I would rather that my device has useful features than that it be considered “modern”, because all “modern” seems to mean is that features are removed for little reason.
Yeah, a keyboard would make the phone thicker, and I understand the argument that people want thinner phones - I still miss the keyboards of my Xperia Pro and LG GW20 though, and would like one (but add-on keyboards have the fault that the device becomes top-heavy as the bulk of the weight is slid away together with the screen, whereas devices with a built-in keyboard usually have the battery in the keyboard half and thus better balance). The thickness argument doesn’t really hold very well for IR and a headphone jack though.
and replaced with useless and annoying AI stuff that shall bind and slave the user closer to the empire platform…
Not a must have, but I consider micro-SD, replaceable battery and audio jack definitely as plus, irrespective if modern, postmodern or ultramodern…
I consider it timeless and useful to be able to listen my FLAC files with my wired headphones and without blocking the USB-C port.
headphone jacks are terrible! if you sell expensive bluetooth headphones to people that could not possibly care any less about the sound quality.
keyboards are terrible! if you want to fit more ads on the screen in your app, and block half the content of the screen when you’re actively using your phone.
removable batteries are terrible! if you want to sell a new model every year.
microsd cards are terrible! if you want to charge your customers 3500% more for storage, and sell a cloud subscription to folks that they only need it you deliberately made your product worse.
removing these features was always hostile, anti-consumer, planned-obsolescence garbage. the fact that so many of the same manufacturers make a tidy side business selling otherwise garbage phones with those features is clear evidence that the features are dearly missed by many.
while it is true that if the N900 had a 4g radio and VoLTE, i’d buy another one right now, that doesn’t mean that these features are dead and buried like my dreams. normal, everyday people still like microsd cards and cheap wired headphones.
I’m interested in the irremote (@piggz) software, is that available from somewhere, or a homemade/personal app, I’m assuming its a sailfish app, looks like it.
If you really need to control something with IR simply use some ESP32 with ESPHome and an IR emitter. Connect to it per Bluetooth LE or WIFI and you can choose your phone independently from the IR hardware. You could even include that device in Home Assistant or something like that.
An IR Emitter would just make the device more expensive and the case design more complicated for like 1% of userbase if at all.
There is a gap in the market for non-foldable pocketable 8 inch fully featured mobile devices with phone calls and SMS like Samsung Galaxy Tab Active5 5G (EU version). It is the only stand-alone mobile device in this size that has fingerprint + phone calls + SMS.
I already use an ESP8266 with an IR emitter soldered on, works a treat with TASMOTA. Mainly for my amp as it came without a remote.
An IR port isn’t required ultimately, agreed, but for me, would be fun to play with. I’m always in a different camp from others.
I use backmarket.fr. They have a number of 10iii, 10iv and 10v, all officially refurbished. They ship to Portugal, I got mine this way. (Edit: my mine was shipped with DHL, which allows to redirect to a local shop after you get the tracking link.)
The bigger problem is Sony just decided to stop selling in Europe.
The window to buy buy new from Sony is usually very short because because Jolla takes some time to port. The window to buy second hand will close for good as normal people stop buying Sonys in Europe.
It has to work as a phone. Unfortunately, my Xperia 10 III has serious shortcomings in this regard. It started with the horrendous ‘no audio in calls’ bug, which now seems much less frequent. Later, probably as my carrier turned to 4G, network problems rolled in…
...network issues
For calling, VoLTE has to be enabled, for sending SMS I need to temporarily disable it…
It takes forever to connect to the network. From time to time I still need to restart the phone in the middle of an interrupted call, after it finally boots the wait only begins as it will waste 3 minutes at minimum to connect to the network again (in signal-covered urban area).
On recent trip through several EU countries the phone would often not even connect to the network, such as while driving. While stationary, in some countries it would take certainly >10 minutes.
I understand parts of the problem may be outside of Jolla’s control but usability-wise but this is the lowest point of any of the several SFOS devices I have used, starting with Jolla 1.
Now to your poll questions and more:
BT support in Android is missing gravely. Do I need to buy another device if I want to connect to my camera? The ever growing number of connected devices will rule out SFOS for most people unless this is implemented.
Nice hardware. Xperia 10 line (at least I and III from my experience) are great looking and well built phones for their price ( 4xx € inc. VAT in my market).
I do not mind the slower processing, smaller RAM if the rest holds true.
If your new phone looks and feels like Jolla 1, awesome! If it is more like Jolla C1 (I haven’t seen the C2), it better be cheap.
Great display: wide gamut, accurate colours, not below 450ppi. Should really be 21:9 as it can make the phone narrower. Rounder edges for better swiping would be a plus! The 6" works but I will take any size.
Any camera config, multiple modules not necessary. It will not replace a real camera anyway but should probably work for videocalls. (Larger pixels are better than high resolution.) Whatever you put there should however work…
...as currently on my Xperia 10 III the camera barely does.
In Android apps it will most of the time not focus or just take forever. Also, the phone will usually be able to take one photo but pressing the shutter button (display or physical side-button) to take another one, well good luck with that. Many times have I stood in front of something I wanted to document while continuously holding or frantically pressing the buttons only to give up a minute later without any photo being taken.
The fingerprint reader is a necessity unless you come up with something better. Typing in codes or passwords would slow it down so much for everyday use.
Way quicker positioning! GPS/Galileo/software integration/or whatever the problem is that will not make me ask a friend to take out their iphone to use their map, just because I wasn’t wise enough to turn on my map several minutes in advance. Yes, while being outside, under clear sky.
Good battery life, even with appsupport enabled. If that means bigger battery and display, be it.
MicroSD is probably a necessity too unless you can put at least 500GB into it while keeping the price under those 600 €.
I wouldn’t want attachments sticking out of the phone, I’ve already said as much in response to pherjung when he said about using the 3.5mm headphone port for an IR transmitter.
Realistically that is all you will get with such a minority feature. Feel free to like it or not - just don’t be disappointed when a built-in one does not materialize.
It seems that this thread, deservingly pivoted partly into a software related one:
Exactly! What’s up with that? (I thought that maybe Jolla doesn’t sell in the US because of some SW patent BS, is it holding them back in the EU too?)
Night light is I imagine even more basic of a feature. It has been present on possibly every other OS for so many years now. Why is it out of Jolla’s focus? Request: Redshift / Night Light / Flux-like feature!
