What niche phone features would appeal to you?

I went through my late teens as the initial smart phone boom was happening. I had a Motorola q that could get TV channels and had a keyboard. I had the enV that flipped open. And many androids/blackberries that I loved for their unique form factor and functionality.

I have never balked at spending money on a phone and for a long time i felt locked into generic flagship devices. With the debut of folding screens I feel like my appetite for unique devices rekindled. I think the power of android lies in its diversity of implementation.

So what features and functionalities would you choose over the next flagship release?

pewgar_seemsimandroid,

duck duck go tracker blocking that doesn’t use vpn technology

trimmerfrost,

Aluminium back instead of plastic or glass

RobotDaniel,

An ir blaster, great as a universal remote

greyscale,
@greyscale@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Keyboard. I want a damn keyboard. I’m a blackberry refugee hiding out on a unihertz titan/titan slim

Gili,

IR blaster

bitwolf,
  • Removable battery
  • Ambidextrous button placement
  • No glue
  • USB4 + desktop mode
tooting_lemmy,

An open bootloader and a removable battery.

Weezard,

Slide out physical keyboard, notification LEDs or some form of cool lights, a dedicated camera shutter button, and a scroll wheel / touch pad like what used to be on the blackberry or like the LG KE970 I really liked that.

I really miss notification LED’s though, always on display is good, but a little light is going to use far less battery and be immediately apparent from across the room by the colour what app the notification came from is.

edit : formatting

BlueSwitch,

I’m so annoyed that my Moto G60 has a sign of life LED that can’t be used for notifications.

Weezard,

That sounds infuriating, I really miss these features, its not like there isn’t even space to put them in, screen real estate isn’t everything.

notapantsday,

There are some niche phones with a thermal camera, would love to see more of that. Thermal modules are getting smaller, cheaper and better all the time and the main producers like infiray or guide are offering modules that seem to be clearly targeted at the smartphone market.

I'm still discovering new uses for my thermal camera and I wish I could have it in my pocket all the time. The obvious uses are finding gaps in your house's thermal insulation or finding devices that draw a lot of standby energy. But you can also use it to find studs in your walls, find things that have recently been used, like cars in a parking lot or chairs in an office.

a1studmuffin,
@a1studmuffin@aussie.zone avatar

Thermal cameras are also really handy for electronics repair and spotting invisible water leaks in ceilings.

fraenki,
@fraenki@feddit.de avatar

Foldable display - They are still way too expensive!

Metal case - I just loved the heavy Samsung Omnia 7 metal case. It made it unbreakable and grippy!

XLRV,
@XLRV@lemmy.ml avatar

A Silent/Vibrate/Ring switch like on the OnePlus phones, headphone jack and a easily swappable battery.

Apophis,

Basically an Asus Zenfone 9 with a removable battery and an Sd card. Also, make the front like Sony phones - larger bezels on the top and the bottom of the display and house stereo speakers and front camera there instead of a cutout.

bigbox,

A microsd card slot and a headphone jack

HouseMouse,

The debut of the Google Pixel Fold got me interested in foldables. If Google is joining the game then android hopefully will become better optimized for foldable screens.

SuperSpruce,

Late to the thread but here’s my thoughts on everything I’d like in a phone. Having just a few of these would make a huge difference in how much I’d want the phone.

Hardware:

  1. Standard features like a 3.5mm jack and MicroSD slot.
  2. Multiple USB ports (especially on tablets)
  3. Thunderbolt port
  4. Here’s a simple idea: Instead of making a thin phone with a massive camera bump, you make a thick phone with the camera flush with the back, and use the extra space for a bigger battery?
  5. User-replacable battery
  6. Modules like the modo mods
  7. Battery passthrough when charging
  8. Upgradable SoC, RAM, internal storage???

Software (here lies my hopes and dreams that will never be manifested):

  1. Starting off simple, a feature that lets you manually limit how much you charge your battery.
  2. Manual over/underclocking controls for the CPU
  3. Separate WiFi/data toggles
  4. More control over how big or small icons and text is
  5. Easy root access with app makers not getting all “you sus” over the fact that your device is rooted
  6. No data harvesting (duh)
  7. Better file management (and removing scoped storage)
  8. Multiple logins to a phone (like what you can do with a desktop)
  9. One app, multiple accounts
  10. Just having the software take less system resources.
  11. Open sourcing hardware drivers
  12. Multiple floating windows like with a desktop OS
  13. More than 3 split screen options
  14. I’m sure there’s a lot more I can’t think of now
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