Why not buy a good phone
this post was submitted on 24 May 2024
31 points (100.0% liked)
chapotraphouse
13538 readers
838 users here now
Banned? DM Wmill to appeal.
No anti-nautilism posts. See: Eco-fascism Primer
Gossip posts go in c/gossip. Don't post low-hanging fruit here after it gets removed from c/gossip
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
I’m doing a data plan and none of the phone I want are one there. Also I’m stuck with iMessage because of my family so all my contacts are iPhone unfortunately
Why not ask them to use a cross platform app like Signal?
They don’t sell Huawei phones in the US anymore, though.
There's plenty of other choices.
I was very satisfied with my Umidigi back in the day. ISTR it had great band coverage, so it just worked when I went abroad; some phones are very skimpy, like they'll only get 4G data on one or two carriers or not in some countries. Fall-induced screen damage made it uneconomical to fix so I got a $150 Nokia and said meh It's enough for Jerboa and a stack of 2FA apps.
The Oukitel designs with dummy thicc batteries look compelling, but I'm not really in the market.
You are paying 300 bucks to apple shareholders
Please elaborate
Apple profit margins on iphones are 40 percent, so you are paying (in some way) apple shareholders 40 percent of phone price, thus it’s counter revolutionary 
Apple profit margins on iphones are 40 percent
Jesus fucking Christ.
You openly wish to use and pursue proprietary software instead of working to free your computing.
What phone do you use?
Unfortunately Android is the best I can do because of material circumstances. A Pinephone daily driver would be the dream however, but a fully FOSS phone is only happening under socialism.
I plan on picking up a high end huawei next time I’m in China, it seems the only way to get android without supporting Google, and I just can’t do that for any reason.
That's not the only way, you could install a de-googled android ROM like LineageOS, CalyxOS or GrapheneOS.
I almost bought a Linux phone when I got my last phone, but I need access to WeChat to talk to my wife and it doesn’t seem to have a version for that. Other than Google pixel, what high end phones can have other OS installed? Last time I looked into it, pixel seemed to be the main way to degoogle, which kinda defeats the purpose.
CalyxOS seems to support some motarola phones and two fair phones https://calyxos.org/docs/guide/device-support/. LineageOS seems to support a wide array of devices (including some from the Chinese brand Xiaomi) https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/. However GrapheneOS only supports pixels https://grapheneos.org/faq. You could always just buy a pixel second hand if you don't want to support google. WeChat should work on all of these ROM's as they are just modified android.
I used to work as a repair technician, even got certified by the big three. I wouldn’t use a pixel phone even if was free haha. I didn’t realize how many devices supported other OS’s though, thanks for the great resources. LG phones are pretty well together, and some models of Moto phones as well. If I don’t end up going huawei, I might go one of those directions. Thanks again, this is a very helpful post!
Based
get a xiaomi and install lineageos on it.
"Apple will build a prison so opulent that people will beg to be jailed"
(Paraphrased) GNU project founder Richard Stallman
Also you're buying into the lottery that ur phone wont become e waste due to apple and the people in the global south who made your phone will have to produce another one for you.
Only libre software and hardware are truly concerned about sustainability and justice because they are ultimately socialist endeavors.
Well you post on HexBear so we all already knew that
youll probably like it too.
Can you tell me why
i was joking. ive had an android of some sort since ‘Donut’. about two years ago I got an iphone because of Covid and my kids.
Im not going to lie my iphone 12pro max is slick. Its got insane battery life. The photos are great quality. If i start a YT vid on my iphone and switch to my ipad, itll start up where I left off just by opening the app. My airpods follow. Everything is very polished.
but i miss my fucking back button. I miss rooting my phone. I miss sideloading shit. I miss a hosts file. I use ssh a fair bit to log in remotely to some Pi’s and some thinclients I have at home doing dumb shit and the ssh apps in the app store are trash. It seems like everything costs money. I miss a fucking homescreen and an app drawer. The list could go longer.
but, i think I use my phone a bit less because despite the polish, i dont really enjoy it, so i guess its a good thing. or maybe i just done really care enough any more. i dunno.
Could you define "insane battery life" for me? Also after two years how good is it compared to when you first got it?
The same as any device, the speed of battery degradation depends on your usage and cycle throughput. You can replace the battery in any device, and none last more than a couple years, but iPhones regularly get 2+ days of battery life for people who don’t live on their phones.
My last phone, a Pixel, required charging at the end of the day. Always. Compared to two years ago, i still have 93% of my original battery capacity. I still end the day with 40% of my battery left.
That's a smaller capacity than I expected with your praise, but the lack of significant deterioration is actually amazing. Thank you very much for your answer!
get it refurbished or used at least
If you can, get one with the lidar (pro or pro max).
I wish I had, because you can use it to create very good 3d scans of stuff and then dump em into cad.
If you can, buy direct from Apple instead of your carrier.
I’m going to buy it from Apple and pay 50$ a month through financing but the only issue is they ask you to buy from one of three carriers
And I’m trying to understand what this means. Apple claims the phone are unlocked but why do I have to buy from a carrier? Does this mean I also have to buy one of their plans and I can’t go with any provider I want?
Different carriers use different standards, gsm and cdma. You gotta pick the one that has the antennas for the network you wanna use.
That’s probably old information, I’ll look into it a little more in a second.
I was wrong. It used to be a modem choice way back in the day but now they’re mostly the same. “Choose carrier later” is unavailable because you picked financing and the terms of financing require a carrier. If you choose to pay up front then you can pick no carrier and set one up later but it’s $30 more because they do some kind of discount for connecting right then.
You're not a counterrevolutionary, just a sucker. There's one born every minute, I hear.