if you mean displays having rounded corners, I’m inclined to think about production cost, wastage, complexity, durability. Also tends to feature with front camera cutouts, under-display FP sensors.
I wish we didn’t go this route. Sony xperia phones still have a top and bottom bezel, the top accommodates the camera, they still have a dedicated FP sensor etc. they still have a 3.5mm jack, sd card slot lol
shame you can’t use them with graphene, calyx, etc.
I have the 7a and even that amount of roubded corners pissed me off. I don’t know what I’m gonna do after this phone. At least I’ll get security updates for four more years.
The pixel security model makes secure, privacy respecting custom ROMs like GrapheneOS, CalyxOS, DivestOS more accessible.
My issues with the P7 are more like generic hangups seen with most phones today, and are not necessarily specifc to the phone itself. This is bearing in mind that my prior phone from 2019 (SD855 SoC) featured an LCD FHD display (without rounded corners or cutouts), headphone jack, notification LED, SD card slot. I had a lot of the hardware amenities that were already being phased out around that time.
I’ve made peace with the idea that I won’t get these back (I’m not going back to vendor ROMs), it’s just a shame that vendors can cut away at everything nice to have in the pursuit of cost optimisation.
Yeah, the phone duopoly is awful, especially for the software. Even on Graphene OS there’s bullshit like notifications only turning on some tiny portion of the screen with a brightness level near zero. Like, I have the setting on so I can see when notifications come in.
But yes I do miss the SD card slot. Not so much headphone jack because I personally prefer wireless but I stand with you.
And I have all day keep going.
Edit: sorry most of that wasn’t relevant to your comment.
The headphone jack is a sore spot for me, I have a few speaker systems around the house and garage with 3.5mm. I use an adapter but wired audio over USB C on android has terrible UX; it’s treated as a generic USB device, so it carries the same security implications (can only route audio with the device unlocked, can cut out if you lock the phone shortly after). Audio quality over type C + adapter has been worse in my experience but this will vary by device.
The displays are kind of a multi faceted thing for me. I can always see the impact of the pentile sub-pixel layout on text regardless of pixel density. I cannot unsee that sort of screen door effect.
Compared to LCD IPS, you might notice a smearing effect with UI animations on oled, I believe the same can be observed with desktop displays (in addition to VRR backlight flicker on darker content)
There’s also the faster rate of degradation it carries as a technology, which has prompted mitigations at the OS level.
The infinite contrast / per pixel backlighting is nice for sure, though it’s led to AOD replacing dedicated notification RGB LEDs (which feels sort of inelegant; that’s additional content to render on display and it’s generally less functional than addressable RGB at a glance), has enabled under-display fingerprint readers (which pale in performance to conventional sensors). Rounded corners aren’t intrinsic to oled but camera hole punch designs seem to be. Those camera holes will never not look like a design concession to me. 18 months with this and I still think it’s dumb.
The phone feels pretty solid but the back is glass, the sides are slippery without a case, and the glass on both sides protrudes past the bezel, making it a bit more damage prone.
None of these things are intrinsic to the pixel, it’s sad to see so little variation out there though.
Hmm, seems like some phones don’t have a DAC anymore and thus, the USB-C adapter need to get the audio in digital form and use its own DAC…
I guess in that case, it would be a better experience attaching a wifi audio receiver and send the hifi signal over that. Best scenario would be if the music box would have a digital in port you can use, so you would use the DAC dedicated to your speakers, which is better than phone DAC in most cases.
I’ve been looking at several powered adapters as well as Bluetooth receivers with aux output. I’ve also considered a low power dedicated music system, problem for the garage is no wlan access.
if you mean displays having rounded corners, I’m inclined to think about production cost, wastage, complexity, durability. Also tends to feature with front camera cutouts, under-display FP sensors.
I wish we didn’t go this route. Sony xperia phones still have a top and bottom bezel, the top accommodates the camera, they still have a dedicated FP sensor etc. they still have a 3.5mm jack, sd card slot lol
shame you can’t use them with graphene, calyx, etc.
I have the 7a and even that amount of roubded corners pissed me off. I don’t know what I’m gonna do after this phone. At least I’ll get security updates for four more years.
similar boat. the pixel security model is tough to move away from. I dislike practically everything else about my p7.
Like what?
how much time do you have 😓
The pixel security model makes secure, privacy respecting custom ROMs like GrapheneOS, CalyxOS, DivestOS more accessible.
My issues with the P7 are more like generic hangups seen with most phones today, and are not necessarily specifc to the phone itself. This is bearing in mind that my prior phone from 2019 (SD855 SoC) featured an LCD FHD display (without rounded corners or cutouts), headphone jack, notification LED, SD card slot. I had a lot of the hardware amenities that were already being phased out around that time.
I’ve made peace with the idea that I won’t get these back (I’m not going back to vendor ROMs), it’s just a shame that vendors can cut away at everything nice to have in the pursuit of cost optimisation.
Yeah, the phone duopoly is awful, especially for the software. Even on Graphene OS there’s bullshit like notifications only turning on some tiny portion of the screen with a brightness level near zero. Like, I have the setting on so I can see when notifications come in.
But yes I do miss the SD card slot. Not so much headphone jack because I personally prefer wireless but I stand with you.
And I have all day keep going.
Edit: sorry most of that wasn’t relevant to your comment.
No worries, I’m just ranting at this point.
The headphone jack is a sore spot for me, I have a few speaker systems around the house and garage with 3.5mm. I use an adapter but wired audio over USB C on android has terrible UX; it’s treated as a generic USB device, so it carries the same security implications (can only route audio with the device unlocked, can cut out if you lock the phone shortly after). Audio quality over type C + adapter has been worse in my experience but this will vary by device.
The displays are kind of a multi faceted thing for me. I can always see the impact of the pentile sub-pixel layout on text regardless of pixel density. I cannot unsee that sort of screen door effect.
Compared to LCD IPS, you might notice a smearing effect with UI animations on oled, I believe the same can be observed with desktop displays (in addition to VRR backlight flicker on darker content)
There’s also the faster rate of degradation it carries as a technology, which has prompted mitigations at the OS level.
The infinite contrast / per pixel backlighting is nice for sure, though it’s led to AOD replacing dedicated notification RGB LEDs (which feels sort of inelegant; that’s additional content to render on display and it’s generally less functional than addressable RGB at a glance), has enabled under-display fingerprint readers (which pale in performance to conventional sensors). Rounded corners aren’t intrinsic to oled but camera hole punch designs seem to be. Those camera holes will never not look like a design concession to me. 18 months with this and I still think it’s dumb.
The phone feels pretty solid but the back is glass, the sides are slippery without a case, and the glass on both sides protrudes past the bezel, making it a bit more damage prone.
None of these things are intrinsic to the pixel, it’s sad to see so little variation out there though.
Hmm, seems like some phones don’t have a DAC anymore and thus, the USB-C adapter need to get the audio in digital form and use its own DAC…
I guess in that case, it would be a better experience attaching a wifi audio receiver and send the hifi signal over that. Best scenario would be if the music box would have a digital in port you can use, so you would use the DAC dedicated to your speakers, which is better than phone DAC in most cases.
I’ve been looking at several powered adapters as well as Bluetooth receivers with aux output. I’ve also considered a low power dedicated music system, problem for the garage is no wlan access.