10 ms·

Fairphone 4 is coming to the US

212 points by raybb 3y ago

mcny 3y ago
Congratulations to the fairphone team on shipping. I have two questions though. 1. Bands: does it have all the bands for GSM carriers in the US? CDMA? 2. Can you use this phone powered solely by the charger with the battery removed? With a 65W Thinkpad charger?
- Paianni 3y ago
  GSM, CDMA and UMTS are all dead or on their way out in the US. In terms of LTE bands I think T-Mobile (or MVNO's depending on their network) is the sole choice.
  - joecool1029 3y ago
    It might work on verizon but it lacks their low bands so coverage won't be good. No way it works on AT&T due to their stupid IMEI whitelisting. Notably it's also missing T-Mobile's N25 which is probably going to be their main midband 5G band eventually, but it has all the others (no B26 LTE but that's old sprint towers almost entirely phased out)
putlake 3y ago
The US already has a repairable, sustainable smartphone. It's called Teracube. https://myteracube.com/ https://myteracube.com/ 4-yr warranty, stock Android.
- itsacomment 3y ago
  I wasn't able to tell from a quick scroll over the homepage, but while they fix instead of replacing, teracube don't seem to include fairly sourced resources, which are a pretty big sales point for fairphone
- KnobbleMcKnees 3y ago
  I was glad to see on arriving at their homepage that the Teracube was not, in fact, a cube.
- martin_a 3y ago
  Opening that website greets me with an alert() with the message: error; [object Object] If their phones do work as good as that... Well...
S4mb 3y ago
When people talk about the Fairphone there are always people bringing up the same or similar (often very valid) points. I would like to use this post sum up some Reddit discussion I took part in when the Fairphone 3 launched because the main points are still relevant for the Fairphone 4 launch: Q: Wasn't the point of Fairphone to have ONE phone and then buy "extensions" or/and replacements only, aka modular - for the sake of preserving the environment, etc etc?! A. No, it was always for repairability to ensure people can keep it for around five years without needing to replace the entire thing at once because the screen cracked or the audio jack broke. This whole upgrade part stuff is something that get's hyped a lot in online discussions but from the very beginning Fairphone has been very honest and cautious when asked about possible upgrade modules in the future. They would love to offer crazy upgrade paths but cmon it's a small company in Amsterdam with limited resources. However they did introduce an upgraded camera module in 2017. I think the main takeaway I have for everybody regarding the Fairphone is: Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. I've preordered the Fairphone 2, got it in 2016. People ask me about it often. They usually get very excited only to get disappointed when they realize that the team behind it has to make compromises just like every other phone brand has to. The fact that they got this product designed, launched and supported with <100 people is really amazing, so please don't feel disappointed by the fact that it doesn't offer something even Google couldn't get market ready. These guys make really good phones that are not only as fair as it gets but also as innovative as it gets when it comes to the overall design. They introduced a camera upgrade module in 2017 which is amazing, other than that it's really just making your life easier when you want to replace parts. I replaced the screen and the audio jack, the phone is still rock solid. Q: What about Software? I keep my phones mostly 3 years, because even after 3 years, many LOS devs are jumping ship...? A: They definitively do their homework. Security updates come usually ~3 weeks after Google releases them. Fairphone OS still gets bigger updates every ~2-3 months. They still support their Fairphone Open OS. Lineage OS is really popular on it and is well supported offering Android Pie for the Fairphone 2. For the Fairphone 3, the manufacturer guaranteed five years of support. This means that replacement parts are available for five years and security updates are offered. In addition, the manufacturer promises a feature update to Android 10, but does not call for a date. Additional feature updates are planned but not guaranteed. For the sold out since March 2019 Fairphone 2 (available since the end of 2015), the manufacturer will continue to publish security updates and reserve spare parts for at least another three years. The Fairphone 2 was delivered with Android 5.1, later came updates to 6.01 and 7.1.2 - the latter with great effort, because there were no official drivers for the Snapdragon 801 chipset used. "Q": What an awful phone. Anyone who buys this is an idiot, you aren’t saving the world and all you’re doing is making yourself feel holier than thou because of your “ethical” decision which you can’t be quiet about. Save your money and get a REAL phone with much better specs for the same price. A: It's still a step in the right direction. I also don't see the problem with feeling cool about "ethical" decisions. I definetely think my Fairphone 2 is cool. I think it's tacky, chunky and technical look is beautiful and it sparks interesting conversations with other people that think it's cool. If fair and open... If having a seven year old phone that looks absolutely worn out becomes the new mainstream cool that would be the best thing to ever happen to us. I for myself feel pretty cool when people ask me about my phone and how old it is. I also feel better, yes. "Q": We shouldn’t care about the conditions our phones are made in. We should care about the best value for our money, performance and quality. A: Well you know that's just like your opinion man. "Q": YEA lol pay [price of the prior Fairphone] for a phone just to feel good about your enviromental impact. top kek. A: As you may know the Fairphone is not only trying to improve the enviromental impact, the company is also doing as much as possible to improve the situation of the involved asian workers. I would like to use this moment of awareness created by the Fairphone 3 announcement to invite you to get a small glimpse into the live of Xu, your typical Foxconn phone assembly line worker. Please excuse that I just copy & pasted this together. On the last day of September, a 24-year-old migrant worker in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen killed himself. Xu Lizhi jumped out of a window of a residential dormitory run by his employer, Foxconn, the huge electronics manufacturing company with a million-strong workforce that makes the majority of the world's Apple iPhones. In most cases, Xu's suicide would have been yet another footnote in the vast, sweeping story of China's economic boom and transformation. He is one of a legion of young Chinese migrants who emerge out of rural obscurity to find work in China's teeming cities, only to end up crushed by both the dullness and stress of factory jobs, insufficient wages and a steady accumulation of personal disappointments. But Xu was a poet. And, after his death, his friends collected his work and got some published in a local Shenzhen newspaper. 