0:01 We reached out to Mr. Who's the Boss to
0:03 find out what he would put into his
0:04 dream smartphone. In this video, we're
0:06 going to cover all the specs, how much
0:08 it would cost, and we even got one of
0:10 our community members to mock up for us.
0:11 >> Whoever's done this is insanely talented.
0:12 talented.
0:14 >> So, let's get into it. Mr. Who's the
0:16 Boss, aka Aaron, has reviewed thousands
0:18 of devices over his career, so we were
0:20 in curious to find out what specs he
0:21 would prioritize if he was to develop
0:23 his own smartphone. Normally when we
0:24 make these videos, the creator will send
0:26 over a bulletoint list of specs they
0:27 want to include in their smartphone. But
0:29 Aaron being quite the overachiever, sent
0:31 us two and a half pages of demands that
0:32 we have to decipher. We also hopped on a
0:34 call to clarify a few details, but the
0:36 summary of what he's after is as
0:38 follows. People already spend a lot of
0:40 money on their phones, but there doesn't
0:41 really exist something right now, which
0:42 is like you don't want to use a
0:44 foldable, but you still want to invest a
0:46 lot of money in your phone experience
0:47 because it matters to you, because you
0:49 love it. So basically, Aaron wants to
0:50 spend a lot of money where every penny
0:52 is invested into the most premium
0:54 experience. Sounds simple enough, right?
0:55 We shared this with all the experts here
0:56 at Nothing to find out what it would
0:58 take to make his dream phone come to
0:59 life. To start us off, Aaron wants to
1:02 include Chi 2.2 wireless charging for
1:03 his device. For those who don't know,
1:05 Chi 2.2 is a new wireless charging
1:06 standard which allows for faster
1:08 charging speeds, better efficiency, and
1:10 allows devices to remain compatible with
1:12 Apple's MagSafe. Well, that sounds
1:14 simple enough, right? But in reality, at
1:15 the time of recording, there's only two
1:17 brands that have tackled the full CHI
1:19 2.2. 2 certification with magnets.
1:21 That's HMD with their Skyline and Google
1:23 with their new Pixel 10 lineup. So, why
1:26 haven't other brands done this yet? I do
1:27 actually know, but uh I'm not going to
1:29 tell you until you subscribe.
1:31 >> You proud of that?
1:34 >> What? Anyway, we spoke to big dog
1:35 Raymond and he explained everything we
1:37 needed to know. But first, a bit of
1:39 context. Wireless charging works through
1:41 electromagnetic induction. Inside the
1:43 charging pad is a coil of wire. When
1:44 alternating current flows through the
1:46 coil, it produces an oscillating
1:47 magnetic field. Your phone also has a
1:49 coil of wire inside, and when it's
1:51 placed on the pad and the coils align,
1:52 the magnetic field induces an
1:54 alternating current in the phone's coil.
1:55 The phone's electronics then convert
1:57 this current into direct current, which
1:59 charges the battery. Isn't science
2:00 great? Anyway, when you're using a
2:02 normal wireless charging pad, often the
2:03 alignment with your phone isn't great.
2:05 So, at best, you're going to get 15 W of
2:07 wireless charging. that compared to the
2:08 65 watts you could be getting with a
2:10 cable on the phone 3. Well, it's just
2:12 not that compelling of an option,
2:13 especially when you consider that it
2:15 also generates additional heat. Mag Safe
2:17 and Ch2 remedy this by adding magnets,
2:18 which means that your two cores are more
2:20 perfectly aligned. This optimized
2:21 configuration means that you get much
2:23 more respectable charging speeds up to
2:25 25 W. And it also means you get to stick
2:26 cool accessories on the back of your
2:28 phone. Isn't that nice? Now, onto the
2:30 main question. Why don't more phones
2:32 have this? The sad reality is it's down
2:34 to legal red tape, industry politics,
2:35 and a whole load of bullit. Even though
2:37 G2 is a wireless standard that anyone
2:39 can use, the magnet configurations that
2:41 optimally support Apple compatible
2:42 wireless chargers are patented and
2:44 restricted. The only way to get around
2:45 this is to develop your own magnetic
2:47 wireless charger to work with your
2:48 device. But because the magnets in your
2:50 device are not the exact same
2:51 configuration as Apple's Mag Safe,
2:53 there's a good chance the cores may not
2:54 be perfectly aligned and you won't get
2:56 the optimized charge speed and you'll
2:58 generate more heat. So, it seems a lot
2:59 of companies have probably weighed up
3:00 the pros and cons of doing this, but the
3:02 reality is it's just not worth it for
3:04 them, especially when wired charging
3:06 solutions are so much faster. When we
3:07 asked our team how much it would cost
3:09 roughly to develop our own wireless
3:11 charging system, they estimated it would
3:13 be about $10 million. But look at the
3:14 name of the video. This is Aaron's dream
3:16 phone, so of course we're going to do
3:18 it. Adding 10 million to the pot, plus
3:20 an additional $4 for the charge coil.
