Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

It's been a decade since I was active here. Just curious what all the old folks who were using N800/N810/N900/etc devices back in the day are using now. I know some of you are probably still using your old devices but I have a feeling most of us have moved on to other, newer devices.

Personally I got a N810 in 2008, and a N900 in 2010 (my first smartphone!). Both of which I sold many years ago. Over the years I've gone through many devices mainly iOS and Android. It seems that the smartphone has really replaced the concept of an "internet tablet." Today I have a Samsung Note 10+ and an iPhone 11 Pro Max. While today's devices are leagues better than those from 10 years ago, there are still some key things I really miss today from my old Nokia devices, mainly:

• Headphone jack: after Apple removed it in the iPhone 7, all other manufatures followed suit. I get that wireless headphones have their perks too, but I'm not a fan of having to replace my expensive headphones every couple years due to worn out batteries.
  
• Removable battery: In my opinion this is getting to be less of a big deal than it used to be because fast charging has gotten so fast, but I still don't like that it's so difficult to replace the batteries when they wear out on modern phones. I understand that's the price we pay for having waterproof phones but it's still a bummer.
  
• Physical keyboard: virtual keyboards and predictive input has certainly improved a lot since 2010 but I still miss being able to use the keyboard as a controller for games. Yes it's possible to use real Bluetooth gamepads now but they don't fit in my pocket. :p
  
• Open-philosophy OS: Perhaps the biggest casualty of the modern era of smartphones. Even the formerly fairly open Android seems to be heading more and more down a path of locked-down, proprietariness. There are some attempts at more open OSes such as Librem 5's PureOS but it's hard to see these alternatives becoming mainstream and getting proper third party software support.

Anyway, what about you? What devices are you using today?

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

New user of N900 for two years. Changed from using iPhone for many years. iPhone 4s through VPN/wifi only for whatsapp mainly and occasionally for taking pictures.

Last year installed Diablo turbo for N810 but not used it yet really. Hoping to use it though in the future. Awesome device with good sound and feeling.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

there was a similar threads i remember "what have former nokia n900 moved to?"

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Currently using an FXtec Pro1

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

n900 in 2010 (still have it in the drawer)
n9 imported from finland for £500 as soon as that came out.
when n9 became a bit flakey I bought a Google Nexus 5
then I got a £250 contract deal on a Huewei P8 (in drawer)
then I got a Sony Xperia X (but never got around to putting sailfish on it)
currently using a Sony XA2 Plus 6GB/64GB - with sailfish.

have bought a copy of SFOS for Sony 10Plus even if I never buy a handset.

hope to get the next Sony mid-range for which SFOS is supported. very happy with Sailfish!

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

770
N800
N810
N900
N950
Several N9
Jolla
Jolla C
OnePlus X with Sailfish
Xperia X with Sailfish
Xperia XA2 Plus with Sailfish
Xperia 10 with Sailfish
Pro1 with Android (for now, a week)

:D

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Exactly
started in 2013, kept (again and again) alive until April 2018.
And should be necroromanced, prolonged with these posts/thread, @HtheB

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

:D:D true that.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Nokia 3300 (not a smartphone but capable to record music from any source with a 2,5mm jack, amazing)
Nokia N70
Nokia N78 (with FM transmitter, it was so cool for me at that time)
Nokia N96
Nokia N9
Nexus 5 with Sailfish, working great and hope it will last for years

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

2009: Openmoko Freerunner
2010: N900
2012: N9
2015: N9 + N900
2016: N9 + N900 + Nokia 808 Pureview
2018: Droid 4 + N9 + Nokia 808 Pureview + N900

Yes I carry these with me at the same time.
Usually N9+Droid4 in my pocket, 808+N900 in my Bag.

The purposes:
Droid 4: Signal, Android Apps I can't avoid, Browsing
N9: Reading, Music, Movies, Stargazing, Reddit, Mail
808: Taking Pictures and Videos, Audiobooks
N900: nowadays only SSH and VNC to other devices.

