I’m an electrical engineer, so I grew up learning about electronics and how you can buy a lot of stuff from Mauser, Vishay, etc.
Usually those companies offer better prices if you buy more and more bulk goods.
For those companies making Linux machines, they might not have the same economies of scale to reach cheaper numbers than Samsung or Google. Then again, Linux phone makers don’t have to add the same amount of profit margin as Samsung or Google, although they still have to make some profit to sustain their business.
$550 seems cheaper to me than a carrier phone, which may be a lot of these manufacturers’ markets.
I had not heard of furi labs until now. I do have some concerns that they operate out of hong Kong, have no published corporate structure or stated ownership and that they are able to produce something so far ahead of any competitors.
It smells like its got a lot of money and resources into it and I’d really like to know who is funding it.
They show one employee on LinkedIn and no job postings. Company size is 2-10 people.
When something seems too good to be true, it probably is. Purism sells their phones for 2x the cost, theyre huge and half-done. I would wager that they are a more realistic representation of where the market really is.
One of the developers used to work (maybe a lead?) on Droidian(/maybe Waydroid; I don’t remember, unfortunately) so part of the advancement probably has to do with already having familiarity of the problem-space.
Also, Purism is trying to serve up entirely libre hardware whereas FuriLabs is using Halium to simplify how well things work in the hardware.
So of course Purism is having a much harder time with things.
You might be able to work with a reshipper/parcel forwarding service, but I can understand the apprehensive sentiment if these products aren’t officially sold in your country.
Here are the big Linux phone contenders that I’ve found:
https://volla.online/en/volla-phone-x23/
https://furilabs.com/shop/flx1/
https://puri.sm/products/librem-5/#tech-specs
https://pine64.org/devices/pinephone/
I think the only promising one these days is the Furilabs FLX1, but it’s definitely good to keep an eye out for how things progress from here.
just found out about jolla https://commerce.jolla.com/products/jolla-community-phone
Interesting! Thanks for sharing! Looks promising. I wonder how the Jolla C2 compares to the others I listed
It may be fast and performant, but it’s not cheap.
If I had $550.00 to spend on a new device I would spend it on a good and powerful computer, for video editing and 3D modeling, not on a phone.
For comparison an used business laptop, costs about $120, an israeli spyware loaded phone costs about $150.
Going from that to $550 is a big jump, and not affordable for most internet users.
What kind of phone do you get for 150 used.
One that the hardware perfectly fits my needs.
Browsing some web pages can be a tiny bit sluggish sometimes, but if I’m doing anything serious I will use the computer anyway.
For what I use the phone for, which is, playing music, watching video, instant messaging, reading, light browsing and Lemmy I couldn’t ask for more.
I also don’t care about the camera, if I want to take photos I will use my DSLR.
The only single problem I have with my phone is the software which is non-free and loaded with spyware. Not the hardware.
I’m an electrical engineer, so I grew up learning about electronics and how you can buy a lot of stuff from Mauser, Vishay, etc.
Usually those companies offer better prices if you buy more and more bulk goods.
For those companies making Linux machines, they might not have the same economies of scale to reach cheaper numbers than Samsung or Google. Then again, Linux phone makers don’t have to add the same amount of profit margin as Samsung or Google, although they still have to make some profit to sustain their business.
$550 seems cheaper to me than a carrier phone, which may be a lot of these manufacturers’ markets.
I had not heard of furi labs until now. I do have some concerns that they operate out of hong Kong, have no published corporate structure or stated ownership and that they are able to produce something so far ahead of any competitors.
It smells like its got a lot of money and resources into it and I’d really like to know who is funding it.
They show one employee on LinkedIn and no job postings. Company size is 2-10 people.
When something seems too good to be true, it probably is. Purism sells their phones for 2x the cost, theyre huge and half-done. I would wager that they are a more realistic representation of where the market really is.
One of the developers used to work (maybe a lead?) on Droidian(/maybe Waydroid; I don’t remember, unfortunately) so part of the advancement probably has to do with already having familiarity of the problem-space.
Also, Purism is trying to serve up entirely libre hardware whereas FuriLabs is using Halium to simplify how well things work in the hardware.
So of course Purism is having a much harder time with things.
And literally none of them are available for sale in (or shipping to) my country…
You might be able to work with a reshipper/parcel forwarding service, but I can understand the apprehensive sentiment if these products aren’t officially sold in your country.
The last time I checked, the website wouldn’t even accept payments from my country…