《一颗螺丝掉在地上》 "A Screw Fell to the Ground" 一颗螺丝掉在地上 A screw fell to the ground 在这个加班的夜晚 In this dark night of overtime 垂直降落，轻轻一响 Plunging vertically, lightly clinking 不会引起任何人的注意 It won’t attract anyone’s attention 就像在此之前 Just like last time 某个相同的夜晚 On a night like this 有个人掉在地上 When someone plunged to the ground -- 9 January 2014 Reading through the poems, one in particular stood out to me, ‘A screw Fell to the Ground.’ While it was done eight months before his suicide, the context seems to be relatable to how he may have been feeling—mostly the sound of “someone” plunging and nobody hearing. We ran along the railway, arriving in some place called ‘the City’ where we trade in our youth, and our muscle. Finally we have nothing to trade, only a cough and a skeleton nobody cares about. ‘Sleepless’ The poems, translated at the leftist website Libcom.org, are a wrenching echo of the alienation and hardship felt by countless people in modern China and, for that matter, in other parts of the developing world. They lament the grinding ennui of the assembly line, the squalor of a migrant worker's narrow, frustrated existence. You can find more of his works here: https://libcom.org/blog/xulizhi-foxconn-suicide-poetry https://libcom.org/blog/xulizhi-foxconn-suicide-poetry You can also check out the complete cost breakdown of the Fairphone 2 here: https://www.fairphone.com/de/2015/09/09/cost-breakdown-of-the-fairphone-2/ https://www.fairphone.com/de/2015/09/09/cost-breakdown-of-th... But don't let me guilt trip you into buying this phone. The Fairphone 2 was an amazing device and I am sure the Fairphone 3 will be a solid upgrade. This is a great phone line and not some shitty alternative. The Fairphone 2 definetely had some reliability issues. I believe it was the right decision to introduce more screws and flat cables to make it more reliable and decrease additional material was needed for all the pogo pin connectors that made the Fairphone 2 extremely quick and easy to disassemble but also prone to all the random connectivity issues. The FP3 is still as good as it gets when it comes to repairability. The changes to the FP3 give me hope that it could finally become a reliable phone as well. Every gripe I had about the Fairphone 2 after using it since 2015 got addressed in this new iteration.
zabzonk 3y ago
see also nokia g22: https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_int/nokia-g-22/specs?sku=101S0609H001 https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_int/nokia-g-22/specs?sku=101...
- mhitza 3y ago
  > Built with recycled materials. Engineered to last longer. > OS upgrades: 2 years of OS upgrades > Security updates: 3 years of monthly security updates (From the global launch date of the device) And I didn't see any iFixit rating. Aside from using recycled materials, don't see much in common on the surface.
  - zabzonk 3y ago
    ifixit are supporting it: https://www.ifixit.com/Device/Nokia_G22#Section_Parts_and_Tools https://www.ifixit.com/Device/Nokia_G22#Section_Parts_and_To...
  - manmal 3y ago
    People should focus more on waste avoidance and reuse instead of buying a new gadget allegedly made from recycled materials that only lasts 3 years. I say allegedly because making durable, nicely colored materials from waste is so hard that we don’t know what tricks were used or shortcuts were taken to make this happen.
- joecool1029 3y ago
  This device has no US carrier band support, it's neat device I guess but terrible suggestion given the submission is about FP4 going to US.
  - zabzonk 3y ago
    sorry, i didn't realise the usa don't do g3 and g4
frazar0 3y ago
Fairphone 4 has been my main and only phone for several months now. Great experience, very good battary life. Performance-wise, I haven't noticed any significant difference compared to traditional phones. The only drawbacks might be the camera and thickness, but honestly I don't care much. Of course, much depends on your use case and expectations. YMMV.
- dadoomer 3y ago
  Is it possible to swap batteries on the go? That'd be killer. I only replaced my phone this year (S7 edge) because the battery was depleting too fast.
  - Lariscus 3y ago
    Yes, the battery is removable just like an old Nokia phone.
  - berkes 3y ago
    Yes. A spare battery is cheap too. You cannot swap it "live" though, phone needs to be shut off and then booted. Also, there's no external loading hardware. So some logistics needed to get the spare batteries full.
al1r4d 3y ago
I hope available on Indonesia
miduil 3y ago
I really wish Fairphone 4 had GrapheneOS support, but after almost 4 years of Fairphone 3 I decided to go with a Pixel instead. Too many hardware bugs with the FP3 that were never acknowledged by the vendor and unhappy customers with bricked FP4's that requires sending them back in. Also I would have hoped for them continuing the FP3 architecture, feels such a waste that they've now instead developed a much more expensive hardware again. Building and maintaining an Android device is truly not trivial, kudos for that, but I don't think with their current company size they're truly up for the task. Also buying a Fairphone instead of a wider used phone means you'll be able to repair it - but because all the internal parts are super customized, phone repair shops won't have their usual source of spare parts.
- cauch 3y ago
  > Too many hardware bugs with the FP3 that were never acknowledged by the vendor I have a FP3, and it has been my first and only Android smartphone. I now wonder if what I've experienced is the "normal Android experience" or if I would have experienced something different from another brand. I'm also avoiding / disabling Google stuffs (I'm using f-droid, ...). I was occasionally surprised to see how a lot of people are flooded with ads / unsolicited messages and seemed not to care. I don't get it, though, it looks such an awful experience. The main thing I've noticed is the long time it sometimes take for the picture-taking app to get on focus. But I thought it was due to the standard Android software. Is there a place to list the FP3 bugs?
  - verall 3y ago
    The camera focus problem is not a an android problem it's just a fairphone problem. OEMs typically write their own camera apps.
  - miduil 3y ago
