To battery experts: Is this a one-off design and/or manufacturing error or are we reaching some limits to what we can do with current lithium battery technology with respect to Ah rating, size, weight, quick charging ability, heat generated with fan-less dissipation, etc.? In other words, is it just a matter of time that other phone manufacturers would hit such issues too?
It's the nature of dense energy storage media to run into problems if the energy is allowed to be released too quickly, but the characteristics of Li-ion do make it more conducive to cause these type of incidents. Battery university has a nice explanation of the typical causes here:
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/safety_concerns_w...
Also, "Charge and Catch Fire: A History of Exploding Batteries and Other Product Recalls":
https://www.thestreet.com/slideshow/13728952/1/samsung-s-bat...
Wasn't this the problem? That the kernel was drawing too much voltage from the battery, or something like that I read.
Seems like they either jumped to conclusions and mis-identified the problem, or they attempted to fix the problem with a band-aid solution with the hopes of reducing the probability of failure just enough to make the issue "go away".
On a more personal note:
I hope this gives other Android phone manufacturers a chance to gain some market share. Primarily, I want HTC to do well. They seem to be one of the most friendly when it comes to unlocking the bootloader (you can do it via their website). I really wanted to get the Galaxy S7, but after finding out that the versions with the SnapDragon SoC will have locked bootloaders, I decided not to. In my experience, Samsung's version of Android has never been that great. Without the ability to flash custom ROMs and remove some of that useless crap, I just couldn't bring myself to make the purchase.
It'd be smart to give the tolerances some extra headroom on the second go-around, but I would guess that in order to get additional certainty on their sample, they would need to run their testing program for longer while the inventory is piling up. And I have to imagine with a production the scale of the Galaxy there are immense pressures to get that inventory moving.
But it sounds like they gambled and lost.
That seems very likely. It's very easy to screw up the fix for a serious issue when you're in a rush. I've deployed my fair share of broken bugfixes.
Paradoxially this kind of tepid circumspect response designed to first protect the brand has a far greater chance of damaging the brand permanently than coming clean unequivocally and proactively taking full responsiblity.
The second approach you take a loss but live to fight another day, the first the public begin to harbour doubts about your commitment to safety and your users and that can cast a long shadow on your future products.
The big problems are (a) they didn't actually seem to get it fixed, (b) they didn't actually seem to get it fixed, and (c) the appearance (and possible reality) that they cut corners initially to get to market before the iPhone.
https://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/hazmat_safety/more_inf...
I'm not the first to think about or wish for this. Many sites have (coincidentally) mentioned or wondered about the same.
Of course, the battery is not much smaller than the phone itself, and removing it exposes the terminals of the battery, making it easier to accidentally short circuit etc. - it's probably safer to leave the battery in the device where it's already contained in one layer of generally non-combusting material.
with regards to your comment the industry should strive to show otherwise and there should not be any reason to not be able to predict this type of failure occurring at the device level. there certainly have to be some telltale signs that are detectable
I may not be able to get a bomb on board, but I sure as shit can short circuit a laptop battery and start a fire.
I'm not sure what the problem is. Maybe Samsung rushed it, maybe it's a defect in some supplier made component, etc I have no idea but it does seem rather unfortunate and kinda sad to see such a nice phone not only be effectively done but it likely caused a lot of brand damage to Samsung in general (lots of reports of airline employees saying Samsung Galaxy phones, not just notes, are not allowed which granted is probably a misunderstanding but the brand impact is there).
My wife currently has a replaced Note 7 and she absolutely loves it and hates that she'll probably have to give it up.
What's particularly wrong with the Note 7 that they can't fix in a PCB or battery redesign?
Anyway, maybe this gives other good Android manufacturers (specially HTC and Sony) a chance to make a comeback.
