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Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

unihertz.com

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Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#221

Post by oinj »

rtpg wrote: post #166

For people worried about the keyboard typing, I've been very curious about the Titan Pocket as an alternative option. Square screen (fun!), "real" keybaord... the biggest problem seeming to be that the keyboard is intentionally a bit weird in the layout to avoid dealing with Blackberry ...design patents I think https://www.unihertz.com/products/titan-pocket As a former iPhone 12 mini user (whose spouse is on their se…

I wrote an input service to improve the keyboard of the Titan Pocket[1], it's quite good for writing things. I've since sold it and tried a Jelly Star, which I returned.

The Titan Pocket is a nice phone, a bit too big and too heavy for me, but like most of the Unihertz offering the major pain point is that the stock firmware is old and not to be trusted, and the community-driven LineageOS alternatives are flimsy and incomplete. This is also due to Unihertz and Mediatek not doing their part and releasing the relevant source code or documentation for specific drivers/services. There is a small community with a few dedicated members but it's a bit of an uphill battle.

[1] https://github.com/oin/titanpocketkeyboard

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#222

Post by exe34 »

cookiengineer wrote: post #176
wkat4242 wrote: post #6

Part of the problem with this brand is that this "Android 13 Smartphone" will probably stay that forever. Updates are very very minimal. I have their first jelly and it didn't even get the upgrade they promised. Other than that, it's not so bad. Swype-typing makes a small keyboard still useful. But the updates really are the achilles heel here.

For me personally, I learned to avoid every smartphone vendor that: 1) doesn't share the sources of their Android OEM images online 2) isn't compatible with LineageOS. 3) doesn't have replaceable batteries. If either of those apply, it's just a waste of money that can be avoided, regardless of build quality. In the case of the Jelly devices, they have a replaceable battery, but it's still just software waste. Usually…

> isn't compatible with LineageOS

I gave up on rugged phones for this, I got a pixel 5 and a rhinoshield, which has survived over a year so far, although I don't just throw it around like I could with the bv7000. that phone was the smartphone equivalent of an old Nokia 3310.

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#223

Post by exe34 »

ncruces wrote: post #68
wkat4242 wrote: post #6

Part of the problem with this brand is that this "Android 13 Smartphone" will probably stay that forever. Updates are very very minimal. I have their first jelly and it didn't even get the upgrade they promised. Other than that, it's not so bad. Swype-typing makes a small keyboard still useful. But the updates really are the achilles heel here.

Honestly, I don't care about feature upgrades in a device like this, which, invariably, degrade experience, rather than improve it. I would much rather the industry moved to focus on security upgrades. Keep the device reasonably updated while it's on sale (either current or previous feature version max), then promise extended support for N years, where any critical security issues are patched, and that's all. I espec…

or comply with the gpl and release the kernel sources so that it can be supported by lineageos et al.

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#224

Post by knallfrosch »

ecjhdnc2025 wrote: post #157

I miss really small phones. My favourite two small iPhones were the small-by-contemporary-standards iPhone 5S and SE. My favourite phone ever, small or large, was the Sony Xperia Mini Pro (the second of the Xperia Mini devices, with the slide out keyboard). An absolutely amazingly useful, chunky little device with a super keyboard, an unusually good camera for the time, and an actual shutter button for it. I'd have u…

I tolerate iOS to get the iphone 13 mini's form factor.

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#225

Post by mistercheph »

laurex wrote: post #84

I still use an iPhone SE (original 2016 version), probably the most beautiful phone ever and quite functional, though this year it finally stopped being supported by a lot of apps due to its iOS. Surprisingly, most apps work just fine until they are just removed from availability. (I'm not gaming on it or anything!) It is the perfect size and with no notifications enabled, is dang near ideal as long as you don't need…

Same! They are awesome phones, and I love that if I break it, my replacement is $50.

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#226

Post by keyringlight »

josephcsible wrote: post #151
keyringlight wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The challenge is trust, can you trust that an third party ROM hasn't been tampered with, and that third party maintaining the build for your device is often some guy on the internet you probably only know as a pseudonym. It might be the latest version, it might have some modifications that 'distro' of ROM applies to all their builds, some required per-device changes to make it work, but what degree of confidence is t…

But if you're going to worry that a custom ROM might be compromised, shouldn't you also be worried that you know that the stock ROM contains unfixed critical security vulnerabilities? Wouldn't any reasonable argument to forbid the former also forbid the latter?

