Kyocera and CAT: Will They Ever Take Smartphones Seriously?
Type "Kyocera" into YouTube. The first thing you might get is the following: Kyocera's Torque Phone: Smashing This Phone Won't Stop It From Working. Type "CAT" into YouTube and you'll get... um... the predictable: small, furry, cute, carnivorous mammals commonly kept as pets. Try "CAT Smartphones" and then you'll get what I'm talking about in this unique context.
CAT, short for Caterpillar Incorporated, is an American company headquartered in Peoria, Illinois. It also claims to be the the world’s leading manufacturer of construction and mining equipment, diesel and natural gas engines, industrial turbines and diesel-electric locomotives. Kyocera Corporation on the other hand, is a Japanese multinational manufacturer headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. They claim to be the leading supplier of solar power generating systems, mobile phones, printers, copiers, printheads, LCDs, electronic components, semiconductor packages, cutting tools and industrial ceramics. Wow, that is surely a lot of goods!
So ok, these companies' products really do have a lot of international recognition and use. You see them all over worksites and several other places. But as you can obviously see, this blog post is about why they don't seem to take smartphones seriously, whether they ever will, and why they should seriously start doing so: because Samsung. What about Samsung? Their Samsung Galaxy S Active series have fallen in grace, ever since the S6 Active. In my opinion, the last good Galaxy S Active was the Samsung Galaxy S5 Active. It had a tiny 12.9cm screen which would make it puny in my books. But despite that, it had proper mechanical navigation buttons, a full high-definition display, Snapdragon 801 Socket-on-Chip and a removable battery with IP68 water-resistance. "HUH?! B-but I thought smartphones had to be sealed with bucket loads of glue to achieve that type of rating?!" Wrong. That's what a lot of these misinformed journalists, YouTubers and even the companies themselves, want you to believe. This couldn't be anything further from the truth. Kyocera's own Kyocera DuraForce XD also boasted IP68 water-resistance and had a removable battery. I'll discuss this device later in the post.
So what went wrong with the 6th, 7th and 8th iterations of the Active smartphones? They became less functional, and more fashion focused. Sad. The 6th iteration, lost both its microSD card slot and removable battery. Really stupid, but at least it kept its mechanical buttons, active key and significantly boosted the battery capacity. The 7th iteration got an even larger battery, and the microSD slot came back. So to be fair, the 7th would have honestly been the 2nd best Galaxy Active, despite the non-removable battery. For the 8th iteration, gone is the Active key and mechanical buttons. The Active key is replaced with that stupid Bixby button that most people hate! Consumers want a dedicated camera button. Not a button for a voice assistant, which Google already provides. And because the regular S8 and S8+ both have IP68 water-resistance, the S Active series at this point is now just an uglier version of its standard counterparts. Talk about a waste of resources.
After reading all of that, you must be thinking, "Is this supposed to be an article on Kyocera and Caterpillar, or a Samsung Galaxy Active bash article?" It's about Kyocera and Caterpillar, but it was extremely important that I first highlighted the fall of the most popular, high-end, rugged smartphone. That way, you can realize how silly Kyocera and Caterpillar have been to not take advantage by offering high-end smartphones to challenge the Galaxy S Active series, and make them look silly about become fashion conscious. Why do I think these two have been really pathetic? Because of what their latest smartphones have offered. I'll explain starting with Caterpillar first.
Alright, to be honest, the upcoming CAT S61 actually has a lot going for it: an improved camera, air quality detection, laser measuring, a normal 16:6 ratio and more. It's biggest downfall would be its Snapdragon 630 chipset. Why? Because for a smartphone that's allegedly going to cost €799, it should be using the very best Socket-on-Chip for 2018: Snapdragon 845! And based on a few hand-on videos I've watched on YouTube, some pointed out the mid-range chipset for struggling with some of the resource intensive applications. Not good. So if only they had just gone with Snapdragon 845 it would have made a notable difference. Also, because it uses its camera and screen for a lot of its technological functions, increasing the native resolution to flagship-modern 2540 x 1440 (2K) or even 3840 x 2160 (4K) would put it right on par with the other high-end guys. Lastly, the 13.2cm screen is puny in my books. I know, I know, me and my bias with tiny screens. But seriously, I'd like to see them make something with 18cm of screen estate. It would allow for more productivity and media related business. So Caterpillar may actually be starting to take its smartphones more seriously, despite the flaws I've pointed out. They said that they'll be planning to give the CAT S61 an upgrade to Android 9.0 Pop-Tart, which further proves a change of attitude.
