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Yesterday, we reported that users of the Galaxy Note 3 had discovered that the recent update to Android 4.4 KitKat had stopped their third-party accessories working as they normally did. Flip cases like Spigen’s S-View case no longer work as they should do since this latest update. While this is a strange move from Samsung, they did say some time ago that accessories that didn’t feature an Identification Chip that was authenticated by Samsung would no longer work at some point. It appears that this point in time is now and so far, there seems to be no budging from Samsung.
The Korean giant has just recently released a statement on the matter in Germany and they had the following to say (translated from German):
“To ensure a pleasant and smooth user experience with Samsung products for our customers, we recommend that only original accessories from Samsung to use. Of course, customers can continue to rely on third-party accessories. The full functionality of our devices and accessories, however, can only be ensured with genuine Samsung components, since only in this way it is ensured that equipment and accessories are perfectly matched. A correlation between the Android version 4.4 and the supposed incompatibility of third-party accessories does not exist.”
While it’s nice that Samsung have released a statement on the matter, we’re pretty sure that fans of third-party accessories won’t care all that much. After all, not everyone wants to use the accessories a manufacturer offers. It’s not as if there’s only a handful of third-party accessories out there either, pretty much anyone who’s anyone in the accessories business makes at least a case or two for the Galaxy Note 3. When it comes to cases that rely on functionality from the device that Samsung is now blocking, companies like Spigen will be facing headaches going forward. It will be interesting to see if Samsung license this ID chip out to accessory manufacturers for a reasonable price. We understand that Samsung want to keep up their brand image and they’ve gone to a lot of trouble creating a whole range of devices for the Galaxy Note 3, but still how much harm can these third-party accessories really be doing?
Via: SamMobile
Source: AllThingsSamsung