Users of some older Samsung devices will soon be forced to use a different voice assistant when the company kills off S Voice this summer. That’s according to recent reports that indicate Samsung will stop supporting S Voice entirely on June 1.
After the support has been dropped, users on devices that still feature S Voice won’t be able to use it. Instead of responding to requests and inquiries. After June 1, S Voice will inform users that it can’t process requests. That’s the same response users see now, indicating they should try again later.
Work on Bixby is to blame but won’t be available on older handsets and tablets
The overwhelming majority of devices that feature S Voice aren’t necessarily new. In fact, the company hasn’t provided the feature on its handsets for several years. That’s because its efforts have chiefly centered around Bixby and, more recently, Bixby 2.0. The new version of Bixby was launched alongside the arrival of a new Android OS design focus Samsung bills as OneUI — which is now already on version 2.0.
Bixby brings similar functionality to S Voice, letting users make phone calls and access other device features such as web searches, by simply speaking a few words. The primary difference here is that Bixby is AI-driven, web-connected, and conversational. It’s much more akin to Google Assistant than it is to S Voice.
Samsung users will need to utilize Google Assistant or a similar alternative going forward though. The South Korean tech giant won’t be bringing Bixby to its older handsets. In fact, it’s somewhat surprising that Samsung would wait so long to kill off support for S Voice. It already brought an end to support for early Bixby variants that may have worked with those handsets earlier this year.
Specifically, Samsung brought an end to support for Bixby Voice on Android Nougat and Oreo phones and tablets on January 1.
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Users who will be directly impacted by this change are those on a fairly wide-ranging array of devices. On the phone side of the equation, budget-friendly gadgets include the Samsung Galaxy A3, A5, A7, A8, and A9. But older Samsung flagships such as the Galaxy Note FE, Galaxy Notes 2, 3, 4, and 5 are on the block too. The Samsung Galaxy S3, 4, S5, S6, and S6 Edge are affected as well.
That’s in addition to tablets like the Samsung Galaxy Note Pro 12.2, Galaxy W, Galaxy Tab 4, Galaxy Tab 4 8.0/10.1, Galaxy Tab S8.4 and S10.5.
As noted above, these are predominantly older devices. In fact, the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge came out way back in early 2015. So the changeover shouldn’t affect too many users. Instead, it’s mostly impacting users who are likely already looking to update their devices soon anyway. Not only is S Voice support now dropping across the board. Those handsets no longer receive firmware or security updates from Samsung either.
The newest run of Samsung devices and those that shipped with Bixby out-of-the-box won’t be impacted by the change at all.
The post Samsung Finally Gets Around To Killing Off S Voice This Summer appeared first on Android Headlines.
Source: ndroidheadlines.com