So it's been a pretty rough year for gaming phones, with both the ROG Phone 5 and the
Legion Phone 2 getting a game over in their first durability test.
It's time to see if this Black Shark 4 can hold up any better.
Today's video is sponsored by Omaze who I partnered up with to give away a brand new,
custom Tesla Model S and $20,000 in cash that you can keep for yourself or pay it forward.
Omaze does these massive giveaways while supporting nonprofits.
And in this particular case we're supporting a nonprofit called Give Power, which helps
get energy and clean water to regions around the globe that need it.
I'll explain more at the end of the video, but you can always go to omaze.com/jerry to
get entered for your chance to win.
And of course I'll put a link in the description.
I think it's time we see how durable this Black Shark 4 really is.
Let's get started.
[Intro]
The Black Shark 4 is intriguing for multiple reasons, one is it's $500 price point, and
the other is this active refrigerating coolant we'll get to in a second.
Inside the box we get a free hard plastic case...kind of nice.
Free protection is a good thing.
And then we have the phone itself.
It's quite a bit different than last year's design.
Still incredibly flashy like a gaming phone usually is.
But we are missing the metal X framed across the back panel which means that this bend
test could be rather interesting.
It's also got a 1020 watt fast charger in the box.
Black Shark was one of the first devices to every implement that dual battery charging,
so I assume that's what's going on again this year.
120 watts is an impressive amount of power and should get from 0-100% charged in just
about 17 minutes.
We'll try out the case just for kicks and giggles.
I always have a case on my own phone.
It looks like the case won't be compatible with that refrigerated cooler though so we
can just take it off for now.
The other interesting component on this new Black Shark phone is the physical motorized
popup trigger buttons on the corners.
Most gaming phones have some kind of capacitive or ultrasonic trigger buttons on the frame,
but there's something to be said for an actual tactile button.
These buttons can be mapped to all kinds of different tasks when not in gaming mode.
And this year instead of motorizing these buttons, this rising action is done with magnets.
I'm not totally sure how, but I'm sure we'll figure it out from the inside during the teardown,
you know, if it survives that long.
Let's talk about the refrigerating cooler for a second.
Getting rid of the excess heat is a task that every piece of electronics has to deal with.
Most smartphones have a passive method of cooling with heatpipes and vapor chambers.
And some have a more active solution like the dual fans inside of the Legion 2...may
he rest in peace.
Out of the box, this fun Cooler 2 Pro has a starting temperature of 73 degrees fahrenheit,
and once I get it plugged into an external power source we instantly get fan movement
as well as a digital readout of the cooler's temperature.
And within seconds we've already dropped 20 degrees down to 56 degrees fahrenheit.
This is an active cooler on steroids and it's surprisingly inexpensive.
Last year's version only cost like 40 dollars right now.
We'll leave this over here on the side to see how cold it can really get while we start
testing this Black Shark 4, starting with the scratch test.
Xiaomi is nice enough to include a built in screen protector on the Black Shark 4.
We'll rip that off and test the surface underneath.
As we know, plastic screens will start scratching a level 2 or 3.
Glass will start scratching at 5 or 6.
And sapphire screens will start scratching at level 8 or 9.
And as we can see from the Black Shark 4, it's made with tempered glass since we get
scratches starting at level 6, with deeper grooves starting at level 7.
We haven't run across a plastic screen in a while.
Our refrigerated cooler is still over there just chilling, now down to 0 degrees celsius.
My laser temperature thermometer is showing about 38 Fahrenheit which is about 3 degrees
celsius.
So it looks like there is a few degrees of discrepancy, but it could also just be that
the internal thermas location is closer to the cooler than my laser is.
Either way, it's still pretty impressive.
Let's keep going.
The Black Shark 4 does have a tiny hole punch cut out in the screen for that 20 pixel selfie
camera, and dual stereo speakers.
The earpiece is covered with a plastic grill that won't be coming off on it's own.
The side magnetic popup buttons are also made from metal, along with the textured switch
that activates the rising.
The buttons seem solid and can't be pried out, or damaged with hammering, which is good
news.
The rest of the frame is also metal.
The side mounted fingerprint reading power button is scratchable, but we'll get to that
more in a second.
The top of the phone is pretty empty.
Then we have the dual SIM card tray and volume rocker on the left side, both of which are
made from metal.
The SIM card tray does not include any expandable memory.
However, the bottom of the phone does have a USB-C and a little friend, the headphone
jack.
Another example of an inexpensive phone to rival with more features than the expensive
ones.
When I first pulled the Black Shark 4 out of the box, I just assumed the black panel
was glass.
Turns out though, it's not.
It's fine with me though.
Art Class with Jerry is back in session.
the fun cooler is now in the negative digits - just below freezing.
And here on the back of the Black Shark 4 we now have a tooth.
