basis.
Cloud storage is all well and good if you have access to a fast home broadband connection or can afford to have a 4G connection with a large allowance. I have neither, I live in a rural location and am lucky if I get 2meg download speeds on my ADSL and just about get a mobile signal so a device with expandable storage is essential for me.
Steven JW FCK - Monday, December 2, 2013 - link
"Similar to our position on removable batteries, devices aren't penalized in our reviews for having/not-having a removable microSD card slot."Ok, I accept that, but you must accept that you aren't praising this feature as a benefit and a *USEFUL* feature to many. You (Anandtech) are taking a very clouded view upon what I see as a deal breaker in picking my next phone and shunning it as a token feature, that's not worth your time of day.
You may well be more interested in seeing the price of internal storage decrease, but in the meantime, a lot of people are suffering from *INFLATION* and the *RISING COSTS OF LIVING,* so day dreaming about NAND memory prices all of a sudden falling is a fantasy you need to GET OVER. I mean Apple charge in the UK nearly £100 for 16GB memory, the most of any manufacturer, and they will do all they can to preserve these 1000%+ profit margins so long as you keep telling people they're worth it. If you want to pay £100 for 16GB of memory, you can, but I'll protest those extortionate costs and ridiculous mark up in my option NOT TO BUY THEIR PRODUCTS, thank you.
sayash - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
Nexus 5 review? Are you paid by apple to specifically delay it?julandorid - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
Hahaha. The phone is too good to be reviewed by Anand. Probably they cannot find any flaw to bitch around :DArbie - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
.I bought a Nokia 520 ($150 unlocked) BECAUSE it had micro-SD. So in one tiny device I have all the phone necessities, minor alarm / calculator etc apps, AND a personal entertainment system. I have several 32GB chips and can swap in movies, tv shows, a large music collection, audiobooks, and ebooks. It also has a snap-in battery, so I have the option of carrying a spare on long trips AND have no concern over when the original no longer takes a charge.
--> Anandtech tells me that none of these things actually matter.
The phone case is perfectly solid, and thin enough for me.
--> Anandtech tells me that I should demand more in build quality and form factor.
Go figure.
BoloMKXXVIII - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
I can only go by my own experience. I have owned 6 cell phones. I have had to replace the batteries in every one of them. I tend to keep my phones longer than most do, and the phones always seem to last an entire day for the first year or so, then they need to be charged part way through the day. I travel a lot also. Carrying a spare battery "just in case" is nice also. Fading batteries is not brand specific. I have owned Motorolas, HTCs, and a Samsung. I will consider buying a phone without a microSD card slot (if it has 128 GB of storage) but until they stop making cell phones without removable batteries I will always buy cell phones that have replacable batteries. Even if I have to go gray market "world" phones.bhima - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
I think the battery argument is flawed as well. It is true that you can have potentially better battery life in a fully integrated system, but I don't believe its necessarily that big of a deal to scrap removable batteries all-together. Take the Samsung Note 3... for having a ridiculously large, bright screen it gets pretty dang good battery life. Easily enough to get you through a full day. I don't believe having better overall battery performance than say the Note 3 is worth the trade-off of basically having to landfill your non-user replaceable phone in a few years just because it won't hold a charge anymore.Anandtech was ahead of the curve when they posited years ago that off-contract services would gain more traction and that would lead to people purchasing phones out-right instead of running a subsidized contract. I agree with that, and with that I believe people who buy their phones outright are LESS likely to want to replace them in 2 years, just like most people don't replace their computers every 2 years. Therefore, not having a removeable battery basically guarantees you will have to, even if you don't want to.
dynamited - Tuesday, December 3, 2013 - link
Yup, that is it, no battery replacement and you're guaranteed disposable phones and how much quality goes into anything inherently disposable and obsoletable every two years? Batteries have a cycle rate, of which the percentage to full charge is less every time. Sorry physics.Someone else wrote here, "I really find this article disappointing. I feel as though the authors are so far into their viewpoint that they're incapable of evaluating the other side fairly." I feel the same way. Anand and company are so embedded with apple in their personal life choices they are incapable of an unbiased opinion. Too bad. BTW, where's the Nexus5 review?
JimmiG - Wednesday, December 4, 2013 - link
Removable batteries have many advantages other than being able to carry a spare one and swap out (which I've never done, a universal, external battery is more convenient).-If you keep your phone for more than 12-18 months, the battery will begin to deteriorate. A fresh $25 battery will give you phone a new lease of life
-If you don't mind having a slightly thicker phone, you can install a third party battery. For the Galaxy S3 I have, Samsung even sell an official 3000 mAh battery. It only adds a few millimeters to the thickness but increases battery life by 50%. If you're extremely demanding about battery life, there are some ludicrously oversized batteries you can buy. It gives you choice, which is why we go with Android over Apple in the first place.
-Non user replaceable batteries is planned obsolescence at its worst. Your phone is literally designed to stop being usable after 12-18 months.
rogekk - Thursday, December 5, 2013 - link
Its still a mixed feeling as i explained in my recent article about this topic (http://www.techjaja.com/tech-all-news/do-you-reall... but i feel we still need a big leap forward in battery technology and more cheaper inbuilt memory.SentinelBorg - Friday, December 6, 2013 - link
Funny enough, this morning I got a Google Play Music update, that added support for SD card storage. ^^Laphaswiff - Monday, December 9, 2013 - link
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Vita nostra brevis est, brevi finietur. Venit mors velociter, rapit nos atrociter, nemini parcetur.
Vivat academia, vivant professores! Vivat membrum quodlibet, vivant membra quaeliber, semper sint in flore!
