But of course we all know that the big manufacturers don’t do this not because they can’t but because they don’t want to. Planned obsolescence is still very much the name of the game, despite all the bullshit they spout about sustainability.
There are indeed good aspects to this product.
But I won’t join the “Fairphone good” circle jerk and give them the free publicity, because just like Apple and Samsung, they removed the headphone jack from their phones soon before the launch of these headphones, in other words, artificially creating the problem and need to sell you their expensive solution.
You don’t get to ride the “we are pro customer!” free publicity train while also wanting to be the next Apple.
I bought the Fairphone 5 and yeah, I miss not having the jack and I see no reason to take it out
Cost. The Fairphone is already too expensive for what it offers.
I agree the price is pretty high for what it is, but I wonder how much adding a headphone jack would actually affect it.
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/CUI-Devices/SJ2-35853B-SMT-TR?qs=DXv0QSHKF4xcEQUTnRYIcA%3D%3D
here is a link to a headphone jack, which costs 47 cents each if you get 5k. they already have the added electronics to be able to send audio over usb-c, so it is pretty much just the cost of the jack itself at 47 cents.
The fairphone 4 doesn’t have a jack and its from 2021.
Yes and they sold shitty generic bluetooth earbuds that they pulled from the market a year and a half later with 0 support when they were almost ready to launch their Bluetooth headphones.
So? Their over ear Bluetooth headphones came out on Q1 2023. Two years developing a new category for your company sounds about right.
Plus, their phones are expected to be used for long, so if they wanted to push people towards Bluetooth they’d have to start early.
Plus, this is still irrelevant - how does the fact they screwed customers over in 2021 somehow make it better?
So? Their over ear Bluetooth headphones came out on Q1 2023. Two years developing a new category for your company sounds about right.
So they first removed the headphone jack but intentionally didn’t launch a companion device because the customers would just wait for them “to sell you their expensive solution”?
the fact they screwed customers over in 2021
Wait, 2021 customers were not informed about that and got their headphone jacks taken away after already paying? They could not make an informed decision and were screwed over?
They explain very thoroughly on their website why they did it:
https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/9836188988049-Audio-Jack-3-5mm
Yep, same excuses as Apple.
Analogue connector too old, too big, hard to make modular. All proven false by a multitude of other devices.
It might be false, but I think the real reason is that very few people care about a jackstick… I care, but I’m the only one I know, and I only ever hear a small group of people online talk about it being a big deal. In the end I don’t think too badly about that specific decision from any phone manufacturer.
Heck, I don’t even care about having an audio jack as long as there are two USB-C ports. I’m a down for a unified connector. There just needs to be enough ports for it.
I might be on board with this, especially how simple and reliable the USB-C analog audio system is supposed to be. And my ongoing problem with Bluetooth is just how amazed I am at how slow/unreliable it is to both pair and to reconnect on a slew of different (modern!) hardware.
But it’s funny. I have a tablet with 2 USB-C ports. I have USB-C to audio adapters that I’ve used with it for a while.
Recent trip, I forgot the adapters. So I picked up a pack of adapters at the local Best Buy. Didn’t work! Tablet behaved as if they simply weren’t plugged in. Rebooted, tried stuff, then bought a different brand of them. Same problem! Got home, original ones I had worked fine.
I don’t care if it’s the tablet’s fault, or the adapters, or what. I’ve never, ever, ever had to worry about stuff like this with 3.5mm jack on any device. Ever. That’s the reason it’s worth it to me (plus not having to worry about charging, or various other complications with wireless. Like when enabling Bluetooth headphones on my last laptop crushed wifi performance. Or makes my good ol’ Steam Link start to freak out with my 8bitdo, or…)
I’ve had issue with very worn out 3.5mm adapters before! Like: I was on an intercontinental flight earlier this week and my cable barely held in the worn out port of the plane. I agree that there are fewer issues with software refusing to work, but the hardware-connection can be quite sucky on them too.