3:22 Next up, we have cameras. And for this,
3:23 Aaron requested the same system as the
3:25 Xiaomi 15 Ultra because he likes the
3:27 style of the images. Now, we haven't
3:28 really gone into this before on the
3:29 channel, but there's loads of reasons
3:31 why image styles differ between
3:32 different brands. Phone camera sensors
3:34 don't have the luxury of size compared
3:36 to their DSLR or mirrorless
3:38 counterparts. For example, the phone 3
3:40 has a 1 over 1.3 in main sensor that
3:44 measures about 9.8x 7 mm. That's tiny
3:45 compared to the camera we're filming on
3:47 right now, which has a full-frame sensor
3:51 that measures 35.6x 23.8 mm. So, how do
3:52 phone brands keep up with such a big
3:53 size difference?
3:56 >> Come on now, dog. Come on, man.
3:58 >> Over the past 20 years, smartphone
3:59 cameras have closed the gap
4:01 considerably, partly due to advancements
4:03 in hardware, but mostly due to something
4:04 called computational photography. This
4:06 translates to a bunch of algorithms
4:08 which are used to enhance your photos.
4:09 And it's these algorithms that the main
4:11 reason for different styles between
4:12 brands. And the teams that make these
4:14 ain't cheap. For example, here at
4:16 Nothing, we have about 100 people in our
4:17 camera team, which is tiny compared to
4:19 Apple, which reportedly has a camera
4:22 team of about 800 people. Isn't that
4:24 more than like our whole company? Yeah.
4:25 Yeah.
4:27 >> Oh, these teams work for months to get
4:29 the best out of a smartphone sensor. We
4:30 tried to find out how many tuning
4:32 versions we had during Phone 3's
4:34 development. And Raymond's response was,
4:36 "Uh, it's hard." But basically, a new
4:38 version every day over the development
4:39 period. And how long is that period?
4:41 Well, about 6 months, which means before
4:43 Phone 3 released, there had been 180 or
4:45 more software versions for the camera,
4:47 which is kind of nuts. Anyway, how much
4:49 does this all cost? Well, for the MKBHD
4:51 video, we bundled all of this into the
4:53 research and development line item, and
4:54 we also didn't account for staffing
4:55 costs, but we're going to rectify this
4:57 now. So, for camera tuning, it's going
4:59 to cost us 30.7 million. Add that to the
5:01 bill. So, the next one's a little bit
5:03 rogue, but it shows that Aaron's
5:04 thinking about the most premium
5:06 smartphone experience. So, this section
5:08 is about customer service. Now, customer
5:09 service is really important when you're
5:11 thinking about buying a new smartphone.
5:12 When you're spending so much money, you
5:13 want to make sure that if the
5:14 unthinkable happens, you're not going to
5:16 be left in the lurch. Aaron wants to
5:18 make sure there's someone available 247
5:19 on the phone in case he faces any
5:21 problems with his device. Now, we
5:22 actually already offer this service at
5:23 nothing for our English speaking
5:25 customers, but for this to be a truly
5:26 global and premium experience, we should
5:28 have multi- language support all the
5:29 time. So, we're going to calculate for
5:31 that. He also pointed out that it would
5:32 be nice to have a single point of
5:34 contact across your entire customer
5:35 service journey. And we think this is
5:37 fair because at some brands you end up
5:39 speaking to multiple agents across the
5:41 journey and that kind of sucks. Anyway,
5:43 enough of all the boring logistics.