I would gladly take a device which fuses some of the functions.
The FxTec Pro 1 has a chance.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Still n900 everyday.

newton
motorola v195
sharp Zaurus 5500
n900

using my pebble with it, txt'n/mms, music with bluetooth & fm usage, terminal everyday, weather currently broken :(, vlc remote for desktop music, syncd w/owncloud for contact, cal, file sync, calls, RSS feed, photos when needed, Navigation sometime, tomboy syncing (with tomboy-ng), irc when needed, password manager (syncd), alarm clock when needed, hotspot, heart rate monitor linked to bluetooth device, text editor (markdown is great for this once sync), comic book reader when I had time, signing pdfs and for drawing in my paint (some time would use it for project sketches and brainstorming.

alrighty, didn't expect that list .. lol

waiting for sailfish, mama-leste, Nemo, or ubuntu all to become stable for me and then fx pro2 mini :) .... with pen ... I can dream!

never personally touch android, but keep up with it to know ... why I don't use it ... lol Apple devices once abandoned will become useless bricks. happen to me with newton and iPod touch 1st gen. So only left with open source software & hardware ... that is my future.

x

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Nokia N900 (multiboot problem?)
Nokia N900 (rootfs full?)
Nokia N900 (cellular chip not working anymore, but I still use it for pretty much everything - music, camera, ebooks, dictionary, email, telepathy/IRC, alarms, calendar..)
Samsung Soul U900 (cellular, and sometimes camera)
Fxtec Pro1 (Sailfish OS): cellular is fine, haven't tried camera yet, SirenSong music player for now, no good ebooks reader yet, trying to find a good offline dictionary, looking for email client, seeking telepathy, starting to use alarms, haven't figured out calendar yet.

Thank you. Best wishes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Per aspera ad astra...

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Right now using an Xperia X with Sailfish X. Had tried a Oneplus X with community port, but radio support in US was iffy. Certain times, certain places it was fine, in others not so much. Hardware-wise, I prefer the Oneplus -- double tap to wake, gestures to turn on flashlight or camera while locked and change media tracks. And the Poetic case looks and feels great! But if your spouse can't understand you when they call, all that doesn't matter.

I've also got a Oneplus One running UBPorts fka Ubuntu Touch. Just don't like the UI like I love Sailfish, so it's a backup. Also Bluetooth doesn't work with car.

And lately -- not technically a phone -- I've been playing around with a Samsung Slate tablet. About original iPad size, it was a cast-off from my wife's office and had been running a version of Windows Pro. I put stock Ubuntu Bionic Beaver (18.04) on it for fun. The virtual keyboard works okayish, but not perfectly. And no cursor keys on VKB! :mad: WTF on Linux, right? Also, it's probably a capacitive screen problem that the touchscreen is unreliable while I'm using it on a treadmill. Which of course is one of the primary applications for the device (the other is amusing the children with movies over extended road trips).

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

N810
N900
N9
Jolla
Xperia X - SFOS
Xperia X Compact - SFOS

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

N900
N9 16gb
N9 32gb
N900
Jolla 1
N900
Samsung S7
N900

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Like your list glo-worm.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

My list would be before N900:

Nokia 3210 (actually bought it again couple of years ago and have golden cover plus white leather beltholder).

iPhone3gs (for shooting and making music and videos and music videos and posting to social media 24/7)

iPhone4s (got stoled) (for shooting and making music and videos and music videos and posting to social media 24/7)

Erickson Music Editioin (modded it to look like iPhone: macosmobile booting screen, safari and itunes skins plus iPhone desktop icons. First experience of flashing a phone and gave me confidence to start using linux - about over 10 years ago)

Now having N900 as a main phone and iPhone4s for whatsapp through wifi and VPN.

Hoping to be able to stick with N900 as long as possible. Love this device.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

N900, and the Pro1 if i'm on the go.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Currently using a Xperia X and a Pro1, both running Sailfish. I look forward to being able to switch to the Pro1 completely; the two things that are holding me back right now are the bluetooth not working with the Pebble (which makes pausing/playing music/podcasts much more of a pain since I have to get the phone out) and the lack of a browser that can load the Google Voice website (since there hasn't been a working SFOS app for years).

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

The same N900 I was using a decade ago.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

random android phone and sometimes in my bag I have jp1, n9...

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Still on the N900, quite worried since this is my last working one. Since 2009 I encountered the following issues:
1x cellular problem / modem not working
1x digitizer
1x screen
1x GPS
1x keyboard
1x speaker
1x cellular antenna
1x USB connector
Scavenged them many times for building a working one, I currently have three retired. Last time a couple of days ago, it took me less than 15 minutes to replace the mainboard due to a non working keyboard.
My path had been:
N900
Lumia 920 (Winphone)
XperiaX with Sailfish
N900
If the Pyra makes it on time, next one will be a IP67 dumbphone. Otherwise... I really don't know!!

