Why one cannot recommend the freerunner as a daily phone (was Re: Is a FreeRunner sufficient for me?)

jeremy jozwik jerjoz.forums at gmail.com
Sun Jun 21 00:18:14 CEST 2009


works for me too : )

actually, i really like the thing. just with the screen was not recessed
into the shell.
and ffalarms works great for me.

On Sat, Jun 20, 2009 at 2:58 PM, Michal Brzozowski <rusolis at poczta.fm>wrote:

> 2009/6/20 Joerg Lippmann <jl_lists at donalbain.de>
>
>>
>> OK, maybe I should explain.
>>
>> My mail should not be taken as FUD. I have a freerunner since it came out
>> a
>> year ago and - being a linux user since 1994 - I was prepared to get
>> something
>> rough and unfinished. But I hoped that it would one day be sufficient to
>> replace
>> first my phone, then my Palm Tungsten C and maybe my Etrex-GPS. It does
>> neither
>> in a satisfactory way.
>
>
> You're spreading a lot of misinformation. Since you might influence
> someone's decision about buying the FR, I'll address those points with which
> I completely disagree (about the rest I could argue).
>
>
>>
>> I used it for about year now, installed this and that distro and during
>> that
>> time I defended all the shortcomings as being a work-in-progress and a
>> community effort. But all in all I cannot recommend it to anyone as a
>> daily
>> phone. Here's why:
>>
>> - The device wakes up too slowly, I lost some calls.
>
>
> The wake up time is about 2 to 2.5 seconds. Usually small enough for
> picking up the call quickly.
>
>
>>
>> - The vibrator is too weak, I missed more calls.
>> - The volume is way to low, You can really only use it indoors.
>
>
> Depends on a particular mixer setting. I could get one that's good enough
> for me (found a link on the wiki)
>
>
>>
>> - The Display is too dark for sunny days, even in the shade.
>> - I lost many SMS. I eventually receiced most of them after restarting the
>> device
>> - The battery lasts only a few hours, again, I lost many calls (this
>> depends
>> on the distro. But even with a »good« one, I had cases in which the device
>> did
>> not suspend due to something crashing)
>
>
> With most distros you get ~48h of suspend time with the GSM running.
> Whether the distro you choose crashes a lot or not depends on your luck and
> ability to chose the right distro and version (release, testing, unstable).
> But agree that most of them crash occasionally, although I don't see how
> this influences battery life (just restart the device)
>
>
>> - Sometimes I cannot access the phonebook (Android, SHR)
>> - Wifi does not work reliably and it takes a long time to connect.
>> - The device/software is terribly slow. How fast was even the oldest palm
>> in
>> comparison!
>
>
> There is a ton of software, and some of it is slow, some of it is fast. The
> device itself is pretty fast for a phone I would say.
>
>
>>
>> - the on-screen keyboards are all terrible for finger-typing. I liked the
>> one
>> from QTe, but you have to install german wordlists by hand. Also it was
>> impractical to switch upper/lowercase. Best solution would be to use
>> landscape
>> automatically.
>
>
> Then you haven't tried the illume predictive keyboard. It's better for
> typing sms with your finger than anything else I've seen. Certainly 10x
> faster than a phone without a touchscreen.
>
>
>>
>> - Even simple tasks like inserting the number of the caller into the
>> addressbook is sometimes impossible or very complicated.
>> (- Many people I called complained about terrible buzz, but I hope to get
>> the
>> fix soon)
>
>
> You can buy a buzz-fixed FR.
>
>
>>
>> - The alarm clock does not work reliably.
>> - When the battery is completely empty, it takes ages to reload the phone
>> and
>> you're not able to turn it on even when plugged in.
>
>
> I think it takes a few hours to reload it. The problem with starting on an
> empty battery have been fixed in recent devices I think.
>
>
>>
>> - You cannot sync dates or even contacts, PIM-functions are virtually non-
>> existent.
>>
>> (And I did not mention nice things like video-playback, a good MP3-Player,
>> voice-notes, a nice email-Interface or a feed-aggregator...)
>>
>> Granted, most things depend on the distro you're using. But neither is
>> really
>> good:
>>
>> OM: 2007: very stripped down, although I liked the simple interface.
>
>
> That distro is 2.5 years old! :-)
>
>
>>
>>
>> QTe: Overall quite OK, but no Sync, no working wifi, no usable browser, no
>> GPRS, no usable GPS-Application
>>
>> SHR: good battery life when not crashing. some bad design decisions
>> (animations are useless on this phone), slow (especially the setup-menus
>> and
>> finger-scrolling), ugly phone-function, contacts crash very often,
>> tangogps is
>> working, many SMS and calls lost. Keyboard either english-only or only
>> usable
>> with a pen.
>
>
> The slowness can be fixed by tweaking some settings in illume gui.
>
> Keyboard english-only? Changing the dictionary to another language is as
> simple as downloading a word list into the FR.
>
>
>>
>>
>> Android: Best of the bunch so far. But volume too low, missing keyboard in
>> stable versions (cupcake one looks better, but is not stable enough at the
>> moment)
>
>
> Well, you definitely forgot about Om2008 and 2009.
>
>
>>
>>
>> Please, developers, don't feel like I want to thrash your work. It's just
>> not
>> ready for primetime, yet. I really like the design and the hires screen.
>> It
>> could make a cool device when it would work...
>>
>
> I will repeat the famous words, "works for me."  Just give it some love.
>
>
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