Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

kooslooijesteijn.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 300 posts

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#91

Post by SOLAR_FIELDS »

janandonly wrote: post #43

This hit home hard for me: > You decided that you wanted to use some framework/feature/API and save developer time. Which is odd. Because consider how much time you spend trying to not harm the environment in your free time: shopping for sustainable products, bringing your reusable cup, recycling. And then think of the minutes you save with new programming stuff compared to the number of iPhones discarded because of…

Interestingly, I felt the opposite reading that. Probably in the author’s country (I’m assuming the Netherlands, given the name and the prices in EUR) this is a general sentiment, but in America where most of the apps the author is using were written the average programmer probably does not care about this as much as the author thinks they do. This is not saying this for better or worse, just acknowledging the reality of the situation.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#92

Post by datadeft »

vanilla_nut wrote: post #80
terhechte wrote: post #8

If they want to use an old phone, they can just stop updating their apps and not installing new apps. I still own a iPad 3 with the same, old, software stack from 2013. It still works, I can do things. I just don't expect todays developers to make a herculean effort so that I can run their apps on my old device. It is not just the overhead of supporting multiple different OS versions with different technologies, it i…

No, you cannot. Apple does not give you the freedom to use old versions of software. You can't downgrade your iOS version. You can only upgrade apps, and iOS only lets you download the latest available version of an app for your version of iOS. Need to do a device reset? If you have managed to keep any apps on old versions, you'll get upgraded now. And you can't even save APKs and sideload because of Apple's develope…

This ship has sailed when people accepted that everything lives in the cloud and companies can dictate what you can, can't and must do with your own property.

The last thing they cannot take away and cannot control is offline physical goods, like books for example.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#93

Post by petodo »

If you were using Android I would suggest just go for some mainstream model from Samsung (S series), Xiaomi (Mi X) or Pixel (basically any model) with pretty much guaranteed long term unofficial ROM updates even after official support cease if your problem were depreciated new app versions, but since you are voluntarily locked yourself to closed iOS, I have no suggestion other than stop updating apps and use the apps which were fine before. Btw. multitasking doesn't really work even on brand new iPhones.

For the record I am running gapps free Lineage with Android 8.1 on my phone from 2018 without any issues, I can hardly find app which would not run on 5 years old Android 8.1, if something (rarely) doesn't work it's because of relying on gapps.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#94

Post by schwartzworld »

patwolf wrote: post #82

It's not just phones. Yesterday I tried to dust off a MacBook Air from 2012 so that the kids could play some games. It was used regularly up until 3 years ago, but now pretty much all software is broken, and it won't let me upgrade anything. Hopefully there's a Linux distro that will work on it.

Interesting, I still have a 2012 MBP that works great. I mostly use command line software on it, but it works just fine.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#95

Post by WrtCdEvrydy »

vanilla_nut wrote: post #80
terhechte wrote: post #8

If they want to use an old phone, they can just stop updating their apps and not installing new apps. I still own a iPad 3 with the same, old, software stack from 2013. It still works, I can do things. I just don't expect todays developers to make a herculean effort so that I can run their apps on my old device. It is not just the overhead of supporting multiple different OS versions with different technologies, it i…

No, you cannot. Apple does not give you the freedom to use old versions of software. You can't downgrade your iOS version. You can only upgrade apps, and iOS only lets you download the latest available version of an app for your version of iOS. Need to do a device reset? If you have managed to keep any apps on old versions, you'll get upgraded now. And you can't even save APKs and sideload because of Apple's develope…

You can install any version using AppStore++ which is available when you jailbreak. The older the phone, the easier the jailbreak.

You can always download the app version that works for your phone using the Purchased section... the only real phone I have yet to be able to do this for is the iPhone 4 which did not have 64-bit apps.

My iPhone 5S and beyond all have access to every app that is available for 64-bit OS. It's often an older version of the app but that's kinda the Apple burden.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#96

Post by timvisee »

V1ndaar wrote: post #89
timvisee wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still use my OnePlus 5 which is now (almost) 5 years old! It has 8GB of memory with Android 13 and a custom ROM. It's still faster than some phones that are released today. I agree though that some apps are extremely resource intensive for the sometimes seemingly things they have to do.

Funny. I'm still on a OnePlus 6 and I see similar bizarre freezes as OP when I open the photo gallery. Or just when starting the camera often I have to wait 15-20s before the phone realizes that I have pictures. Sometimes when swiping through the gallery it will become excessively slow and stop reacting to panning / swiping / zooming. It's what is driving me close to grabbing a new phone at some point this year.

Not fun!

Using a custom ROM? I'm running LineageOS with minimal Google Apps.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#97

Post by nehal3m »

mnw21cam wrote: post #49
andrekandre wrote: post #32

> Starting some apps takes really long, like 10–20 seconds. I think it’s because today’s apps require more RAM than their older versions. is it that? i seem to remember something about flash chips wearing down over time and get less and less performance... could it be that instead?

The flash chips in the SSD in my actual computer don't seem to have done this, and they're older and have had higher write traffic. If this is a thing, does this just indicate the phone manufacturers are saving a few pence on each unit at our expense?

>If this is a thing, does this just indicate the phone manufacturers are saving a few pence on each unit at our expense?

Would this surprise you? If, before I bought a phone, I would have some insight into how long the storage chips will last that would definitely factor into my purchasing decision. This is not something reviews cover, or are even able to cover.

Hope LTT Labs sets something up here.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#98

Post by traverseda »

crims0n wrote: post #72
traverseda wrote: post #7

I'd like to see "right to downgrade" put in to law, if I buy a product I should have the option to have it run older firmware, or play an older version of a game I bought.

Sounds like a security nightmare.

That's another benefit, if I buy a smart TV with the express intent of sideloading software on to it and then they remove the ability to do that later on than the product I've purchased has fundamentally changed. Most EULA's allow them to make arbitrary modifications like that.

I consider being able to exploit security issues in older firmware revisions an absolute win for software freedom.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#99

Post by SOLAR_FIELDS »

nehal3m wrote: post #73

At some point you're better off switching to a dumb phone for phone calls and a tablet with a data-SIM for everything else.

I tried doing that a couple years ago. The problem with dumb phones (or at least the problem when I researched this several years ago) is that it’s a niche market with high enough demand that all of the products are low-effort, low quality and exorbitantly priced for what you get.

Re: I don’t want a new phone, but I’m probably buying one

#100

Post by AndyMcConachie »

terhechte wrote: post #8

If they want to use an old phone, they can just stop updating their apps and not installing new apps. I still own a iPad 3 with the same, old, software stack from 2013. It still works, I can do things. I just don't expect todays developers to make a herculean effort so that I can run their apps on my old device. It is not just the overhead of supporting multiple different OS versions with different technologies, it i…

Enjoy all the security vulnerabilities.
Post reply on HN