    * Easily damaged by moisture (even though they've claimed certain IP ratings), due to the printed conductor inside the plastic layers with pin connectors * Battery swelling after less than two years of operation (no way to source this battery locally since they've built a custom connector / redesigned an standard OEM battery) * Overheating * Touch screen glitches (they've resolved that after a year via software, support was super unhelpful with that problem) * Wi-Fi 5 GHz broken/unreliable for many people * Camera focus (not sure if FP3+ improved on that front) * Broken fingerprint sensor (from the beginning, most common issue) and by broken I mean not functional at all * self-disintegrating plastic parts (back and side covers), likely due to the fact they are using recycled plastic - they've changed the plastic chemistry with FP3+, for me the plastic became more and more brittle - In addition for me with software: * charging LED can't be disabled, which is extremely bright when you're sleeping - community members shrugging this off with "you shouldn't use your phone in your bedroom anyway" * screen brightness too bright / unreliable brightness sensor readings (they had several updates because it was so hard to tweak for them) On the positive end: Phone is quite durable, fell down on many occasions and because of it's plastic/design openness the battery falls out but screen never broke in bunch of occasions. Edit: Formatting
TheMode 3y ago
Is the hardware really the bottleneck to sustainable device? The software seems more much important but nobody is tackling it. Having a phone with a new battery doesn't matter if I can't run the same apps as others.
- mrpopo 3y ago
  They also provide 5-year software support. https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/9979180437393-Fairphone-OS https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/997918043739... > For Fairphone 4, we guarantee software support until the end of 2026, this includes an upgrade to Android 12 and, later on, Android 13.
  - denismi 3y ago
    Doesn't that mean that buying the newest Fairphone in 2023 gets you 0 years of Android updates and 3 years of security updates? Compared to 4 years of each with a midrange Galaxy A?
    - mrpopo 3y ago
      The FP4 was out in 2021. That's 5 years. But you're right, and it's actually discounted 50 eur because of that. You can wait for the FP5 if you're not satisfied
  - TheMode 3y ago
    That's not solving anything at all, what we need is hardware that doesn't need to have its software updated constantly. If you cannot have that, I wouldn't consider it ""sustainable"". There is nothing sustainable about depending on some company on the other side on the world to do the right thing continuously. Now sure, you could answer that they are doing it better than others and you may be perfectly right, but is it really the way we want to solve it? Gossiping on every company on how often they update their software?
    - notRobot 3y ago
nubinetwork 3y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36405014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36405014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600211 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600211 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600709 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600709 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36608312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36608312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36634318 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36634318 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36635666 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36635666
nologic01 3y ago
Got a fairphone 4 for somenody I care about and will likely get one for myself when my current unrepairable, glued-battery piece of e-waste becomes unusable. I wish they would come preinstalled with something like kde plasma mobile though. I will never warm to android, no matter how "degoogled" it might become. There is something about its architecture that seems freakish. Like the entire digital universe that was created in the last decades.
lawn 3y ago
I've been using my Fairphone 4 for around a year or so and it's been great. An easily removable battery is a godsend and the phone is surprisingly durable as I've been dropping it a lot (me clumsy). I haven't encountered any issue and the one complaint I have is the lack of 3.5 jack. It was quite hard to find a USB converter that worked and having to use an adapter is really annoying. Still if this one breaks I can repair it and I would even buy a new one if I had to.
- ctenb 3y ago
  I bought a converter too, but it just didnt work at all! Which adapter worked for you?
  - lawn 3y ago
    I don't remember the one I got, but I looked it up in a list. Maybe this was the list? https://forum.fairphone.com/t/fp4-list-of-usb-c-to-3-5-audio-jack-adapter/79386 https://forum.fairphone.com/t/fp4-list-of-usb-c-to-3-5-audio... There's also an adapter on the official site that they say should work (but I haven't tried it): https://shop.fairphone.com/shop/usb-c-to-mini-audio-jack-adapter-3-5mm-18 https://shop.fairphone.com/shop/usb-c-to-mini-audio-jack-ada...
rmdes 3y ago
Issues with microphone on the FP4 that are not explainable but the good news is? I can just change the mic for 20 euro! The real issue with the FP4 is the camera. Ugly pictures, and under bad lightning its like taking picture on android a decade ago.. Albeit the pixel number is enough.
- londons_explore 3y ago
  All modern smartphones have masses of proprietary stuff to turn gigabytes of raw data from the sensor into a beautiful photo. If you want an opensource phone, you end up with crappy photos unless you have a camera team of 500 people to rewrite that stuff, and a big team of lawyers to deal with all the patent licensing you're going to have to do for the techniques you use.
  - morsch 3y ago
    I'm not sure that it's truly all down to software, but as far as it is, you don't have start at zero -- there are excellent, competitive raw photo processors available as free software, like darktable and RawTherapee. Still a lot of work, though, no doubt.
    - londons_explore 3y ago
      heh - no. Camera stacks on modern phones process many raw frames to make a single photo - sometimes as many as 100. Collecting those frames is done in a second or so before and after the user clicks the shutter button. Thats a data rate of ~15 Gigabits - far faster than most phones can write to storage - and anyway would you be happy for each photo to take a few gigabytes of storage space until it was processed? Therefore, the raw data needs to be processed (or at least preprocessed) in realtime. You can't store it and do it later. And to do that, you typically need custom silicon - all the big phone manufacturers have ASICs dedicated to image processing. And to make the trouble even worse, you often need to use data from some of the raw frames to adjust camera parameters for the next frame - for example adjusting amplifier gains. See patent US9196027B2 for an example of the sort of thing that is done 'in the loop'.
stevezsa8 3y ago
This is cool and all... I just wish someone would release a device with user replaceable battery and better OS update policies. Basically a pixel with slightly easier repair. I think the modular aspect is cool, but seems like a gimmick that would be prone to failure. Just my opinion anyway.
- dimitar 3y ago
  I have a Fairphone 4 and I can replace the batter and upgrade the OS (a choice of multiple ones is available)
