Discouraged and depressed. No good options anymore. What is there to do anymore?

[zuben el genub]

Learn to sew and add pockets. You could build a special pair of cargo pants.

 

[codezer0]

That unfortunately wouldn't work. Uniform being what it is.

All the more surprising that the Note 3 in its ZL case and battery fits just fine in one of my work shirt pockets. Unless I could find some jeans with cargo pockets big enough, that's about the one thing I could change. But, that's besides the point.

With the extended battery, I didn't have the problem of breaking USB cables. I only put up with it breaking as many as it did because most of those were spares. Once I ran out of those and had to start buying some to preserve the few good ones I had left, Yes, it started becoming a problem.

 

[chanchan05]

The biggest problem here being your phone is running too hot that it kills power banks without gaining charge, or too hot for battery cases. I really don't see how that can be unless there's an ongoing problem with the phone.

 

[Jfalls63]

Granted that it is GSM, the SM-G900T, T-Mobile version of the Galaxy S5 has a lot of the things you are looking for. Anker makes a 7500 mAh extended battery and cover.
SD card slot.
Custom and deodexed stock roms available.
I had thought about picking up one from Swappa to play with but Verizon has better coverage where I live and only two 4g LTE bands are compatible.

 

[codezer0]

Granted that it is GSM, the SM-G900T, T-Mobile version of the Galaxy S5 has a lot of the things you are looking for. Anker makes a 7500 mAh extended battery and cover.
SD card slot.
Custom and deodexed stock roms available.
I had thought about picking up one from Swappa to play with but Verizon has better coverage where I live and only two 4g LTE bands are compatible.

How well can it be rooted, though? Can it run Xposed framework? Because not being able to do that with my note 3, and that nobody would make a deodexed ROM for it, basically killed my ability to use it. Can it have Android 6, at least?

Apologies if I do sound like I'm only complaining; however, I'm not used to being put into this proverbial corner. And knowing that literally no manufacturer is making any phone that meets my desired requirements, and that all attempts at a modular design that would solve these problems have been proactively neutered and killed off - by Google, even - just make me especially pissed off that I basically feel stuck with a phone that can't keep up with me.

 

[Jfalls63]

Take a look at the 900T S5 section at XDA and see what is available
http://forum.xda-developers.com/tmobile-galaxy-s5

 

[codezer0]

Take a look at the 900T S5 section at XDA and see what is available
http://forum.xda-developers.com/tmobile-galaxy-s5

Okay. Looking on XDA there, most of what is available for the T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy S5, is all for Android 5; while there is a ROM of Android 6 for the phone, I couldn't find any deodexed ROMs for it, based on that build.

Curiously, GSM arena states the s5 lacks band 12 LTE; however, the note 4 for T-Mobile and the us unlocked version (n910w8) does support it. However, that would be more expensive than the lg g4, at least on Swappa. At least for band 12 LTE phones that have removable batteries, and extended batteries available, that list would have:

• Note 4
• Note edge
• LG g4
• LG v10

Not sure what else. Most of it only has bands for T-Mobile, and nobody else if I get them that way. Still not sure how I feel about Swappa, but wondering whether it's better or worse than eBay.

This is what I'm looking at presently, with relatively open criteria. PhoneArena's Search gives mostly similar results... Annoyingly, both sites confirm that there's no such thing as a phone with the universal bands support with a removable battery. Heck, if it supported three of the four, like that US991 LG G4, then I could bite with that (since I've no interest in ever being on Sprint again), but of course LG basically threw a wall at me then, forcing me to the MXPE I have now.

 

[Slug]

Annoyingly, both sites confirm that there's no such thing as a phone with the universal bands support with a removable battery..

There's no such thing as "universal band support" when it comes to 4G/LTE, as the frequency bands used vary by market locale and are strictly regulated. Only a few US-based networks utilise Band 12, for example, and it's not licensed for use anywhere else in the world.

 

[codezer0]

That's not what I mean... I mean like how with the mxpe, I can go to any major carrier here with the same phone, and it would work.

Presently, I'd even be fine if it say, didn't support Sprint's frequencies, since I have no interest in moving to any sticks where only they have a signal.

But I detest the idea of basically throwing away an otherwise good phone because it won't support a carrier switch.

 

[Hadron]

This is where a more regulated market has advantages: in most of the world a phone that works fully on one carrier works equally well on any other. The USA is almost unique in the extent to which different carriers use different bands or even different technologies.

