Ilandar

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Ilandar ,

Agreed. The Pixel line had a really distinctive design language with the 6 but they've moved further away from that with each release since.

Ilandar ,

That all sounds pretty reasonable to me. You AI holdouts are going to have accept it in some form sooner or later.

Ilandar ,

Generative AI will be forced on you, regardless of whether you want it in your life. The entire world is moving in that direction very rapidly. We are not just talking micro scale like which web browser you use - every institution you rely on in your daily life will have AI implementation at some level.

Ilandar ,

lol

Ilandar ,

They are probably referring to the suite of games exclusive to NSO subscribers.

Ilandar ,

I have had a Nintendo one for the last few years, mostly for the online multiplayer. Split between myself and 7 friends, it has been affordable for us. I cancelled it earlier this year as the Switch is past its hype period and we're all playing less these days.

Ilandar ,

Pretty nice looking phone. I am always a sucker for primary colours.

Ilandar ,

Missed opportunity for a dedicated shutter button with that camera-centric design.

Ilandar ,

Good video, thanks for sharing. Not sure what people here are moaning about. I guess anything over 10 seconds is "too long" nowadays.

Ilandar ,

Is that personal preference a reason to complain about someone else sharing a video link?

Ilandar , (edited )

Try Grayjay. It's free (though you can buy a license to support its development) and open source has fully viewable source code. You can login through the YouTube plugin's settings and either stay logged in or import all your subscriptions and then logout to avoid any further Google tracking. It's pretty stable compared to other FOSS YouTube apps and also has plugins for Twitch, Nebula and other video/audio content platforms. The YouTube plugin supports SponsorBlock and dislikes. Grayjay is being actively developed by the FUTO organisation, so is unlikely to randomly die like can sometimes happen with other FOSS projects.

Depending on how you use YouTube, the one significant downside may be the complete lack of support for Shorts. Not only can you not access Shorts from inside Grayjay, but if you open a Shorts link inside the application you cannot play it in full screen vertical. I am not a Shorts viewer (I used to disable it in ReVanced) but other FOSS apps like LibreTube support Shorts so this is one notable point of difference with Grayjay.

@unknowing8343

Ilandar , (edited )

You're technically correct, if I recall they decided to release it under an alternative license after seeing other FOSS YouTube clients like NewPipe being forked, loaded with ads and then put on the Play Store. This gives FUTO the option of pursuing legal action if bad actors attempt to do the same with their app. However, it is free and the source code is viewable.

Ilandar ,

If it is free to download, free to use and has no pay nagging or restrictions then it is effectively free to any user. As I said, you can buy a license to support its development and this is clearly what they would like you to do, but there is nothing forcing you to pay.

Ilandar ,

Although interestingly the price of the 10 series continues to fall quite significantly. I'm not quite sure what Sony's strategy is but it seems they are trying something at the moment.

Ilandar ,

That's a boring answer but it is sadly true for Google and every other big tech company currently. They focused on massive growth for years off the back of heavy investment but now that the financial climate is bad and interest rates are up, all these companies suddenly need to refocus the business around profitability. It's why this wave of enshittification has hit the internet within the last few years.

Ilandar ,

Through subscriptions. Both Google and Samsung are focusing heavily on that at the moment. That's also why their unique software features are often free at first. If Galaxy AI started off as a monthy subscription everyone would ignore it but their plan is to get you reliant on it then introduce a fee.

Ilandar ,

I think the previous model had the best battery life of any phone GSMArena had tested, so I guess that's the niche. But I'm sceptical of a crossover between people who buy phones with with an extreme focus on battery life and people who buy phones with pretty unimpressive and out of date mid-range processors. Particularly at the price the 10 series retails for. I'm struggling to understand why Sony continues with the 10 but I guess there is a market somewhere.

Ilandar ,

It’s not as though Motorola doesn’t offer support for the device. The company confirmed that it would offer “three major Android updates and four years of security patches” over the course of Razr+’s lifespan, but it’s clear that customers will be left waiting for any major updates.