  - stevezsa8 3y ago
    I was tempted after a colleague got the FP4. In the end I decided to get a pixel 6a for half the price. I'm taking a bet on not smashing the handset. €300 extra was just too much for a replaceable battery. Atleast for my usecase.
zeroCalories 3y ago
I like that we're moving in the direction of repairability. I haven't needed to upgrade my pixel 2, and I would love it if I could simply replace parts as needed instead of buying a whole new phone. That said, it seems clear that phone makers would prefer you upgrade every two years. Wonder if we will see regulation around that in the coming years.
- passwordoops 3y ago
  >seems clear that phone makers would prefer you upgrade every two years And of course they all have PR and websites devoted to how much they care about the environment, even positive ESG scores in some cases
jaylittle 3y ago
Years ago this would've been interesting to me. But it took too long. Given that the Fairphone 4 has been out everywhere else for years now and there wasn't even a peep of it coming to the US, I decided to jump ship for an iPhone. If I couldn't get a truly repairable phone, then at least I could buy the one that would likely last the longest given the wide availability of official repair outlets (e.g. Apple Stores) and the history of solid software support for at least five years. So that's where I am at. Thankfully things are looking a bit better on the laptop side of the repairability fence. I have every intention of pre-ordering a Framework 16 the second pre-orders open.
jokoon 3y ago
So does it mean it's not possible to have popular apps like whatsapp or Tinder on this? I also wish it was just a phone with much less performance for a smaller price. I want something durable and repairable, not something fast, Wirth's law is very important to consider when consider software and hardware. I hope they will make such phone, one day, because I am not spending that much money for a phone. I bought a 150 euro phone and it already lasted 3 years, because even if a phone becomes obsolete, it is still cheaper, per year, to use crappy phones, than to use a durable expensive phone. If your really care about fairness and the environment, make lightweight hardware and software.
- jokowueu 3y ago
  It has microG you can download the apps you want including the play store
- frollo 3y ago
  I've got a FP3 (so the older model) and I have had no problems with any app. I don't use Tinder, but Whatsapp works as good as on any phone I've ever owned. As for the cheapness, I've been keeping a running tab of how much the repair is costing me vs how much it would have cost with a normal phone (ballpark estimate) and, considering the phone price, I'm currently saving about 200€, even factoring in the phone price. The biggest expense is shipping because I live in the middle of nowhere and I can easily get 10€ of shipping on a 15€ spare part (which is why I'm not replacing the protective cover even though it looks like shit).
- zerox7felf 3y ago
  I have been using a FP4 for about a year with /e/-os, and it has been pretty ok so far. I don't use many (if any) of the /e/-os cloud features, so can't speak for those. Other apps have been working fine w/ microG and the custom app store (which combines the play store and fdroid). The only issue I can think of off the top of my head is google translate not working. Other Gapps (Gmail, yt, lens, etc) seem to work fine, as do pretty much all others I have tried. Unsure how well in-app purchases work. Some /e/-os apps have UI quirks... But nothing is worse than "ok" in my view. Ymmv. Not sure I buy that lightweight phones would necessarily be better for the environment? Surely repairability is key?
cge 3y ago
As a note about repairability, ignoring various problems with the phone: while the FP4 does have more availability of parts from the manufacturer, is generally easier to repair, and is advertised as repairable, I found the Fairphone forums to be surprisingly and unexpectedly hostile to discussions of repair and repairability. A significant portion of the forum userbase considers that Fairphone's primary focus is on fair trade, the treatment of workers, and the sourcing of raw materials. Regular posters, and highlighted users ("Fairphone Angels"), will often argue to users that the phone is not primarily meant to be repairable or longer-lasting than other phones. Concerns about outdated security updates and long-lasting, serious software problems with basic functionality often get responses about workers in phone manufacturing, and reminders that this is the point of the phone. This goes directly against Fairphone's own advertising, but it seems to be the general sense amongst users the company attaches their name to. Coming from the Framework forums, this was astonishing and disappointing.
- gclawes 3y ago
  I'd buy a Framework phone in an instant...
  - amelius 3y ago
    Yes. But what OS would it run out of the box? And what would you run on it?
    - pshirshov 3y ago
      GrapheneOS
    - christophilus 3y ago
      I’d want to run Debian + Phosh.
      - squarefoot 3y ago
        Add sandboxed Android layer for apps compatibility and it would be next to perfect.
res0nat0r 3y ago
I would just love a good Android based phone with a Blackberry style keyboard. I know there are a couple out there, but something from a current large manufacturer would be nice.
malf 3y ago
SO had a fairphone. Broke screen. Turned out the screen replacement module was vaporware.
- progval 3y ago
  Was it out of stock? Non-functional?
coding123 3y ago
$600? Doesn't it make sense to buy 3 shit phones that can't be repaired for $200 each? Is this phone worth $600?
- fsflover 3y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36653377 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36653377
gsa 3y ago
I really want to love my Fairphone 4 but they really need to improve their software support. I have a bunch of bugs with my device: the screen dims after a short period making it unusable in bright daylight, NFC is erratic and needs a restart to fix, 5 GHz hotspot hasn't worked for months. The brightness bug is the biggest killer for me. There's a whole list of bugs tracked on the Fairphone website [0], and progress is unfortunately very slow. [0] https://forum.fairphone.com/t/known-reproducible-and-reported-issues-of-the-fairphone-4/82572#list-of-known-reproducible-and-reported-issues-6 https://forum.fairphone.com/t/known-reproducible-and-reporte...
ctenb 3y ago
My experience with fp4 has been pleasant. No problems. The only mild annoyance was the finger print unlock mechanism, which feels less user-friendly than my previous phones. But you get used to it.
t0bia_s 3y ago
Dimensions 162 x 75.5 x 10.5 mm are huge. Not for my pocket and hands. And I'm a tall person.
ntnsndr 3y ago
Tester here. After some months of working out the kinks, this phone and OS pair are working great. I strongly recommend (if you are okay with a so-so camera).