5:45 How much is this all going to cost?
5:46 Well, typically phone companies will
5:48 attribute about 5% of a devices's
5:50 revenue to customer support, but for
5:51 this enhanced experience, we're going to
5:53 have to bump that up to 7%. Now, that
5:54 might not sound like much, but when you
5:56 multiply that across several devices and
5:58 consider the material cost of the phones
5:59 themselves, this is all going to add up.
6:01 And with all the premium materials in
6:02 this phone, that's going to add about
6:04 $80 to the cost, which will support the
6:06 phone across 7 years. Now, we've done a
6:07 few of these videos at this point, so I
6:09 don't need to tell you the cost of all
6:10 of the individual components in a
6:11 smartphone, but we're going to put them
6:13 on screen for you. Now, one thing to
6:14 note is that Aaron asked us to include
6:16 the Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, but we
6:18 know they normally release an improved
6:19 chip around October. So, we'll jump
6:21 ahead and add that in, which increases
6:24 the price to around $200. That gives us
6:27 a grand total bomb of $1,163.
6:29 But to develop out and improve all of
6:30 the other elements like customer
6:32 service, camera, and all the other R&D,
6:33 the whole project would come in
6:37 somewhere around $26,350,000.
6:38 Now, you might have noticed a little
6:39 asterisk in there, but don't worry,
6:40 we're going to cover that at the end of
6:42 the video. Okay. Now the money chat's
6:44 out of the way, it's time to show the
6:46 big dog his final design. Thankfully, he
6:47 gave us plenty of references, saying he
6:49 likes the angularness of the cheuring
6:50 phone and the visor-like camera bar of
6:52 the old Pixel 6 phones. Pairing those
6:54 with a quadcurved display, he gave our
6:55 designer a bit of a challenge in
6:56 bringing this to life. We're pretty
6:58 happy with how it turned out, but we're
6:59 curious to see if it's anything close to
7:01 what Aaron envisioned. So, let's see
7:35 [Applause]
7:37 Whoever's done this is insanely
7:39 talented. Oh my god. So yeah, it's kind
7:41 of a it's a very interesting mix of
7:44 curvature with geometry. It's completely
7:47 nailed that like cyberpunky aesthetic I
7:48 was trying to go for. It was quite an
7:50 extensive brief. It was had good
7:52 references, some just some big elements
7:53 to get in there. Obviously, the visor of
7:55 the Pixel and then your chewing phone
7:57 with a lot of kind of geometric
7:58 references, which isn't like a huge
8:00 departure from how we do phones. Anyway,
8:02 it's easy to forget that this isn't just
8:04 a render that's been smacked together.
8:06 This is actually like a a calculated process.
8:06 process.
8:08 >> It's safe to say you'd be a customer if
8:09 this was released.
8:11 >> Hell yeah. There's things I would tweak.
8:13 Something about the corners isn't
8:14 hitting for me right now. I think I've
8:17 seen is it Huawei doing a sort of
8:19 waterfall type display and I think
8:21 they've managed to do it without those
8:23 sort of corners. I suppose that makes it
8:25 more fragile, but maybe I'd take that.
8:27 Yeah. So, I think I would have gone all
8:30 sort of melt display. There's very
8:31 little else. I think the Pixel camera
8:33 bar is perfect. You have my money.
8:34 Actually, no, no, no, no. It depends how
8:36 much it is. Tell me first. for this
8:40 phone to retail at $1,800 USD and price
8:42 for all of the specs you gave us and all
8:44 of the premium materials will be $1163
8:46 USD. It's actually a little bit less
8:48 than I was expecting. I'm very curious
8:49 to see what you've done with the
8:50 software on this thing.
8:51 >> Aaron raises a pretty good question.
8:53 Remember that asterisk from earlier?
8:54 Well, in the original brief, he asked
8:56 for a fully custom OS as well. So, we're
8:57 going to do a part two. This one's going
8:59 to be all about software. So, be sure to