It also promised at least bi-monthly updates for the 2023 razr line, another area in which it has failed to deliver. My razr 40 is still stuck on the February security update. Before that it was stuck on the November security update until the middle of March. This is the first time I've owned a Motorola phone so whilst I knew they had a bad reputation for support, I was clearly a bit naive. I never imagined they would be so far behind within the first year of release.

Ilandar ,

I don't think anyone is actually so clumsy that they need a phone like this. If you think you are, it's likely because you're not focusing enough on using the phone when you're using the phone. Inattentiveness is a major cause of phone drops from what I've seen and experienced.

Ilandar ,

I didn't say anything about building sites. I was responding to the part of your comment where you claimed you need a fugly brick phone because you're clumsy.

Ilandar ,

To me the real issue is not trust in the design, but rather trust in the warranty/return/refund process. The technology is fairly new and still has potentially significant weaknesses that may leave the occasional customer with a damaged or completely broken phone through no fault of their own. To me, that is an acceptable and understandable problem and one that doesn't inherently make the product unfit for sale to the general public. The real problem is that several manufacturers of these folding/flipping phones have warranty policies and/or practices that attempt to make the customer foot the bill for a defected product that they have not mishandled or mistreated in any way. Shane Craig has done a couple of videos on his experiences with a broken Pixel Fold and Google's warranty service recently that highlight this practice. That is completely unacceptable and is definitely an extremely valid reason to avoid folding phones if you live in a country like the US with weak consumer laws.

Ilandar OP ,

That's strange. It behaves normally for me and I'm also using Firefox.

Ilandar OP ,

I think it's trying to say that DivestOS has removed more proprietary blobs than the others. Poor wording, I agree.

Ilandar ,

That is a very cute blue.

Ilandar ,

Mediatek devices generally have really bad custom ROM support. Historically their chipsets had a reputation for being less efficient, too.

Ilandar ,

I’m confused what’s in the new phones that make them cost $1700 more…

Nothing. Like obviously they may be using higher quality/more expensive/licensed components and are superior in some areas, but in terms of actually getting what you paid for the really expensive ones are not value for money in the slightest. These manufacturers are 100% taking advantage of consumers when they price their phones so high. There are some examples like Fairphone where you can see how the cost has been inflated (smaller company, more expensive supply chain, paying workers a higher wage, etc) but in the case of a massive company like Samsung the markup will be insanely high.

Ilandar ,

I think the extra space at the top and bottom actually looks nicer, too (as long as it's close to symmetrical).

Ilandar ,

The refresh rate is a noticeable omission from the marketing material. I'm guessing 60Hz.

EDIT: NotebookCheck has since reported that it has a 60Hz display.

Ilandar ,

I wouldn't define the A series as "budget", but yes - the cameras are very good for the price. I briefly used a 7a last year and the only other phone I've seen that was comparable in that price range was the A54.

Ilandar ,

I don't listen to music away from my desktop very often these days, as that experience has mostly been replaced by audiobooks and podcasts. So in a purely selfish sense, the disappearance of the 3.5 mm jack doesn't really affect me. I am content with Bluetooth for the majority of my use cases. However, I am still not convinced that the 3.5 mm jack had to disappear as early as it did or that engineers and designers can't find a way to include it on a modern, high end smartphone, so in that sense its disappearance annoys me. Until recently I have also been using a variety of 2017-18 era phones, all of which have a 3.5 mm jack, and it is very satisfying to have the occasional music listening session in a cosy setting like my bed with studio headphones plugged in.

The problem I have with Bluetooth vs wired, is the same problem I have with lossy vs lossless music and low vs high bitrate video. What frustrates me is not that I can immediately discern a difference (though depending on the material and comparison, sometimes it's quite obvious) but rather that if I think I hear an imperfection my immediate thought is "would this sound better through my wired headphones?". And as soon as that thought pops into my head I find myself actively listening for further imperfections to prove my theory, instead of just relaxing and enjoying the music like I intended to. With wired headphones I know that it's very unlikely there will be any quality problems and I can just get completely immersed in the experience.

Ilandar ,

I have had a similar experience to you. My earliest pair was bought in 2019 and their battery life is still really good. Perhaps I just don't listen as often or at the same level of volume as others. However, they are still objectively worse for the environment than wired earphones by virtue of the battery - there is no escaping that.