(That's also why GSM "won" internationally: when it was defined as the standard in Europe that established a huge user-base, while the technological fragmentation in the US meant that the home-grown solutions remained niche. This isn't about technological merits, like VHS vs Betamax it's about market share - though from the user's point of view the ability to change handsets by swapping a SIM is a huge advantage of GSM over CDMA).

 

[MarvinSands]

This has been something that's been on my mind for several days. But now that i'm currently on medical leave from work, and not really been able to do much, it's been something that's been nagging me to think about, and wanting to at least vent, if not gain some perspective from others. Apologies in advance if this gets wordy, but I'd be doing a disservice to you and myself if I "tl;dr" this. Anyone looking for that, well... chances are you're not going to have much to contribute to this, anyway.

Even from the beginning of smartphones showing up, Android appealed to me for the fact that it seemed more designed for power users from the beginning. Things like removable batteries, easy rooting and recovery, and having pretty solid and even budget phones having excellent options for external storage and the like just meant that there were many great options to tune and tweak to my heart's content. And for a while there, if I needed to, or wanted to, upgrade my phone, the benefits were real, tangible, measurable, and usually led to a greater experience. However, lately, it just seems like the Android ecosystem has somehow lost its way.

First, it was things like how a build of the Facebook app not only tried to make itself startup with the phone, but effectively replace the OS of the phone entirely. Then there were things like Samsung's Knox, which were marketed to be toward making the phones secure. Then we started seeing high end phones sold without the ability to replace the battery at all, culminating with the recent reports of exploding Samsung phones. We have many a Sony phone that unless you had some specific sub-model, has no avenue to root whatsoever. Then we have google pushing Android OS updates that basically block or brick the access to any form of external storage whatsoever, which still boggles my mind. And the more recent attempts by google to basically bury Project Ara harder and faster than - to put a parallel to it - when the WWE buries any up and coming star by making them lose to John Cena.

To put it in perspective... here at home I basically have two phones left. One is a galaxy note 3... that for whatever reason, because it's not carrier locked (SM-N900), all the ROM and mod makers pretty much ignored. Xposed won't even try to make a version of their framework that would even work on any Samsung phones rocking Android 5 or better. And that phone certainly has the guts to handle Android 6 in my opinion. But no such luck for it from anywhere. Couple this with it lacking any of the LTE bands, I had to start looking elsewhere after a year... even after basically buying it new for ~$530 + another $65 for the Zero Lemon battery that only seemed to get me two days of battery use compared to anywhere from four to six days like I got with prior phones.

More recently, I have been using a Moto X Pure that I paid $400 for on April 2016; I hated having to spend that much on an NRB, even then. on the software front, it's been great to basically have a rom that is rooted from the beginning without any companion apps required, and between Xposed and such, it's performed very well, usually. At the time, I chose it because it was the only phone that had all the US carrier bands supported, and external storage support via the SD card slot.

That said, I can't say that my experience with the phone has been anything but smooth. OEM charger pretty much stopped quick charging altogether, and kept getting slower and slower, forcing me to spend more money on both a new wall charger, car charger, and a power bank for it since of course, the stupid non-removable battery that I have always loathed. To say it's been a misadventure is an understatement. I've so far had several USB cables ruined that I'd tried using for charging the phone, and just like the Xperia T2 Ultra that I used to have, I would have fits where it would basically refuse to charge. Only, rather than it popping up a dialogue box telling me "oh, I can't charge anymore", it would simply get hot, drain the battery pack and not actually increase in %age. Even though this would imply some kind of hardware fault, Motorola wouldn't do a damn thing about any of it. So worse than I initially feared, having to have a power bank is basically costing me more money in having to frequently replace usb cables because they all keep getting broken. And then of course it never fully charges the phone, so it just drains itself faster and I'm then having to juggle between what to charge when I do get home, because I only have the one quick charging port for both the phone and pack, and attempting to daisy-chain (wall charger -> power pack -> phone ) just leaves the power bank completely flat and it refusing to charge at all, which then makes it not want to deal any current to the phone. All this, and even with what should have been good conditioning and training, and I damn sure don't get anywhere near the "all day battery" that these phone makers tout and toot about on their advertising pages. Not ever. Even the best of days, GSam basically says I only get about five actual hours of screen use with this stupid moto x pure (usually only getting 3~4), where I was getting anywhere from 11~20 with the Note 3 + ZL battery.

At least with the extended battery, even if it took longer per charging cycle, it was for sure charged, and would last me for at least a solid day, if not more.

Ever since I started buying phones outright, I usually at least tried to keep a mind of having "one good alternative", so that if something happened catastrophically and suddenly to whichever I was using then, I still had one I could be happy with if I had to replace it. I used to be able to always have a model in mind in that respects. However, it just seems like this era, there literally is no such thing, from any manufacturer, or any OS that I could see.

