Technologies

Foldable Tablets Are More Than Just a Gimmick Thanks to Samsung and LG

Commentary: At CES 2023, we saw promising concept tablets that bend and slide without breaking.

Foldable phones are all the rage, with Samsung, Oppo and Motorola, releasing their own devices. Other companies, like Apple and Google, are rumored to be working on versions of their flagship products with foldable designs.

But at CES 2023, foldable tablets are what piqued my curiosity. Samsung and LG, two of the world’s largest display-makers, both showcased tablet-like devices in various shapes and sizes that can bend, fold, slide or do all three.

These concepts got me wondering about whether there’s a real future for foldable tablets, especially at a time when companies are struggling to sell traditional tablets. What is clear, however, is that companies like Samsung and LG are thinking about it, as are PC-makers like Lenovo and Acer.

The more I’ve thought about it, the more a foldable tablet starts to make sense — maybe even more so than a foldable phone.

Samsung and LG’s foldable concepts at CES 2023

Samsung and LG both kicked off CES 2023 with announcements about their concept foldable displays, many of which come in tablet-sized formats. The star of the show was Samsung’s Flex Hybrid, a concept that you have to see to fully understand.

It closes like a notebook and opens up to reveal a tablet-like screen. But the real wow factor is that you can extend the screen’s size and even change its aspect ratio when unfolded. The right side of the screen slides out, extending the display size from 10.5 inches to 12.4 inches. In a demonstration at its CES booth, Samsung showed how the display automatically adjusts to show more content when the screen is extended.

This isn’t the first time Samsung has exhibited concepts like this. In 2022, Samsung flaunted accordion-like displays and sliding screens, designs that are also present this year.

Samsung has other ideas for shapeshifting tablets, too. It also showed the Flex Slidable Duet concept at CES, a screen that expands on both sides to provide more viewing area for playing games or watching movies. The display measures 13 to 14 inches but can extend up to 17.3 inches, according to a Samsung press release. There’s also a version of this concept that can only expand its screen in one direction, a device that Samsung appropriately calls the Flex Slidable Solo.

LG had two main foldable tablet concepts to show at CES: an 8-inch tablet that can fold inward and outward in both directions, and a 17-inch device that folds in half. LG asserts that the 17-inch display is almost entirely creaseless, and the company is positioning it as either a giant tablet or a more portable external monitor for a laptop.

The gadgets shown at CES are far from being the first foldable tablets. There are Lenovo’s X1 Fold and newer ThinkPad X1 Fold, while Asus has the Zenbook Fold OLED. LG’s 17-inch concept largely looks like it’s trying to accomplish the same goal that Lenovo and Asus have already begun to explore with these devices.

The big question is whether these companies can convince consumers that foldable tablets are even useful in the first place. Samsung is seemingly trying to address this conundrum by developing screens that can change their shape and size to go along with how you’re using your device. Based on Samsung’s demo of the Flex Hybrid, it looks like you’ll be able to view content that wasn’t visible before when expanding the slideable portion of the screen. The clip above seems to show a shopping website as an example, with more products being shown as the screen expands.

Lenovo already has some interesting ideas about how to put the X1 Fold’s bendable screen to good use. When the screen is folded halfway, you can place Lenovo’s Bluetooth keyboard over the bottom half of the screen so that it functions as a mini laptop.

Samsung also isn’t the only company experimenting with displays that can expand by sliding and rolling. TCL and Motorola have both dreamed up similar concepts for smartphone designs, although Samsung’s feels closer to an actual product given its experience in foldables. Samsung is also the world’s largest smartphone-maker and second-largest tablet-maker, which makes its concepts seem more impactful than those from TCL and Motorola. While LG no longer has a presence in the mobile industry, it’s a major display supplier and still makes its own laptops.

Foldable tablets may have advantages over foldable phones

Having a phone that can fold in half to easily fit in your pocket can certainly be useful. But a tablet that can do the same thing is even better, mostly for the simple reason that tablets are inherently larger than most phones.

There’s another advantage: Foldable tablets may not face all of the same design challenges that bendable phones have encountered so far. For example, one of my biggest complaints about the Galaxy Z Fold lineup has been that it sometimes feels awkward to use when closed. The cover screen has vastly improved since the first Galaxy Fold arrived in 2019, but it still doesn’t come close to feeling like a standard, nonfolding phone.

The Galaxy Z Fold also feels bulky when closed since its thickness essentially equates to two phones stacked on top of one another. When I reviewed Microsoft’s Surface Duo 2 in 2021, I struggled to find a comfortable way to hold it when taking photos with the main camera since you must keep the phone unfolded to see what you’re shooting.

These drawbacks may not be as big of an issue with foldable tablets. Unlike phones, you’re probably not going to be using a tablet in one hand most of the time. An outer display on a foldable tablet, if there even is one, wouldn’t matter as much because you’re presumably going to be using the device unfolded. The foldable tablets I’ve seen so far don’t even have cover screens.

Aside from the selfie camera for video chats, camera quality also isn’t as important on a tablet as it is on a phone. So the awkwardness issue I mentioned when taking photos with the Surface Duo 2 likely wouldn’t happen on a foldable tablet.

