The foldable smartphone revolution is under way, but note everyone wants to spend $1,500 on an unproven first-gen device from Samsung or Razr. Now, a new crowdfunding campaign offers a different — and much less expensive — option.
Meet castAway. It’s a case that lets you add a secondary display to your existing smartphone, provided that you’re using an iPhone or Samsung device. As of now, castAway’s creators are working on support for the iPhone 6 to the iPhone 11 Pro Max and the Galaxy S7/Note 7 up to the the S10/Note 10.
Two different display sizes are being offered: 5.8 inches and 6.3 inches.
As you might have guessed from its name, castAway is a pocket-sized screen casting device. The hardware itself is like a very small Chrome OS tablet. It’s powered by a 1.5 GHz ARM-based OP1 processor and has 4GB of RAM and 32GB of onboard storage.
You can use either of the two USB type-C ports to recharge castAway. You can also use castAway like a portable power pack and top off your phone’s battery. A 35 Wh lithium-polymer battery provides runtime “similar to that of the average smartphone.”
castAway even has its own built-in front and rear-facing cameras. That may have more to do with it being based on off-the-shelf hardware than a second set of cameras being a truly useful addition to your phone.
According to its creators, the castAway adds about 200 grams of weight — which is about the same as most of the compatible devices.
So how do you actually use castAway with your smartphone? With the help of a companion app called Multitask+. It allows you to use castAway in much the same way you would use a second monitor with a desktop PC.
Casting is done wirelessly, which allows for some interesting uses. castAway pops also apart easily, so instead of handing off your unlocked phone to someone so they can flick through your photos you can pass your secondary screen that’s locked in to a single app.
After finally seeing LG’s dual-screen G8X in person, I’m much more intrigued by castAway. It’s priced aggressively, too. Earlybird perks start at $129, which seems pretty reasonable for a device like this… though as with any crowdfunding project, it’s important to temper your expectations.
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