Apple's finally got phones with full carrier band support as of the 6S, and while the MSRP of the 7/plus is a fair chunk less, the NRB and the lack of headphone jack are two things I cannot ignore or abide by.
I haven't ever ruled out Windows phones entirely, at least on the OS portion. The 550 that my fiancee insisted on having has not been bad - removable battery, SD storage support, excellent pricing. But neither Microsoft nor anyone making windows phones make one that support all the carriers like I'd prefer.
Android presently, just feels like staring into a discombobulated mess right now.

I just want an actual power users' phone again. One I can then actually put an extended battery on like I did before. Despite google's hate boner for any non-cloud storage, I know that with an SD slot, I have a ready-made way to do an image backup and quickly recover if either had something bork spontaneously or just plain bit rot and be back up and running usually within 5~10 minutes. As far as the bands go... that's more or less stemmed from my experiences with the carriers in general. I've had so many instances of basically phones that used to work well just suddenly not able to get a signal anymore, and being fed up enough to want to switch, only to be forcibly delayed because now I have to buy another phone to do it. Having one that at least supports most of the carriers (if not all) enables me the power to walk away if a carrier wants to be a brat to me.

Looking at the Android landscape now... there just seems to be literally nobody attempting to make anything that meets this criteria. At this point, it's like no phone anywhere seems to be meeting this need. Not just none on android, no phone period. And they want us to spend $800+ to basically rent a flagship phone that will just go flat within a year. Even more aggravating if say, the service suddenly gets awful, and I want to switch carriers, but now have to buy a replacement phone for the new carrier because the existing phone I invested in both doesn't work and won't even fetch 1/5th of the value I paid for it.

This Moto more or less has only justified my prejudice toward phones with non-removable batteries, because it has been doing exactly the same thing every other phone I've ever had with an NRB do. Refuse to charge, get hot and drain other power but not actually charge, drain too fast, need to be plugged in at least twice a day... and now not only having to juggle extra baggage with the power bank, but then basically having to buy replacement USB cables that get ruined or smashed when I have to stow it in my pockets.

So, I guess if I had to make a tl;dr version? Hating this NRB phone. Can't justify spending more than $200 for an NRB phone because I know they won't last. If it exceeds $200 USD, I consider it an investment. But nobody seems to be making a phone at any price that has the ability to replace the battery (with an extended capacity version), with the carrier bands, and support for external storage.

Happen to like back market for phones the one plus Nord's are nice once programed prices are slashed.. personally like 10minemail.net to get my receipt never had a problem. On medical leave is problematic boredom and appointments. Hopefully things look up

 

[codezer0]

Odd to see this thread necro'd. Frustrating that this is still, a problem for me.

Happen to like back market for phones the one plus Nord's are nice once programed prices are slashed.. personally like 10minemail.net to get my receipt never had a problem. On medical leave is problematic boredom and appointments. Hopefully things look up

Whence T-Mobile changed things around to where I could not even make or receive calls with my V20, I was more or less forced to start looking elsewhere.

Ended up with a Nord N20, because well...

• iPhones deliberately gimp themselves when they're not the currently selling model anymore
• Samsung likes to blow up, literally (no, I'm not going to forgive samsung for the note 7, don't even @ me on that)
• Motorola/Lenovo can get bent for suing parts suppliers so I couldn't fix my MXPE at all
• LG's gone from the market
  
• Apparently the makers of the fairphone 4 absolutely refuse to sell to the States, and their listed reseller won't even list their phones either

Six years of supposed advancement in tech and the N20 out of the box feels slower than my outgoing V20. Bruh. Crap like this is why I'm convinced that ARM can't multitask to save a literal life.

And of course, it won't let me root. XDA can't be arsed to provide a method because it's not a Pixel, and as such I'd been having another new behavior.

Case in point, it will at times do this thing where, it shows full or near full signal bars, but if there's an exclamation point on the icon, I can't do any data related activity at all! and it won't fix itself on it either, I always end up having to reboot the damn phone.

I bought this phone with the best buy replacement plan (since it was low cost enough where they won't really bother servicing it). Yet even now, I can't think of anything I'd rather swap to even with this behavior. The phone market is seriously that trash in this godforsaken state of things.

 

[mikedt]

• Apparently the makers of the fairphone 4 absolutely refuse to sell to the States, and their listed reseller won't even list their phones either

FYI Fairphone only officially distributes their devices in Europe. So I'm not really in a position to be one of their customers either....Well I could get a friend in the UK to buy a Fairphone 4 for me, and then he could ship it back to the country where it was made.

