Entries tagged 'cat:Phones'

Entry created on 2024-10-05 (edited 2024-10-19) author:steeph (337) cat:#100DaysToOffload (40) cat:-e-OS (1) cat:Android (4) cat:Batteries (3) cat:Battery (4) cat:Computers (14) cat:Crowdfunding (4) cat:Hands-On (3) cat:Hardware (12) cat:Keyboard (4) cat:LineageOS (1) cat:Phones (3) cat:Smartphones (4) lang:en (186)

So, I've hand this device with the weirdly complicated name spelling for a while now. But I haven't used it as my main phone since recently because I first wanted to flash a different OS onto it. I didn't have the capacity/time to take care of that among other reasons because it's something that I've rarely done, and never before successfully. After several failed attempts to get /e/OS to run on it, I've now settled fore LineageOS. Since I want to use it as my main phone from now on I don't think I'll experiment with any other systems on it for now, even though it would be the perfect phone to get some experience with Ubuntu Touch, Sailfish or some other Linux Distro.

Battery

The last time I've written about this device it looked like the battery was affected too much by having been empty for years, notz even allowing the phone to charge its own battery. Android suddenly shut down seemingly randomly and had 3 to 20 % battery when turning it back on minutes later evewn though it displayed 30 to 50 % when it turned off. Sometimes it displayed a higher battery charge after turning back on than when it turned itself off. Sometimes it would last less than five hours usage before it went down. This became better over time. It seems that Android became better at guessing the current battery charge. Now on LineageOS the battery doesn't last a whole day when it's used a lot, but so far it didn't do any surprise jumps or shutdowns. Technically, it lasts a bit over 24 hours with moderate usage. But that is with the last couple of hours under a warning LED (if I hadn't turned that off). According to the LineageOS settings, the battery is healthy and has 100% of its original capacity of 3313 mAh. That would be 113 mAh more than advertised. Maybe I'm just too spoiled by my previous 4000+ mAh devices with smaller and low-rews displays. I didn't do any independent measurement yet. (Edit: More on that in the last part of this entry.)

Keyboard

Probably the most important thing of this phone is the keyboard that makes it unique on today's marked. It is very similar to those of the later Nokia smartphones that still had keyboards. I sort of see it as an N900 with more room for a larger keyboard. It is crammed, but none of the keys are too hard too reach. Not even the number row, that has smaller keys very close to the screen. And every key on this board has a good reason to be there. As somebody coming from a Unihertz Titan Pocket with a Blackberry-style keyboard with a very reduced layout, I'm glad not only punctuatioin and number keys but also for proper arrow keys and four modifier keys of which the ones that are used as lot appear twice. I chose a German keyboard layourt because I'm used to it and can find every symbol I need on it, and it's useful to have the extra letters when I write in German. The Android it came with had only one German QUERTZ layout to select and it didn't match the labeling exactly. Some special characters were switched or missing, and it couldn't produce an apostrophe (') by any means. With LineageOS there is a 'F(x)tec QUERTZ' and that works perfectly now. After the first getting used to they keyboard is a delight to type on compared to any other phone I held in my hands in the last 5 years. I think I still like the Nokia N9300 and N9500 keyboard better. But the more layout closer to PCs does make more sense with a phone where apps aren't developed for that keyboard specifically. And I am enjoying the extra keys, especially on the command line. The backlight also works as one would expect, which is not a given in keyboard smartphones.

Camera

Let's not get into it too much. The camera isn't good. 48 MP doesn't mean anything when every picture that it produces is automatically heavily mushed by noise reductin. It's better than my last phone camera. It's able to produce photos with room light that aren't blurred to the point where you can't read anything. That's enough for me right now. It does have the bug where the camera app gets rotated when you open the phone (which forces all apps into landscape mode), but the image isn't rotated, but its dimensions are. The viewfinder isn't really usable with the keyboard open. But it's not as bad as it is with the Planet Computer phones/PDAs.

Display

Once a smartphone display has reached a certain quality, I don't have much to say about it. And that quality point has been matched even in cheap phones for years. It's bright enough, resolution is high enough, I don't know or care about the maximum frame rate, colours seem fine, viewing angle isn't an issue (very good actually), touch resolution is fine enough that it isn't a problem. It does have black spots in some corners. Apparently that is something that can happen when you bend a panel that maybe isn't advanced enough to be bent that much. The rounded edges are nice though and I don't mind the black spots as long as they aren't growing. I've never accidentally activaterd the touch screen while typing.

Fingerprint Sensor

It's located below the power button on the right. I haven't found a comfortable way of using it to unlock the phone, yet. Maybe I won't use it. It's irritating how often it thinks it's been used when I handle the phone and vibrated he phone. Sometimes it's locked for too many failed attempts once I actually want to use it.

Exterior

As for ports, there are two: USB-C and a headset jack. No more or less than necessary. There's one fingerprint sensor. There are four buttons: Power, volume up, volume down and camera. And then there's a SIM and SD card tray.