I’d prefer that to the jack tbh. I’ve been converted to prefer digital wired audio
I’d be more okay with it if that weren’t for the fact that there can still be compatibility issues when before there weren’t.
In my case, lots of people I know care about it. And I definitely do.
But these are just anecdotes, and I haven’t seen real data.
I’m guessing the majority of people would prefer to have it, but don’t care enough that it’s a major factor for their phone. And the number that care at all continues to shrink. But we’re both just guessing.
This is just one search result but it’s showing 326 million phones shipped in just Q4 of last year. How many of those new phones do you think shipped with headphone jacks?
https://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS51776424
There’s plenty of industry analysis out there that, while not perfect, is data showing that new phone sales have not been hampered by the removal of the headphone jack.
I’m rocking a Pixel 5a which does still have it and I do get a warm and fuzzy in my nerd brain by having it there. If I’m honest though, I used it maybe twice in the last year.
Yeah, same here. It’s a pretty specific demand when bluetooth headphones have become really good and actually have a lot of advantages compared to wired ones. Also there is always the option to use a USB C dongle so it’s really not that big of a deal.
I don’t need another hole in my phone that does nothing but collect debris.
So - takes up too much space, is the main reason :)
I don’t care, still worth it to me. As long as I have the option, any phone I buy (including the one I bought last year) will have a 3.5mm jack.
I hated that too at the time, but I have to admit, that in practice this has not really turned into an issue basically ever: My headphones and earbuds are bluetooth anyways and I did get a usb-c to headphone adapter that I store with my earphone’s backup audio cable for the very rare case that I need it (I can count on one hand the instances for when that happened). And in those very few cases I wasn’t about to charge my phone anyways, which is the one argument for why you might want both.
So, I don’t know, maybe it really is time to move on. I will defnitely say that I’m not a big fan of analog cables, so maybe a more general move to USB-C for audio might be the right way to go in the first place?
Yeah I feel the same way. I didn’t get in on Bluetooth until I got Bluetooth hearing aids, but it’s just really convenient.
My last pair of computer headphones are analog and they’ll be my last analog headphones
Okay, but my phone has a jack and absolutely dog water sound quality. Because it has a jack it does not support the USB DAC which I use on my desktop.
Worst part is, the whole USB DAC is $12 including shipping and it has USB connector and 3.5mm, and an amp. They cheaped out on this part not only on the phone, but also on the motherboard. On my computer the amp is way too weak to drive my around ear headphones.
So if it’s a crap one maybe they shouldn’t even include it, since I’ll have to use a USB DAC to get perfectly transparent sound. The only good one I own is on my budget Acer Aspire laptop.
LG phones used to come with a DAC. I still use mine as an MP3 player even though it’s not my main phone.
All phones with a 3.5mm audio jack have a DAC. You can’t play digital audio without one somewhere along the chain and all audio going through a phone or PC is digital unless you’re picking up a radio signal or some other analog signal that’s being fed directly to the audio jack.
You probably mean it comes with a good DAC, since they aren’t all created equal.
A bit of a tangent, but I believe that’s why people considered Macs better for audio stuff, they probably used a better DAC than most motherboards come with or might have just added that pathway in general back when it wasn’t standard on most PC motherboards and your had to use a sound card if you wanted better audio than the PC speaker which was more of a synthesizer. They’d take a pitch and generate an analog wave at that frequency while a DAC uses a sample rate and series of amplitudes at that frequency to generate rich sound.
I’d rather they just give me a headphone jack tbh
I’m right there with ya. I know many people prefer wireless earbuds, but I like ripping cables out of my ears at random. Makes me feel alive.
Yes! I had totally forgotten about the instant pang of shock and anger I would feel when that happened.
This. I hate to charge my headphones everyday
My sony ones survive more than a week.
that isn’t the typical experience though, and letting your batteries drain completely is bad for them. also if you don’t have some sort of routine, a lot of people (myself included) end up forgetting to charge them and end up with no working headphones until they can charge them again, which is pretty annoying.