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

It’s also been many years since I was active on here. Been attracted back lately by the noise around the Communicator/Pro1/Librem5/Pine/etc.

I’ve been using an iPhone for years now. I tried Sailfish but just didn’t like it. I’m just disappointed.

I’ve given this a lot of thought. I would be willing to pay between $3k and $5k USD for a modern phone running a modern Maemo. But there’s no one to give the money to.

The Pro1 says “run the OS you want” but the only fully functional OS is android. The Communicator supposedly runs many distros but they only claim support for android. Other devices/OSes are just developmental.

Hate to be negative but I’m tired of chasing ghosts.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Give it a another year or 2, it would seem that maemo-leste will be upto the task by then. Also by then pine phone and librem5 will hopefully reach a full functioning state in hardware and software will be on a second level of refinement.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Sailfish OS on Fxtec Pro1 is functional, where phone calls (quiet for me, loud for somebody else? quirky) and SMS and camera and alarm clock and music playing (not perfect GUI, but I am spoiled by Maemo) are concerned. Haven't figured out eMail/Calendar/Telepathy yet, but that's because I haven't got a Jolla account yet - hence no default jolla-apps?

Don't know about Cosmo Communicator. They are seemingly working on Linux-ready firmware?

Thank you. Best wishes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Per aspera ad astra...

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

For me... the list is quite short... :)
I used an ancient Alcatel OT 300 for 8 years when I bought my n900 in 2010. I used this beast for 9 years. Well, almost. The one that I bought first fell down and so the usb port broke. It was 8 and a half years old but still usable :) My second n900 is in perfect condition (I bought it from another forum's member in my country - it is original and almost as new as a brand new device) so I used it until... Until my family life reached the point when popular apps are needed to communicate with each other, get things done, etc (at least I tried to set syncing Maemo calendar with Google's but without success)... So I bought my brother's iPhone 6 (in 2019 april or may). Then I cooked its CPU... Hahahaha... :) It was simply overheated in the car during navigation... It cannot be fixed. So I started to use my wife's Samsung Galaxy A5 (2015) and bought her another Samsung (XCover 4).
I'm using the A5 since then. There is a Sailfish port available for it but never tried that... Since I bought a Samsung smartwatch I need Samsung's OS on it. I used LineageOS for a while but then I found a custom rom that is built on Samsung's one (Xtreme OS - based on Android 7.1.1) so I'm using this at the moment.
My n900 is still in use for some hacking, listening to music in car (I really miss that fm transmitter...) but it is manly turned off and sits on a shelf...

I'm waiting for Leste now or maybe Sailfish. But I really need apps that at least could communicate the ones available for Android/iOS. I cannot tell my whole family to use other apps... And I would like to use my (or another) smartwatch. So that would be cool :)

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

When I used iPhone my thinking went "people are using something; if my phone is not able to that something is wrong with the phone". After I changed to N900 my thinking has changed: "If N900 can't do something people are doing, then something is wrong with other people, never in my device". Iteresting to notice. N900 is a new absolut and measure.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Yeah, that is what I was thinking for years too. But now... Maybe I'm getting old(er)... Some feature is quite useful for me... Sending money to my wife with instant message or just log in to my bank account in the middle of nowhere to do the same... Or just see our shared calendar to know what our day would look like (pick up children and my wife, visit grandma', go shopping...) With n900 I could not do that. And I still not feel that something is wrong with me... :D And I cannot say to my grandmother (86 years old) that "Hey, something is wrong with you using videochat to see your great-grand children"... Interesting :)

