[Closed] Smartphones - have we reached peak innovation or have they got further to go?

Can't say I've ever found plugging in a cable terribly difficult.

I mean I [i]could[/i] invest in charging pads, cradles and furniture and then leave them all turned on to save myself up to several seconds a fortnight - but really there are a lot of others things I'd rather they got sorted first!

The only really good point I can see with inductive charging is that it makes it easier to seal the phone to make it waterproof.

I think we need to make the distinction between induction charging with proximity to pads, and wide area wireless charging. Imagine shoes having wireless charging transmitters from walking energy, or solar panel hats? The future's coming people!

I do like that yotaphone though.

wide area wireless charging

The future is here. Electricity over the airwaves.

[img] [/img]

My contribution is to say that nobody knows. Yes we will see the refinements above. But they are not the revolution that a touch screen smart phone is to a Nokia brick.

Key board and mouse has been stable on a PC for a while. So maybe the essence of a phone might not change for a bit, with the current touch screen being the as good as it gets

I wouldn't count on hydrogen fuel cells anytime soon! There are substantial issues with hydrogen power (infrastructure, refueling, safety, packaging etc) before they become a mainstream product.

I do know that intelligent energy are playing around with planar fuel cells for embedded systems in consumer electronics applications though.

Talking about wireless charging. There was a story in a recent New Scientist where radio authorities investigating a black spot in the LW frequency narrowed it down to a house where a guy had hidden an aerial around his garden fence and using it to charge a load of batteries to power 12v lighting in his house he'd pinched from a railway depot. He was also in the process of setting up an inverter to get 240v. That was 50 years ago. 🙂

Screens that can provide feedback by changing shape - IIRC it's been done already but not ready for production yet - eg that little icon would actually be slightly raised so you could feel when you press the right part of the screen. That would significantly improve accuracy of smart screen use.

And ultimately they'll be integrated into your body with a screen in your eye initially and ultimately projected into your mind's eye. Those two may be a little way off though.

in his house he'd pinched from a railway depot

Good effort!

Graphene is the future. Smaller, lighter, bendier, everythinger

mikewsmith - Member
geoffj - Member
Wireless charging will be the next big one,
seriously about 2 years late on that one....

Native on an iPhone? Nope

Yes your phone maker has decided to stick it's head in the sand, sad isn't it? You only get the tech they decide you can have, that they think you are ready for. Could that be one of the biggest stumbling blocks in tech advancement?

project ara where the phone is modula

http://www.projectara.com/faq/

I'd like to see flexible folding screens. Some sort of bio mechanical control. Maybe make calls by movement so you dont even need to look at a screen and tap your contact.
Separate the screen from the phone so we can project the phone ui onto any device we are currently using ( pc, tablet, wrist / arm display)

CountZero: True, but then physically plugging something in so you can transfer data is a pretty archaic practise anyway.

Surely long range wireless charging (as in walk into a room/starbucks with your phone in your pocket and it will start charging) is going to be insanely inefficient? Unless the power transmitter is able to know where a given phone is, and then send power in a narrow beam directly towards the phone (which might well be possible one day, but seems very difficult).

Otherwise with power being beamed out in all directions, it will be analogous to walking around a room that has a lightbulb in the middle of it and a phone-sized solar panel in you pocket. Only a fraction of a percent of the power would make it to the phone.

The New Scientist article about the guy harvesting power from lw radio signals sounds absurd, maybe a fun experiment but the wattage must have been miniscule.

Personally I think that the changes to phones since iOS and android first came about have been mostly gimmicks (galaxy s2 still going strong here). I really don't get what the newest phones can do that mine can't.

Like others, I think the next big thing is being able to wirelessly use a phone to connect to mouse, keyboard and tv/monitor, and have a fully working computer, either using the processor in the phone or a cloud.

Fueled I can't find a link to the full story

But you know the Droitwich Transmitting Station is 500KW?

Chorlton, do you have a link to the article?

