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Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

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Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#361
post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't work anymore because no one cares about audio jacks on their devices, so no manufacturer puts them in. Apple may have started it, but every other manufacturer eventually followed as not enough people complained. Doesn't your laptop have USB ports?

Roughly speaking every laptop on the face of the earth, including every Apple MacBook, has a headphone jack. Speaking of Macs, many of them have very high-quality DACs and amps that can drive quality headphones. Apple has gone out of their way to make the headphone outputs very good.[1] Why then would you occupy one of your maybe two USB ports with an inferior dongle? "Not enough people complained" is a terrible metr…

Space is at a premium on mobile and water ingress is a problem, there's no licensing fees to use such a jack and the part itself is absolute peanuts to buy. The real estate they gained by getting rid of the part eventually got filled by something that's almost certainly more expensive.

You don't have to overthink, you just need to think. Why permanently graft a part to a highly space optimized device when it isn't even being used most of the time?

I got over it, you should too. It helps to try to put off the onset of grumpy old man syndrome as long as possible.

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#362
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's obviously a trade-off between able to open the case without having to glue it back together - which is kind of needed for good repairability - and having IP67. It don't think it's even possible tbh. If you have screws, you'll have gaps and since IP67 has to be completely dust proof (not only dust protected as IP5) and water proof for 30 minutes in 1m water it's kind of a silly ask for anything repairable.

What is the trade off? Diving gear (flashlights etc) has had replaceable batteries since forever. The culprit is Steve Jobs' obsession with thin phones. Just thicken the phone and add some gaskets and you are good to go. People put those thin phones in thick cases anyway, so it is fine.

That's fair and I hadn't thought about the "Make it a bit thicker again" variant. I would like that. Probably not what will happen though.

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#363

I never broke a phone, not even scratched the screen but I feel force to buy a new one every 3 years because they become obsolete (I guess apps require more and more memory to the point I cannot have two open at the same time, which kills my ability to pay online). I bought a Framework laptop for the same reason and I successfully managed to upgrade it, not repair it! Is there a phone that allows me to upgrade over t…

You are one of the rare people that never broke a phone, probably.... or you just started using a cellphone... or you dont really use it or armored case, or something similar

I have been using mobile phones since at least the 90s and have never broken one.

(Motorola Sapphire was my first, 1G, and I still have it somewhere. Powering it up would probably break several laws at this point. The SIM was an entire credit-card size also...)

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#364

I thought that fairphone was: you buy once, and you can upgrade modules over time. But it seems that modules of newer fairphones don't necessarily fit an older fairphone. So it's more about repairable for that specific version. Which is still better than no repairability.. but I imagine you can feel quite duped still having to buy a new phone every 3 years and throwing the old one out. Anyone with experience of havin…

I own an FP 4 since it aired. No complaints so far. I mainly use it for browsing. I haven't needed any repairs yet, but I like the idea of that being an easy feat. Of course everyone hopes that they can make their phones more modular and upgradable than they do now, but it's also understandable they have to iterate their architecture before they can converge on a design that truely lasts multiple generations of upgrades.

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the planet: Not much better

There's more nuance than that. Total lifetime matters. If the first buyer keeps it 3 years, the next buyer may well keep it 3 more, or even longer.

Or the first buyer keeps it for three years then needlessly throws it away, or (more likely) shoves it in a drawer somewhere until it gets thrown away ten years later.

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#366
post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't think you have to. If banking apps are a bit slow, so what? I know that individual actions have limited impact, but do you realise what's at stake when it comes to environmental issues? FWIW I run a 6yo xiaomi and I avoid crapware, it's working fine, I can AV call, message, browse HN and other forums/links aggregator, navigate, track my sports and calories... The resources (some) apps and websites us…

It's not that they are slow. When I pay online, I need to confirm the payment through my bank app. When I switch to it, the browser or shop app closes and I cannot complete the transaction.

That seems kind of odd, my iPhone 12 Pro has zero issues with things like that and it’s three years old.

I did upgrade a few weeks ago because the iPhone 15 cameras are amazing and I care a lot about that but I honestly had zero performance reasons to upgrade. I’ve never had an issue with a 5-6 year old phone and I always keep my old phone as a backup specifically for banking.

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't any delay measured and accounted for in syncing playback of videos? When was the last time you've used a great pair of bluetooth headphones

> Isn't any delay measured and accounted for in syncing playback of videos? It can be, but your operating system needs to support it. Support for audio delay compensation is pretty good on macOS. No idea about other OSes, though.

It works everywhere. There is not much to do with delay on interactive content though.

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#368
post #8

Motivated by this article, and already thinking about handing down my current phone to a family member as a Christmas gift, I visited the Fairphone store ( https://shop.fairphone.com/ though likely available only on Amazon in the US) and read one review ( https://www.theverge.com/23895548/fairphone-5-review-price-f... ). Here's why I'm holding off. 1. No wireless charging. Switching to this phone would require a big…

I'll add to your list of fairphone shortcomings the lack of a headphone jack. I really don't buy their excuse that including one would make the phone too large to be commercially viable.

So what do you think the real reason is?

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#369

I was curious what the DRC map on https://valkyrie.cdn.ifixit.com/media/2023/12/06065751/disas... (included in the post) could signify. Search found (view HTML or click "More about our materials") on https://shop.fairphone.com/fairphone-5 > In addition, we account for 100% of the cobalt used in the battery by buying cobalt credits, which support the improvement of working conditions for artisanal cobalt miners in the…

Sorry, wrong comment

Re: Fairphone 5: Keeping it 10/10?

#370
post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't think you have to. If banking apps are a bit slow, so what? I know that individual actions have limited impact, but do you realise what's at stake when it comes to environmental issues? FWIW I run a 6yo xiaomi and I avoid crapware, it's working fine, I can AV call, message, browse HN and other forums/links aggregator, navigate, track my sports and calories... The resources (some) apps and websites us…

> I honestly don't think you have to. If banking apps are a bit slow, so what? Many phones are essentially abandoned by the manufacturer and don't receive any security updates not too long after release, which might just be an issue: https://source.android.com/docs/security/bulletin/2023-12-01 Not only that, but many apps won't run on the older versions of the OS either, due to the API level deprecation in Android: h…

But based on this it seems like the right comparison is between a three year old iPhone and a brand new mid-level android because they’ll last you the same amount of time, and three year old iPhones aren’t very expensive (though it depends on where in the world you live. In plenty of countries ~2yo iPhones cost the same as brand new iPhones at US prices, because you can use them for so much longer than local market android phones).
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