3 ms·

Specifications of the Firefox OS Developer Preview Devices

74 points by robhawkes 14y ago

icot 14y ago
After owning a Geeksphone One and using a Zero, I have some mixed feelings about them producing the firsts Firefox OS phones.
- daliusd 14y ago
  It would be interesting to hear longer review. Still I believe you experience is better than OpenMoko FreeRunner (I have not owned it but my coworkers and other people I know bought these and never used again). This experience alone discouraged people from trying anything else. It would be interesting to see if one of those Open devices or OS succeeded but it needs more than "open" for that.
- mbrubeck 14y ago
  These are just the developer devices. The first Firefox OS devices sold to end-users in Brazil will be manufactured by ZTE and/or Alcatel. (Note: I am a Mozilla employee, but I don't know anything about the Telefonica devices beyond what's been publicly announced.) https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2012/07/02/firefox-mobile-os/ https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2012/07/02/firefox-mobile-os/
dsr_ 14y ago
On the one hand, this is not enough hardware to make me happy. On the other hand, if it runs smoothly on this, it should run smoothly on more sophisticated devices, so it's probably a pretty good test platform. (One exception: not enough pixels on screen to stress the graphics hardware.)
- zokier 14y ago
  > One exception: not enough pixels on screen to stress the graphics hardware I'm more worried about DPI/PPI scalability. In theory web-based content should scale rather well, but reality is always more complicated than that.
- mtgx 14y ago
  Adreno 200 (what the S1 is using) is probably the worst GPU of the entire 5 years of modern touchscreen smartphones' existence. You really don't want many more pixels than that. Virtually no 3D games work on it, and even some more "graphics intensive" 2D games can be too much for it with a 480x320 resolution. I remember Angry Birds working pretty poorly on it initially, but they fixed it later.
zokier 14y ago
They weren't kidding when they said they were aiming for low-end devices.
- mtgx 14y ago
  Those are the specs of a high-end phone in 2012, though. And it's still a bit far from the $50 low-end Android phones being sold in Africa right now, but it's also lower than what would be mid-end today, so somewhere between low-end and mid-end.
  - daliusd 14y ago
    Until they will have device that will be interesting to non developers that will be low-end. Most probably I will consider it for buying to my mother then.
  - zokier 14y ago
    > Those are the specs of a high-end phone in 2012 No, not really. Eg. Galaxy Nexus from 2011 has significantly higher specs than this. Quickly looking, Galaxy S (from 2010, 2.5 years ago) has similar specs. edit: Nexus One (also from 2010) has almost identical specs. But even in 2010 high-end seemed to have transitioned to 800x480.
  - brudgers 14y ago
    Everytime I read "mid-end" I saw a kitten die.
  - veemjeem 14y ago
    Last phone to use the qualcomm snapdragon s1 processor was the htc droid incredible. It came out in 2010 and reached end of life near the end of 2011.

74 points by robhawkes 14y ago

icot 14y ago

After owning a Geeksphone One and using a Zero, I have some mixed feelings about them producing the firsts Firefox OS phones.

daliusd 14y ago
It would be interesting to hear longer review. Still I believe you experience is better than OpenMoko FreeRunner (I have not owned it but my coworkers and other people I know bought these and never used again). This experience alone discouraged people from trying anything else. It would be interesting to see if one of those Open devices or OS succeeded but it needs more than "open" for that.
mbrubeck 14y ago
These are just the developer devices. The first Firefox OS devices sold to end-users in Brazil will be manufactured by ZTE and/or Alcatel. (Note: I am a Mozilla employee, but I don't know anything about the Telefonica devices beyond what's been publicly announced.) https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2012/07/02/firefox-mobile-os/ https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2012/07/02/firefox-mobile-os/

dsr_ 14y ago

On the one hand, this is not enough hardware to make me happy. On the other hand, if it runs smoothly on this, it should run smoothly on more sophisticated devices, so it's probably a pretty good test platform. (One exception: not enough pixels on screen to stress the graphics hardware.)

zokier 14y ago
> One exception: not enough pixels on screen to stress the graphics hardware I'm more worried about DPI/PPI scalability. In theory web-based content should scale rather well, but reality is always more complicated than that.
mtgx 14y ago
Adreno 200 (what the S1 is using) is probably the worst GPU of the entire 5 years of modern touchscreen smartphones' existence. You really don't want many more pixels than that. Virtually no 3D games work on it, and even some more "graphics intensive" 2D games can be too much for it with a 480x320 resolution. I remember Angry Birds working pretty poorly on it initially, but they fixed it later.

zokier 14y ago

They weren't kidding when they said they were aiming for low-end devices.

mtgx 14y ago
Those are the specs of a high-end phone in 2012, though. And it's still a bit far from the $50 low-end Android phones being sold in Africa right now, but it's also lower than what would be mid-end today, so somewhere between low-end and mid-end.
- daliusd 14y ago
  Until they will have device that will be interesting to non developers that will be low-end. Most probably I will consider it for buying to my mother then.
- zokier 14y ago
  > Those are the specs of a high-end phone in 2012 No, not really. Eg. Galaxy Nexus from 2011 has significantly higher specs than this. Quickly looking, Galaxy S (from 2010, 2.5 years ago) has similar specs. edit: Nexus One (also from 2010) has almost identical specs. But even in 2010 high-end seemed to have transitioned to 800x480.
- brudgers 14y ago
  Everytime I read "mid-end" I saw a kitten die.
- veemjeem 14y ago
  Last phone to use the qualcomm snapdragon s1 processor was the htc droid incredible. It came out in 2010 and reached end of life near the end of 2011.