Sound

It has stereo speakers, which are actually placed on opposite sides, facing left and right when in landscape mode. They are loud enough and sound like phone speakers sound nowadays: clear, without any surprises and enough bass to not miss it during any sort of speech recording. The position of the speakers could be worse. They arent covered when the phone rests on somthing and they can't be accidentally covered both at the same time. But they aren't facing you directly and can't possibly both face you at the same time. So the sound will always be roomy if both speakers are on. Their distance also creates a problem that I've rarely heard in a phone: If both ar producing the same or almost the same sound waves, parts of them will cancel each other out before the reach your ears, especially if the phone isn't exactly in the middle between your ears and exactly horizontal and straight. At 50 cm distance, if you want to watch a video with sound, in order to understand ecerything, you have to turn up the volume so much that others in the room are wondering why you're watching at that volume. At least I have to and I would wonder. My solution is to turn one of the speakers off almost completely. One is still loud enough usually. In Google's Android the audio settings are hidden in advanced accessibility settings. On LineageOS audio adjustments are directly on the accessibility settings screen. Set to mono you'll still hear everything. The setting does not influence bluetooth earphones.

Practical Usage

Whether the screen is activated by opening the keyboard or by pressing the power button, it takes a second until the screen comes on. That's annoying, but I'm going to get used to it. It's the case with both stock Android and LineageOS.

For daily usage so far it has been great, except for the battery life. Once I've stopped downloading and installing lots of stuff every day and trying things out it has become better. Also I think the battery charge indication has been caribrated. Because it doens't turn off with two digits of battery charge left. I'be decided to go with the battery enabled all the time. This way it lasts well over one day, even when I use it a bit more than usual. According to both the phones own and my measurement the capacity is almost exactly as advertised. (4 to 13 mAh more. I didn't factor in the voltage.) But the fact that it's runtime is at least a third shorter than that of by previous phone (with a smaller battery) makes me think it that the screen and other parts are probably not as energy efficient. I glady charge it more often for the experience with the better keyboard.

F(x)tex Pro¹ X

Entry created on 2024-08-03 author:steeph (337) cat:#100DaysToOffload (40) cat:Android (4) cat:Batteries (3) cat:Computer (75) cat:Crowdfunding (4) cat:Hands-On (3) cat:Hardware (12) cat:Keyboard (4) cat:Phones (3) cat:Smartphones (4) lang:en (186)

First of all: Look at the title. That's how the name of this device is spelled. I've never, and probably will never, be able to spell that correctly without looking it up.

I've contributed to the crowdfunding campagne in 2020. Various pandamic-related issues, a partly re-design, Chinese lock-down delays, devious shipping-issues and, during the last few years, suspected additional, unexplaned issues caused the delivery date to be postponed uncounted times. More than three years later, I've received my Pro¹ X arrived. That means that I guessed right about the makers not being the worst scum of the earth because the ran off with the money without sendind out the devices that we knew had already been produced. I don't know how this scam should have worked unless they sold the devices again to other people. But that was the general tone to which the comments on Indiegogo had goaded each other over the years.

I wanted a keyboard phone for years. I've had My experience with the Planet Computers devices, which some see as the competition. I've had more hopes for the Pro¹ X being the device I was whishing, searching and waiting for becasue it's keyboard is closer to those of the later slide-out qwerty smartphones, like Nokias N900 and because the Pro¹ X's predecessor, the Pro 1, has been reviewd positively by people with the same preferences as me.

So, the phone finally arrived. And, it didn't work. The battery hasn't been charged in years. It didn't charge. It did nothing electronic. But luckily some other campagne contributor has figured out a way to persuade the phone to charge. Interesting that they decided to send out the devices without knowing how the receipients could use them. Of course, the battery's capacity isn't what it was advertised as. In airplane mode with the display turned off and no app running the battery lasts for just over 24 hours. When used, the battery gets drained respectively quickly. But it works. Enough for a few sentences about my first experience.

The keyboard is not the theoretical ideal my brain has developed in the last 10 years. But I don't think that ideal exists. There probably are keys with a nicer preassure point and a click that feels nicer and is even more reliable. There have been in 2O02. But I didn't honestly expect that in a sub-1000-€ phone. The slide-lout mechanism is as snappy and firm as I've seen it described by users od the previous F(x)tec phone. I hope it lasts at least a few hundret times as long as the one on the Astro Slide.

The camera is fine. Much better than the alibi camera of the Titan Pocket that I'm currently using as my main phone. As it happens, I the week after I received the phone I stayed in the same hotel I was in when I tried out the Astro Slide. So I was able to make the same pointless test photos that I've posted in the Anstro Slide entry back then. (See below.) Okay resolution, mediocre sensore, unreliable auto white balance, usable but not enjoyable under artificial light (of normal brightness).

The screen is nice, which is the absolute minimum one expects in the cheapest of phones nowadays. It's bright enough, has a higher resolution than I need, has noticable colour-shift when viewed at an extreme angle. One edge is rounded, which is a first in my personal phone, but not really something I'll expect to use. It's more than fine. I don't need a display as great as what's common nowadays.