212 points by raybb 3y ago

mcny 3y ago

Congratulations to the fairphone team on shipping. I have two questions though. 1. Bands: does it have all the bands for GSM carriers in the US? CDMA? 2. Can you use this phone powered solely by the charger with the battery removed? With a 65W Thinkpad charger?

Paianni 3y ago
GSM, CDMA and UMTS are all dead or on their way out in the US. In terms of LTE bands I think T-Mobile (or MVNO's depending on their network) is the sole choice.
- joecool1029 3y ago
  It might work on verizon but it lacks their low bands so coverage won't be good. No way it works on AT&T due to their stupid IMEI whitelisting. Notably it's also missing T-Mobile's N25 which is probably going to be their main midband 5G band eventually, but it has all the others (no B26 LTE but that's old sprint towers almost entirely phased out)

putlake 3y ago

The US already has a repairable, sustainable smartphone. It's called Teracube. https://myteracube.com/ https://myteracube.com/ 4-yr warranty, stock Android.

itsacomment 3y ago
I wasn't able to tell from a quick scroll over the homepage, but while they fix instead of replacing, teracube don't seem to include fairly sourced resources, which are a pretty big sales point for fairphone
KnobbleMcKnees 3y ago
I was glad to see on arriving at their homepage that the Teracube was not, in fact, a cube.
martin_a 3y ago
Opening that website greets me with an alert() with the message: error; [object Object] If their phones do work as good as that... Well...

S4mb 3y ago

When people talk about the Fairphone there are always people bringing up the same or similar (often very valid) points. I would like to use this post sum up some Reddit discussion I took part in when the Fairphone 3 launched because the main points are still relevant for the Fairphone 4 launch: Q: Wasn't the point of Fairphone to have ONE phone and then buy "extensions" or/and replacements only, aka modular - for the sake of preserving the environment, etc etc?! A. No, it was always for repairability to ensure people can keep it for around five years without needing to replace the entire thing at once because the screen cracked or the audio jack broke. This whole upgrade part stuff is something that get's hyped a lot in online discussions but from the very beginning Fairphone has been very honest and cautious when asked about possible upgrade modules in the future. They would love to offer crazy upgrade paths but cmon it's a small company in Amsterdam with limited resources. However they did introduce an upgraded camera module in 2017. I think the main takeaway I have for everybody regarding the Fairphone is: Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. I've preordered the Fairphone 2, got it in 2016. People ask me about it often. They usually get very excited only to get disappointed when they realize that the team behind it has to make compromises just like every other phone brand has to. The fact that they got this product designed, launched and supported with <100 people is really amazing, so please don't feel disappointed by the fact that it doesn't offer something even Google couldn't get market ready. These guys make really good phones that are not only as fair as it gets but also as innovative as it gets when it comes to the overall design. They introduced a camera upgrade module in 2017 which is amazing, other than that it's really just making your life easier when you want to replace parts. I replaced the screen and the audio jack, the phone is still rock solid. Q: What about Software? I keep my phones mostly 3 years, because even after 3 years, many LOS devs are jumping ship...? A: They definitively do their homework. Security updates come usually ~3 weeks after Google releases them. Fairphone OS still gets bigger updates every ~2-3 months. They still support their Fairphone Open OS. Lineage OS is really popular on it and is well supported offering Android Pie for the Fairphone 2. For the Fairphone 3, the manufacturer guaranteed five years of support. This means that replacement parts are available for five years and security updates are offered. In addition, the manufacturer promises a feature update to Android 10, but does not call for a date. Additional feature updates are planned but not guaranteed. For the sold out since March 2019 Fairphone 2 (available since the end of 2015), the manufacturer will continue to publish security updates and reserve spare parts for at least another three years. The Fairphone 2 was delivered with Android 5.1, later came updates to 6.01 and 7.1.2 - the latter with great effort, because there were no official drivers for the Snapdragon 801 chipset used. "Q": What an awful phone. Anyone who buys this is an idiot, you aren’t saving the world and all you’re doing is making yourself feel holier than thou because of your “ethical” decision which you can’t be quiet about. Save your money and get a REAL phone with much better specs for the same price. A: It's still a step in the right direction. I also don't see the problem with feeling cool about "ethical" decisions. I definetely think my Fairphone 2 is cool. I think it's tacky, chunky and technical look is beautiful and it sparks interesting conversations with other people that think it's cool. If fair and open... If having a seven year old phone that looks absolutely worn out becomes the new mainstream cool that would be the best thing to ever happen to us. I for myself feel pretty cool when people ask me about my phone and how old it is. I also feel better, yes. "Q": We shouldn’t care about the conditions our phones are made in. We should care about the best value for our money, performance and quality. A: Well you know that's just like your opinion man. "Q": YEA lol pay [price of the prior Fairphone] for a phone just to feel good about your enviromental impact. top kek. A: As you may know the Fairphone is not only trying to improve the enviromental impact, the company is also doing as much as possible to improve the situation of the involved asian workers. I would like to use this moment of awareness created by the Fairphone 3 announcement to invite you to get a small glimpse into the live of Xu, your typical Foxconn phone assembly line worker. Please excuse that I just copy & pasted this together. On the last day of September, a 24-year-old migrant worker in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen killed himself. Xu Lizhi jumped out of a window of a residential dormitory run by his employer, Foxconn, the huge electronics manufacturing company with a million-strong workforce that makes the majority of the world's Apple iPhones. In most cases, Xu's suicide would have been yet another footnote in the vast, sweeping story of China's economic boom and transformation. He is one of a legion of young Chinese migrants who emerge out of rural obscurity to find work in China's teeming cities, only to end up crushed by both the dullness and stress of factory jobs, insufficient wages and a steady accumulation of personal disappointments. But Xu was a poet. And, after his death, his friends collected his work and got some published in a local Shenzhen newspaper. 《一颗螺丝掉在地上》 "A Screw Fell to the Ground" 一颗螺丝掉在地上 A screw fell to the ground 在这个加班的夜晚 In this dark night of overtime 垂直降落，轻轻一响 Plunging vertically, lightly clinking 不会引起任何人的注意 It won’t attract anyone’s attention 就像在此之前 Just like last time 某个相同的夜晚 On a night like this 有个人掉在地上 When someone plunged to the ground -- 9 January 2014 Reading through the poems, one in particular stood out to me, ‘A screw Fell to the Ground.’ While it was done eight months before his suicide, the context seems to be relatable to how he may have been feeling—mostly the sound of “someone” plunging and nobody hearing. We ran along the railway, arriving in some place called ‘the City’ where we trade in our youth, and our muscle. Finally we have nothing to trade, only a cough and a skeleton nobody cares about. ‘Sleepless’ The poems, translated at the leftist website Libcom.org, are a wrenching echo of the alienation and hardship felt by countless people in modern China and, for that matter, in other parts of the developing world. They lament the grinding ennui of the assembly line, the squalor of a migrant worker's narrow, frustrated existence. You can find more of his works here: https://libcom.org/blog/xulizhi-foxconn-suicide-poetry https://libcom.org/blog/xulizhi-foxconn-suicide-poetry You can also check out the complete cost breakdown of the Fairphone 2 here: https://www.fairphone.com/de/2015/09/09/cost-breakdown-of-the-fairphone-2/ https://www.fairphone.com/de/2015/09/09/cost-breakdown-of-th... But don't let me guilt trip you into buying this phone. The Fairphone 2 was an amazing device and I am sure the Fairphone 3 will be a solid upgrade. This is a great phone line and not some shitty alternative. The Fairphone 2 definetely had some reliability issues. I believe it was the right decision to introduce more screws and flat cables to make it more reliable and decrease additional material was needed for all the pogo pin connectors that made the Fairphone 2 extremely quick and easy to disassemble but also prone to all the random connectivity issues. The FP3 is still as good as it gets when it comes to repairability. The changes to the FP3 give me hope that it could finally become a reliable phone as well. Every gripe I had about the Fairphone 2 after using it since 2015 got addressed in this new iteration.

