Any chance of non-Sony phones being officially supported in the future ?!

[PeegeeTips]

is there any indication of official support for the new new Planet Computers “Astro Slide” slider device?

[nero355]

@David

Also, the Sony team was friendly and keen.

Very unusual for Sony since they are the ones who send a police squad to your home if you mod their products!

Their vision is that the products you buy from them are not owned by you : They are still owned by Sony according to them!

@David

Remember, Jolla’s market isn’t us and hasn’t been for a few years.

Please explain

@usbee

I think not all community ports has battery issues, also since you bought an used phone, it can be a hardware issue too. (old battery for example)

I know for sure that there are Community Ports out there that don’t have batterydrain issues, but this particular one has it unfortunately…

It’s not the battery of the phone : It’s fine when I use it in combination with Android
The phone had only been used for about 8 months according to the guy who sold it to me and my own tests more or less confirm that!

@usbee

They still have struggle with stability, so I don’t think they will expand the lineup soon.

So even a Sony Xperia X II or in the future the III won’t give me a 100% reliable experience ?!

@PeegeeTips

is there any indication of official support for the new new Planet Computers “Astro Slide” slider device?

WOW!!!

Astro Slide 5G Transformer

That thing looks damn good!

[Seven.of.nine]

Very nice new phone!!

[marcelpol]

@nero355

Very unusual for Sony since they are the ones who send a police squad to your home if you mod their products!

Sony Mobile is based in Sweden and much more relaxed than the departments in Japan.

[usbee]

oh wow so they kept the Sony Ericsson legacy in some form?

[peterleinchen]

So on what does this view base on?

Reading those stuff below does not sound ‘relaxed’ to me (and it is not first mentioning of this behaviour):

Claiming warranty on Xperia 10, should I reflash Android, lock the bootloader?

Well… The repair center in the Netherlands denied repair of the phone, and kindly passed the phone number for Sony if you don’t agree with the denial of the repair. Even writing emails pointing out to the EU law does not help. I even asked what the cost would be if I would like to pay for the repair (mainboard replacement) and they even denied this because when it is not within the warranty Sony does not allow then to repair the phone. So they basically say you wanted this and even if our produ…

Claiming warranty on Xperia 10, should I reflash Android, lock the bootloader?

I accidentally dropped my Xperia 10 II and the screen broke. Contractor (Sweden) says that a screen replacement would cost just over half the cost of a new phone but since I’ve unlocked the bootloader they would need to replace the motherboard and that in it self is more expensive than a new phone. They also claim that my insurance will not cover this since the fault (unlocking bootloader) was caused by me. If had not unlocked the bootloader and the phone was actually beyond repair, my insuran…

Claiming warranty on Xperia 10, should I reflash Android, lock the bootloader?

I also asked the contractor “Is it possible to replace battery without replacing motherboard on a rooted Sony phone?” (Maybe a bit unclear since I did not explicitly state that this was a hypothetical question?) Got an answer this morning (translated from Swedish by me): "Hello again. We are unfortunately not allowed to do that as an authorized Sony workshop. As the device is rooted we are in fact not allowed to handle it at all."

despite (Switzerland)

Claiming warranty on Xperia 10, should I reflash Android, lock the bootloader?

Funny, I have the opposite experience in Switzerland: I had a busted micro-USB socket on my Xperia X phone (so I couldn’t easily connect to flashtool and return it to factory state. In fact I couldn’t even charge it). Warranty-repair subcontracting company explained that they don’t give a damn what’s installed on the phone: they will always wipe the phone, flash the factory image and relock the boatloader as part of their standard repair procedure (to cover troubles which are of software orig…

[Inte]

There is an official port for the gemini pda which is not a Sony phone.
Plus, there seem to be some russian phones running the russian sfos derivative “AuroraOS”. I don’t know these phones have Android support though, but I guess they don’t.

[Inte]

Link:

Мобильные устройства на платформе ОС Аврора

[nero355]

The Gemini PDA is a bit of a hate/love relationship for me so I am not yet sure what to do with that one!

Those AuroraOS phones are not a option because of two things :

• Russian market phones.
• MediaTek SoC’s which I would rather avoid whenever possible!

But thanks anyway!

