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Minimal Phone: Low-priced smartphone with E Ink display and complete keyboard
(www.notebookcheck.net)
Before you get excited, it's an IndieGoGo project.
this post was submitted on 04 Mar 2024
275 points (95.1% liked)
Android
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The one and only time I bought into a project on Indiegogo was for a phone that said it was shipping that month, even though the company had been delaying it for a year already (unbeknownst to me) and they had no idea when they were going to finish. It was straight up fraud, Indiegogo let the company do it without consequence, and 2.5 years later the project is still up on Indiegogo. Now Iβm out $800, and the asshole company is still claiming theyβll send all the backers their phones any day now. Theyβve been literally saying it for years.
Donβt learn the hard way like I had to. Never back an Indiegogo project.
!RemindMe 1 year
Isn't indiegogo just like Kickstarter? There's never a guarantee you'll ever get the thing you back.
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Aww shucks I was actually a bit interested
Is there something in particular about Indiegogo that I missed, or are you just pointing out it's crowd funded? (and that means you could lose your money without anything in return)
Probably the chances of them never delivering being more than 0
They have a history of really hilarious scams
https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/biggest-kickstarter-and-indiegogo-scams/
Kickstarter is infamous for being full of marketing tech bros who take your money and deliver nothing.
Indegogo is Kickstarter without any of the consumer protections. It's not a matter of if you'll get scammed, but by how much.
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So it goes well with my Cicret bracelet
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I'm not disinterested, though $350 is a little steep ($450 if you're not an 'early bird'). Ideally it would be bootloader unlockable and rootable as well. I would probably use it like a PDA of old.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-minimal-phone-first-e-ink-qwerty-phone#/
Preliminary Specs:
- CPU: MTK 6769
- RAM: 4GB
- Storage: 128GB
- OS: Android 13
- Display: 3.5β E-Ink Touch / 300 PPI / High Refresh Rate
- Front Camera: 8MP
- Rear Camera: 16MP
- WIFI: 802.11 a / b / g / n 2.4GHz / 5GHz WiFi DirectοΌWiFiοΌB 4.1
- ATοΌT: YES
- T-Mobile: YES
- Verizon: YES
- Battery: 4000mAh QC 18W Wireless charge less than 20W
- Features: QWERTY keyboard, NFC, GPS, A-GPS, Fingerprint (side), Face unlock, G sensor, Compass, Gyroscope, Proximity, Light sensor
I looked into E-ink displays this summer and the tech is just so high priced
Wasn't e ink in the highest tier of patents stifling advancement?
Yeah, licensing fees are super high. Who knows what kind of battery life and displays we might have on our personal devices today if eink wasn't so encumbered.
It's fucking crazy cause my city just put e-ink displays on bus stops and I thought it was because they were going cheap, I guess not, though.
Because e ink is basically perfect for bus stops. You don't need to update more than once a minute or two and it uses basically no power for running 24/7.
They can't claim carrier compatibility yet before they even source the parts. (They're in Japan right now sourcing Chinese parts, allegedly, and only have renders thus far.) Let alone until they have a working prototype to test against fyi.
Carriers may very well not certify the device due to compatibility issues. Or they won't be able to afford the certification process.
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Man, what I really want is a e-ink smart watch....
RIP in peace Pebble
I wonder how hard it would be to open source something similar with something like an nrf52 or similar and a 3d printed enclosure I might have to look into this tbh
Idk if Bangle.js is open source, but I imagine a e-ink display could be possible?
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The Garmin Instinct watches have an e-ink like display. I get about 25 days of battery on mine.
I have an old Sony eink one which still works and is perfect
I have a Fossil Hybrid, it's perfect
SQFMI Watchy exists... And has a chinese supplier now which doesn't suck
The community is also active, recently a few from ground up firmwares have appeared
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This sounded like something I would be excited about but damn we got different ideas of 'low-price'.
This is almost twice as expensive as my moto power was that gives me several days of heavy use or a week of light use on a charge
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325$, how is that low-priced? I've never paid more then 200$ for a phone, I have an s20+ now.
For that price i can get second hand phone with higher specs & colorful screen
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Why do these phones always miss the mark?
Expand on that thought...
I'm just annoyed that they sell uncomplicated phones, but they are always hundreds of dollars. Just put an eink screen on a cheap SOC price around $40.
$40 is way too low. Economics of scale do not apply for such a niche product. $140-180 should be doable.
The problem is that e-ink is a patented technology and the patent owner charges insanely high royalties for using it in your product.
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I'd get this if it has other messaging apps like Signal, and banking apps...seems like it has android so should be ok. Unfortunately I don't see it hitting the market realistically...
Man, I hope that takes off. Would be great to charge your phone every week or two.
$350
Low price
I could go get a new Motorola from Walmart for $69 right now.
The 69 dollar phone is a subsidized pre paid device. They plan on taking a loss on the sale and making it up with cell plans.
Also this is a niche device for a VERY niche audience. It will never be cheap cheap, just cheap for what it is.
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If it came with a good terminal app I would be very tempted. I loved my blackberry and the old slide androids.
Is anyone using one of the Hisense e-ink phones? How are they?
"Minimal"
At the software level, the Minimal Phone is based on a customized version of Android 13 and uses the MediaTek MT6769 SoC. It has 4 GB of RAM and 128 GB of internal storage. The front camera has a resolution of 8 MP and the main camera 16 MP, of which the latter comes with flash. Bluetooth and WiFi for both the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands are supported. NFC, GPS and a side-mounted fingerprint sensor are also included, as are a compass and gyroscope.
A fingerprint sensor? 16 MP camera? This is just a regular phone with a worse display. The 2009 BlackBerry Tour had 128MB of RAM and a 3.2 MP camera, and it was high end. I realize there just isn't a market anymore for a device that doesn't have these features that could be priced under $400, but it really speaks to a lack of imagination in the industry.
Also even if the prototype in the video is fully functional, they are not gonna have these delivered by August this year with a $500k goal lmao.
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How long does the battery last? I think a week minimum and preferably a month it's what would be needed to make it worth it.
"several days"
So the same as most other modern phones under light use.
Not the same. E-ink displays only require power when you turn on the backlight or things change on the screen. The screen on time should be higher compared to regular LCD/OLED panels.
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I have an e-ink notebook. The low refresh rate is intolerable for doing anything like menus or text input.
I like the idea of a minimal phone but I think e-ink is a deal breaker for me, and I suspect most others.
I wish I could get a tablet that is like the ReMarkable tablet with more storage (at least 64GB, storage is dirt cheap these days) or a MicroSD slot. I'm not paying $400 for a tablet with 8GB of storage in 2024. For comparison, you could buy 8TB of SSD storage for that price.
This is interesting but not quite what I want.
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