Oct 23, 2022
These Three Were The First Phones With Now Common Features
Modern day smartphones are jam packed with technology. Powerful cameras, powerful processors, great build quality, etc.
Now days features like ,fingerprint sensors, cameras, and folding screens are common. But, this wasn’t always the case. So let’s talk about three first features in the smartphone world. And the devices that started these trends.
First Fingerprint Scanner
So many people may know this. And many other people may not know this. But the iPhone was not the first phone to use a fingerprint reader. It was the first to really popularize it, but it was beaten to the punch by the Motorola Atrix.
But before that there was the Pantech GI100. The first phone to incorporate a fingerprint scanner for added security. And the Pantech GI100 beat both the Atrix and the iPhone 5s by more than a couple of years.
The Atrix released in 2011 and the iPhone 5s came out in 2013. The Pantech GI100 came out in 2004. Almost a full decade before the iPhone 5s.
The Pantech GI100 even had fingerprint authentication, and fingerprint speed dialing. Not pad for a phone that is almost two decades old.
First Camera phone
Selfies, portrait photos, videos, etc. We modern humans sure love documenting our lives.
From what we had for lunch, to that interesting yet frightening bug we just saw. Millions of pictures are snapped each and every day.
According to Samsung it launched the world’s first camera phone. But.
That claim to fame can be disputed.
Chronologically the Kyocera VP-210 was first to come out in 1999. This phone had its camera on the front facing the user. Once you took 20 pictures with the VP-210 your storage was full.
This was followed by Samsung’s SCH-V200 in June of 2000. This phone also could take 20 pictures before filling up.
However, the SCH-V200 wasn’t able to photos taken wirelessly. The camera portion had to be hooked up to a computer so you could get the photos off. Then you could email them.
Lastly, of the phones claiming to be the first camera phone we have the Sharp J-SH04. This phone came out in November 2000.
This phone had the capability to send photos taken via email right from the phone. Unlike the Samsung SCH-V200
So although Samsung claims to be first, it looks like Kyocera beat them to the punch
Here’s a bonus fact, the first camera phone to be available her in the United States was the Sanyo SCP-5300.
AKA the Sanyo Katana.
First folding phone
If I were to ask you what the first folding smartphone, what would your answer be? I’m assuming many of you would say the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 1.
That would be a safe, but incorrect guess. Its actually the FlexPai from Chinese company Royole.
A phone from a company I’m sure many people outside of techies would have heard of. Samsung threw its weight behind foldable devices when it released it’s Galaxy Z Fold 1 in 2019. Thus proving that the form factor can be useful and a commercial success.
But Royole and FlexPai definitely beat the South Korean behemoth to the punch by releasing December 8 2018.
The FlexPai folded outward in stead of inward like the Galaxy Z Fold family. This meant that the folding screen wrapped around the outside of the phone.
Honestly, I have never understood why that was ever a viable option for folding devices. Folding screens are hella fragile.
So, basically exposing them to outside elements just seems terrible. But, I’m not an expert so there must be a reason for the design.
Okay we’re going to stop here for today, but I will definitely be covering more smartphone firsts in the future. Things like the first water resistant smartphone, first phone to feature USB-C, and the first phone
with a 90Hz and 120Hz screen.
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