What phone brand do you like the best?

posted 6 months ago

Wild Bill@midwest.social

privacy@lemmy.ml

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*In terms of privacy, customisation, camera quality, and battery time.

For the longest time I have only used either iPhone or Samsung. I plan on switching to Android for the next phone I get, but I find that Samsung phones are often too big for me and put too much energy on camera quality (I don’t take many photos). I have started to look into brands such as Nokia and Motorola, and I would like to know what you guys think of them. Additionally, do you suggest any other phone brands aside from them? My biggest priorities are privacy and long battery time. Bonus if the phone can run LineageOS (I have excluded Graphene as they are only compatible with Pixel phones).

Thank you for any answers. Cheers!

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EntropyPure@lemmy.world

15 points

6 months ago

In regards to stock systems, I agree.

Been stuck in the convenient ecosystem for a while, and I cope by telling myself Apple makes the bulk of its money with hardware and services. Not ads like Google. But if I would start over from zero, I think Graphene OS and Linux would be the way. But migrating the whole family away from our current Apple line up - I dread that challenge.

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sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works

8 points

6 months ago

Eh, you can always start with yourself. Let the rest make their own decisions.

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Pussista@sh.itjust.works

1 point

6 months ago

The thing about the Apple experience is that it doesn’t only integrate well among your own devices, but also others. Being isolated from that can be pretty challenging, especially if you are the only one in the family. Unless you come up with a whole marketing concept to make the change seem attractive to other (not techy) family members, you’d be cycling uphill.

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sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works

1 point

6 months ago

Can you be more specific?

I’ve heard this argument, but AFAIK the main things are iMessage and FaceTime. I don’t know about your family, but I generally don’t want FaceTime most of the time. I haven’t used iMessage, but it seems like Signal is a drop in replacement, and the benefits are compatibility with Android and desktop apps for Windows and Linux.

Perhaps the play is to switch one app at a time. That’s what I’m going to try to get ready to leave Android for Linux phones (assuming they’ll be daily-driveable at some point).

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Pussista@sh.itjust.works

3 points

6 months ago

iMessage and FaceTime are really not that relevant outside the US and, as you said, can be relatively easily replaced by Signal. As another commenter pointed out, it’s more about little things like Airdrop or iCloud’s all around seamlessness that cannot be matched by anything else I’ve tried. Family sharing alone would be a major loss if I were to switch. What Google or Microsoft have to offer in that regard is laughable in comparison (not that they’re any more “private”), and AFAIK, there is no FOSS alternative all of the iCloud family sharing functionality.

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sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works

1 point

6 months ago

Makes sense, thanks for elaborating.

I’ll have to look into the FOSS tools to see what could be a reasonable set of alternatives. Some initial thoughts:

KDE Connect - connects phone to Linux computer in an interesting way - easy to send files, see SMS, and a couple other things; it’s a bit chunky, but maybe something I could help with
restic - automatic backup for desktop; pair with Syncthing to automatically keep stuff on your phone synced with your desktop
Steam now has better family sharing, and you could set something like Plex up to handle video streaming for owned content

But each of these are a bit inconvenient compared to what Apple offers. I’ll think about it some more, and maybe I’ll try building something. My kids will be getting old enough to have phones in a couple years, and I’d really rather avoid Apple’s ecosystem, but their friends will likely all have iPhones so I’ll want a reason for them to prefer something else.

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Pussista@sh.itjust.works

1 point

6 months ago

I already use KDE Connect to exchange files with my Linux laptop and it’s not the best, but it’s good enough for the occasional thing.

Steam is not a solution IMO because it locks you in just as much as Apple while being clunky and giving you the illusion of choice. And it’s only for games. Family sharing on Apple products is more than games. If you’ve bought apps or subscriptions, you can share them with family members at no additional cost (if the app opts into that which is disclosed to you very clearly in the App Store). Screen Time is great to block apps above a certain age rating and to restrict or outright block purchases for children. Another thing is location sharing in the Find My app. I know there are many solutions for that, but I just like the UX in the Find My app a lot more.

About the Plex server, I’ve heard they’ve changed their TOS and are now pretty shady or something. Also, if I were to make a server like that, I’d be pirating stuff anyway which I already do through my go-to pseudo-streaming piracy sites.

I could see myself hosting a Synology NAS in the future, but that is still not as convenient or well thought out as the iCloud services tbh.

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