Kyocera! Out of the two manufactures I'm discussing here, they are by far the biggest offender with their attitude towards their smartphones! Their newest half-decent smartphone was released all the way back in October 2016, Kyocera DuraForce Pro. It had some middle-ranged specifications on paper with its Snapdragon 617 chipset and full high-definition resolution. Unfortunately, a lot of users complained about the device breaking or not being as reliable as it was touted to be. They also hated the camera quality, despite it being touted as 13MP. It also doesn't help that Kyocera doesn't seem to upgrade their smartphones to at least one major version of Android. I haven't ever heard of them at least unlocking their bootloaders either. Maybe that's changed. Maybe it hasn't.
If there's one smartphone of theirs that caught my attention most, and would have had a lot of potential if loaded properly, it would be the Kyocera DuraForce XD. It had a massive 3700 milliampere hour removable battery, IP68 water-resistace and a 14.4cm screen, making it the same size as the Samsung Galaxy Note 5. A quick search will reveal why it was dead on arrival: very poor specifications! The screen resolution was supbar for a device that large, the chipset was really weak, and so was the camera. On top of all this, the Kyocera DuraForce XD remains stuck on Android 5.1 lollipop with a locked bootloader.
Now at this point, you might thinking that Kyocera and Caterpillar just don't give two hoots about making high-end smartphones to compete with Samsung's S Active Series. Their goal is solely to make devices that can take a wicked beating and make calls, right? Sure, if that's all they're going after, then they have succeeded greatly. But as you can obviously tell from my desire to create this post, I seriously think that they should do more than just that. Why would they want to just let Samsung get away with being the only maker of high-end, ruggedized smartphones when they have huge potential to take a bite out of their lunch? It's like having a big, strong, rough-tough man, getting up from the dessert table to go and paint his nails. And then all you do is just stare at his complete cookie butter cheesecake. Why not take a slice? The opportunity is staring you right in the face.
People probably might not have thought about the importance and difference it would make to have more proper, high-end choices in the ruggedized smartphone world. If you've taken the time to read this entire post, I hope that I've been able to successfully make you aware of this. Oh, how nice it would be to have a nice, large, high-end, rugged device that wouldn't shut off in frigid, Canadian weather, even after recording for 30 minutes!
*This post contains affiliate links
If there's one smartphone of theirs that caught my attention most, and would have had a lot of potential if loaded properly, it would be the Kyocera DuraForce XD. It had a massive 3700 milliampere hour removable battery, IP68 water-resistace and a 14.4cm screen, making it the same size as the Samsung Galaxy Note 5. A quick search will reveal why it was dead on arrival: very poor specifications! The screen resolution was supbar for a device that large, the chipset was really weak, and so was the camera. On top of all this, the Kyocera DuraForce XD remains stuck on Android 5.1 lollipop with a locked bootloader.
Now at this point, you might thinking that Kyocera and Caterpillar just don't give two hoots about making high-end smartphones to compete with Samsung's S Active Series. Their goal is solely to make devices that can take a wicked beating and make calls, right? Sure, if that's all they're going after, then they have succeeded greatly. But as you can obviously tell from my desire to create this post, I seriously think that they should do more than just that. Why would they want to just let Samsung get away with being the only maker of high-end, ruggedized smartphones when they have huge potential to take a bite out of their lunch? It's like having a big, strong, rough-tough man, getting up from the dessert table to go and paint his nails. And then all you do is just stare at his complete cookie butter cheesecake. Why not take a slice? The opportunity is staring you right in the face.
People probably might not have thought about the importance and difference it would make to have more proper, high-end choices in the ruggedized smartphone world. If you've taken the time to read this entire post, I hope that I've been able to successfully make you aware of this. Oh, how nice it would be to have a nice, large, high-end, rugged device that wouldn't shut off in frigid, Canadian weather, even after recording for 30 minutes!
*This post contains affiliate links
No comments:
Post a Comment