zabzonk 3y ago

see also nokia g22: https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_int/nokia-g-22/specs?sku=101S0609H001 https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_int/nokia-g-22/specs?sku=101...

mhitza 3y ago
> Built with recycled materials. Engineered to last longer. > OS upgrades: 2 years of OS upgrades > Security updates: 3 years of monthly security updates (From the global launch date of the device) And I didn't see any iFixit rating. Aside from using recycled materials, don't see much in common on the surface.
- zabzonk 3y ago
  ifixit are supporting it: https://www.ifixit.com/Device/Nokia_G22#Section_Parts_and_Tools https://www.ifixit.com/Device/Nokia_G22#Section_Parts_and_To...
- manmal 3y ago
  People should focus more on waste avoidance and reuse instead of buying a new gadget allegedly made from recycled materials that only lasts 3 years. I say allegedly because making durable, nicely colored materials from waste is so hard that we don’t know what tricks were used or shortcuts were taken to make this happen.
joecool1029 3y ago
This device has no US carrier band support, it's neat device I guess but terrible suggestion given the submission is about FP4 going to US.
- zabzonk 3y ago
  sorry, i didn't realise the usa don't do g3 and g4

frazar0 3y ago

Fairphone 4 has been my main and only phone for several months now. Great experience, very good battary life. Performance-wise, I haven't noticed any significant difference compared to traditional phones. The only drawbacks might be the camera and thickness, but honestly I don't care much. Of course, much depends on your use case and expectations. YMMV.

dadoomer 3y ago
Is it possible to swap batteries on the go? That'd be killer. I only replaced my phone this year (S7 edge) because the battery was depleting too fast.
- Lariscus 3y ago
  Yes, the battery is removable just like an old Nokia phone.
- berkes 3y ago
  Yes. A spare battery is cheap too. You cannot swap it "live" though, phone needs to be shut off and then booted. Also, there's no external loading hardware. So some logistics needed to get the spare batteries full.

al1r4d 3y ago

I hope available on Indonesia

miduil 3y ago

I really wish Fairphone 4 had GrapheneOS support, but after almost 4 years of Fairphone 3 I decided to go with a Pixel instead. Too many hardware bugs with the FP3 that were never acknowledged by the vendor and unhappy customers with bricked FP4's that requires sending them back in. Also I would have hoped for them continuing the FP3 architecture, feels such a waste that they've now instead developed a much more expensive hardware again. Building and maintaining an Android device is truly not trivial, kudos for that, but I don't think with their current company size they're truly up for the task. Also buying a Fairphone instead of a wider used phone means you'll be able to repair it - but because all the internal parts are super customized, phone repair shops won't have their usual source of spare parts.