[WedgeStratos]

Some of the takes in this thread are surprising and disappointing.

The decision for Sony is one that I find very compelling, in large part because of the Open Devices program. At one point in time, a company such as HTC offered a relatively easy bootloader-unlocking solution (until their mobile division started to falter). Sony Mobile makes bootloader-unlocking easy, and also offers prebuilt ROMs of Android Open Source Project (a theoretically non-Googled Android build). Meanwhile, Samsung invests millions into their KNOX security, and disables features, or hardware outright when you unlock their bootloader (say goodbye to your camera).

Currently out of the popular manufacturers of smartphones, Sony has my support. Having used both my XA2 on Android briefly, and being stuck with Android on the 10iii until 4.4 or 5 releases, I believe Sony strikes a very good medium of software customization. It isn’t a bloated experience like a Samsung or LG device, it has just a few of Sony’s trimmings to make it distinctly a Sony product, they have a handful of useful features and apps that, while proprietary, are much better apps than the competing versions. I would be very comfortable with Sony’s array of media applications over what I’ve stumbled through using on any other gadget.

Sony’s hardware is absolutely no slouch either. The 10iii has an AMOLED display, the 21:9 aspect ratio, while understandably a tall device, is much slimmer in the hand than you realize. It’s actually slimmer in the horizontal compared to the XA2, which may be the last official option for a small Sailfish device. Yes, it’s tall, but it’s still practical as a one-handed device, especially since Sailfish is a more gesture-driven OS overall. Front-facing speakers, headphone jack, a 4500mAh battery with fast charging support. NFC is one thing Sony heavily advocates for that I appreciate. They have it on a lot of their products, and they make it very clear where it is on your phone. I have to guess half the time where the NFC reader is on someone’s phone, and the way people fumble with using Google Pay at checkouts, a lot of manufacturers should be taking notes. (EDIT: Turns out there isn’t wireless charging on the 10 iii, and the two-stage shutter button was dropped in favor of… a Google Assistant button. That’s a massive bummer, but I’m sure we can make better use of that button in Sailfish.)

Only Google’s Pixel devices can compete in actual price to hardware, and with that, you’re clearly paying that low cost for the privilege of Google’s aggressive data collection and utility for always-listening Assistant (their sales pitch with that is you can check your phone in a store or coffee shop and Assistant will have already listened in and identified what song is playing on the intercom) and their AI-based image processing, which has obviously been gathered from the terabytes of pictures backed up to Google Photos since the first Pixel and beyond. In other regions, I’m sure a Xiaomi or ASUS ROG or Redmagic can provide good hardware ans performance, but there’ll be a lot of bloat in their implementations of Android, even if they lack Google Play services. You get what you pay for. And sorry to say, OnePlus has not been worth their asking prices for the past 5 years. Don’t be duped.

Huawei making an “Open Devices” program is hunorous, considering they’re on the same track that Samsung is going through, with their China-backdoored HarmonyOS in smart TVs, fridges and watches. That’s as humorous as the notions our own Sailfish would get an Aurora-style fork in those territories.

The Pinephones are not yet daily driver material, that’s without even the stable base of a strong community port of Sailfish. That said, you won’t probably find as free and open a smartphone for ~$200 like a Pinephone. And to support the Librem, you’ll be paying well over the reasonable asking price and mostly, it’s for those hardware toggles and the freely available code of the Freescale CPU among other parts, and PureOS is still under heavy development. A great base, but at ~$700, no thanks.

As has already been pointed out, the Open Devices program, and the availability of these binary blobs, are dependent on the manufacturer and companies involved. Those sorts of things are NOT available simply by asking. Sony has to put just as much an effort as Jolla does with convincing a company to make such a thing accessible, and then it’s on Sony to get the legalese handled for the little guys to have these small comforts. Sony is a huge minority among the smartphone manufacturers. The only company in this same league is Fairphone, and far as we can tell, any discussions about SFX on Fairphone stop at the community forums. Obviously it’s hush-hush stuff that has to be worked out behind closed doors, and Jolla is primarily B2B now.

