Forgotten Market, The Compact Phone

[EskeRahn 5,471]

On 5/11/2021 at 11:54 AM, DieBruine said:

Just received an email that the Titan Pocket campaign will be launched on the 18th of May.

Titan Pocket – Unihertz

I have been trying to pledge for one of these, but kickstarter just returns

after a while when I try to pay,
I was in for the lowest price several times, until they sold out, but no luck, and only worked on a higher price after perhaps twenty attempts.... So we will see if I ever receive anything....
 

[netman 1,424]

13 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

I have been trying to pledge for one of these, but kickstarter just returns

after a while when I try to pay,
I was in for the lowest price several times, until they sold out, but no luck, and only worked on a higher price after perhaps twenty attempts.... So we will see if I ever receive anything....
 

You are not alone. [edit: for those with the same issue, it appears to work after you retry a bazillion times]

Edited May 18, 2021 by netman

[EskeRahn 5,471]

7 minutes ago, netman said:

You are not alone.

Yes I see their comment section is all about people having the same issues... 🙄

[netman 1,424]

1 hour ago, EskeRahn said:

Yes I see their comment section is all about people having the same issues... 🙄

+ me + anyone i know that tried to go for the super early, did anyone actually get one?

[EskeRahn 5,471]

53 minutes ago, netman said:

+ me + anyone i know that tried to go for the super early, did anyone actually get one?

Yeah, the two early one could be fake... no one seems to have posted that they got one....

[netman 1,424]

24 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

Yeah, the two early one could be fake... no one seems to have posted that they got one....

Or someone has a bot that bought them all at once.

[EskeRahn 5,471]

2 minutes ago, netman said:

Or someone has a bot that bought them all at once.

At the least one seem to have got one of the second category.

[netman 1,424]

2 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

At the least one seem to have got one of the second category.

i got the normal "early bird" one after many refreshes

[DieBruine 397]

There were 12 super early birds sold when I got my perk. But the system hung during payment.. I ended up deleting my account 🖕.
Two hours later my Pro1 was delivered. I shit you not.

[Muth 132]

16 hours ago, EskeRahn said:

I have been trying to pledge for one of these, but kickstarter just returns

after a while when I try to pay,
I was in for the lowest price several times, until they sold out, but no luck, and only worked on a higher price after perhaps twenty attempts.... So we will see if I ever receive anything....
 

Got the same errors 3 times, then I thought I will not enter my credit card number once again. I then gave up...

Maybe I will wait to have your wise thoughts  before buying it. Honestly if it was the BB Q10 form factor, I would insist. But to me the titan is still too big unfortunately.

Thank for having shared you problems with Kickstarter, I feel less alone 🙂

[JamesB 2]

18 hours ago, netman said:

i got the normal "early bird" one after many refreshes

Me too🙃

[DieBruine 397]

I bought myself a Jelly 2 from Amazon. I went straight to LoS 18.1 from meetoul. If you're looking for a compact smartphone 4" screen and have good eyesight, I highly recommend this little gem. LoS 18.1 works like a charm, except for drainage. The battere depletes in 24 hours no matter what you do (or don't). Typing is bi!@#$ of course. 

Still no response from FxTec regarding my RMA. At least for now, I'm covered.

[hka 131]

Got my Titan Pocket today! I will try it as my main phone for a while and see how I like it, I really lile that it is smaller than the pro1 and I actually prefer that style of keyboard (can reach entire keyboard and operate the phone one handed easily).

[DieBruine 397]

It's a shame I missed out on this one. I am really enjoying my Jelly 2. Apart form the keyboard and notification LED it does everything the Pro1 did and camera-wise even better. So I can imagine the Titan trumping it because of the larger screen and the keyboard. Hope you like it as I do my Jelly 2!

[EskeRahn 5,471]

I got one too. Have not found the time to make a review of it.

I'm not a fan of keyboards in the wrong direction, with REALLY few keys though - but to each their own.
Though (almost) any real keyboard phone is worth supporting, as it is still better than touch only.

But I must accept that I'm simply too old to use a device with that size of screen, despite it being more pocketable, for other than occasional usage. I really struggle with the small print. And yes yes not illustrated by the picture below, that was just a quick one for the content.

The hardware feels sturdy and good - despite a minor issue with a side button.

The GPS is extremely much better than the Pro1 BTW. I have seen the Pro1 down to 3m occasionally, but the Titan went down to 1m almost immediately when I brought it outside...

Here a side by side, where it also cries out how much smaller the display is (slightly over trice!)
And yes there really is 12mm waste space between the top row and the display. I really wonder why they did not use a less small display, or added a key row????

Not that I use the GPS in a phone a lot. But just such a huge difference, for anyone that does.
(Do not be confused by the compass, the app got a bug there...)

[VaZso 1,998]

52 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

The GPS is extremely much better than the Pro1 BTW.

Anyway, I had the same feeling after switching to Pro1 from Moto G6, however, I wasn't satisfied with G6's GNSS generally.

If Titan is even better then it should be definitively good in this area.

