Sidephone - 1 week review
tl;dr review of the sidephone after about 1 week of use
Overview:
I've had a great experience after ~1 week of using the sidephone. It has become my daily driver and largely replaced my iphone. I've managed to keep the apps I need and cut out what I don't. Using the Classic Keypad right now. Switching keypads is novelty for me; I'm happy with one and done. This is in Canada on Virgin Mobile.
Apps:
I'm currently running some stock utility apps (e.g. notes) but my additional installs to help make this possible as my daily driver include: tailscale, bluebubbles (imessage), spotify, pocketcasts, wikipedia.
All of these have been installed via the aurora store. Aurora store was installed via:
Obtanium (app pack) --> Aurora store --> additional apps
Battery:
The battery gets me through the day and sometimes into the next but I wouldn't go two full days without a charge. I do notice the battery gets quite warm during calls and if I'm driving around streaming from spotify there's a noticeable increase in battery drain. I understand, small phone, small battery, big phones make spotify go brrr. I do wish that it wasn;t quite so taxing on the battery though.
Camera:
Don't buy it for the camera. It's good to have as utility to get the job done for tasks but not really a memory keeping tool.
Build Quality:
Build quality is overall alright. I would love to see it improved but it's great for first gen and I think its the right decision where cost is a bigger factor for getting buy in than premium quality (i.e. I would not have paid twice the price to try this out just because it was a higher quality frame). It's mostly just the fact that I've adapted to the standard aluminum phone frames. Going back to a plastic feels like a drop will break it. I notice long hairs can sometimes slip under the edge of the screen. The screen quality is crisp and nice. Love that. Doesn't need to bubble/be curved though. That feels like it could break more easily. Keypads could have a more premium feel but honestly the still feel better than I expected. +1 on backlit keypad being a nice future addition
Cellular:
Good quality. No complaints
Cases:
I don't like the look of the flimsy silicon cases. I skipped on that, bought a felt sheet and stitched my own carrying pouch. That's good enough for me. Protects it from keys and to allows me to toss it in a bag. I feel like the store could easily sëll something like this made from leather and it would sëll well as opposed to the floppy silicon cases. (adding umlauts because it otherwise flags my post as a sëlling post)
Conclusion
Great work sidephone team and thank you! This is a great device and I hope it has a strong future! It's amazing how much your smart phone feels like an unnecessary rocket ship when you get to using the sidephone more. I now more intentionally use my laptop for things I would have done on my phone when I need to and find myself reaching for distraction less.