The primary appeal behind foldable tablets from Samsung, LG, Lenovo and Acer — concept or not — is portability. Having a tablet that folds in half makes it easier to fit in a backpack, suitcase or purse on your next flight, commute or beach trip. But phones are already compact in their current form, meaning the value proposition behind phones like the Galaxy Z Fold can be a little harder to sell.

That doesn’t mean foldable tablets are immune from design hiccups, as my colleague Dan Ackerman wrote when trying out Lenovo’s and Acer’s devices. Creating larger displays that bend and fold likely presents its own set of engineering challenges compared to foldable phones.

Foldable phones are also moving more quickly, with market researcher IDC forecasting a 66.6% year-over-year increase in global shipments in 2022. So even though foldable phones may have different hurdles to overcome, companies like Samsung have been able to address these points over several generations of products so far.

Tablets need a refresh

Tablet sales got a boost during the early phase of the pandemic as people socialized, worked and attended school virtually. But sales looked bleak last year. Global tablet shipments were down 8.8% year over year in the third quarter of 2022, marking the fifth straight quarter of decline, according to IDC. That slump was mostly due to economic headwinds as consumers are looking to spend less, says the report.

New tablets with shapeshifting displays may not be enough to change that, especially since foldable devices are typically expensive. But tablets are still long overdue for a refresh. Arguably, the tablet’s biggest transformation since the first iPad’s launch has been the shift toward laptop-tablet hybrid devices, a transition that began roughly a decade ago around the debut of Windows 8. But tablets haven’t fundamentally changed much since then, aside from adapting larger screens and gaining routine hardware upgrades.

It took years for those hybrid devices to work out their kinks and become mainstays in our lives. If foldable tablets catch on, the case will likely be the same, mostly because of high prices and software challenges. But the concepts present at CES show that progress is certainly happening.

The goal for all tablets, foldable or not, is to provide a larger display for tasks that your phone may not be ideal for such as gaming, watching movies, reading and working. So finding creative ways to further extend that screen size, as Samsung has done with the Flex Hybrid’s slidable screen, seems like a natural evolution.

Foldable phones still feel like they’re in search of a purpose, but foldable tablets may have already found one.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Monday, May 19

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for May 19.

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword is pretty easy. 5-Across, «one for whom every day is Boxing Day,» stumped me because I really wanted the answer to have something to do with cats. (Spoiler: It did not.) Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? Read on. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

The Mini Crossword is just one of many games in the Times’ games collection. If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get at those Mini Crossword clues and answers.

Mini across clues and answers

1A clue: Network satirized on «30 Rock,» for short
Answer: NBC

4A clue: Sport played on horseback
Answer: POLO

5A clue: One for whom every day is Boxing Day?
Answer: MOVED

6A clue: Like correct letters in Wordle
Answer: GREEN

7A clue: Blend together
Answer: MELD

Mini down clues and answers

1D clue: «Invisible Man» or «Little Women»
Answer: NOVEL

2D clue: Run in the wash
Answer: BLEED

3D clue: What bourbon whiskey is primarily made from
Answer: CORN

4D clue: Tiny hole in the skin
Answer: PORE

5D clue: Longtime movie studio acquired by Amazon in 2022
Answer: MGM

How to play more Mini Crosswords

The New York Times Games section offers a large number of online games, but only some of them are free for all to play. You can play the current day’s Mini Crossword for free, but you’ll need a subscription to the Times Games section to play older puzzles from the archives.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for May 19, #238

Hints and answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, No. 238, for May 19.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Connections: Sports Edition might be tough today if, like me, you don’t know what «loge» means. Read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is out of beta now, making its debut on Super Bowl Sunday, Feb. 9. That’s a sign that the game has earned enough loyal players that The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by the Times, will continue to publish it. It doesn’t show up in the NYT Games app but now appears in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can continue to play it free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Brag.

Green group hint: Where’s my seat?

Blue group hint: City that never sleeps.

Purple group hint: Opposite of go.

Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Yellow group: Boast

Green group: Stadium seating sections

Blue group: New York Knicks

Purple group: ____ stop

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is boast. The four answers are crow, gloat, grandstand and showboat.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is stadium seating sections. The four answers are bleacher, loge, suites and upper deck.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is New York Knicks. The four answers are Bridges, Hart, McBride and Towns.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is ____ stop. The four answers are back, jump, pit and short.

Technologies

Blade Runner: 18-Rotor «Volocopter» Moving from Concept to Prototype

It may look "nutty" and like a "blender," but the designers say the craft could challenge helicopters

Inventor and physicist Thomas Senkel created an Internet sensation with the October 2011 video of his maiden—and only—test flight of a spidery proof-of-concept 16-rotor helicopter dubbed Multicopter 1. Now the maker of the experimental personal aviation craft, the European start-up e-volo, is back with a revised «volocopter» design that adds two more rotors, a serial hybrid drive and long-term plans for going to 100 percent battery power.

The new design calls for 1.8-meter, 0.5-kilogram carbon-fiber blades, each paired with a motor. They are arrayed around a hub in two concentric circles over a boxy one- or two-person cockpit.

