Nothing has something new for us today: the incredibly unique looking Nothing Phone 2.
And we get the world's first exclusive look at what's under the glass. At first glance,
the pillowed back panel makes me kinda nervous. Raised or exposed edges usually crack first during
impacts, but time will tell. It's time we delve into the depths of nothing. Let's get started.
[Intro]
The Nothing Phone 2 is IP54 water resistant. Good for a few splashes here or there, but definitely
no submersion. Like always, heat is our best friend during the back panel removal, along with
our trusty matte black JerryRigEverything razor knife. $14.95. Link in the description. Lifting
up on the panel with a large suction cup, the blade sliced just below the perfectly clear back
glass. Cutting through the adhesive to help lift the glass from the frame. And you gotta admit,
the lights do look pretty cool. With the original Nothing Phone 1, we got 5 strips of
LED illumination, with 12 notification zones. Here on this Nothing 2 though, we get a substantial
upgrade to 11 LED strips, and 33 individual lighting zones – meaning that the LEDs can be used
for far more diverse notifications...like progress bars for both charging and timers, including
volume levels and custom ringtones. 33 individual lighting zones on the back, and two and a half
million individual lighting zones on the front of the front (ba-dum-tss).OLED jokes are lit.
With the glass totally separated we can see that the pillowed three dimensional effect of the slab
is not due to a thicker piece of glass as it insinuates, but actually because it's a turtle
shell shape – the edges are curved inward. Again, having the radius so close to the edge
of the glass makes me nervous about longevity – especially when it's thin. The 7 silver T4 screws
under the glass are entirely functional, each with their own little dab of blue thread locker.
If you remember, I did count the individual LEDs of the original Nothing Phone 1 and we got 971
total lights all lined up in pairs. And it looks like this time around Nothing is doing the same
thing again – pairing up LEDs under an aesthetic white diffusing sticker. The LEDs themselves are
a brilliant blue shade up in the 6,000 or 7,000 kelvin, and the sticker brings it back down to
a more 5,000 white daylight color temperature. Taking special care, of course, to distinguish
between color kelvin and temperature kelvin. I haven't measured, of course, but I'm going to
guess that the LED strips are not 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit. The LED layers are not one uniform
board, but actually several separate components, and are hiding 8 more black Phillips head screws
throughout the layers, making disassembly slightly more painful. But I've been told
that beauty is pain. And getting to see some of the insides from the outsides is totally worth it.
The red recording LED filter comes off with some persuasion, followed by the wireless charger and
several of the LED strips. Most of the LED zones have a singular gold contact pad supplying power
to the strip, but the more complex zone, like the progress bar in the top right quadrant of the
charging pad, has its own Lego-style ribbon which is able to handle the 16 addressable zones in this
section alone. The 15 watt wireless charger is also capable of reverse wireless charging at 5
watts, probably so the Nothing Phone can provide power to the Nothing headphones without any wires.
The earpiece, which also comes out with the back panel, has some waterproofing mesh over
the opening, as well as the little white foam balls inside, which help the speaker
sound bigger than it actually is. Nothing has been very vocal about their phone being slightly more
environmentally friendly than other mainstream devices, which is great. Keep in mind though,
that the more environmentally friendly thing you can do is actually not buy a
new phone at all. But it is nice that Nothing is factoring in the environment
and using things like removable batteries and recycled metal in the frame and circuit board.
Even with the pull tab the battery is still very strongly adhered to the phone, but it's
nice that the tab doesn't break. Thumbs up for that. This is a 4,700 milliamp hour capacity.
With the battery gone we get a glimpse at the gloriously gold vapor chamber and
we can start removing the circuit boards. The lower board has a single screw in our SIM card
tray. It's also been globbed up with glue to help protect the little components from water.
With the board gone we can pop out the USB-C charging port which can charge up at 33 watts.
And then we can remove the lower loudspeaker which also has balls of its own. The charging
port ribbon can pop off the main board just like a little Lego, and that's all that it is.
A single port with a red rubber ring and a long traversing ribbon that goes
the entire length of the phone. Super simple and easy to repair.
The main board has 2 more screws and a few signal wires holding it in place.
And when those are gone it can lift up and out of the phone body,
giving us full access to the 32 megapixel selfie camera, which does not have OIS. The
50 megapixel ultrawide camera also does not have that optical image stabilization. But
the main 50 megapixel camera below it does have both OIS and EIS. Nothing has included
some thermal paste to help facilitate the passage of heat from the motherboard to
the gold vapor chamber. And as I always say, happy thermal paste is the best thermal paste.
Again, down at the bottom of the phone we have the world's smallest vibrator, along with an optical
fingerprint scanner. It's a rather beautiful device from both the inside perspective as well
as from what can be seen of the insides from the outside perspective. I think Nothing has
done a good job of coming in, establishing an eye catching, unique footprint, in an otherwise
very boring, rectangular space. And I'm a fan of where they're headed. If the phone turns
back on you gotta subscribe. And there you have it. Nothing is better than coming back to life.
With the silver screws and back panel set in place, our Nothing Phone 2 is back in business.
Thanks a ton for watching, and I'll see you around.