Samsung Lied to Us

[00:03] that they never talk about, and it's time to find out why. It's called the Galaxy X Cover 7 Pro, which I assume means it has some extra cover, making it more durable than their usual glass covered flagships. And what's this? A

[00:17] removable battery in 2026. To those of you born after the second millennium, a standard way to build a smartphone back in the day. Right up until Apple started

[00:29] gluing their phone shut in 2007. What's wild though is that even with a removable battery, this X Cover 7 Pro is still IP68 watertight, meaning it can be immersed in 1 and 1/2 m of water for 30 minutes and most likely still be fine.

[00:44] minutes and most likely still be fine. We have indeed been lied to. To be fair, technically this Xcover 7 Pro was released last year in 2025, but since this series of rugged constructiongrade durable smartphones only gets updated

[00:57] every 2 or 3 years, this one is still the relevant model for this year as well. It does cost about 600 bucks though, which seems rather excessive. And the screen scratches at a level six with deeper grooves at a level seven,

[01:09] meaning it's made from glass. Glass is glass and glass breaks though, so factor that in for your construction site usage. Interestingly enough though, screen replacements only cost $23. The glass screen also sits over the 13

[01:22] megapixel teardrop selfie camera. This films in 1080p and the glass screen is inlaid down inside some rubbery plastic frame material which will help protect it from drops. The fingerprint scanning power

[01:35] button is scratchable. The volume rocker is removable in typical Samsung fashion. And up here at the top we have some noiseancelling microphones and a fully programmable button. Right now, it's set to trigger the back flashlight, but it

[01:48] can be configured to anything or any app. There is a second much larger programmable button on the side, which can double as a walkie-talkie over into. It can also be programmed to open up any other app on your phone, like

[02:02] Bixby. Too soon. This button is not removable. Down at the bottom, we have our pretty abysmal 15watt USBC port and stereo loudspeaker. But we also have two contact pins, which apparently can be

[02:17] used to charge the phone without the USBC port. It just has to be docked in some kind of group charger of some kind. You know, it's built for fleets. Now, one massively missed opportunity for Samsung, though, is this back panel.

[02:29] It's removable and costs about 10 bucks to replace, but it also could have been more useful with some markings to mimic measurements in inches or centimeters. The current design is overly aesthetic instead of pragmatic. There could have

[02:42] been some unit conversions, time zone maps, angle calculators, or even a simple inch or centimeter ruler for measuring things. You know, construction tools for a phone built for construction. You can always add your

[02:54] a tad more precise coming straight from the factory. As for cameras, we do get two of them this time around, at least on this Pro model. The top is our 8 megap ultra wide and the bottom is our 50 megapixel main

[03:08] camera. Then there's two single tone LEDs for the flash and the flashlight. Speaking of construction sites and factories, I have some really big wheel building machines showing up at my wheelchair factory 3 weeks from now, and

[03:20] immediately. So, lucky for you, a 12-pack of Jerry can water is now just three bucks when you use the discount code thirsty. Water inside an aluminum can has a 5year shelf life if kept in a cool, dark place. So, keep a pack or two

[03:34] stored away for an emergency. And thanks for supporting the channel, drinkbison.com with discount code thirsty. Speaking of water, fire reveals replacements are so inexpensive. We can tell the 120 Hz 1080p display is an LCD

[03:51] screen and not an AMOLED screen by the way the pixels go black and turn off from the heat. LCDs aren't bad obviously, but knowing now that the screen is LCD, the $600 price tag seems a little more egregious. Making our way

[04:04] over to the sidemounted fingerprint scanning power button, even with copious amounts of scratching and damage to the button,

[04:16] Thumbs up for that. The next question we aim to answer is if the removable battery and non-glass slab back panel make the phone less structurally sound. The answer is kind of. The X Cover 7 Pro

[04:30] does flex more than the normal Samsung, but it also still does not crack, kink, or catastrophically fail. The Galaxy X Cover 7 Pro passes my durability test, but I'm having major doubts about that removable battery warranting the $600

[04:44] price tag. Let's dive in and see if there's anything else more valuable in here. With the back panel off again and the battery removed, this obviously turns off the phone. I noticed that there are actually no screws on the back

[04:56] to remove. There are plenty of glued shut plastic tabs, but these reside over antenna locations or pins on the motherboard and don't have any screws underneath. This means either the phone is held together with magic or the entry

[05:09] point is through the other side under the screen. Let's check the screen first. With a bunch of heat, I'll make sure my pry tools are just touching the glass, staying under the black bezel since accidentally nicking the edge of

[05:21] the LCD will probably kill the screen. And I'd rather keep this guy alive. Google, who makes the Pixel phones, have been assembling their phones this way for a while now, so it's not unheard of for the screen to come off first.

[05:33] Samsung just normally likes people to enter in from the back. With the display lifted off in one piece, I'll toss in the removable battery real quick just to see if it's working. And nice work to myself. I knew I could do it. I'll pop

[05:45] off the plastic bracket that holds down the ribbon connectors. And then I unplug the screen like a little Lego. Then I'll remove 15 silver Phillips head screws. These all have the safety yellow construction themed thread locker on the

[05:59] ribbon that connects the main board to the charging port board. And the thick metal mid plate can come out next. This is probably what gives the XCO 7 Pro all of its strength. I'll unsnap it from the inside of those plastic side rails as I

[06:13] There's no thermal paste, but the silver mid plate has a copper heat pipe built in, which helps cool the Snapdragon 7S Gen 3, which was released back in 2024.

[06:25] additional screw on the charging port board and two screws on the motherboard before it can lift away from the phone body, revealing some really tiny cameras. The 8 megapixel ultrawide camera is up top with no optical image

[06:39] stabilization. The 50 megapixel main camera sits right below that, also with no OIS. The 13 megapixel front-facing camera doesn't have OIS either, but that's pretty normal. But I think that is indeed my deciding factor this time

[06:52] around. Even though this phone does have an SD card slot and removable battery, the tiny cameras with their tiny sensors and no optical image stabilization makes the X Cover 7 incapable of capturing everyday moments outside of the

[07:06] monotonous corporate realm. Combine that with the super slow 15 watt charging speeds and a speaker with no balls, it's clear that Samsung designed this phone to be as monotonous as a corporate cubicle with a corporate price tag to

[07:19] sip on all that corporate revenue. I wouldn't be able to recommend this phone to anyone outside of a work environment. And maybe, just maybe, that's also why Samsung never talks about it. But hey, at least now we know. When Samsung or

[07:33] Apple says we can't have easy to remove batteries, point them to this video, cuz of our eyes. And everything still water for three bucks. Link in the description. And thanks a ton for

[07:47] description. And thanks a ton for watching. I'll see you