- It happens during the best of years,
so you knew it was gonna happen in 2020.
Some things just fall through the cracks.
So, for the last video of the year
I'm purging the backlog
to share overdue thoughts on products
I didn't get around to covering.
From earbuds to electric vehicles.
There's even a telescope in there.
Join me for the inaugural round
of an annual tradition I'm calling, "The Leftovers".
(upbeat music)
Starting us off at number six,
two pairs of true wireless earbuds
that couldn't have less in common.
I've been using Samsung's Galaxy Buds Live
on and off since they arrived
with my Note 20 Ultra review sample.
For reasons that have very little to do with their sound.
You see, I'm not wild about either the audio
or the comfort on these.
They don't fit as well in my ears as buds with in-ear gels
and their sound is just okay.
Partially because of what everyone reported
when these came out, the active noise canceling
just isn't that effective.
But I do still use them because one,
the sound is good enough for a guy
who listens to podcasts just as often as he pumps Pinback.
Two, the convenience is unmatched
if you use one or more Samsung phones on the regular
and three, after years of shipping earbud capsules
that were just too big,
this compact cuboid is as fresh a breath
as the fanciful design of what we've all come to
affectionately call the Galaxy Beans.
Now contrast those with the Bose.
The maker of the legendary quiet comfort line of headphones
brought all its expertise to bear
when it made these earbuds of the same name.
They plug into the ears with a gel and twist-lock combo,
they deliver some of the best noise canceling
you're likely to find on earbuds,
11 customizable levels of it.
And their sound stage is as rich
as the Galaxy Beans are lacking.
But just look at this horse pill.
And not just in relation to the Beans.
The Bose case is literally larger
than some bars of soap I have in my bathroom.
It'll cause questions in pockets,
it'll even take up too much space in some bags,
it's just ludicrously large.
And at 280 bucks, the quiet comforts
cost double what the Galaxy Beans do.
Elsewhere in wearables,
the most asked about smartwatch of the year is Clear.
A lot of you loved the limited edition
Clear Diesel On Fadelight
when I covered it on Instagram back in September,
and it's easy to see why.
Transparent technology,
even when it's only partially transparent
will always catch the eye.
And every time this Wear OS smartwatch
has cameoed in a video
the comments have lit up like a Christmas tree.
Sadly, this one's cemented my doubts
about Diesel's smartwatches.
The foundation they're built on is proven,
the generation 5 core from Fossil Group
underpins everything from the Skagen Falster 3
to Fossil's own Carlyle.
But something about Diesel's implementation
always leads to problems.
This one works better than the Diesel Axial
but thanks to its poultry half gig of RAM
and what I assume are a few unresolved software issues.
It suffers from all the flaws
that gave the Wear OS watches
of yesteryear such a bad name.
Stutters, slow performance and even occasional lockups.
To add insult to injury,
the once perfectly transparent band
is already showing early signs of yellowing
after less than four months.
You can still get the translucent red and blue versions
but when the same 200 bucks can buy you much better models
from Fossil's own catalog, and my personal favorite
the third generation Moto360 is now down to $129.
Well, no matter how pretty it is,
the Diesel On Fadelight is a tough sell by comparison.
And speaking of tough sells,
let's talk about the iPad Pro.
I had plans to review the iPad Pro
which I've been buying almost every year since it debuted.
And I was gonna call it,
"The review you don't need
for the tablet you do."
Because everyone knows the iPad is the best tablet around.
But then something happened
which will be familiar to you subscribers.
I leaned fully into foldables for 2020
and that meant my iPad took an immediate
and permanent backseat to my Galaxy Fold and then Z Fold 2.
Because when you have a tablet you can fold up
and put in your pocket,
you tend not to bother with its big brothers as much.
That said, the iPad Pro still has its place
with the expensive acreage on my 12.9 inch model
really coming in handy when I put it to use
as a second screen.
In addition to the tablet app ecosystem
and all the other conveniences,
if you're already an Apple user,
Sidecar really cements the iPad as not just another toy
but a useful tool when I need some extra desktop.
And before we move on I know you're wondering
what makes my iPad so H-A-W-T,
so a word from my sponsor.
You know DBrand as the company
that lets you customize your devices
with almost as many looks as you can imagine.
I know DBrand as the partner in crime
I turn to when I drop my gadgets
and need to cover up the evidence.
Either way, DBrand makes quality skins at fair prices
and you can hit 'em up at the link in the description.
So, I was sitting here trying to figure out a way
to say that I wouldn't be covering phones
like the OnePlus 8T anymore.
And I was really stuck for a minute
until I watched the intro
to Alex Dobie's review of this phone at Android Central.
- [Alex] Basically take the OnePlus 8,
flatten it out and improve the display a whole bunch,
bump up the battery and add crazy fast charging.
- [Michael] Now, Alex goes on to say
that there are many other things to this phone.
'Cause of course there always are.
And Android Central always covers them very well.
But folks, this kind of mild iteration we're seeing
between increasingly alike slabs of glass, it's dull.
And that's part of what drove me
to cover more cutting edge products like foldables
and dual screen phones and dual screen laptops
and wild combinations of all three.
It's also what inspired my throwback series
"When Phones Were Fun".
Because I wanted to celebrate a time
before phones became these indistinguishable
anonymous candy bars.