Ilandar ,

I think there's probably a pretty big crossover between those two groups as well. So yeah, not really "pointless" for the intended market.

Ilandar , (edited )

It's a welcomed feature, but there is really no excuse for struggling with notification spam on modern versions of Android. There are enough controls available, both at a system level and within apps themselves, that it's more a case of user error at this point. If you have an app that is just completely out of control then I would question why you actually need something so intrusive installed on your device in the first place.

Ilandar ,

Translation error? Reminds me of the slogan for No Brand Burger in Korea: 'Why Pay More? It's Good Enough'. You can see what they were trying to say but it doesn't actually make the product sound particularly enticing lol

Ilandar ,

Read the article before commenting. It's not the same feature..

Ilandar ,

If it's different then it's not the same. Certainly nowhere near enough to claim that it already exists on a device running Android 13 or 14 (it doesn't).

Ilandar ,

I like the way Samsung and, to a lesser extent, Google have incorporated multiple cameras into their design language recently. I think Samsung's cameras look quite stylish now, though not as good as the LG Velvet's (which I'm sure they took inspiration from). Apple and Chinese manufacturers are still just lazily dumping them all in some gigantic camera module, which looks absolutely awful. It's so funny to me that Apple phones are still seen as a high end status symbol in society, particularly by younger people, because they have looked ugly for years now. It's like one of these celebrities who everyone thinks is cool because their clothing is expensive, despite the fact it looks like it was assembled by a 3 year old.

Ilandar ,

Basically, Epic doesn't want Google to be able to offer anything that other competing app marketplaces can't. That includes exclusive apps

Kinda funny considering Epic has its own history of releasing games that are exclusive to its store.

Ilandar ,

Interesting, I guess we will have to see how quickly and widely this is enforced. I haven't used the official YouTube app for a very long time and have relied heavily on third party alternatives (Vanced/ReVanced, NewPipe, LibreTube, Grayjay). There is absolutely no way I am paying $17 a month for YouTube so I think a family plan would probably be the best option, though at this point I think I'd be more likely to just abandon the platform altogether.

Ilandar ,

Some people, like myself, prefer small phones because they are easily pocketable. I don't have any problems operating a larger screen but I don't like carrying around a larger device all the time, especially since I've cut back on usage significantly and it spends a lot more time in my pocket. Flip phones are the modern solution to this problem.

Ilandar ,

"Nice" is subjective, but the 7a is objectively not a small phone. It is very thick and heavy, and much larger than true small phones.

Ilandar ,

My only Motorola phone is a razr 40 which I've had for 4 months now, so not a ton of experience but I'll share it anyway. The quality of the sofrware has been pretty good. It's close to what reviewers used to call "stock" Android, in that it hasn't received any significant UI modifications and doesn't come with many proprietary apps. There are very few bugs or performance issues. You also don't need a Motorola account to access any important software features.

However the software support is absolutely awful considering the RRP of the phone, its age and the promises made by Motorola. It was supposed to receive at least bi-monthly security updates but by January had already fallen behind that. The most recent update had been the November security patch, so I expected an update in January. Instead I received a February security update towards the end of March - nearly a 5 month update gap on a mid-range phone still less than a year old. Personally I think that is an absolute joke and I'm now considering selling it and either going back to an older phone with LineageOS or buying a Samsung flip since I know that will actually receive updates.

Ilandar ,

It's also just cheaper to use an SD card for some of that stuff rather than paying for more internal storage on the device itself.

Ilandar ,

4 years of security on a mid-range phone is okay, Bare minimum but it wouldn't put me off buying one.

Ilandar ,

Everyone pretends they're an ethical consumer until you put up the tiniest hurdle lol

Ilandar ,

Paying more for a product that better aligns with your interests, ethics or ideology.isn't a strange concept.

Ilandar ,

It's not an all or nothing situation. Like choosing to buy cheap clothing doesn't mean you can't practice ethical consumerism elsewhere. There is no contradiction there. Life is all about determining what values are important to you and attempting to uphold them to the best of your ability.

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