cauch 3y ago
> Too many hardware bugs with the FP3 that were never acknowledged by the vendor I have a FP3, and it has been my first and only Android smartphone. I now wonder if what I've experienced is the "normal Android experience" or if I would have experienced something different from another brand. I'm also avoiding / disabling Google stuffs (I'm using f-droid, ...). I was occasionally surprised to see how a lot of people are flooded with ads / unsolicited messages and seemed not to care. I don't get it, though, it looks such an awful experience. The main thing I've noticed is the long time it sometimes take for the picture-taking app to get on focus. But I thought it was due to the standard Android software. Is there a place to list the FP3 bugs?
- verall 3y ago
  The camera focus problem is not a an android problem it's just a fairphone problem. OEMs typically write their own camera apps.
- miduil 3y ago
  * Easily damaged by moisture (even though they've claimed certain IP ratings), due to the printed conductor inside the plastic layers with pin connectors * Battery swelling after less than two years of operation (no way to source this battery locally since they've built a custom connector / redesigned an standard OEM battery) * Overheating * Touch screen glitches (they've resolved that after a year via software, support was super unhelpful with that problem) * Wi-Fi 5 GHz broken/unreliable for many people * Camera focus (not sure if FP3+ improved on that front) * Broken fingerprint sensor (from the beginning, most common issue) and by broken I mean not functional at all * self-disintegrating plastic parts (back and side covers), likely due to the fact they are using recycled plastic - they've changed the plastic chemistry with FP3+, for me the plastic became more and more brittle - In addition for me with software: * charging LED can't be disabled, which is extremely bright when you're sleeping - community members shrugging this off with "you shouldn't use your phone in your bedroom anyway" * screen brightness too bright / unreliable brightness sensor readings (they had several updates because it was so hard to tweak for them) On the positive end: Phone is quite durable, fell down on many occasions and because of it's plastic/design openness the battery falls out but screen never broke in bunch of occasions. Edit: Formatting

TheMode 3y ago

Is the hardware really the bottleneck to sustainable device? The software seems more much important but nobody is tackling it. Having a phone with a new battery doesn't matter if I can't run the same apps as others.

mrpopo 3y ago
They also provide 5-year software support. https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/9979180437393-Fairphone-OS https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/997918043739... > For Fairphone 4, we guarantee software support until the end of 2026, this includes an upgrade to Android 12 and, later on, Android 13.
- denismi 3y ago
  Doesn't that mean that buying the newest Fairphone in 2023 gets you 0 years of Android updates and 3 years of security updates? Compared to 4 years of each with a midrange Galaxy A?
  - mrpopo 3y ago
    The FP4 was out in 2021. That's 5 years. But you're right, and it's actually discounted 50 eur because of that. You can wait for the FP5 if you're not satisfied
- TheMode 3y ago
  That's not solving anything at all, what we need is hardware that doesn't need to have its software updated constantly. If you cannot have that, I wouldn't consider it ""sustainable"". There is nothing sustainable about depending on some company on the other side on the world to do the right thing continuously. Now sure, you could answer that they are doing it better than others and you may be perfectly right, but is it really the way we want to solve it? Gossiping on every company on how often they update their software?
  - notRobot 3y ago

nubinetwork 3y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36405014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36405014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600211 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600211 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600709 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36600709 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36608312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36608312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36634318 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36634318 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36635666 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36635666

nologic01 3y ago

Got a fairphone 4 for somenody I care about and will likely get one for myself when my current unrepairable, glued-battery piece of e-waste becomes unusable. I wish they would come preinstalled with something like kde plasma mobile though. I will never warm to android, no matter how "degoogled" it might become. There is something about its architecture that seems freakish. Like the entire digital universe that was created in the last decades.

lawn 3y ago

I've been using my Fairphone 4 for around a year or so and it's been great. An easily removable battery is a godsend and the phone is surprisingly durable as I've been dropping it a lot (me clumsy). I haven't encountered any issue and the one complaint I have is the lack of 3.5 jack. It was quite hard to find a USB converter that worked and having to use an adapter is really annoying. Still if this one breaks I can repair it and I would even buy a new one if I had to.

ctenb 3y ago
I bought a converter too, but it just didnt work at all! Which adapter worked for you?
- lawn 3y ago
  I don't remember the one I got, but I looked it up in a list. Maybe this was the list? https://forum.fairphone.com/t/fp4-list-of-usb-c-to-3-5-audio-jack-adapter/79386 https://forum.fairphone.com/t/fp4-list-of-usb-c-to-3-5-audio... There's also an adapter on the official site that they say should work (but I haven't tried it): https://shop.fairphone.com/shop/usb-c-to-mini-audio-jack-adapter-3-5mm-18 https://shop.fairphone.com/shop/usb-c-to-mini-audio-jack-ada...

rmdes 3y ago

Issues with microphone on the FP4 that are not explainable but the good news is? I can just change the mic for 20 euro! The real issue with the FP4 is the camera. Ugly pictures, and under bad lightning its like taking picture on android a decade ago.. Albeit the pixel number is enough.

londons_explore 3y ago
All modern smartphones have masses of proprietary stuff to turn gigabytes of raw data from the sensor into a beautiful photo. If you want an opensource phone, you end up with crappy photos unless you have a camera team of 500 people to rewrite that stuff, and a big team of lawyers to deal with all the patent licensing you're going to have to do for the techniques you use.
- morsch 3y ago
  I'm not sure that it's truly all down to software, but as far as it is, you don't have start at zero -- there are excellent, competitive raw photo processors available as free software, like darktable and RawTherapee. Still a lot of work, though, no doubt.
  - londons_explore 3y ago
    heh - no. Camera stacks on modern phones process many raw frames to make a single photo - sometimes as many as 100. Collecting those frames is done in a second or so before and after the user clicks the shutter button. Thats a data rate of ~15 Gigabits - far faster than most phones can write to storage - and anyway would you be happy for each photo to take a few gigabytes of storage space until it was processed? Therefore, the raw data needs to be processed (or at least preprocessed) in realtime. You can't store it and do it later. And to do that, you typically need custom silicon - all the big phone manufacturers have ASICs dedicated to image processing. And to make the trouble even worse, you often need to use data from some of the raw frames to adjust camera parameters for the next frame - for example adjusting amplifier gains. See patent US9196027B2 for an example of the sort of thing that is done 'in the loop'.

stevezsa8 3y ago

This is cool and all... I just wish someone would release a device with user replaceable battery and better OS update policies. Basically a pixel with slightly easier repair. I think the modular aspect is cool, but seems like a gimmick that would be prone to failure. Just my opinion anyway.

dimitar 3y ago
I have a Fairphone 4 and I can replace the batter and upgrade the OS (a choice of multiple ones is available)
- stevezsa8 3y ago
  I was tempted after a colleague got the FP4. In the end I decided to get a pixel 6a for half the price. I'm taking a bet on not smashing the handset. €300 extra was just too much for a replaceable battery. Atleast for my usecase.