It's the best phone I had in my hands in years. The best for my preferences. If only the battery hadn't been killed by it's years-long storage period, the software would be the only thing I'd have to concern myself with in order to make this my primary phone. The pre-installed Android is very very Google-y. Not to my taste anymore. It works well, as one would expect. Not as buggy as with the Astro Slide and previous Planet Computers' Mediathek-based PDAs. Once I've installed LineageOS and replaced the battery, this may become my favourite smartphone ever. It might finally be the one to beat the Nokia 9300 for practical reasons.

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Phones people say don't exist but they do

Entry created on 2022-08-01 (edited 2022-08-04) author:steeph (337) cat:Batteries (3) cat:Displays (5) cat:Electronics (14) cat:Keyboards (5) cat:Phones (3)

Some people say things like: Phones should have bigger batteries, I don't care how thick it is. Or: Why aren't there any smartphones with screens smaller than 5 inches anymore? Or: There used to be a wider variety of phones; I'm missing keyboard phones/rugged phones/phones without a bunch of bloatware/etc. I think it is a very small group of people who feel like this strongly enough to say it. But I keep stumbling over such comments and I notice them because I have sometimes felt the same. And there's some truth about some of it. The most popular phones are all large and thin with privacy-invading bloatware that you can't uninstall and often with other malware pre-installed. They don't have keys on the front and you can't simply switch out the battery. But there is a bigger variaty of phones than there has ever bean. If you're missing a certain feature in your phone and can't find one that has it, you probably haven't looked far or long enough. I'd just like to mention a few manufacturers of not entirely mainstream phones and then maybe I'll make individual entries about some of them later with more information.

Keyboard phones

Notable options are:

F(x)tec: Flips open, keyboard in the style of late Nokia keyboard smartphones, best for thumb-typing, currently the first version is only available used and the newer version is currently shipping to Indiegogo backers. So it should be available without a long wait from the web shop soon.

Planet Computers: Different variants available, older ones are clam-shell, the latest is trying a new mechanism that leaves the touchscreen on the outside and usable when the physical keyboard is closed. Keyboard in Psion Series 5 style, best for table typing.

Unihertz: Clones of late Blackberry keyboard phones, screen above keyboard, for thumb-typing.

A used phone. Because you can still get a blackberry if you like. A few weeks or months from now you probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference between you almost new one and a refurbished one anyway. It's cheaper, you have more devices to choose from and it's better for the environment (whatever your definition of that may be). Did I miss or forget an option?

Phones with small screens

Uniherts also has started to fill this gap. Or you can get an older phone, maybe a used one. A few weeks or months from now you probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference between you almost new one and a refurbished one anyway. It's cheaper, you have more devices to choose from and it's better for the environment (whatever your definition of that may be). Did I miss or forget an option?

Phones with large batteries

If that's your one important requirement, you have many cheap phones that claim to have batteries with around 10 Ah (yes, 10.000 mAh if you prefer to see read more zeros) to choose from. Some manufacturers that I don't know anything about are: Yess, Gionee, Blackview, Ulefone. Ulefone seems to have several current models to choose from and I know somebody who is happy with theirs, whatever that tells you. I'm sure there are more brands of phones with giant batteries. But I'm personally happy with the 2 to 3 days I get out of my regular phone. I only complained about this when phones would at most last for one day without getting charged. If you're content with a battery with a capacity of around 6 or 7 Ah, you have even more to choose from and that range has actually started to enter the mainstream phone market (Huawei, Samsung, Asus, ZTE, …). You'll easily find some if you look for them. But many still don't think of searching for one. I guess this has been more of an issue 10 years ago, where phones needed more power to come through a day while at the same time no smartphones with big batteries existed. Getting an external battery that clips to the back of your phone has been more of a thing back then. That's still an option if such a product exist for your phone or you really love duct tape.

Headphone jacks, removable batteries, hardware buttons below the screen, ...

How about getting a used phone. A few weeks or months from now you probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference between you almost new one and a refurbished one anyway. It's cheaper, you have more devices to choose from and it's better for the environment (whatever your definition of that may be). Or at least I read that somewhere a few minutes ago. There are new phones with current hardware that haven't given up on these concepts. But none that I care to mention and the choice of phones with current hardware and easily removable batteries or hardware more than one hardware button below the screen doesn't appear to be good. Did I miss one?

But what about software? Security updates, free software, Google-less Android, privacy-respecting operating systems

Well, it would certainly make choosing and setting up a phone easier if you don't care about those things. But the FOSS community is producing images for many phones that otherwise would only run an Android built by the manufacture or carrier with all the usual insults like bloatware, pre-installed malware and other privacy-invading components. Using an older smartphone (maybe not a Nokia Communicator/Nokia 9xxx, but like maybe 10 years old) with current free software is certainly an option.