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Is it time to question the yearly release cycle for phones? (lemmy.zip)

submitted 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) by shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip to c/technology@lemmy.world

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So recently I've been seeing the trend where Android OEMs such as Google, Samsung, etc. have been extending their software release times up to like five, six, and seven years after device release. Clearly, phone hardware has gotten to the point where it can support software for that long, and computers have been in that stage for a very long time. From what I can tell, the only OEM that does this currently might be Fairphone.

Edit: The battery is the thing that goes the fastest so manufacturers could just offer new batteries and that would solve a lot of the problem.

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[–] Kazumara@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

From what I can tell, the only OEM that does this currently might be Fairphone.

Does what? I don't see anything in the sentences before that "this" could refer to.

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Apparently they use one of the faster IoT chips that's supported for like 10 years.

[–] todd_bonzalez@lemm.ee 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

There is no CPU that is ever going to be supported for 10 years for a consumer application. ARM CPUs today are 20x faster than they were 10 years ago, and the ARM/RISC-V chips a decade from now will likely be 10-20x faster than today.

Regardless, the Kryo 670 CPU in the Fairphone 5 is already 3.5 years old, and it's not super special, it's just a semi-custom Snapdragon SoC. Consider that 4G LTE launched 13 years ago in the USA, and in 10 years that Kryo chip in the FP5 will be older than that. Could you handle the performance of your last 3G phone today?

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 weeks ago

There is quite a large delta between 512 KVPS 3G and even rather slow 4G at say like 10 MBPS which allows you to stream 1080p video etc. Yes 10 MBPS is not super fast for downloading but it will get your tasks done within a decent time.

[–] Kazumara@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 2 weeks ago

On a general note I would say for the individual consumer it doesn't matter so much if they keep releasing yearly, we just don't have to buy yearly.

It's kind of a waste of resources for the manufacturers supporting more models than necessary. If that leads to shorter support schedules that's when it impacts us. But as you observed they seem to be lengthening at the moment.

I'm currently on a Pixel 6 from 2021, that I bought used from someone who was chasing the latest and greatest. I have no reason for changing yet. After October 2026 when support ends I'll see if I have to migrate to Graphene OS or something. If no secure path forward exists I may have to get newer hardware then.

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