 

[codezer0]

FYI Fairphone only officially distributes their devices in Europe. So I'm not really in a position to be one of their customers either.

Meanwhile, when it comes to gpu's I'm also boned for wanting a card with a white pcb. Galax won't sell here, and AMD seems to actively scare away any partners that would sell a white pcb Radeon for that matter. Hell, I didn't even know AMD allowed white pcb radeons until I saw this one video from Hardware Unboxed where they showed a 6650XT(?) from Powercolor with such.

 

[mikedt]

Meanwhile, when it comes to gpu's I'm also boned for wanting a card with a white pcb. Galax won't sell here, and AMD seems to actively scare away any partners that would sell a white pcb Radeon for that matter. Hell, I didn't even know AMD allowed white pcb radeons until I saw this one video from Hardware Unboxed where they showed a 6650XT(?) from Powercolor with such.

I don't really know what to say about that. Except that issues with PCB(printed circuit board) colours might be in the #firstworldproblems category.
I'm using computers everyday, both home and at work, and have no idea what colour the boards are inside them.

I'm really old-school when it comes to electronics, and that generally meant brown circuit boards were made from SRPB(synthetic resin bonded paper) or paxolin, and green was glass-fibre. The latter usually cost more, but were generally more robust. The former was usually found in consumer devices, like radios and TVs.

 

[codezer0]

I don't really know what to say about that. Except that issues with PCB(printed circuit board) colours might be in the #firstworldproblems category.

I'm really old-school when it comes to electronics, and that generally meant brown circuit boards were made from SRPB(synthetic resin bonded paper) or paxolin, and green was glass-fibre. The latter usually cost more, but were generally more robust.

Was trying to do a themed build, so white and gold would have fit that.

That said, eBay can get bent wanting $5000 for a Galax 3090 now. Even if Galax cards with a bespoke white PCB are often over engineered, I know they weren't that marked up when new. Either way, that's neither here nor there.

 

[mikedt]

Was trying to do a themed build, so white and gold would have fit that.

That said, eBay can get bent wanting $5000 for a Galax 3090 now. Even if Galax cards with a bespoke white PCB are often over engineered, I know they weren't that marked up when new. Either way, that's neither here nor there.

Are you keeping it all open or something?

I used to build PCs myself, until I moved to China in 2008. I remember choosing mainboards, processors and their heatsinks, Nvidia and ATI Radeon graphic boards (does anyone else remember 3DFX?), Creative Labs sound boards, etc, but once they were inside the enclosure, they wouldn't be seen anyway, So any"theme" didn't really come into it, but system performance yes, that was important.

 

[jack58]

I used to build PCs myself, until I moved to China in 2008.

Hey Mike.... I don't know if you remember me, you use to comment and like my posts as I did yours a few years ago. I left then because I hated all the ads that were all over the place, even inside the posts and I see it's still going on. I especially hate the ones that pop up INSIDE the posts I'm trying to read. That said, I'm gonna try to look the other way for awhile, but it may drive me away again.

I noticed you said you moved to China in 2008, where did you move from? My nephew lived there for awhile, but got out when the virus hit and relations were getting bad with China/USA. I was custom building computers and repairing custom painting laptops during the same time as you myself.
Some of what I did, desktops:
Jack's Custom Desktop Build
Laptops:
https://moskovita-photography.com/notebookpaint.htm

Anyways, good to see ya still hanging around! I always did enjoy your posts.

 

[mikedt]

Hey Mike.... I don't know if you remember me, you use to comment and like my posts as I did yours a few years ago. I left then because I hated all the ads that were all over the place, even inside the posts and I see it's still going on. I especially hate the ones that pop up INSIDE the posts I'm trying to read. That said, I'm gonna try to look the other way for awhile, but it may drive me away again.

I noticed you said you moved to China in 2008, where did you move from? My nephew lived there for awhile, but got out when the virus hit and relations were getting bad with China/USA. I was custom building computers and repairing custom painting laptops during the same time as you myself.
Some of what I did, desktops:
Jack's Custom Desktop Build
Laptops:
https://moskovita-photography.com/notebookpaint.htm

Anyways, good to see ya still hanging around! I always did enjoy your posts.

Hi Jack, I do remember you, it's been a while. I moved to China from Bristol, UK. And been here ever since. Even through all the virus lockdowns, but things are pretty much back to normal now, no more tests, no more masks required(except in hospitals). Although this will probably be my final year of working full-time in China though, as I'm now 60, and so can retire. Next semester I'm moving to a university position, NO more middle school, NO more kids.
Another thing, I had a heart attack this time last year, which meant two weeks in a Chinese hospital for angioplasty, with two stents inserted.