Frankly, it's an answer to a problem that most people just don't have.

Yes this thank you not just me. All its saving is the action of plugging and taking a big chunk of plastic and electronics to do so. I've seen people get excited by this and have to wonder why.

Surely battery technology is lagging behind. It'd be nice for a smartphone to last a week of heavy use in between charges.

Imagine a world where you could pop the back of your phone off and easily insert a spare battery when your one is flat.
I would have bought an iPhone if Apple could trust me to perform that simple manoeuvre.

Well the internet appears divided on the truthfulness of the anecdote:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/3336114/Over-to-you-Mythical-electricity.html

Even at 500kw at source, it will be a whole lot less once you are just a mile or so away. Can lw transmitters be directional? ie. more power going away closer to a flat plane rather than up and downwards?

The manufacture of these are very close to reaching a price point where they can be integrated into future phones.
http://www.compoundphotonics.com/products/light-engines

the moto g is the pinnacle of smart phones for me, don't need any more, or rather I'm not willing to spend any more.

Might invest in new tech when the suss out proper augmented reality (it's a silly idea on a phone)and your phone turns into a contact lens, which is the only way that technology will ever catch on. you can shove yer google glass nonsense! 😆

tbh implants and the like are the natural conclusion to the smart phone and technology I reckon. It's seems weird to us, but in the next couple of generations they won't think twice about it.

As a mate pointed out watching an ad for one of those phones at the cinema, you still have to have a charging pad plugged into something to supply power, so what's the difference between that and just using the little cable so thoughtfully supplied by Apple, that not only allows the device to be charged up, but simultaneously allows the transference of data!
I don't see charging pads allowing the device to sync data.
Frankly, it's an answer to a problem that most people just don't have.

Unfortunatly the lack of common place integrated wireless charging in tables etc. may have something to do with apple not adopting a standard and being worried they will end up with incompatible tech.

Chorlton, do you have a link to the article?

No. Looked for it myself and thinking about it, it was on the letters pages. Just thought it was a good story.

Battery tech is unlikely to see massive jumps just incremental improvements. Until then buy a Sony far better battery life than Apple and Samsung IME.

I'm always amazed at how long the battery lasts on my Xperia SP (so not even one of the flagship models!) compared to friend's phones, especially IPhones. So liberating to be able to listen to music in the car for a few hours, do a bit of surfing and make phone calls for 2-3 days without a charger being thought of! It's like having a modern Nokia 😀

I don't really want longer battery life especially; it's rare than I'm away from a power source for long enough to merit it. Rather, batteries need to be much, much smaller.

Try working in a job where ready access to a socket is not guaranteed. Just witness the shock of the teenagers when the battery warning pings onto the screen. It's all very well having all the latest connectivity but if the battery is dead it's just a pretty brick of plastic and precious metals. From a semi-luddite perspective the power appetite of IPhones etc seems to be the barrier to everything else mentioned here. Same as with electric cars.

hmmm

The smart phone no bloody good as a sat nav at least mine isn't so i have a garmin for that

to small for email despite the 5 inch screen so i have a tablet for that.

touch screen is bloody annoying for my fat fingers battery is always flat if i tun anything on..games are all the same you are just chasing pixels across the screen and its to big and fragile for my pocket.

My next phone will be dumb! fed up with the smartphone it promises much and delivers little.

I don't know about peak innovation but the usefulness peak is in the past. 3/4G is about the Internet right?

The browser will give you a lot of advertising rather than something that really corresponds to the key words you entered.

When you find what you are looking for you click and get something else due to an advertising hijack.

When you get rid of the redirect site you find so much advertising on the site itself you have to zoom and move around then accidentally click on something and get more advertising.

I use my phone as a phone, for SMS and as an mp3 player.

A solar charger in the screen wouldn't go amiss...

The browser will give you a lot of advertising rather than something that really corresponds to the key words you entered.

When you find what you are looking for you click and get something else due to an advertising hijack.