[EskeRahn 5,471]

46 minutes ago, VaZso said:

Anyway, I had the same feeling after switching to Pro1 from Moto G6, however, I wasn't satisfied with G6's GNSS generally.

If Titan is even better then it should be definitively good in this area.

I bought an old house some ten years ago, and found out that part of the insulation used in walls and ceiling was a sheet of metal foil, so to a large extent I live in a Faraday's cage. Thus I can not use my WiFi in the garden - no big deal for me, but a big surprise for many guests.
So it was no surprise to me that none of my phones have been able to get an indoor gps fix. (Except when standing under the passage to the attic)
The big surprise is that the Titan gets a fix indoor, and with 3-4m accuracy!! (2m under the passage)

[Rob. S. 1,664]

Just for the record, for me, the Pro1 seems to have no significantly worse GPS precision or ability to get a GPS fix compared to the phones I was using before (Motorola Moto Z, Moto Z3 Play). That said, a Moto G6 I have acquired lately (just to find out that here in Europe it didn't and won't even get the update to Android 9 that it got in the US, so it will be stuck on Android 8) actually does seem noticeably better. Outside of my house, the Pro1 varies between 4m and 9m accuracy, the Moto Z3 Play between 3m and 9m, while the Moto G6 quickly arrives at 3m and stays there, using the tool @EskeRahn has been using above (GPS Test Plus Navigation).

[claude0001 1,352]

Be remined that the accuracy reported by the phone is just an estimate.

Even under optimum conditions, the true position deviation can be significantly worse than the reported estimate, as e.g. this study found. In particular, the authors show that phones can, both, over- and underestimate their precision, and that models reporting better values may in fact have larger deviations in reality.

If surrounding structures (e.g. tall buildings) introduce systematic errors the receiver cannot sort out, these deviations can probably be much larger still.

My personal experience largely agrees with those findings. When observing my reported position in OSMAnd, I often see that it is obviously wrong by many meters (e.g. wrong side of the road), although the Pro1 believes it is already locked to 3-4 m. When I move around a little, it then suddenly corrects my position to a realistic one with no change in reported accuracy.

Edited September 9, 2021 by claude0001

[EskeRahn 5,471]

38 minutes ago, Rob. S. said:

Just for the record, for me, the Pro1 seems to have no significantly worse GPS precision or ability to get a GPS fix compared to the phones I was using before....

Sorry. I was not trying to say that the GPS on the Pro1 is bad. What I meant to say was that it is surprisingly good on the Titan.

[EskeRahn 5,471]

2 minutes ago, claude0001 said:

Be remined that the accuracy reported by the phone is just an estimate.

Even under optimum conditions, the true position deviation can be significantly worse than the reported estimate, as e.g. this study found. In particular, the authors show that phones can, both, over- and underestimate their precision, and that models reporting better values may in fact have larger deviations in reality.

If surrounding structures (e.g. tall buildings) introduce systematic errors the receiver cannot sort out, these deviations can probably be much larger still.

My personal experience largely agrees with those findings. When observing my reported position in OSMAnd, I often see that it is obviously wrong by many meters (e.g. wrongs side of the road), although the Pro1 believes it is already locked to 3-4 m. Whem I move around a little, it then suddenly corrects my position to a realistic one with no change in reported accuracy.

Note that some navigation apps tend to be smart, so if you move at some speed along a road it will snap you to the side of the road it expect you are.
(so this could muddle things further)

[claude0001 1,352]

1 minute ago, EskeRahn said:

Note that some navigation apps tend to be smart, so if you move at some speed along a road it will snap you to the side of the road it expect you are.
(so this could muddle things further)

True. But I regularly record GPX tracks of my hiking or biking tours with OSMAnd~, and they are always "noisy" and little "off" the road, so I believe it does not do such things.

[claude0001 1,352]

6 minutes ago, claude0001 said:

True. But I regularly record GPX tracks of my hiking or biking tours with OSMAnd~, and they are always "noisy" and little "off" the road, so I believe it does not do such things.

Nope. I underestimated OSMAnd~ (again). 😄

One can indeed activate "Snap to Road", however that is active only during turn-by-turn navigation. Not when just recording or monitoring your position while you move around freely. 

[VaZso 1,998]

2 hours ago, Rob. S. said:

That said, a Moto G6 I have acquired lately (just to find out that here in Europe it didn't and won't even get the update to Android 9 that it got in the US, so it will be stuck on Android 8) actually does seem noticeably better.

Interesting... I have ordered my Moto G6 in late July of 2018 but it has received Android 9 update later, also Europe here. 🙂

However, it was sold by local T-Mobile as an unlocked phone.
I don't remember any custom T-Mobile signs of the firmware anyway.

There was also one or maybe two security updates since I use my Pro1 on that phone but it will definitively not be upgraded further...

[Rob. S. 1,664]

2 hours ago, EskeRahn said:

Sorry. I was not trying to say that the GPS on the Pro1 is bad. What I meant to say was that it is surprisingly good on the Titan.

Oh, I didn't want to suggest something different, either 🙂