I see your custom PC builds, and so the current fashion is to have like a window in the side of a PC enclosure, and illuminate the insides with LEDs? And so one might desire colour co-ordinated PCBs? I've seen PCs like that at the local cyber malls, but I thought they were like sales samples, to show how the PCs were built. Didn't realise people were actually buying and building them like that for home use. I use PCs everyday at work but they're just black boxes, from Lenovo and Great Wall. And at home I just have Apple Macbooks. My phones are always Android though.

 

[jack58]

Hi Jack, I do remember you, it's been a while. I moved to China from Bristol, UK. And been here ever since. Even through all the virus lockdowns, but things are pretty much back to normal now, no more tests, no more masks required(except in hospitals). Although this will probably be my final year of working full-time in China though, as I'm now 60, and so can retire. Next semester I'm moving to a university position, NO more middle school, NO more kids.
Another thing, I had a heart attack this time last year, which meant two weeks in a Chinese hospital for angioplasty, with two stents inserted.

I see your custom PC builds, and so the current fashion is to have like a window in the side of a PC enclosure, and illuminate the insides with LEDs? And so one might desire colour co-ordinated PCBs? I've seen PCs like that at the local cyber malls, but I thought they were like sales samples, to show how the PCs were built. Didn't realise people were actually buying and building them like that for home use. I use PCs everyday at work but they're just black boxes, from Lenovo and Great Wall. And at home I just have Apple Macbooks. My phones are always Android though.

Good to hear from you! 60 huh? I'm 70, still working.

You picked a bad time for heart attack at the peak of the Covid virus! Hospitals grossly overcrowded, force to wear masts everywhere etc. I had mild heart issues a year ago myself, but caught it in time and it's better due to lifestyle changes like eating better, cutting out sugar, no pop, rarely drink alcohol anymore etc. along with daily exercise five days a week. Dropped 50lbs too which helps.

Yes, a lot of folks, especially serious computer nerds like the glass case Desktops.
My two Nephews aren't nerds, but love the look of them so they have one as well.
Of course this is Microsoft country, Seattle area. I live 40 miles SE of Seattle in outskirts of a small town 40 miles from Mt Rainier. I'm not a big city person.

I've never owned an Apple MacBook. Instead I have fully loaded Dell XPS laptop and the Samsung S23 Ultra. A great Combo.

 

[mikedt]

Good to hear from you! 60 huh? I'm 70, still working.

You picked a bad time for heart attack at the peak of the Covid virus! Hospitals grossly overcrowded, force to wear masts everywhere etc. I had mild heart issues a year ago myself, but caught it in time and it's better due to lifestyle changes like eating better, cutting out sugar, no pop, rarely drink alcohol anymore etc. along with daily exercise five days a week. Dropped 50lbs too which helps.

Yes, a lot of folks, especially serious computer nerds like the glass case Desktops.
My two Nephews aren't nerds, but love the look of them so they have one as well.
Of course this is Microsoft country, Seattle area. I live 40 miles SE of Seattle in outskirts of a small town 40 miles from Mt Rainier. I'm not a big city person.

I've never owned an Apple MacBook. Instead I have fully loaded Dell XPS laptop and the Samsung S23 Ultra. A great Combo.

Yeah, having a myocardial infarction during the Covid-19 was unfortunate timing. What actually happened, I thought I was having heartburn, which I've had before but it wouldn't go away. I went to the school doctor, who said "Get in a taxi and go to Jinan Central Hospital now!". Because all the emergency ambulances were dealing with Covid. The healthcare I received in hospital was like second to non, probably better than UK. Unfotunately no visitors were allowed because of Covid. There was a large bill(around $8000 USD), but fortunately employer's insurance dealt with that.

I've seen the stalls with their glass cased PC samples. And have seen them going through photocopied lists of Windows activation codes, trying to find something that works and will activate Windows 10 or 11.

I am a geek when it comes to certain things, namely valves(vacuum tubes), and devices with nixie tubes and VFDs(vacuum fluorescent display). I have a few clocks and watches with nixie tubes and VFD displays.

 

[mikedt]

When it comes to personal laptops and PCs, using Windows in China usually means it's pirated, especially if one requires it to work in English. Which is something I prefer not to be dealing with. Apple Macbooks running MacOS are expensive, but the software they can use has served me well for 15 years now. My phone is currently a Samsung Galaxy Note20 Ultra, had it two years and still very happy with it.