With the latest news circling the explosion of the newfangled Samsung Galaxy Note9, it seems that the company hasn’t been learning from it’s past mistakes - case in point some similar incidents that took place a couple of years back, which involved the Galaxy Note7. The company was forced to withdraw it’s product from the market then, and there may be a possibility that the Note9 meets a similar fate.
Samsung had introduced Water Carbon Cooling in their Note9 smartphones which claimed to increase it’s cooling surface area. Considering that the technology was actually brought in to improve the safety parameters concerning the phone’s battery, this incident sure came as a shock for everyone.What went wrong this time?
According to the reports, Diane Chung, a real estate agent in New York, filed a lawsuit at the Supreme Court in Queens County, New York, claiming damages and an injunction against the sale of the Galaxy Note9 in connection with a fire involving the Galaxy Note9. According to Chung, while using the Galaxy Note9 in an elevator, the smartphone suddenly became hot so she put it into her bag. Then, Chung heard a whistle-like sound out of the bag and smoke came out of it. Chung tried to hold her smartphone with her hand but the heated-up smartphone burned her hand. It was reported that the fire was put out only after all things in her bag were thrown out of the bag and she put the smartphone into a bucket filled with water. Chung is demanding both damages and the halt of the device's sale, saying that she has been shocked by the accident and unable to contact her clients. (Source)
Samsung launched its Galaxy Note9 series on August 24 in New York. The device claimed all day long battery capacity and had an increased cooling system.
Previously, Samsung Electronics had reduced the capacity of the Galaxy Note8 battery to 3,300mAh as compared to 3,500mAh of the Galaxy Note7 - a phone that had been under a lot of controversy due to many of its models catching fire.
But now Samsung expanded the battery capacity of the Galaxy Note9 to 4,000mAh, the highest battery capacity until now for any Galaxy Note device. The company seemed confident regarding the phone’s performance owing to its new jargon ‘Water Carbon Cooling System’.
We looked upon the newly introduced cooling system in the Galaxy Note9 on the Samsung website.
Samsung says,
“When we launched the Galaxy S7, we introduced a new type of water-based cooling into our phones. It used a porous thermal spreader filled with water, which absorbed the heat and turned into steam and then carried the heat away through a pipe. Once the heat dissipated, the steam condensed into water again. This system was the blueprint for the Water Carbon Cooling system in the Galaxy Note9, but we wanted to make it bigger and more efficient.
The most difficult part of improving the cooling system was to make it more efficient. The original system was thin and used two Thermal Interface Materials (TIM), one made of highly conductive carbon fiber, to transfer heat away from the processor. Our answer was to add a layer of copper between the two TIMs, making it possible to transfer more heat between the two materials for more efficient heat dissipation. We also engineered a wider thermal spreading pipe, coming in at 350mm3 compared to the Galaxy S9’s 95mm3, to dissipate heat over a wider surface area.
Thanks to the improved Water Carbon Cooling system, the Galaxy Note9 can effectively manage heat generated from its powerful processor. With the wider thermal spreader and enhanced Carbon Fiber interface, the cooling system conducts and transmits heat efficiently to the surface of the device, allowing the Galaxy Note9 to operate at peak performance consistently. When compared to the Galaxy Note8, the upgraded cooling system’s heat absorption is three times greater and the thermal conductivity is 3.5 times higher.” (Source)
Samsung’s decision to increase the battery capacity in the Note9 to such an enormous amount may be seen as an overkill side of things, keeping in mind the fact that the galaxy Note7 fires were actually a result of it’s battery and design flaws. Samsung had to make a comeback in it’s Galaxy Note series and the new Galaxy Note9 sure seemed promising. It had the biggest screen, the fastest processor, the biggest battery, and the largest storage. But it doesn’t make sense to give all these flashy features if the device’s safety is compromised.
According to TOM’S GUIDE report of their Indoor tests: Note9 didn’t come out to be the coolest!! When they measured the final temperature of each phone (Note9, Note 8 and iPhone X ),the Note9 was actually the hottest, hitting 106 degrees; the Note8 topped out at 103 degrees, and the iPhone X hit 102 degrees. Note9's water carbon cooling system didn't seem to make any noticeable difference in their tests. The consistency was pretty surprising; given that the Note9 uses a water cooling system with carbon fiber (the Note8 also uses water cooling, but without carbon fiber).
Today, all handheld devices require a good cooling system. Samsung’s motive to increase the area for Water Carbon Cooling might have been successful, had they settled with the same battery specifications as of the Galaxy Note8. The improved cooling system alone would have fetched them a good market, and on the side they could figure out a way to increase the battery capacity - devoid of it exploding into flames! Another way to tackle the issue would be devising a heat management system that renders the phone useless until it cools down - similar to what Apple is already implementing in their iphones.
The company had claimed that the Note9 will have better performance, and a better cooling system (three times greater heat absorption) than the Note8, but failed miserably. With the crisis dawning upon the Korean electronics maker for the second time now, the Note series looks to be doomed somehow. It’s imperative that they get back to the drawing board to figure out what went wrong, and delve for a plausible solution.
Samsung launched its Galaxy A7 and A9 models on October 11, 2018 in Malasia in what they called “A Galaxy Event”. The A7 will be showcasing a triple camera featuring ultra wide angles. The fingerprint scanner is moved to the side - now integrated in the power button. The invite for the event had boldly stated “4X Fun”, that referred to the A9’s quad camera- a feature that will probably take the company ahead of the curve. The four cameras are placed exactly in the order given below-
An 8MP Ultra Wide Camera that has a 120 degree coverage (more than what our eyes provide).
A 10MP Telephoto Camera that has 2 times optical zoom.
A 24MP main camera.
A 5MP depth camera that lets you decide what stands out in a frame, and blurs the background.
Samsung says that the new device will bring "more ways to express yourself" and will allow you to "capture the fun". They claim that with their new phones, users will be able to capture the real world as they see it.