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this post was submitted on 14 Jan 2024
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I'd much rather they invest efforts into supporting customisable phones. Instead of just releasing a few flavours of the same hardware each year, give us a dozen features we can opt into or not. Pick a base size, then pick your specs. Want a headphone jack, SD card, FM radio, upgraded graphics performance? No problems, that'll cost a bit extra. Phones are boring now - at least find a way to meet the needs of all consumers.
Not exactly what you are talking about, but slightly related: the company Fairphone makes phones with parts that can easily be replaced. The philosophy is that you will not have to buy a new phone every 3 years. They do have some customized options aswell (i.e. ram, storage, models) but its limited.
But going full on optimization with phones, laptops and tablets, similar as a desktop, is just incredibly hard due to the lack of space in the device for the components. As such it makes more sense to offer a wide variety of models, with some customizable options, and then have the user pick something.
On Fairphone, they flat out refuse to even discuss adding a headphone jack (check the posts in their forums - it's a "hands over ears" no) so I'm sticking with Sony/ASUS (the latter atm as they've been slightly less anticompetitive recently but I'd much rather go to a decent company) until they do... It's not like you notice a phone being 1mm thicker when you have a 3mm case on it anyway
It seems we all have our dealbreakers. I love the Zenfone but the lack of software updates is a hard no from me.
Their answer is buying the usb-c to 3mm adapter. If you keep that connecter in you bag, ot connected to your headphones, you should be fine most of the time. Unless you would like to charge and listen to audio at the same time.
To me, that feels like a solid design choice, but yes we all have our dealbreakers.
Solid in the same way the designers heads are solid bone I guess...
A 3.5mm adapter is not an answer as it causes wear on the USB C port in ways it's not designed for (but 3.5mm is as it's circular so the cable rotates and breaks before the port), and it's hard to get a good dac that isolates the power noise when using a multiple charging/listening adapter that's also that small
My problem with fair phone is that they use old hardware.
I never replaced any parts on my old phone and only replaced the phone with a new one because it was getting really slow. I replaced the xr with an iPhone 15.
So my concern with the fair phone is that I’ll replace it with faster hardware more frequently than I would have replaced a no repairable phone that’s faster.
RIP Project Ara
Here's the summary for the wikipedia article you mentioned in your comment:
Project Ara was a modular smartphone project under development by Google. The project was originally headed by the Advanced Technology and Projects team within Motorola Mobility while it was a Google subsidiary. Google retained the ATAP group when selling Motorola Mobility to Lenovo, and it was placed under the stewardship of the Android development staff; Ara was later split off as an independent operation. Google stated that Project Ara was being designed to be utilized by "6 billion people": 1 billion current smartphone users, and 5 billion feature phone users.Under its original design, Project Ara was intended to consist of hardware modules providing common smartphone parts, such as processors, displays, batteries, and cameras, as well as modules providing more specialized components, and "frames" that these modules were to be attached to. This design would allow a device to be upgraded over time with new capabilities and upgraded without requiring the purchase of an entire new device, providing a longer lifecycle for the device and potentially reducing electronic waste. However, by 2016, the concept had been revised, resulting in a base phone with non-upgradable core components, and modules providing supplemental features. Google planned to launch a new developer version of Ara in the fourth quarter of 2016, with a target bill of materials cost of $50 for a basic phone, leading into a planned consumer launch in 2017. However, on September 2, 2016, Reuters reported that two non-disclosed sources leaked that Alphabet's manufacture of frames had been canceled, with possible future licensing to third parties. Later that day, Google confirmed that Project Ara had been shelved.^to^ ^opt^ ^out^^,^ ^pm^ ^me^ ^'optout'.^ ^article^ ^|^ ^about^
I wish a company would build 4.5"-5.5" and 5.5"-6.5" flagship phones, put as many features that make sense in each.
Then when you release a new flagship the last flagship devices become your 'mid range' and you drop the price accordingly, with your mid range dropping to budget the year after.
When Nokia had 15 different phones out at a time it made sense because they would be wildly different (size, shape, button layout, etc...).
These days everyone wants as large a screen as possible on a device that is comfortable to hold, we really don't need 15 different models with slightly different screen ratios.
iPhone mini gang rise up!
Yay I’m part of something! :-)
I updated to the latest mini iPhone after rumours it would be the last. I hope not, but the trend seems to be bigger and more ridiculous “phone” form factors.
Your talking about project Ara. Google bought it out and killed it roughly ten years ago.
Here's the summary for the wikipedia article you mentioned in your comment:
Project Ara was a modular smartphone project under development by Google. The project was originally headed by the Advanced Technology and Projects team within Motorola Mobility while it was a Google subsidiary. Google retained the ATAP group when selling Motorola Mobility to Lenovo, and it was placed under the stewardship of the Android development staff; Ara was later split off as an independent operation. Google stated that Project Ara was being designed to be utilized by "6 billion people": 1 billion current smartphone users, and 5 billion feature phone users.Under its original design, Project Ara was intended to consist of hardware modules providing common smartphone parts, such as processors, displays, batteries, and cameras, as well as modules providing more specialized components, and "frames" that these modules were to be attached to. This design would allow a device to be upgraded over time with new capabilities and upgraded without requiring the purchase of an entire new device, providing a longer lifecycle for the device and potentially reducing electronic waste. However, by 2016, the concept had been revised, resulting in a base phone with non-upgradable core components, and modules providing supplemental features. Google planned to launch a new developer version of Ara in the fourth quarter of 2016, with a target bill of materials cost of $50 for a basic phone, leading into a planned consumer launch in 2017. However, on September 2, 2016, Reuters reported that two non-disclosed sources leaked that Alphabet's manufacture of frames had been canceled, with possible future licensing to third parties. Later that day, Google confirmed that Project Ara had been shelved.^to^ ^opt^ ^out^^,^ ^pm^ ^me^ ^'optout'.^ ^article^ ^|^ ^about^