Edit:// My point is - you have to learn your manner of using technologies, even if it is "smart" or modern or anything. There was a picture I saw lately with a sentence that was written on a wall of a house (it was a graffity): "Only dead fish swims with the stream". For me it says: you can swim against but you have to learn how. You have to live with (and in) the stream.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Still using a N900 as my primary, though at this point it is less smart as web2.0 forward has ruined the usefullness of too many devices in exchange for tracking users across websites amd I guess some mobile customizations.
I have to bring a LineageOS w/microG device slaved to my N900(bluetooth tethering) to use NFC transit card and browse transit websites as well as managing my Pebble watch though I get full use function of the Pebble on the N900 with Maebble.
Until yesterday I had a working tablet-ized S4 mini, a nice pocket sized slave device, but botched the LCD connector when replacing the auto-firing home button. Tablet-ized as I disconnected the telephony antenna connector and ran
to disable attempts to use the cellular radio, sadly this also leaves the GPS unpowered but the N900 has nav and I can transfer the stationary coordinates to the fakeGPS app if I need it on the Samsung, I might even have figured out a bluetooth-serial bridge and script had I not damaged that device and needed that function.
I will probably go back to my (Kingston early emmc death now repaired) larger Nexus7 (flo) as my slave device though I miss having a pocket sized tablet with removable battery and SD card.
The one downside to a tablet-ized and LineageOS w/microG S4 mini is that it requires at a hardware level external power or a modified pin connector to do USB OTG.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

biketool, I though I remember someone playing with this libpebble, https://github.com/Hexxeh/libpebble

To get thing done with your pebble.

Anyway your situation seem a bit challenging.

x

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

I understand your point and it's a very good one. I will say though that your can set up calendar sync fairly easy for a maemo users :D.

You just need caldav compatible calendar.

I have a share cal on my own cloud server, which you can easily setup these days with a vm pre-setup.

And yes this is one tiny hole plug for what seem to be many cracks for you :D

Cheers

x

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Thanks for the tip :)

I know about caldav and setting own server... And you know this calendar thing is just a small fragment of the problem (I have to convince family members - who are way too far from the phrase "techie" - to use this or that; which they are not familiar with... It is always challenging...)... There are so many aspects as you said: many cracks... :D

From theoretical aspect it is quite a bit of a question for me: I would like to be with my family instead of solving problems (heavily time consuming...) that are existing because I do not want to use mainstream/Google/Apple/whatever apps/services. Freedom in tech world or free time in the real world...?
There are solutions such as microg or aptoide/F-Droid but these are limited too... For now, I hope

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

My daily driver is Asus ZenFone Max Pro M1. Excellent device with a battery which lasts 2 days and a price of $160.
Before I bought it in last december I used Meizu M5 Note (no comment here) and Nokia N9 as a second phone for a work calls.

I love my N9, but it is almost useless nowadays in terms of smartphone tasks.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Since LineageOS leadership seems to be mostly concerned with good Google relations they are interested in getting people to dl the Gplay apk and install it; LineageOS for microG is a minor fork with the major benefit of being designed from install to spoof Gplay services and never installing Gplay so be sure to follow and get the correct OS for your privacy.
https://lineage.microg.org
The fork of LineageOS from the microG project
https://microg.org/
Paid Protonmail has a google compatible calendar which is supposed to go free this year sometime, I have not tried this with my N900, you can get the email app APK or if paid use encrypted pop3.
Lineageos with microG includes fdroid store with most apps you will need.
If you are not concerned with tight security Aurora store app lets you get annon APKs direct from the Google store that you can't live without.
MicroG spoofs location and most other(excluding push) Gplay functions.
this link can also help shine up LineageOS
https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/com...ageos_in_2019/
LineageOS with microG is still just an Android fork and you are still stuck with super sketchy hardware and bin-blob drivers which seem designed to serve governments and corporations not you. This is why I (recoverably)neutered that Android phone's cellular capability after putting the best in a bad situation OS onto it.
There are the root level ad blocking, VPN, script blocking, and other things you can do to get the best and most you respecting experience out of the hardware we have to work with.
Hoping that the next GNU Linux handheld is finally a true user device with proper hardware/drivers and a large enough ecosystem of programs and perhaps wine-like containers and compatibility to bridge the gaps of things we need in a mobile comm and computing device.

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

If I bought something today, SFOS on the Pro1 seems like the best option. However, having tried Sailfish once already, I am skeptical.

Can you sell me on it?

I haven't used it since version 1. I tried to download a virtual machine of version 3 so I could try it out, but that required running a binary and I stopped there. Why can't I just download a VM image or ISO to try?

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

To try out Sailfish OS in a Virtual Machine, you could try installing Sailfish OS application SDK. It requires Oracle VirtualBox version 4.1.18 or higher pre-installed on the host machine, see https://sailfishos.org/wiki/Application_SDK .

