4 ms·

It was $700 two years ago and has almost doubled. I have no issue with a $1300 phone (I own one) but generally tech things get cheaper as time passes.

crazygringo 3y ago
> but generally tech things get cheaper as time passes. I don't think that applies at all to super small high-skill manufacturing runs.
Matl 3y ago
There's the USA edition and the standard edition. AFAIK it's the US-manufactured one that's so expensive, they're also short of parts AFAIK.
- srgpqt 3y ago
  The USA edition is/was over $2000
- martin8412 3y ago
  USA edition is around $2k
Tommstein 3y ago
Not cell phones. I remember when the most expensive phone you could get was like $700. Then all the stories about how prices were about to hit a ludicrous four figures. Now there's a wide variety of phones that cost four figures.
- LoganDark 3y ago
  Man, I miss the days when you could get a rootable phone that could run the latest LineageOS for like $80. (That's how much it was for my Motorola Photon Q 4G LTE which was extremely rootable.)
  - chunk_waffle 3y ago
    I miss the Firefox OS phones, I think mine was like $90? It had it's problems but phone calls and SMS worked reliably.
  - MostlyStable 3y ago
    I miss the days when there was hardware differentiation at any price. There is literally one brand of phone right now that both A) has a headphone jack and B) doesn't have some kind of screen cutout for the selfie camera, and that's the Sony Xperia line. Despite the price (their entire line of current models is >$1000), I would probably pay it (or buy an older year model on ebay) except that they are not compatible with my provider (or at least uncertainly so, the internet has mixed things to say and they are 100% for sure not _officially_ supported. I ended up going with a 3 year old phone from a different manufacturer that is officially supported but still had to give up the headphone jack.
    - LoganDark 3y ago
      B is super important to me, so my phone right now is a OnePlus 7 Pro. It was one of the last models ever made that can still pass SafetyNet while rooted (due to being whitelisted for "basic" / non-hardware-backed attestation). Unfortunately now it's several versions out of date and will stay that way for the foreseeable future, on top of the fact that nobody's figured out how to lock the bootloader on a custom ROM, despite the fact that it'll get you back Widevine L1 keys (the 7 Pro doesn't erase them on bootloader unlock like most phones do). But this all stopped mattering to me when something accidentally activated a "feature"[0] of TWRP that erased my device and the maintainers have so far been completely hostile to the notion of adding an option to disable that functionality. ADHD now permanently bars me from any form of tweaking because the risk of TWRP suddenly erasing my device one day cannot be mitigated whatsoever. Even making backups from TWRP is off-limits because I'm afraid of it erasing my device instead. Now I just use my phone because OxygenOS is great, the hardware mute switch is great, lack of camera cutout is great (fuck rounded corners though), and it has some serious flagship specs. Not an advertisement or anything, but this was $300 refurbished from Back Market. [0]: https://github.com/TeamWin/Team-Win-Recovery-Project/issues/1597 https://github.com/TeamWin/Team-Win-Recovery-Project/issues/...
seba_dos1 3y ago
Not when you had to split already relatively small production batches into even smaller ones because the entire supply chain has collapsed and you couldn't obtain components in any helpful quantity for about two years.

crazygringo 3y ago

> but generally tech things get cheaper as time passes. I don't think that applies at all to super small high-skill manufacturing runs.

Matl 3y ago

There's the USA edition and the standard edition. AFAIK it's the US-manufactured one that's so expensive, they're also short of parts AFAIK.

srgpqt 3y ago
The USA edition is/was over $2000
martin8412 3y ago
USA edition is around $2k

Tommstein 3y ago

Not cell phones. I remember when the most expensive phone you could get was like $700. Then all the stories about how prices were about to hit a ludicrous four figures. Now there's a wide variety of phones that cost four figures.

LoganDark 3y ago
Man, I miss the days when you could get a rootable phone that could run the latest LineageOS for like $80. (That's how much it was for my Motorola Photon Q 4G LTE which was extremely rootable.)
- chunk_waffle 3y ago
  I miss the Firefox OS phones, I think mine was like $90? It had it's problems but phone calls and SMS worked reliably.
- MostlyStable 3y ago
  I miss the days when there was hardware differentiation at any price. There is literally one brand of phone right now that both A) has a headphone jack and B) doesn't have some kind of screen cutout for the selfie camera, and that's the Sony Xperia line. Despite the price (their entire line of current models is >$1000), I would probably pay it (or buy an older year model on ebay) except that they are not compatible with my provider (or at least uncertainly so, the internet has mixed things to say and they are 100% for sure not _officially_ supported. I ended up going with a 3 year old phone from a different manufacturer that is officially supported but still had to give up the headphone jack.
  - LoganDark 3y ago
    B is super important to me, so my phone right now is a OnePlus 7 Pro. It was one of the last models ever made that can still pass SafetyNet while rooted (due to being whitelisted for "basic" / non-hardware-backed attestation). Unfortunately now it's several versions out of date and will stay that way for the foreseeable future, on top of the fact that nobody's figured out how to lock the bootloader on a custom ROM, despite the fact that it'll get you back Widevine L1 keys (the 7 Pro doesn't erase them on bootloader unlock like most phones do). But this all stopped mattering to me when something accidentally activated a "feature"[0] of TWRP that erased my device and the maintainers have so far been completely hostile to the notion of adding an option to disable that functionality. ADHD now permanently bars me from any form of tweaking because the risk of TWRP suddenly erasing my device one day cannot be mitigated whatsoever. Even making backups from TWRP is off-limits because I'm afraid of it erasing my device instead. Now I just use my phone because OxygenOS is great, the hardware mute switch is great, lack of camera cutout is great (fuck rounded corners though), and it has some serious flagship specs. Not an advertisement or anything, but this was $300 refurbished from Back Market. [0]: https://github.com/TeamWin/Team-Win-Recovery-Project/issues/1597 https://github.com/TeamWin/Team-Win-Recovery-Project/issues/...

seba_dos1 3y ago

Not when you had to split already relatively small production batches into even smaller ones because the entire supply chain has collapsed and you couldn't obtain components in any helpful quantity for about two years.