Elaborating on what David meant by Jolla’s market, Sailfish X is the enthusiast and community-focused branch of Sailfish OS. Jolla has put their focus on B2B relations, with Russia’s Rostelecom being one of their strongest contracts, and a large reason for why Aurora OS exists. SFX exists so that the original crowdfunders and the interested parties therein, who still believe in what Jolla’s trying to do, have a device and a place that they can belong. If you buy a license, you’re mostly paying for the cost of their Android app support. True, it is not a requirement by any means. Using the free version, or a port, just means you don’t get predictive text, Android apps, Microsoft Exchange, or “OTA” updates. It sounds like that isn’t a deal breaker for you anyway, so fair enough.

As it is, your only bet is any and all community ports. We aren’t aware of any other major devices coming down the pipe, and a lot of us are perfectly happy with our Sony devices. I wouldn’t even be buying another phone in the first place, but my XA2 looks like it’s been through some scuffles. Dented top and bottom brackets, missing paint, there’s a chip off in the back plate, and I can tell it’s starting to bulge from the battery. Still, it feels good in the hand, screen is always nice to use, still gets respectable standby and SOT, and while I have complaints with memory management that I can only truly solve by just… having more memory (thank goodness the 10iii has 6GB), I will still say Sony’s phone are a solid choice, and I’d recommend them to more people in general if Sony would actually sell their mid-rangers state-side.

[mintplague]

@WedgeStratos

thank goodness the 10iii has 6GB

There’s also a variant of XA2 Plus with 6GB of RAM, that is H4493. I got one and it works well, even in European mobile bands.

[PeegeeTips]

i use the xa2 plus, great phone.

[nero355]

@WedgeStratos

The decision for Sony is one that I find very compelling, in large part because of the Open Devices program. At one point in time, a company such as HTC offered a relatively easy bootloader-unlocking solution (until their mobile division started to falter). Sony Mobile makes bootloader-unlocking easy, and also offers prebuilt ROMs of Android Open Source Project (a theoretically non-Googled Android build).

Like I said : That is surprising considering the fact it’s a brand that has a very unfriendly attitude towards their customers in general!

Their opinion is that their products will always stay their products no matter how much money you have paid for them!
And let’s be honest : Every damn Sony product is well overpriced compared to their competitors!

@WedgeStratos

Meanwhile, Samsung invests millions into their KNOX security, and disables features, or hardware outright when you unlock their bootloader (say goodbye to your camera).

Samsung is totally out of the question for many reasons here so let’s not waste much time talking about their stupid products!

But just for the record : I am not looking for a good cameraphone since I don’t use it much anyway 99% of the time!

@WedgeStratos

I believe Sony strikes a very good medium of software customization. It isn’t a bloated experience like a Samsung or LG device, it has just a few of Sony’s trimmings to make it distinctly a Sony product, they have a handful of useful features and apps that, while proprietary, are much better apps than the competing versions. I would be very comfortable with Sony’s array of media applications over what I’ve stumbled through using on any other gadget.

You know that Sony is the brand that is known for pushing their own proprietary standards right ?!
Memory Stick cards, All sorts of compression codecs for music, etc…

Also whatever is on the phone in the Android Stock ROM doesn’t really bother me : I either remove it or flash a Custom ROM or in this case a totally different OS

@WedgeStratos

Sony’s hardware is absolutely no slouch either. The 10iii has an AMOLED display

GREAT!

But so has my € 300 ZUK Z2 Pro for about 5 years now!

@WedgeStratos

the 21:9 aspect ratio, while understandably a tall device, is much slimmer in the hand than you realize. It’s actually slimmer in the horizontal compared to the XA2, which may be the last official option for a small Sailfish device. Yes, it’s tall, but it’s still practical as a one-handed device, especially since Sailfish is a more gesture-driven OS overall.

That’s actually one of the things that bothers me the most : The damn “Bananaphones”
And then ofcourse Sony had to do something totally different that’s weird and introduce their “Bananaphone++” models!

Come on…

@WedgeStratos

Front-facing speakers, headphone jack, a 4500mAh battery with fast charging support.

• The battery is average these days.
• The jack is nice but I would barely use it and we all know the quality of such input/outputs goes down over time and the sound quality goes down with it…
• Front facing speakers : I think dual front facing speakers are a thing of the past now just like easily removable batteries ?!