I am currently trying to sell myself on it :-) Storeman is a touch confusing, I am sure that zypper (command-line) sees repositories and applications which Storeman (GUI) doesn't see. I am slowly trying to move things over from Nokia N900 to Fxtec Pro1 - such as, SIP accounts. Going well, so far!

Thank you. Best wishes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Per aspera ad astra...

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

I've been lurking here for a long while before creating an account, but apparently that has been >10 years now, as well. That's something like a thousand internet years, so I might be in the target audience for this thread. Soooo, let's go.


Daily Drivers:

N800
N900 (first phone I actually used, hated cell phones before that)
[an android phone provided by work, galaxy s2, I think]
Jolla Phone
Jolla Phone
Xperia X (Sailfish OS)

Plus a bunch of devices to play with/learn (and develop, since I at some point started to build some applications for SFOS):

- Harmattan: N9
- SFOS: Yet another Jolla Phone, Intex Aqua Fish with Jolla C Software, Jolla Tablet, Gemini PDA, Xperia XA2
- Android: Rooted Tolino with a huge SD-Card for reading, another XA2 used for keeping in touch with more or less current android systems.

cheers!

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

So for me the smartphone story started with the Neo FreeRunner I got from school to work on my bachelors thesis & this is where modRana first ran on a mobile devices, forked from a FreeRunner navigation app called "Rana". Later on I got a N900, which I still have in working order and occasionally use for modRana testing.

After the N900 I used N950 for a while & ported modRana to MeeGo Harmattan, followed by Nokia N9 I got from the Maemo Coding Competition.

The Sailfish OS ear started for me by pre-ordering the Jolla 1, which I used for quite a while, followed by Jolla C. I also pre-ordered the Jolla Tablet, but was not quick enough to be in the super early batch that actually shipped. But a friend of mine was quick enough and I bought the Jolla Tablet from him later on and used it for a while. At the moment it has a broken USB connector (again, after a previous repair), bringing back memories about the fragile N900 USB connectors that thankfully did not impact my N900, at least so far.

I started the Sailfish X ear with an Xperia X & then with a second one when the first one turned out to be incompatible with high speed pavement impact. Since then I bought a second hand Xperia X with Sailfish OS also to a non power users family member to see how usable is Sailfish OS for regular users. Looking good as far as I can tell. :)

I still use Xperia X with Sailfish OS as my primary mobile device even though I've already got the [s]Longcat[/s] Xperia 10+, I have not yet flashed it with Sailfish OS partially due to lack of time & due to waiting a bit till the hardware support stabilizes a bit.

As a secondary device I use the Galaxy Tab S6 with Android, mainly for drawing using the built-in S Pen functionality. I've also got the official keyboard cover for it, which has been working quite nicely. It would still rather get something comparable with Sailfish OS or Fedora, even for the standard Linux drawing apps (Krita, Mypaint) but as far as I can tell, nothing like this is available at the moment. At least the Tab S6 has a bootloader that can be unlocked, so I guess there is chance of a decent OS might be ported in the future.

As for my future plans, I definitely plan to get the Pine Phone - I have good experience with their Pine 64 SBCs and the price (~150$) is IMHO really good for such a nice device. I'm also aware of the Pro1, but find it just bit too expensive & bit bulky given that I mostly lug a 10 inch tablet with a rather nice keyboard with me. :)

Still, it's really nice to see all the new & reasonably open mobile devices! :) It's a shame a smooth transition from the FreeRunner/N900 to these devices was not possible & many people had to switch to less open yet more usable modern devices, at least in the interim. Still, giving all the buzz around all these devices & all the community mobile OS porting initiatives gives me hope nothing was really lost, just quite a bit of people patiently waiting for the right time. Which is apparently now. :)

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Really loving all these device history and usage stories.

x

Re: Longtime users: What device(s) are you using today?
 

Me, N900 monomaniac.
I feel like a fish into it. Comfortable, warm, known environment, fluid feeling of use...
Lazy and afraid to dive into a fresh-new-cold-unknown-something-else. Rearrange everything, loose habits, convert things...

Maybe a Pro1, once, for a better camera and for the ability to watch videos decently. And a bit more speed with a filesystem, calendar and contacts getting really huge after so many time. But still, can doubty blobs and backdoors be excluded on a Pro1 (as well on a n900 btw...)?