zeroCalories 3y ago

I like that we're moving in the direction of repairability. I haven't needed to upgrade my pixel 2, and I would love it if I could simply replace parts as needed instead of buying a whole new phone. That said, it seems clear that phone makers would prefer you upgrade every two years. Wonder if we will see regulation around that in the coming years.

passwordoops 3y ago
>seems clear that phone makers would prefer you upgrade every two years And of course they all have PR and websites devoted to how much they care about the environment, even positive ESG scores in some cases

jaylittle 3y ago

Years ago this would've been interesting to me. But it took too long. Given that the Fairphone 4 has been out everywhere else for years now and there wasn't even a peep of it coming to the US, I decided to jump ship for an iPhone. If I couldn't get a truly repairable phone, then at least I could buy the one that would likely last the longest given the wide availability of official repair outlets (e.g. Apple Stores) and the history of solid software support for at least five years. So that's where I am at. Thankfully things are looking a bit better on the laptop side of the repairability fence. I have every intention of pre-ordering a Framework 16 the second pre-orders open.

jokoon 3y ago

So does it mean it's not possible to have popular apps like whatsapp or Tinder on this? I also wish it was just a phone with much less performance for a smaller price. I want something durable and repairable, not something fast, Wirth's law is very important to consider when consider software and hardware. I hope they will make such phone, one day, because I am not spending that much money for a phone. I bought a 150 euro phone and it already lasted 3 years, because even if a phone becomes obsolete, it is still cheaper, per year, to use crappy phones, than to use a durable expensive phone. If your really care about fairness and the environment, make lightweight hardware and software.

jokowueu 3y ago
It has microG you can download the apps you want including the play store
frollo 3y ago
I've got a FP3 (so the older model) and I have had no problems with any app. I don't use Tinder, but Whatsapp works as good as on any phone I've ever owned. As for the cheapness, I've been keeping a running tab of how much the repair is costing me vs how much it would have cost with a normal phone (ballpark estimate) and, considering the phone price, I'm currently saving about 200€, even factoring in the phone price. The biggest expense is shipping because I live in the middle of nowhere and I can easily get 10€ of shipping on a 15€ spare part (which is why I'm not replacing the protective cover even though it looks like shit).
zerox7felf 3y ago
I have been using a FP4 for about a year with /e/-os, and it has been pretty ok so far. I don't use many (if any) of the /e/-os cloud features, so can't speak for those. Other apps have been working fine w/ microG and the custom app store (which combines the play store and fdroid). The only issue I can think of off the top of my head is google translate not working. Other Gapps (Gmail, yt, lens, etc) seem to work fine, as do pretty much all others I have tried. Unsure how well in-app purchases work. Some /e/-os apps have UI quirks... But nothing is worse than "ok" in my view. Ymmv. Not sure I buy that lightweight phones would necessarily be better for the environment? Surely repairability is key?

cge 3y ago

As a note about repairability, ignoring various problems with the phone: while the FP4 does have more availability of parts from the manufacturer, is generally easier to repair, and is advertised as repairable, I found the Fairphone forums to be surprisingly and unexpectedly hostile to discussions of repair and repairability. A significant portion of the forum userbase considers that Fairphone's primary focus is on fair trade, the treatment of workers, and the sourcing of raw materials. Regular posters, and highlighted users ("Fairphone Angels"), will often argue to users that the phone is not primarily meant to be repairable or longer-lasting than other phones. Concerns about outdated security updates and long-lasting, serious software problems with basic functionality often get responses about workers in phone manufacturing, and reminders that this is the point of the phone. This goes directly against Fairphone's own advertising, but it seems to be the general sense amongst users the company attaches their name to. Coming from the Framework forums, this was astonishing and disappointing.

gclawes 3y ago
I'd buy a Framework phone in an instant...
- amelius 3y ago
  Yes. But what OS would it run out of the box? And what would you run on it?
  - pshirshov 3y ago
    GrapheneOS
  - christophilus 3y ago
    I’d want to run Debian + Phosh.
    - squarefoot 3y ago
      Add sandboxed Android layer for apps compatibility and it would be next to perfect.

res0nat0r 3y ago

I would just love a good Android based phone with a Blackberry style keyboard. I know there are a couple out there, but something from a current large manufacturer would be nice.

malf 3y ago

SO had a fairphone. Broke screen. Turned out the screen replacement module was vaporware.

progval 3y ago
Was it out of stock? Non-functional?

coding123 3y ago

$600? Doesn't it make sense to buy 3 shit phones that can't be repaired for $200 each? Is this phone worth $600?

fsflover 3y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36653377 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36653377

gsa 3y ago

I really want to love my Fairphone 4 but they really need to improve their software support. I have a bunch of bugs with my device: the screen dims after a short period making it unusable in bright daylight, NFC is erratic and needs a restart to fix, 5 GHz hotspot hasn't worked for months. The brightness bug is the biggest killer for me. There's a whole list of bugs tracked on the Fairphone website [0], and progress is unfortunately very slow. [0] https://forum.fairphone.com/t/known-reproducible-and-reported-issues-of-the-fairphone-4/82572#list-of-known-reproducible-and-reported-issues-6 https://forum.fairphone.com/t/known-reproducible-and-reporte...

ctenb 3y ago

My experience with fp4 has been pleasant. No problems. The only mild annoyance was the finger print unlock mechanism, which feels less user-friendly than my previous phones. But you get used to it.

t0bia_s 3y ago

Dimensions 162 x 75.5 x 10.5 mm are huge. Not for my pocket and hands. And I'm a tall person.

ntnsndr 3y ago

Tester here. After some months of working out the kinks, this phone and OS pair are working great. I strongly recommend (if you are okay with a so-so camera).