Concept phones come and go … some of them never see the light of day. Hopefully this innovative phone does. This concept phone, dubbed the Unliquited by Samsung, has the potential to change the future of cell phone development.
Some past concepts include a rollaway cell phone powered by a AA battery and a battery charger powered by wind. A predecessor to the Unliquited was even seen, a phone that could turn water into power.
The current phones on the market are outdated within only a few months. Companies are always producing phones with faster processers, larger hard drives, more memory and better screens. What happens when people replace their old phones? Those old phones usually get thrown away.
The Unliquited looks to lengthen the time between new phones, to help protect the environment and keep phones out of the landfill. The Unliquited takes away the need for a lot of the hardware in a phone and replaces it with server-side software.
Moving components, like the processor and memory server-side, means less materials are used producing the phone and less energy is needed to run the phone. All programs and processes can be run through the server and all stored data can be saved on the server. People won’t lose their data if they do damage their phone. Any problems with a phone can be fixed by updating the software, a much easier-to-implement solution than producing a phone with new hardware. The phone’s metal frame can be melted down and reused when the phone is no longer usable.
Another benefit of the Unliquited is how it is powered by a direct methanol fuel cell instead of a rechargeable battery. It combines methanol and oxygen, converting them into electricity. When the fuel cell runs out, instead of plugging the phone in to charge, the cell just needs to be refilled instead. Tiny 10mL packs of methanol can be injected into the 40mL storage on the phone.
Although the concept of replacing a battery with a fuel cell may take awhile to get used to, the ability to constantly upgrade our phones without having to actually buy a new phone, tying us to a service provider with every new 2-year contract, is something we should all be able to get on board with. I look forward to seeing this phone on the market some day.
Via: Behance Network and Eco-friendly
