Introduction to Cloud Phone#
China Mobile has launched a beta version of its cloud phone service, and I tried it out as soon as possible. First of all, let me give you the conclusion: this is an attempt by cloud computing to reach individual users.
Cloud Phone Configuration and Benchmark#
Hardware Specifications#
Have you ever seen a smartphone with an AMD graphics card? This is my first time seeing it too, but I was confused when the CPU was shown as Vivo. I don't understand this stuff. There's no need to introduce the memory, it's just a regular 8GB of RAM, and the storage is only 64GB, probably because it's a newly released cloud phone.
Operating System#
I can't hold back anymore about this Redmi4 model. It uses the Hongmeng OS, the camera has been removed, and it comes with Gboard as the default keyboard, which is really inconvenient. In summary, it's a Frankenstein phone. I hope it can be optimized in the future to provide a unique remote phone service for mobile users.
Benchmark#
The benchmark results really surprised me. Both the benchmark scores and the performance of the memory and storage are much better than I expected. The most impressive aspect is the bandwidth, as the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has been emphasizing the promotion of gigabit bandwidth. However, I have never been able to afford it, and the campus network at my school is hard to describe. 5G is not as fast as I imagined, only this cloud phone from China Mobile can allow me to witness true 2,000 Mbps bandwidth. When downloading software, I can't even see the progress bar.
User Experience#
The cloud phone from China Mobile only allows 2 hours of usage per day. Interested friends can download and experience it themselves. When using it, you can clearly feel the lag, whether it's due to unstable network or poor optimization of the cloud phone. The average latency between my phone and the cloud phone is about 68ms, which is moderate and not considered high. However, if you include the latency to game servers when playing online games, it might be slightly higher.
After many years, the three navigation buttons have made a comeback. To avoid conflicts with the gestures on smartphones, I chose the default three navigation buttons. If you mind, you can manually change it to the bottom navigation bar. The system settings are as minimal as they can be, and many settings cannot be manually changed, such as the developer mode. Lastly, the phone supports a maximum resolution of 720p. Seriously, China Mobile? Are you not confident in your own bandwidth?
To try out this phone, I downloaded Genshin Impact for the first time. I don't know if it's because I'm not used to the game or for other reasons, but everything feels awkward, the graphics are very blurry, and the gameplay is extremely laggy. The experience is okay, but if you really want to play, it's not necessary.
Evaluation and Reflection#
What is a cloud phone? Simply put, it's a mobile display. The computing process when using our phones is handled by servers, and the calculation results are sent to the cloud phone. Our phones only need a small chip for video decoding, which provides a direction for making phones thinner and lighter.
Personally, I don't think cloud phones will become the mainstream form in the future, for the following reasons:
- The smartphone market has reached saturation, and there is no extra market space for cloud phones to experiment.
- The ecosystem and system optimization are difficult. Without an ecosystem, there is no market, and without a market, there is no advancement in the ecosystem. It's a death spiral.
- The current form of smartphones has already passed the market test, and consumers have no motivation to switch.
Does this mean cloud phones are useless? Of course not! Personally, I believe cloud phones are a trial for the next generation of mobile smart devices—VR (whether it's AR, VR, MR, etc., I'll refer to them all as VR). These types of virtual reality devices have limited space, and if they want to be portable, most of the space needs to be used for batteries, displays, microphones, and other hardware. There is not much room left for chips and cooling components. The combination of cloud computing and 5G is, in my opinion, a more reasonable solution for VR.