@WedgeStratos

NFC is one thing Sony heavily advocates for that I appreciate. They have it on a lot of their products, and they make it very clear where it is on your phone. I have to guess half the time where the NFC reader is on someone’s phone, and the way people fumble with using Google Pay at checkouts, a lot of manufacturers should be taking notes.

Don’t use it. Don’t need it. Sorry!

@WedgeStratos

(EDIT: Turns out there isn’t wireless charging on the 10 iii, and the two-stage shutter button was dropped in favor of… a Google Assistant button. That’s a massive bummer, but I’m sure we can make better use of that button in Sailfish.)

I sure hope so too!

I don’t like those spying assistants either!

@WedgeStratos

Only Google’s Pixel devices can compete in actual price to hardware, and with that, you’re clearly paying that low cost for the privilege of Google’s aggressive data collection and utility for always-listening Assistant (their sales pitch with that is you can check your phone in a store or coffee shop and Assistant will have already listened in and identified what song is playing on the intercom) and their AI-based image processing, which has obviously been gathered from the terabytes of pictures backed up to Google Photos since the first Pixel and beyond.

Ugly spyware phones that are ironically the best deGoogle option in many cases indeed…

But beeing cheap or a good price/performance/features ratio is something they definitely DO NOT have!

@WedgeStratos

I’m sure a Xiaomi or ASUS ROG or Redmagic can provide good hardware ans performance, but there’ll be a lot of bloat in their implementations of Android, even if they lack Google Play services.

ASUS Zenphone Flip and the Xiaomi phones with a pop-up camera are my favorites mainly because of one thing : A 100% screen on the front which is just that! A screen!

No stupid notches or fat bezels or even worse : Holes in my screen!

Pricewise Xiaomi wins and because of some stupid patent related stuff between ASUS and Philips the Zenfones need to be imported over here so Xiaomi wins again when it comes to the availability!

@WedgeStratos

And sorry to say, OnePlus has not been worth their asking prices for the past 5 years. Don’t be duped.

I am not duped!

I just like their OnePlus 7 Pro and OnePlus 7T Pro because of the same thing I like the Xiaomi 9T (Pro) and the Pocophone F2 Pro for example : The looks!

@WedgeStratos

Huawei & HarmonyOS

Yeah… let’s skip those and not talk about them ever again!

@WedgeStratos

The Pinephones are not yet daily driver material

Sadly indeed still the case, but hey… who knows… one day… ?!

@WedgeStratos

That said, you won’t probably find as free and open a smartphone for ~$200 like a Pinephone.

True!

@WedgeStratos

And to support the Librem, you’ll be paying well over the reasonable asking price and mostly, it’s for those hardware toggles and the freely available code of the Freescale CPU among other parts, and PureOS is still under heavy development. A great base, but at ~$700, no thanks.

According to a couple of people heavily involved in both projects buying either the PinePhone64 or the Librem 5 will benefit the same goal in the end : The development and future of true Linux phones!

So it’s basically your choice : How much are you willing to donate ?!

@WedgeStratos

As has already been pointed out, the Open Devices program, and the availability of these binary blobs, are dependent on the manufacturer and companies involved. Those sorts of things are NOT available simply by asking. Sony has to put just as much an effort as Jolla does with convincing a company to make such a thing accessible, and then it’s on Sony to get the legalese handled for the little guys to have these small comforts. Sony is a huge minority among the smartphone manufacturers.

I am aware of all those things but still : Wouldn’t it be nice to have more than one brand to choose from ?!

@WedgeStratos

The only company in this same league is Fairphone, and far as we can tell, any discussions about SFX on Fairphone stop at the community forums.

I am willing to buy a Fairphone at some point but the offers I have seen so far were not really interesting to me from both price and design perspective…

But again : Who knows… maybe one day… ?!

@WedgeStratos

Obviously it’s hush-hush stuff that has to be worked out behind closed doors, and Jolla is primarily B2B now.

B2B as in phone manufacturers or telecom companies ?!

So far I am only aware of the things we all already know :

@WedgeStratos

Jolla has put their focus on B2B relations, with Russia’s Rostelecom being one of their strongest contracts, and a large reason for why Aurora OS exists.

And that’s it as far as I know ?!

