I guess contractually there is no reason for Samsung to do anything as the trade in could be seen as separate from the Note 7 purchase. Of course from my perspective, I wouldn't of switched to a Note 7 in hindsight but the small print would support Samsung.
Another case of getting screwed over by a big conglomerate powerhouse. Yay!
UPDATE: I just asked Samsung and they said they can do nothing, I have to buy the Note 5 at current market value.
Actually screw Samsung, I'm going to buy a Xiaomi Max (128GB version) for around what I got for my used Note 5 or 3x cheaper than the Note 7.
Sure, I'll miss the AMOLED 4K screen, IP68, stylus, iris scanner and Secure Folder... but my disgust for Samsung far surpasses any neccessity for these features.
I'm not sure if I'm simply justifying the eventual loss of my Note 7, but I'm actually excited to have a 6.4inch screen to play games and watch movies on with a 4850mAh battery that has QC 3.0, 128GB internal memory and 4GB of RAM. Plus Touchwiz is still crappy and the curved screen on the Note 7 has terrible functionality swiping.
Waterproofing isn't a deal breaker and I broke my stylus a few weeks ago and it's not that big of a deal once you adjust to fingers, especially on a 6.4inch screen! Knox can do most of what Secure Folder can do and fingerprint scanner can do what the iris scanner can albeit a bit less convenient.
The ONLY thing that i'm annoyed with is not having UHQ upscaler with music as I found it improves headphone sound with much better clarity by filling in areas of compressed sound. I'm definitely no audiophile but I'll stick with what my ears enjoy more even if it alters the recording. Sort of like using an EQ or infamous, "Crystaliser" on an X-Fi board. Just personal preference.
"UHQ Upscaler allows you get back some of the lost information through some interpolation algorithms that Samsung has developed, so it essentially guesses what frequencies were cut during compression and tries to put them back."
I was eyeing the Asus Zenfone 3 or HTC 10 but they are double the cost of the Xiaomi Max and I'm not sure the sound is actually that great. They also have terrible batteries and the Zenfone 3 Ultra is too big at 6.8inches. From what I hear, the Xiaomi Max has very clear sound at high levels, so hoping for the best.
It's not healthy and clever to be fueled by anger but I'm so angry with this I'm never actually buying another Samsung product again. You might think, oh yeah, i've heard that all before but once I promise myself something I'm stubborn as hell. I'm also under no illusion that my decision to do this will have no impact whatsoever on Samsung, I'm pretty sure they will bounce back.
More to the point, good riddance Samsung. Next on my shopping list is one of the new 65' LG OLED 4K TVs, thankfully alot easier on the wallet given the money I get back for the Note 7.
Life goes on.
EDIT: Just been introduced to Huawei Honor Note 8! GG