When you get rid of the redirect site you find so much advertising on the site itself you have to zoom and move around then accidentally click on something and get more advertising.

This seems very strange and nothing like the browsing experience I have at all, in most cases it's either exactly the same as the web page or a decent mobile version that scales correctly. The only annoying bit is when people don't get the keyboard switch from text to numbers right.

I was in Spain and trying to find a hotel for the night. I gave up and went to the tourist office.

The smart phone no bloody good as a sat nav at least mine isn't so i have a garmin for that

My phone is often used in preference to my in-car sat nav - which is crap.

games are all the same you are just chasing pixels across the screen

In the same way that books are all the same because they just have words in them.

This seems very strange and nothing like the browsing experience I have at all...

Ditto. That sounds more like a Pebcak issue with the sites you were using, rather than any particular failing of smart phones in general.

Graphene.

[img] [/img]

[s]Graphene.[/s] Photoshop fantasy

Wake me up when they can do [i]any[/i] of that.

Bit like "science fiction" you mean?

[img] [/img]

Well yeah, but that science fiction capsule has one foot in science.

As far as I know, graphene isn't actually invisible.

Here's a more realistic sci-fi future:

[img] [/img]

😀

They could make the things a bit tougher.... I'm sick of replacing phone and tablet screens where someone in the house (even the cat!) has dropped, stood upon or just plain unexplainably broken the ****in thing. There must be a polycarbonate type material out there that can withstand scratches like glass and still has the slick touch feel of glass but is practically unbreakable?

CountZero: True, but then physically plugging something in so you can transfer data is a pretty archaic practise anyway

Archaic:

Previous definition: of an early period of art or culture, especially the 7th–6th centuries BC in Greece.

Current definition: about 3 years

🙂

I was in Spain and trying to find a hotel for the night. I gave up and went to the tourist office.

Google Maps -> set to current location -> search for "hotel". ???

Here's a more realistic sci-fi future:

Star Trek could be pretty prescient at times. The PADD is an obvious one, and I believe automatic sliding doors first appeared on ST before they actually existed.

They could make the things a bit tougher.... I'm sick of replacing phone and tablet screens

I've had a mobile phone since... 1999 I think, and I've never, ever had a broken screen. I'd respectfully suggest that it's not a technology issue you're having.

Edukator - Troll

When you get rid of the redirect site you find so much advertising on the site itself you have to zoom and move around then accidentally click on something and get more advertising.

You should stay away from the dodge porn sites! 😆

I've never, ever had a broken screen. I'd respectfully suggest that it's not a technology issue you're having.

I'm guessing you don't have kids. Currently score: one cracked iPad screen, one cracked iPhone screen, and one completely dead Android something or other.

I have kids. The only screen I've ever had broken was when I crashed on my mtb and the phone was in my camelbak hip pocket...

I've never, ever broken a screen neither. However, if I still lived with the ex I could guarantee a different response.

I've never seen someone break (or lose) so many things (sunglasses and phones especially) in my life.

Some people just have a knack. It would be good if phones were more durable....

On one thread wee have people who have never had a problem and on another thread [url= http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/not-sure-how-to-post-this-without-getting-the-post-deleted ]we have.[/url]

Ghostery shows you what's going on in the background. Adult sites are generally clean.

[quote=suburbanreuben ]A solar charger in the screen wouldn't [s]go amiss...[/s] be very useful

I'd rather see advancements in infrastructure rather than the phones. Blanket, reliable 4G for example. Seamless global roaming, that sort of thing.

A solar charger in the screen

Hmm.. here is a 5W solar panel capable of putting out the 5v/1A needed to charge a phone.
http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/5w-solar-panel-kit-l13br

It's £45, pretty big (306 x 218 x 25mm), heavy and not transparent.

I don't think they'll be overlaying them on screens any time soon.

the power of the audio chip in the S6 is roughly 4 times the power the main applications chip was in the S3