@WedgeStratos

If you buy a license, you’re mostly paying for the cost of their Android app support. True, it is not a requirement by any means. Using the free version, or a port, just means you don’t get predictive text, Android apps, Microsoft Exchange, or “OTA” updates. It sounds like that isn’t a deal breaker for you anyway, so fair enough.

Exactly!

In fact : I wouldn’t mind buying a license anyway even if I would only be using the OTA Updates/Upgrades and skipping all the rest!

@WedgeStratos

As it is, your only bet is any and all community ports.

Looks like it…

@WedgeStratos

a lot of us are perfectly happy with our Sony devices.

When I browse the forum here it seems that even the officially supported Sony models are not always 100% Stable as daily devices ?!

That’s perhaps the thing worries me the most :

• Let’s say I buy the Xperia III in 2022
• Buy a license, flash Sailfish

And then the bugs start to attack and don’t go away for a long time : What are my options at that point ?!

Have you read the previous reply about the Sony warranty stuff ?!
Not my idea of good RMA support for a expensive phone!

@WedgeStratos

and I can tell it’s starting to bulge from the battery.

Good point there!

What if I buy a older Sony phone and need to replace the battery : Are they easily available ?!

@PeegeeTips

i use the xa2 plus, great phone.

That’s great for you but not the right answer for me!

[PeegeeTips]

@PeegeeTips

i use the xa2 plus, great phone.

“That’s great for you but not the right answer for me!”

Unless you are happy to compile (and support!) your own port, or personally convince Xaiomi to create an Open Devices Program, then the right answer for you might not be Sailfish.

[marcelpol]

Some blocks of text here read very much like a personal wishlist.

As for Sony being anti-user, I can buy that argument. But then arguing for Xiaomi, Huawei and other Chinese brands is very much going downhill in that regard. I guess the main motivations for those brands are more value for the money, but they can offer that mainly because they are anti-user.

Audio-jack is very much an argument. Maybe not for everyone, but for a wide range of users of Sailfish this can be a good argument. For me personally it is the reason I won’t buy a Sony Tama device even though they seem very nice.

Gathering from pervious discussions, supporting PinePhone, FairPhone and Volla devices will be highly appreciated.
For Xiaomi devices there is already a community port being built. If that can get the commercial packages available, sure, why not, if the people at Jolla see a demand there.

[nero355]

@PeegeeTips

Unless you are happy to compile (and support!) your own port, or personally convince Xaiomi to create an Open Devices Program, then the right answer for you might not be Sailfish.

Again : That’s not what I am saying!

@marcelpol

Some blocks of text here read very much like a personal wishlist.

One can dream right ?!

Also I am not saying it has to be Xiaomi or any specific brand : Just not only damn Sony!

For example : Maybe if there was a partnership with LG Mobile they wouldn’t be left without a phone department by now ?!
Who knows…

[remote]

Speaking of wishes.
Asus (routers) has a long-standing history of collaborating with community - Merlin firmware.
MoBo’s a bit, too.
Too bad, the mobile division is not so friendly…
Otherwise zenfone 8 would be almost the perfect candy (148 x 68.5 x 8.9 mm)

[nero355]

@remote BINGO!

Like I said : Their Flip model is something I wouldn’t mind having and installing Sailfish on!
https://www.gsmarena.com/asus_zenfone_8_flip-10892.php
Not the cheapest but I would rather pay that amount for it than I would for many other phones these days!

[ron3kl]

Seems Planet Computers has “planned support” for Sailfish on the Astro Slide, along with Debian and Kali. Its not mentioned on that indiegogo page, but certainly is on the Planet Computers own product page Astro Slide 5G - Planet Computers (in the section on “Platform”). No indication whether Jolla feels the same way though…

[Inte]

Planet anounced SfOS for the Cosmo as well - they even had a Sailfish Logo on the Indiegogo site. Apart from an alpha release and some updated packages there has never been an active community around this device, so I wouldn’t bet on support for it’s succesor. I guess the Gemini PDA is still the safest bet for a keyboard device running SailfishOS. There was a quite active community around the F(X)tec Pro1. It got a bit quiet around this device, though, and I don’t even know if the Pro1x is supported at all.