Pretty accurately sized for a Great White Shark, you know, the massive sharks currently
swimming around in the ocean today.
I drew a Great White tooth because if I were to draw an extinct Megalodon tooth it wouldn't
fit since the largest Megladon tooth ever found is about 7 inches long, and would disappear
off the top and bottom of the plastic panel.
How's that for freaky.
The Black Shark 4 has 3 rear cameras: the main 48 megapixel sensor, then we have an
8 megapixel wide angle in the middle, followed by a 5 megapixel depth sensor all tucked up
under the same piece of glass.
With our freezer over there as cold as ice, it's only fair to bring some heat from the
opposite end of the temperature spectrum.
This guy has a 6.6 inch 1080p display, with a 144 hertz refresh rate, and a 720 hertz
touch sampling rate.
Pretty similar to that Legion Dual 2.
This Black Shark 4's AMOLED display lasted about 25 seconds under the heat from my lighter
before going white, but eventually did recover.
Before we check out that icicle of a cooler, let's test the side mounted fingerprint scanner.
This has already been scratched so it did take a little longer than normal to set up
my fingerprint since it was damaged.
But I'll be honest, I think I prefer this side mounted setup on the power button more
than I do the under display sensors since if it doesn't register my fingerprint or my
fingers are wet or dirty, my finger is already on the power button and just makes unlocking
the phone that much faster.
I wish more smartphones did it this way.
Finally, let's see how this refrigerated cooler works from the inside.
Black Shark is calling this the Fun Cooler 2.
We had it down to about negative 1 degree celsius when all by itself.
Clipping it to a warm phone brings it up to about 3 degrees celsius, but that's still
like playing with your phone inside of a refrigerator.
Pretty much guaranteed to keep things cool and would allow the internal processor to
be pushed far beyond its normal capacity.
There are 3 screws underneath the fan grill, and then we have a thin piece of black rubber,
which probably helps keep the plastic back of the phone protected from the metal copper
layer of the cooler.
There are 4 screws holding that bottom copper to the fan.
Black Shark is using a thermal electric cooler inside of this thing, sometimes called a Peltier
Cooler since that's the guy who came up with it back in the 1830's.
Little did he know though that people would be using his tech to more efficiently throw
Angry Birds at pigs on their smartphones.
Welcome to the future.
The internal board components are covered with a thick rubber waterproofing layer.
Since the super low temperature differences can literally form ice inside of here in humid
environments, and you might think that this metal part and these metal fins are for the
phone, but this is actually made for the backside of the Peltier Cooler since the far side of
the white freezer chip gets hotter as the side facing the phone gets colder.
We can see this in action as I plug in the disassembled cooler and remove the freezer
chip from the backside of the heatsink without the fan and metal cooler to help get rid of
that heat that the Peltier Cooler is producing, it can get up into the 150 degree range before
it gets too hot to touch.
It's pretty cool technology.
Even cooler is that this pretty much fits any phone, not just the Black Shark 4.
Peltier chips can also be used to generate the electricity when placed in extreme temperature
situations, but that's an experiment for a different video.
It's time to see how well the Black Shark 4, with it's plastic back and popup triggers
can handle the bend test.
I'm kind of nervous since the last two gaming phones didn't survive.
But with a bend from the back, the phone does flex, then locks out and does not break.
When flipped over and bent from the front, we do get a subtle bend and the screen shrinks
down into one-handed mode, but nothing is catastrophically broken.
It's kind of nice having a phone survive again.
It bends the most right above the power button so I imagine that's where the battery and
motherboard meet up inside of the device.
But we won't know for sure until the teardown.
I'm looking forward to this one.
Not bad for a $500 gaming phone.
You just make sure you keep an eye out for all the saltwater Megalodons when you're out
in the ocean.
Speaking of the ocean...Like I mentioned earlier, Omaze is a company that works with creators
to provide experiences and work with nonprofits.
And for each donation made, you get entered to win super large prizes.
In this particular case it's a custom Tesla Model S, and $20,000.
Samantha W. won the Tesla Model 3 Performance in the last dream house giveaway.
The nonprofit we are supporting is called Give Power.
There are over 2.2 billion people on the earth that don't have access to clean water, and
Give Power is able to provide electricity and clean water to those people who need it.
Give Power is also able to pull salt out of the ocean to make clean drinking water for
humans, animals, and plants.
It's pretty cool technology.
So for your chance to win the custom Tesla Model S and $20,000 in cash, just head to
Omaze.com/jerry to enter for your chance to win.
Huge thanks to Omaze for putting this on, bringing awareness to Give Power and making
things a little more interesting for people who decide to donate.
Do you think the Black Shark 4 is going to be as complicated to open as the Black Shark
3?
Let me know down in the comments.
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And thanks a ton for watching.
I'll see you around.