I'd say when something like a bank is involved, they need something more substantial to point at for their insurance arrangements if/when something goes wrong. "Our app allowed a $5000 transfer on the user's stock Samsung" is easier to grasp the state of the system they're playing in than a user modified one.

Also knowing what security risks are in play with N year old OS lets them decide if they want to allow the user to proceed or work around. Some applications are more aggressive in what version OS they need and that's a driver for upgrading phones, pushing the OEM to keep a phone in support for longer, or third party ROMs if this catch22 wasn't part of it.

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#227

Post by dredmorbius »

timschmidt wrote: post #97
orson2077 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iPhone 4 was the apex of phone design, I will die on this hill!

It was the Pre 3 [0] and I'll fight you for it. Lol. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_Pre_3

Psion Series 3:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psion_Series_3>

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#228

Post by cookiengineer »

t0bia_s wrote: post #188
cookiengineer wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me personally, I learned to avoid every smartphone vendor that: 1) doesn't share the sources of their Android OEM images online 2) isn't compatible with LineageOS. 3) doesn't have replaceable batteries. If either of those apply, it's just a waste of money that can be avoided, regardless of build quality. In the case of the Jelly devices, they have a replaceable battery, but it's still just software waste. Usually…

4) Is not bigger than 72mm W. What you ended up with?

Honestly, some Sony XZ and Xiaomi Redmi devices were kinda nice in the past because even when they had a sealed battery they were still replaceable without super expensive heat plates.

Ethically I'd probably recommend a Fairphone 2/3/3+ in used condition, though they are somewhat clumsy. Ironically it's somewhat more private because the fingerprinting sensor never works in all of these models :D

In theory the Pixel 3+ devices would be amazing, but their resale value is just way too high for my cheap pockets. I set myself a limit of max 200 bucks for a used device, for both used laptops and smartphones and I never buy new hardware.

I'd avoid MediaTek chipset devices, because they have a known RootKit that can be easily exploited. Their CPUs have an undocumented root mode, and there's some apps and SDKs available that got leaked a while back.

My previous devices are now kind of ARM homeservers, because they either run ArchLinuxARM or PostmarketOS [1] on them, which is kinda nice and gives me a little satisfaction when I see that I can still use them for a nice tinkering purpose even without a battery inside.

One phone even runs my local mesh router with external USB Wi-Fi adapters, off-the-grid and solar charged. The display is used for the Web UI to manage things, which is also kinda nice. It's basically a fullscreen WebKit in kiosk mode.

[1] https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#229

Post by iSnow »

barbs wrote: post #124
grishka wrote: post #70

It's a bit too small, but I like that it's a thing. However, for my own use, I want something in-between. A 4" phone would be ideal. I'm still confused how there aren't any phones for people who still use a computer as their primary means of accessing the internet . Even for this one, the media review section makes it look like it's "to distract oneself from social media". As if a phone's primary purpose isn't to be…

Unihertz will be launching their Jelly Max phone in a couple of days, which is bigger than the Jelly Star but (hopefully) not too big. As a 1st gen iPhone SE user I'm intrigued.

Well, that would have been the perfect smartphone for me, I had the original Jelly but it was too small.

Now, I have the iPhone 13 mini and I love it.

Re: Jelly Star – The Smallest Android 13 Smartphone

#230

Post by cookiengineer »

exe34 wrote: post #222
cookiengineer wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me personally, I learned to avoid every smartphone vendor that: 1) doesn't share the sources of their Android OEM images online 2) isn't compatible with LineageOS. 3) doesn't have replaceable batteries. If either of those apply, it's just a waste of money that can be avoided, regardless of build quality. In the case of the Jelly devices, they have a replaceable battery, but it's still just software waste. Usually…

> isn't compatible with LineageOS I gave up on rugged phones for this, I got a pixel 5 and a rhinoshield, which has survived over a year so far, although I don't just throw it around like I could with the bv7000. that phone was the smartphone equivalent of an old Nokia 3310.

Same here, same here.

All Blackview and CAT models were insanely bad when it comes to their software, and I couldn't get them to run any self-built ROM and neither any GSI image so I gave up on my dream of an open rugged phone, too :(

In the BV case I even tried using the MediaTek root-mode exploit, but didn't have success booting any compiled kernel because lots of drivers are messy in their firmware.

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