Purism Finally Announces The Firmed Up Specifications For The Librem 5 Smartphone

[schmidtbag]

I think the real problem with the price is that you probably won't be able to get this phone on a contract deal. Most people don't actually pay $1000 on an iPhone; they basically lease one. I'm sure most carriers aren't going to have contract/lease options for this phone, which means people will need to pay the price in full (or go with a 3rd-party payment plan).

[NatTuck]

The Purism team seems to clearly understand that they're not building a mass-market phone, certainly not for their first release. There's demand for a freedom focused phone running a proper Linux distro - enough demand to design and sell one - but it's not going to immediately get any measurable portion of the overall cellphone market. Failing to understand that is what killed Ubuntu Touch.

[AsuMagic]

Well, here's the thing I meant: Outside of some specific groups, 600€ is far too high compared to the competition.
Of course, I don't think they're charging this much out of greed. The effort they have spent on it is several times what most companies do when creating their shitty Android flavours with more love put into spyware than into actual usability. Plus, the likely low amount of units that will be produced forces the price up which in turns reduce their potential marketshare...

What worries me is that their target audience is extremely niche, far more niche even than linux desktops.
You're not going to convince anybody to pick that phone over say a Samsung or an iPhone similarly priced.
You're not going to convince people who you set up a Linux distro on their computer for and who just want a simple phone that works, because no way they're going to spend 600€.
It is worse in every way in hardware and while the software side is very interesting and refreshing for hardcore Linux users (like... those browsing phoronix, usually, and excluding hardcore gnome3 trolls), most users, including tech savvy ones, are only going to see it as just less mature and with worse app support - do they plan Android compat? That alone could decide a lot of the marketshare they'll get.

I don't doubt that they'll manage to sell units, but I'm worried that they won't be able to sell enough.

[starshipeleven]

I think the real problem with the price is that you probably won't be able to get this phone on a contract deal. Most people don't actually pay $1000 on an iPhone; they basically lease one.

This is not aimed at idiots that need to show off with money they don't have, so that's not a major issue.

Besides, getting a 700$ lease isn't that hard in first world countries if you have some kind of stable job. If you can't just save up money like a non-US-citizen usually does.

[Zajec]

I'm OK with the screen. I just happen to use PC for gaming and TV for watching movies.
One things that bothers me is missing NFC. That's very useful for contact less payments. A bit weird decision since NFC chipsets shouldn't be that expensive.

[skeevy420]

I like the phone and the spec. Of course, freedom has a price, I wasn't expecting anything different.

Hopefuly, the price should decrease in the year or two (or three).

I am quite pleased to see a 720p screen phone, as that should be plentiful given the limitations of human sight. I'm quite surprised to see that the author of the article bashed the screen, showing his complete ignorance on the subject, and trying to promote the all-abound high-resolution histeria sponsored by greedy smartphone companies.

Edit: I'm also quite pleased to see that the phone is powered by Cortex-A53 cores, which are immune to Spectre and all related security issues.

Maybe it's just me, but after using a QHD LG G3 for so many years, I can see so many imperfections on 1080p and lower resolution screens. I don't notice a thing with higher resolution screens until comparing zoom-in quality with text.

For the record, I'm using an LG V20 now. Only phone that's modern with a removable battery, external storage, QHD screen, a DAC, a freakin headphone jack, and more.

[edwaleni]

I'm almost sure it will be. It's almost as overpriced as Apple phones. Disgusting.

iPhones weren't overpriced at the beginning.

But they are way overpriced now and the quality has gone down as well.

Tim Cook was a sourcing guru and it shows in the current iPhones. It used to be the US Government overpaid for the cheapest parts, now its just their residents.

iPhone sales are dropping so fast Apple doesn't report sales numbers anymore.

Sprint leveraged the company on selling them and now is paying for it (or should I say T-Mo is)

Apple even dumbed down the software to make up for the crappy Intel modems they sourced so no one could tell the difference.

As for Librem, I agree with starshipeleven.

[andyprough]

Maybe it's placebo effect. Have you tried a double-blind test?

Quite likely. The ability to see imperfections in 1080p would be superhuman.

[skeevy420]

Maybe it's placebo effect. Have you tried a double-blind test?

The closest would be using other LG phones of similar screen sizes with different resolutions and I can notice more imperfections as the resolution decreases. It's mainly fonts that I notice at 1080p, which includes my 48" television as a monitor as well as 15-23"PC monitors, but below that is when I start to really notice pixelation, aliasing issues, and generally start to perceive content as possibly lower quality than it may or may actually not be.

I've only ever owned and primarily used 1080p or 2K devices/screens for the past 21ish years which is around 2/3 of my life; primarily 1080p. I think being accustomed to higher resolutions from around 11 or 12 to 34 now has a lot to do with it.

I have noticed, anecdotally, that people 45 and up tend to not notice lower resolutions on phones and other displays anywhere near as much as younger people. For my parents, older relatives, and older people that I know, they're almost always perfectly happy with 720p and can't perceive any difference with increased resolution other than the comment of "I can see more stuff"; but "seeing more stuff" is not the same as "seeing increased quality". They see more stuff but the quality is the same. I wonder if that can be attributed to growing up with lower quality screens and then hitting a level where better/higher becomes harder to notice due to being used to lower quality imperfections for greater a percentage of their lives.

What's funny is that I really don't perceive much of a difference between 30FPS and 60FPS with most games. The few times I do it's first person shooters and racing.

EDIT: After posting I realized that my monitor when I was 11 or 12, our first home PC, was a 13" 1024x768 monitor and I was around 15 when I got my first 1080p monitor and a few years later when I got a job and moved on to using 1080p televisions. Since then I've only ever used a freebie 15" 1440x900 monitor at home and for two weeks because lightning killed my TV, only ever owned 1080p and up phones outside of rare circumstances...

Or my Dad has broke two of my phones in the past 3 years, by accident, and I had to use his backup Flex (720p 6"), after he broke my backup G3 (5.5" 2K) until I got something new and I did not like the 720p screen; extended reading on it gave me a headache. A few years back AT&T fucked up and sent both of us two phones when we upgraded our work phones...four phones for two cents...

I managed to find a new V20 for the cost of the refurbishment parts for the G3 so that's what finally got me to upgrade phones .

[futuretim]

The price of this phone is no question high compared to a high-volume, derivative phone that has benefited from a decade(??) or more of research, development and expertise. That's an objective fact when you look at the price of one compared to the price of another.

It's not "disgusting" it's just a fact of life. If you go to your local wholesaler and buy 1000x of something you will likely get a better deal than if you buy 1x. That's also a factor.

If you don't value the proposition of the phone (open source, mainline kernel, modem separated from CPU, etc.) then that's certainly your right. But I see little reason to attack Purism over the phone.

I work for a company that does actual low-level, custom chip design but I'm a software engineer. Prior to working here I thought I had a remote idea of what was involved and I can say definitively I had almost _no idea_ how hard this all actually was. Granted Purism isn't developing new SoCs or anything but I would venture to guess most people criticizing them or the price are clueless; maybe I'm wrong.

As to being a commercial success, I think it will be for Purism and the internal goals they've set or at least I would imagine so.

At any rate I can say I'm anxiously awaiting mine and wish them all the best. They don't get a pass, we'll be tough on them where they deserve it and luckily we'll help improve it.