Ask Lemmy

No removable battery.

• No good operating system preinstalled by default
• No headphone jack anymore

My fingerprint scanner was on the back, but now it's on the front, and can't identify me as regularly as it did before.

I've gotten used to the new location, but I can't forgive making it less accurate than it used to be.

the constant surveillance.

No fucking mini jack for headphones.

Touchscreen basically being unusable in any kind of rain no matter how light

The lack of a fucking headphone jack

I'm relatively content with my Pixel 4A running LineageOS (with root), but that's an experience that's really only suited to very technical users, in large part because some apps actively resist running in an environment the device owner actually controls.

My complaint is with the smartphone ecosystem as a whole: it's designed to empower the OS vendor and app developers over users. The entire tech world (outside Microsoft and maybe some corporate IT types) saw Microsoft Palladium as a nightmare scenario a couple decades ago. Now we've let Apple and Google do the same thing with barely a grumble out of the mainstream tech press.

Missing status LED. I'd like to deactivate the always on screen feature.

Least favorite things? Hmmm...

Things that I want on my phone:

-headphone Jack

-user replaceable battery

-micro SD

-good camera

I know the specs would be terrible nowadays, but in terms of physical features and overall design, I think phone design peaked around the Samsung S5.

How much Google controls the software experience and locks it down.

Currently I wish I could run a local HTML/CSS/JS App on my browser (like you can easily do in any desktop OS) but I can't.

My least favorite thing is it is getting old and I can't find a good equivalent to the Pixel 4a to replace it with. They are all too big, have no headphone jack, and are too expensive for what I get out of them.

It's too big. I couldn't get a phone the same size as my old one without sacrificing the micro sd slot so I ended up with something bigger than ideal

That it's 7 years old and I can't find a replacement that isn't a downgrade in functionality.

I want a physical keyboard again. I cam't type on these damn tochscreen buttona. They're too small and i canct tell which keya i'm toiching.

The lack of basic things that used to be standard many years ago. Namely headphone jack and micro-SD card slot missing.

Google cutting off customization and generally being annoying and creepy. I know I can install some other OS on it, but at the same time I don't want to deal with Google's "play protect" thing.

Ever since smartphones exploded the expectation to respond IMMEDIATELY is out of control. Anyone who gets my number I warn them they'll be left on read for days if not weeks at a time. If it's important I'll respond but otherwise it's whenever I get time to decompress and respond. I've got a buddy who I love we respond to each other every other week mostly. We will even have calls in between. People really get entitled to others time and it's insane.

I know someone's gonna say it but no the entitlement wasn't even remotely as bad with the older phones. Smartphones began putting pressure to respond because it was easier and then they introduced the "seen" option followed by the "typing" option.

KATIE LEAVING ME ON READ WHEN I ASK FOR FEET PICS

Stupid large dimensions, it simply doesn't fit in pockets anymore

The fact that I have to pay money for it. This thing should be paying me. Actually, everything should be. You there, reading this, fucking $50, now.

Other than that? It doesn't have a front-facing bottom speaker. Basically everything else is perfect.

The shear amount of samsung/Microsoft bloatware on my samsung a55

A rare Lemmy thread that has more comments than kicks.

Lots of people covered other things I dislike more, so I'll say the curved screen at edges. I liked it flat better. It also makes it so much harder to install the screen protector.

The hardware fuse samsung put in that flips when you try to change roms and can never be replaced. Wtf kinda world are we living in :/.

The bloatware. And custom Roms being dead for all except Pixel

The fact that it's got a dedicated hardware button that is locked to something useless/arbitrary (bixby...)

I don't own it like my computer, i'm forced to use the OS that google put, and i don't even have root access to it

The undocumented proprietary SoC and Modem. I want complete bit register level documentation of every piece of silicon used.

Battery life

Keeping too many things running in the background, making things laggy. (I do close out apps when I'm done using them, and I solve laggy times with the Optimize widget. I just wish it would automatically optimize)

Receiving calls and texts from people.

Context: I have an iPhone 14 and I drive a 2012 Fit. The Fit first gen came with a USB port that connects to the stereo.

When I connect my phone to the stereo in my car, 4/5 times the iPhone will launch the Music app, and play the first track in my library. That’s been true for quite some time (since iPhone 7 at least.) I listen to podcasts on a non-Apple app, and I listen at 1.5x speed. Since the iPhone 12, when I disconnect the phone from the car or turn the car off, there’s a 9/10 chance Music will start playing, at 1.5x speed. This clearly has something to do with Core Audio and the old dock connection system in iOS, and it will almost certainly not be addressed because it’s only going to affect older cars that don’t have 3rd party CarPlay stereos installed, and Apple only cares about CarPlay now.

The camera bump.

Spam and ads

Had a Galaxy S8 and loved it. Got a Pixel 6 and now the slow fingerprint sensor is the bane of my existence. Why did they put it on the front? Why is that the standard now? It sucks, it's just slower and less ergonomic.

The constant UI changes that fix nothing of importance and make using it less enjoyable.

A recent update changed the options for navigation from being able to hide the three icons at the bottom and swipe instead to make it like an iphone where you have one swipe up and it does things based on whether you hold or let go immediately and now the sides are go back swipes. They kept the option to show buttons, but apparently keeping the two options and adding this new train wreck as a third option is too hard. So to use my fulll screen real estate I have the joy of accidentally going back a page dozens of times per day, holding or not holding the swipe up the wrong amount of time dozens of times per day, and when I crop photos I constantly catch the stupid edge go back thing and have to cancel. At least it asks first I guess.

Why couldn't they keep swipe up for three things if they kept the buttons in the same spot anyway? I am still trying to get used to the new stupid thing after a few months because the bottom buttons are such a waste of space.

That is the worst offender, but changing icons, how notifications work, and several other things are just annoying enough tl not drive me away but feel like change for the sake of change. I know some changes can require a lot of maintenance to have multiple options, but keeping a basic navigation option when adding a third should not jave been a big deal.