Vivant omnes virgines, faciles formosae, vivant et mulieres, tenerae, amabiles, bonae, speciosae
Vivat et respublica et qui illam regit, vivat nostra civitas Maecenatum caritas, quae nos hic protegit
Pereat tristitia, pereant osores, pareat diabolus, quivis anti burschius atque irrisores.
ASHH - Tuesday, December 10, 2013 - link
what if your phone breaks or you soft brick or brick your phone and you didn't back up your device? For me this is why sd cards are crucial. Regardless of performance or not I don't backup my stuff every single day and what if I have no access to "Cloud" services. This is the main reason Phones should have sd slots. Peace of mind.artl - Wednesday, December 11, 2013 - link
Cell phones do not cease functioning when powered-off. Many housekeeping choirs are going on, including reporting your tower location. To trully turn off, you must remove power source (battery).glenesis - Monday, December 23, 2013 - link
I recently had the USB charging port on my phone fail. Without a way to charge nor a way to mount the phone on a computer, I had no way to easily retrieve my valuable files from my phone. When I received a replacement phone from my carrier, I was able to charge a battery with the replacement phone, move the battery into my damaged phone, and to copy the entire contents of my internal storage onto a 32gb MicroSD card. This is not even an argument or a discussion for me. I will not buy a device that has a unibody design. I have thoroughly learned the value of removable power and removable storage. I consider these things necessities. As for more an faster internal storage options? Yes, please, bring it on! I routinely fill my 32gb cards up. I'd love to have a 128gb storage capacity onboard, and a pair of Micro SDXC slots! Also, note that the first thing I do after I decide that I'm going to keep a new device is to buy the highest capacity extended battery that I can find. Having the option to upgrade my device is essential to me.IUU - Friday, December 27, 2013 - link
Ok, there are obvious reasons why the manufacturers would opt for internal storage only, but you always end to a consumer losing.A device with external storage is dynamically a device that will serve the end user to the terabyte territory. The rule is that we are more attached to the content of our devices than the devices themselves. Such a device would generally last for inappropriately long time compared to the companies' sale cycle. Now we wouldn't want that , would we?
A failing battery may be a decision for device changing, but having the option for easy battery
replacement would generally lead to a longer time using the device. We wouldn't want this too, would we?
Then there's the need for catering for the cloud thingy. If the end user is indepedent storage wise
, then how will all these companies sell petty storage for gold?
zangdook - Sunday, December 29, 2013 - link
What about the ridiculous difficulty of transferring files between PC and phone? My experience is limited but on a Samsung device the procedure is deeply flawed. You have to install a crappy bloated media player on your PC and then you can transfer a limited range of media file types only (no .avi). For other filetypes they don't seem to want to let you do it. I just want to transfer any file I choose in either direction in a straightforward way. So I just pull out the sd card and plug it into the PC.signal121booster - Monday, January 13, 2014 - link
Well, there is none kind of issue with the Google Nexus 5 smart phones. It is working perfect. As it comes with 16 GB memory, I don't need any more space. It is enough for me.cellphoneboosterstore
bertiebond - Tuesday, January 28, 2014 - link
Ho hum.1)You can buy a sealed PC with 0.5TB, 1TB and 1.5TB harddrives for 200, 300 and 400 bucks
2) Or you can but a open PC with no HD for $200 where you can swap, add HDs as much as you want. Like a 2TB HD for a $100. Except you _may_ experience HD compatability issues if the HD manufacturers dont get their act together
I guess most people who come to this site (including me) prefer the second option
I guess most phone manufacturers want to/are selling to the first group
Personally, I would not choose a phone without external sim, mSD and battery access unless it was so cheap I could use for a year and throw away like chewing gum.
caretaker - Tuesday, January 28, 2014 - link
The day will come when people can rely totally on internal storage, if and only if manufacturer stops charging sky-high premium price for a simple storage increase namely 16GB to 32 GB to 64GB to 126GB and all of us know the GB/$ is way cheaper than how they price their product.zodiacfml - Monday, February 3, 2014 - link
basically it. as long as manufacturers insist on putting premiums on higher capacity devices, a card slot is necessary for me.aknotts - Thursday, March 27, 2014 - link
This by far one of the dumbest articles on anandtech. Apparently not of the authors has had a phone with a removable battery and actually bothered to get a extra battery and a external charger. When u have a way to get u phone from totally dead to 100 percent full in 20 seconds using a nonremovable battery let me know. The argument about more capacity is laughable the phones ive seen with unremovable batteries actually had less capacity. Compare the htc one to the galaxy s4 capacity. What are u going to do when ur battery loses its charge? When u cant replace the battery. They only last so many charge cycles u know. As far as u know what consumers want apparently u dont have a clue. Compare the sales of phones that do have removable batteries and sd card slots with the android phones that dont. Consumers have spoken loud and clear.petergreyhill - Wednesday, May 28, 2014 - link
this argument is wrong for smartphonesw -the entire point of a replaceable battery is convenience, and those manufacturers like apple with non replaceable batteries do in fact gouge their loyal customers and do NOT deliver more battery life than those manufacturers who do provide replaceable batteries.SDCard are also meant for convenience - and to protect oneself from being gouged for additional memory, again as in apple's memory prices. The SD Card is for convenience, offload sub critical apps, photos, docs etc and keep internal memory available for higher priority items.
The argument makes no sense at all - since most manufacturers would love to gouge their customers for memory and battery replacement - we do not live in an ideal world.
bestoffertou - Saturday, October 6, 2018 - link
People want cheaper/reusable storage and cheaply repairable devices that have decent build quality and market value. Lots of them love fashionable devices, but not most mind you, the former beinghttps://www.bestoffertou.com