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Comment by the_clarence

1 year ago

I switched from a lifetime of iPhones to an android phone last year, just because of folding phones. They are amazing and IMO the reason why Apple is going to have issues as these get cheaper (unless they release a folding phone too). Now that I have all this screen estate the current UI feels limiting often.

Rumors are Apple will be inventing the folding phone in a year or two.

  • Haha yeah, I’ve heard that too! Apple might be late to the foldable party, but you know how they do it — show up last and still steal the spotlight. If they really launch one, it’ll probably be super refined… and super pricey. Let’s see if they can change the game like they did with the notch!

    • I am pretty skeptical that I would like the size but I’m certainly interested in seeing what they come up with.

      They like to wait until stuff is “ready” to their standard. Android had 3G, 4G, and 5G first. OLED screens too.

      Early folders had a lot of issues, but I know a lot of that has been sorted for years.

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  • It's not like Apple hasn't had the ability to release a folding phone since the display technology has existed for years. The tricky part of releasing a folding phone is figuring out how you're going to handle the incredibly high warranty claim rate when screens spontaneously fail.

    Apple in particular will get to deal with all the negative PR when people buy their $2000 iPhone Fold and online reports come flooding in for all of the week 1 display failures.

    • Google pixel folding is great quality, I think you're talking about the first gen folding phones.

      In addition Apple would be happy if people started upgrading their phones more frequently.

How does this relates to the submission's "Desktop View"? Genuinely trying to find the connection.

  • The desktop view is for larger screens, it is somewhat similar to fordable phones.

    • The screen of foldable phones is still smaller than most tablets, and there’s a reason iPads offer something like Stage Manager for (larger) external screens (disregarding for the moment its janky implementation). Meaning, the screen size of foldable phones doesn’t change that much about the usefulness of being able to connect to a desktop-size screen.

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I switched from iPhone to android a month ago and it was so awful that I just went back to using my old phone. I treat the android device as essentially a powerbank with a camera, and even that it's bad at. plug it into my PC to transfer pictures? no response

  • Smells like user error and bias.

    I've swapped dozens of users from iOS to Android in the last year or so and nobody has had issues. Over the years I've helped hundreds of people migrate. Most everyone really likes the freedom to use different apps or workflows.

    The only folks who ever have problems are people who need to be told how to use their devices. Choices confuse them so android is overwhelming, which is understandable. That's where iOS excels. iOS dictates how users can do things, which works for some people but also atrophies people's understanding of technology. People learn to do as they're told, not how to think about what's going on. Apple's walled garden makes people worse at technology.

    Also sounds like you bought a garbage bargain android device. Idk how something can barely work as a camera/powerbank unless user error is present.

    • >The only folks who ever have problems are people who need to be told how to use their devices.

      While this may be the case - many iPhone users love their phones (and iOS) for a different reason.

      I've been with Android for some time: rooting, custom builds, different launchers, you name it. And it was fun back when I was in my early 20s, when had the time for this and when it was something new (HTC One, the very first model was my last Android phone).

      Then I've bought iPhone 6 (I had switched from Arch to macOS few months earlier) and tried a few android phones since.

      I simply don't need those "workflows".

      I need about a dozen apps (the ones I use almost daily), I want them to be thought through (like Drafts) and I want my OS to work and behave the same way at least 5 years later (not to mention security updates and such).

      This is where iPhone delivers and where Android quite often fails. I have iPhone 13 now and I can be sure that even few years from now everything will just work the same way does now.

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    • get your head out of your own arse. it's got fuck all to do with needing to be told what to do; you should see the level of customisation I have set up on my laptop. the overriding issue here is that if you're doing things on your phone that require massive customisability then you're doing something wrong. phones are for calling, photos, music and occasionally looking something up. almost anything else you should be doing with a keyboard and mouse. a phone that you have to constantly dig through the settings and install a million utility apps to make bearable is a bad phone. a phone you have to pay a grifter to transition you to using is a bad phone

      >Idk how something can barely work as a camera/powerbank unless user error is present.

      I literally explained this in the comment. the device doesn't connect to my laptop when I plug it in, meaning that I can't transfer photos off it easily

      your entire comment smells viciously of "oh my god! how dare he not have had a good experience with android. my poor baby android..."

      if I was biased I wouldn't have bought an android in the first place

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  • Is your PC a Mac? Apple doesn't support MTP because they want iPhones to look good or something. Every other OS with a reasonably complete Desktop Environment will allow mounting an Android device as what appears pretty much as a standard USB drive. It's part of why I prefer Android. Using an iPhone on Linux/BSD is just not worth the hassle.

    • > mounting an Android device as what appears pretty much as a standard USB drive

      AFAIK Google got rid of built-in support for this in Android Jelly Bean. Additional tricks are needed to make later versions of Android behave as a USB Mass Storage device. If it works for you out of the box, I suspect it may be specific to your Android distro.

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    • I think it’s more that MTP is an awful protocol than anything else. It’s slow and flaky even under OSes that support it. It’s shocking to me that with all of the brilliant people working for Google, nobody has managed to figure out a better replacement.

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  • I have been an iPhone user since 2009, but take 'Android-excursions' every few years. I am currently using a Pixel 9 and I can't see why it would be worse than an iPhone. Functionality-wise they are pretty much on-par. Sure, there are some differences, Pixels have much better AI functionality, iPhones better Mac integration. But I don't see a clear advantage of either, except that Android hardware is much more affordable (you can pick up a still pretty-ok Pixel 8a new for 379 Euro here currently) and Android has more customizability (but good out-of-the-box defaults).

    And you have the bonus that with a Pixel you can remove big tech from the equation when needed with GrapheneOS.

    That said, I would only recommend people to buy Pixel or Samsung A5x or up. They are the only Android phones that have reliable monthly updates [1], plus they are the only two brands that are not vague about having a truly separated secure enclave (Titan M2/Knox Vault respectively). Other vendors don't really talk about it and probably only use ARM TrustZone.

    [1] Pixel is the only phone that gets them really on time, but with Samsung it's normally within a month on A5x and the flagships.

  • Curious to know what phone you got. A Pixel 9 with GrapheneOS is so much better than any iOS devices from my experience. But since users you have more freedom on Android, this will depend on what you do with it (e.g me, I use Syncthing to locally sync all my files and photos with several devices -- no cloud / subscription needed).

  • > plug it into my PC to transfer pictures

    In 2025? I got my first Android phone, what, 15 years ago and I've never transferred files over USB because why would I.

    • I want my photos on my laptop. why would I go to the trouble of messing around trying to find an app, installing it on both devices, trusting some additional third party with my photos when I can just plug it in and transfer?

  • There's lots of different Android phones. Some of them work better for some people than others.

  • Why would you want to plug in if you can sync them over Wi-Fi using Syncthing?

    • why would I sync them using an app I need to install on both devices, an additional third party I have to deal with, when there's zero technological reason I shouldn't be able to literally just plug it in with its charging cable? it's just overcomplicating matters

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  • skills issue for sure

    • is it a skill issue that it doesn't just plug and play into my laptop? is it a skill issue that swiping from the left goes back to the previous page and swiping from the right also goes back to the previous page? is it a skill issue that google translate requires me to have the google search app installed? and that the google search app puts a big fuck off search bar in the middle of my home screen, of which the only simple way to remove is to delete the app?

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