To be clear, I'm still covering a ton of phones.
The flagship smartphones from the major brands
are all on the list.
And I'm looking forward to hitting that OnePlus 9,
Galaxy S21, the iPhone 13, et cetera.
But the in-betweens, those 9T's and FE's and SE's,
you'll see fewer videos on those.
And you'll see more on the foldables,
rollables, wing nuts, throwbacks
and sometimes products straight out of left field.
Now, a good example of that latter category
is a product that's mobile only in the sense
that it connects to a phone or tablet,
but it so completely appealed to my inner space nerd
that I just had to review it.
Meet Stellina.
No, it's not a turret from portal.
Instead, well, its massive price aside,
It's kind of a telescope for the rest of us.
Manufacturer Vaonis wanted to make a telescope
that was easier to use.
One that would connect to your phone or tablet,
so stargazing wasn't limited
to peering through an eye piece one at a time.
So, the company sent over a sample of Stellina
in winter 2019 when I was house sitting for my mom
out in the country.
A country whose cloudy November skies
were sadly not conducive to sky watching.
Fortunately for me, the skies of summer
in Suffolk County suck less.
Stellina's setup was just as easy the second time around.
You just mount it to the tripod and connect its battery pack
and then introduce it to your iOS or Android device.
That gives the telescope it's GPS fix
which it then cross references
with a visual fix to get its head on straight.
After that, you go into the app
and basically shop for what faraway object
you'd like to photograph.
A half hour to two hours of self-tracking,
exposure stacking later, bam!
You've got your very own photo of the Dumbbell Nebula.
I love being able to say that not only did I take this photo
of an object 1,200 light-years away,
but that I did it from my dad's porch.
Now due to some compromises in the optics and sensor,
the images are noisier than higher end scopes can output.
And there is still a bit of motion blur,
despite the auto tracking.
Also don't expect to shoot
our neighbor planets with this glass.
Stellina is optimized for objects much further out,
and it costs $4,000.
That's a hefty premium for convenience
and relative portability.
Still, Vaonis has already announced
a much more affordable sibling named "Vespera"
currently on Kickstarter.
And my astrophotographer friend, Chris Pearson
sees a lot of potential for this new category of telescope.
He shared a lot of great thoughts with me.
I'll link to his YouTube channel and of course,
to Vaonis and every product
in this video in the description.
(relaxing music)
(wind roaring)
Finally, there's the matter of cars.
Specifically electric cars, more specifically
how they fit into the channel going forward.
See, when I started Mr. Mobile in 2016,
electric vehicles were gonna be
one of the channels tent poles.
As such, I tried to log as much time
inside alternative fueled vehicles as I could.
Tesla test drives, hydrogen powered road trips,
EVie excursions, concept car unveilings,
single-driver cars, I even took a quick ride
in the Cyber Truck.
But with more automakers launching electrics,
and these videos taking a lot of time and effort to shoot,
there was just no way I could maintain
the production pace to keep up.
And to be honest, while the videos did okay,
car videos have always underperformed on average
which has real ramifications
when it comes to how the YouTube algorithm treats a channel
and therefore how healthy that channel can ultimately be.
So, my last extended time with an EVie
resulted in four days worth of footage
that I've been trying to figure out what to do with
for over a year.
It was spent behind the wheel
of the gorgeous and all electric Jaguar I-Pace
with friend of the channel David Cogen
of TheUnlockr riding shotgun
on a Hollywood road trip that took us from
the Peterson Automotive Museum
to the Griffith observatory,
to a variety of bars with questionable characters.
To my West Coast hotel Mainstay, the RMS Queen Mary.
While my intention was to review the I-Pace,
as I say, you're not really here for car reviews
and maybe I'm not either.
It wasn't until I combined my memories of the I-Pace
with a more recent jaunt behind the wheel
of a new Chevy Bolt,
that I realized, hey, charging an EVie
as a new owner can still be really inconvenient.
So, I want to talk about EVie charging infrastructure.
And I've done a lot of talking about the technology
packed under the hood of these things,
but not so much about the cockpit and creature comforts,
and how they stack up.
And most importantly, taking a page
out of David Cogen's book,
I want to talk a lot more about the experiences
these cars enable.
A bit less about the cars themselves.
Now, whether that takes the form of standalone videos
or a new series or a tie-in with the road trip reviews
that I now do for smartphones, I don't know.
Point is, expect me to shake it a little on the auto front.
And if you have suggestions or requests
I'd love to hear 'em in the comments.
(airplane roaring)
But you know, as tiring and miserable
and prematurely aging as this year has genuinely been.
2020 has also given me an opportunity
to experiment with things like series ideas
and new approaches to videos
that I don't think would have been possible
if I was still constantly on the road, like always.
So, thank you for giving me the leeway
to experiment with those things
and figuring out what the Mr. Mobile of 2020 wants to be.
And stay tuned for more surprises in 21.
(upbeat music)
This video featured a mix of review and retail devices
both purchased by Mr. Mobile
and provided by or loaned from
their respective manufacturers.
As always though, the opinions in this video are my own
and no manufacturer was given editorial input,
copy approval rights, or an early preview of this content.
They're seeing it for the first time right alongside you.
Until next time, thanks for watching.
Keep those masks on when you're around others
and cross your fingers for a better new year
as you stay mobile, my friends.