After awarding the volocopter concept a Lindbergh Prize for Innovation in April, Yolanka Wulff, executive director of The Charles A. and Anne Morrow Lindbergh Foundation, admitted the idea of the multi-blade chopper at first seems «nutty.» Looking beyond the novel appearance, however, she says, e-volo’s concept excels in safety, energy efficiency and simplicity, which were the bases of the prize.

All three attributes arrive thanks largely to evolo’s removal of classic helicopter elements. First, the energy-robbing high-mass main rotor, transmission, tail boom and tail rotor are gone. The enormous blades over a normal chopper’s cabin create lift, but their mass creates a high degree of stress and wear on the craft. And the small tail rotor, perched vertically out on a boom behind the cabin, keeps the helicopter’s body from spinning in the opposite direction as the main blades, but it also eats up about 30 percent of a helicopter’s power.

The volocopter’s multiple rotor blades individually would not create the torque that a single large rotor produces, and they offer redundancy for safety. Hypothetically, the volocopter could fly with a few as 12 functioning rotors, as long as those rotors were not all clustered together on one side, says Senkel, the aircraft’s co-inventor and e-volo’s lead construction engineer.

Without the iconic two-prop configuration, the craft would be lighter, making it more fuel efficient and reducing the physical complexity of delivering power to the top and rear blades from a single engine. Nor would the volocopter need an energy-hungry transmission. In fact, «there will be no mechanical connection between the gas engine and the blades,» Senkel says. That means fewer points of energy loss and more redundancy for safety.

E-volo’s design eliminates the dependence on a single source of power to the blades. As a serial-hybrid vehicle, the volocopter would have a gas-fueled engine, in this case an engine capable of generating 50- to 75 kilowatts, typical of ultralight aircraft. Rather than mechanically drive the rotors, the engine would generate power for electric motors as well as charge onboard lithium batteries. Should it fail, the batteries are expected to provide enough backup power so the craft could make a controlled landing.

Whereas helicopters navigate by changing the pitch of the main and tail rotor blades, the volocopter’s maneuverability will depend on changing the speed of individual rotors. Although more complex, it is more precise in principle to control a craft using three to six redundant microcontrollers (in case one or more fails) interpreting instructions from a pilot using a game console–like joystick—instead of rudder pedals, a control stick and a throttle.

Wulff’s first impression about the volocopter’s design is not uncommon. E-volo’s computer-animated promotional videos of a gleaming white, carbon-fiber and fiberglass craft beneath a thatch of blades recall the many-winged would-be flying machines of the late 19th century. This point is not lost on Senkel.

«I understand these skeptical opinions,» he says. «The design concept looks like a blender. But we really are making a safe flying machine.»

That would be progress in itself. Multicopter 1 looked like something from an especially iffy episode of MacGyver, complete with landing gear that involved a silver yoga ball. Senkel rode seated amid all those rotors powered only by lithium batteries. Multicopter 1 generated an average of 20 kilowatts for hovering and was aloft for just a few minutes.

There’s a reason why the experimental craft flew briefly and only once.Senkel describes that first craft as «glued and screwed together.» Seated on the same platform as the spinning blades, he says, «I was aware of the fact that I will be dead, maybe. Besides, we showed that the concept works. What do we win if we fly it twice?» he asks rhetorically.

Other than putting the pilot safely below the blades, the revised volocopter design would operate largely the same as the initial prototype. The design calls for three to six redundant accelerometers and gyroscopes to measure the volocopter’s position and orientation, creating a feedback loop that gives the craft stability and makes it easier to fly, Senkel says.

The volocopter’s revised prototype under construction could debut as soon as next spring. The first production models, available in perhaps three years, are expected to fly for at least an hour at speeds exceeding 100 kilometers per hour and a minimum altitude of about 2,000 meters, still far shy of standard helicopter’s normal operating altitude of about 3,000 meters. «This could change our lives, but I don’t expect anything like that for 10 years,» Senkel adds.

Given that most of the technology needed to build the volocopter is already available, «this idea is fairly easy to realize,» says Carl Kühn, managing director of e-volo partner Smoto GmbH, a company that integrates electric drive systems and related components.

Like Senkel, Kühn has modest short-term expectations despite his repeated emphasis on the standard nature of the technology involved. «I guess that e-volo will have [a prototype] aircraft in three years that can do the job—that it will lift one or two persons from one point to another,» he says.

The biggest immediate limitations appear to be regulatory. For instance, European aviation regulators consider any electrical system greater than 60 volts to be high voltage and regulate such systems more aggressively, Kühn says. As a result, the volocopter will operate below that threshold. The craft will also need to weigh no more than 450 kilograms to remain in the ultralight category, which is likewise subject to fewer government aviation regulations, according to Senkel.

The Lindbergh Foundation’s Wulff says the organization’s judges felt e-volo had «a greater than 50 percent chance of succeeding, or they wouldn’t have given them the innovation award.» Asked if she would line up to fly one someday, she says, «I sure would. It looks very compelling to me.»