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Fairphone 3 gets 7 years of updates, besting every other Android OEM
(arstechnica.com)
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this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023
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From what I heard many Fairphone 3s didn't even survive that long. Quality, audio quality and performance all seem to be pretty bad. That combined with its very high price point kinda defeats the point of it. The idea is great, but the execution isn't.
I'm using a FP4, and here the signs are reversed. The hardware is working so far, but the software is incredibly buggy and instable.
Add to it the very mediocre hardware (slow, outdated SoC, terrible camera, bad battery life) and it's not a fun phone to use. Especially not at that price point.
You can get a pretty top of the line smartphone for that price, which I'm also not willing to pay for either.
Let's hope EU regulations can make smartphones generally a bit more sustainable.
Yeah, the high price point kinda destroys the repairability aspect for me. I could get a similar phone from Samsung or Google for €200-400 less. For that money I can get the battery/screen replaced multiple times.
I hope, the EU regulation makes repairability mainstream.
If the software is a major issue, why not install a Rom like LineageOS?
Tbh, I am not convinced they run much better than stock.
Also, I do use stuff like banking apps on my phone, and I don't want to completely lose that.
Phone cameras quality does not really depend on hardware these days. It's all software.
Get yourself a hacked Google Camera. Night and Day change.
I did and it is an improvement, but it can't completely fix the bad camera.
I renewed phones late last year and I pondered on getting the FP4, but I was unhappy with the camera and even though it's replaceable it is not upgradeable. I got instead a Pixel 6A and it's a pleasure to use (tolerating all the Google stuff).
I have high expcetations for FP5
I am quite certain you get the better user experience with the Pixel 6A than with the FP4.
Let's see about the FP5. The issue is that FP is just not a large manufacturer, and it shines through.
I agree wholeheartedly. Do you end up checking your e-mails for FP employee responses to the Forum posts?
I did for a while, but I gave up. Both their support and their communications on the forum is almost inexistent.
Yep, on the Forum they're nowhere to be found, usually. I'm the reporter of the screen ghosting issue. Have you tried Support though? They offered me an RMA.
I tried their support a few times. Since the bugs are software-only, an RMA probably wouldn't have fixed anything. They took the bugs, said they stuck them into their backlog, and then didn't do anything about them. The bugs got swapped out for other bugs when Android 12 came around.
The biggest two bugs I had before were that the notification toggles disappeared ~1/day and I could only get them back by repeatedly changing the user on my phone. The other one was that video wouldn't work in split screen.
With Android 12, both of them are fixed, but now my screen turns completely black whenever a new notification appears. Also my mobile data connection disappears ~1/h and only appears again if I manually toggle mobile data. Sometimes when using split screen, the phone gets completely stuck for ~30-60secs. The nav bar also sometimes just disappears. ~1/day the recents button on the navbar loses it's function and requires me to reboot for it to start working again. GPS randomly dies as well and only works again after a reboot. That's especially fun when you are currently using your phone for Google Maps while driving.
The navigation bar disappearing and the mobile data connection needing manual re-enablement affects me too. I don't think anyone has posted about them on the forum yet, though.
If only CalyxOS supported the Google Play Store, I would use that.
I bought my FP3 at release in September 2019, while it does overheat from time to time and I'm on my 3rd battery (kinda the point of it), I'm very happy with the purchase overall, when it dies I'll move on to the FP4 or 5 if it is released.
TBH, I was also surprised to see support for Android 13 was out
I'm still on my original FP3 battery (2021), although I am rooted and changed the PD charging speed to 2.5W...
What kind of torture are you doing to your device for it to overheat, damn 😳. I've only overheated my device once and that's mainly because I was using it as a bike computer in hot weather 😅
First one came DoA so it got replaced by warranty, the second one became a spicy pillow less than a year ago
Going through a battery each year doesn't really sound like the point of it though? That's a lot of excess waste. I use my Pixel 4a for about 2 years now and the battery is still good.
Ive been using my Fairphone 3 every single day since January 2020. I did have a vibration motor wear out, but its replaceable so its fine. My battery is a bit iffy now. According to a battery scan app I use, its at 63% health. I'll be replacing that soon too since sometimes it will only charge up to a certain point etc. Still though, on any other phone, that would be a deal breaker, but since I can order a replacemt battery for like 25€, its not an issue.
Only other issue I have is sometimes the screen experiences ghost touches, where it will register a touch on the screen even when I'm not using it. Again, this will be fixed with a replacement later on.
I love my Fairphone and I strongly reccomend it for its repairablity alone. The sustainability and FairTrade aspects are just a bonus IMO.
I've had my FP3 for the same amount of time, still on all original components. Battery lasts through the day easy. The camera is bad, so I might replace that for the upgrade, but other than that I have no issues. My partner buys fancy phones and he is on his third phone in the same timeframe because they all broke. Shame your FP3 is not holding out as well as mine!
If you had gotten a high quality phone from another manufacturer it is unlikely you would have had this many hardware problems requiring a replacement. This seems like a toss up.