Yes, I get it. I would still use wired headphones, but I got bluetooth ones as a gift. And to add to your critisism, batteries die and you have to replace them around every 10 years.
I use my AirPods daily for 5-6 hours and still only have to charge for 20 minutes once a week. It’s really not that big of an issue
Am I the only one that can’t stand the few hundred millisecond delay of Bluetooth audio?
I have come to love my bluetooth earbuds… but darn when im in the car i just wanna plug my phone in some times.
fuck wireless headphones! I don’t want to remember charging another god damn thing to start with.
I wish all their stuff wasn’t EU only.
It’s hard for a small manufacturer to start selling in overseas markets. It would take a certain volume for them to have the capital to set up shop in the US.
They’re not, they sell the phones in the US through here https://murena.com/america/shop/smartphones/brand-new/murena-fairphone-4/
Search for KZ IEM it’s a chifi has this kind of feature also probably cheaper than fairphone version.
I completely agree. This is annoying.
I think you can get them imported but the costs go up significantly. Also they wouldnt be certified by your electronic bodies
I’m doing just fine with my bio body…
You can, I had an English vendor ship me my FP4 and it works just fine stateside. It does have its quirks being locked to GSM networks and the 5G bands not being universally aligned between the continents.
I still use the free wired earbuds I get on flights. You can also go to walmart and get unpackaged bags of them for like $1. I just lose wireless ones too easily
Nothing’s fair with FP when they can’t give the option of a jack. So much for caring about the environment
Meh.
Overpriced.
I can buy 3 or 4 pairs of BT5 earphones for the price of these.
My most expensive pair currently was $75.
I’ve never had batteries go bad in them - they get broken well before that happens. Though I have a noise canceling headset from 2006 that still works. Battery lasts long enough.
I’d rather break a pair of $30 earphones, and have multiple spares than a single pair of $150.
And they all sound about the same given the source and environment.
Overpriced.
their entire premise is making sure that people on the supply chain of their devices are compensated adequately (hence the “Fair” in the name), which is why their products are more expensive than you’re used to.
Nooooo! You can pry my cheap tat produced by child labour from my cold dead hands!
It’s called feel-good marketing. Similar to organic veggies or ethical coffee from Starbucks.
I don’t know about Starbucks or Big Organic Veggie, but Fairphone publishes annual reports on sustainability and life quality of their workers.
Of course, that’s part of the marketing idea. Starbucks (and many others with feel-good marketing) did the exact same, until it leaks that it wasn’t quite the truth.
It’s not for nothing that Fairphone is guilt-tripping in rich countries ;) But still exploiting poor countries.
And downvote me what you want. It doesn’t make you immune for cheap marketing tricks. People with a Fairphone are the same kind of people who brag about how their cup of Starbucks saved a life, stepped right into the trickery.
I totally get it, why buy one expensive thing once, when you can buy cheap stuff that will cost more in the long run? 5 times 30 surely is cheaper than 1 times 150.
From my experience, there is just stuff where you don’t want to cheap out on. Don’t get me wrong, there is no need to buy „premium“ stuff when good stuff is about the same quality but cheaper, but buying cheap stuff, just because it is a little less than the good stuff usually never pays off for me
Sadly in my experience the boots theory is no longer accurate as the $50 pair of boots fall apart as quickly as the $10 pair, especially when talking about electronics. There may be longer lasting devices out there but the price is so beyond my price range that it may as well not exist.
Updated for 2024, the boots theory would read something more like a $50 pair of boots lasts for one year and is mostly comfortable to wear, the $10 pair lasts for one year but is uncomfortable to wear, and the $2000 pair of boots is comfortable and will last many years but anyone who buys them will toss them after one year anyway when “the fashion” changes.
My batteries are already on their last legs in the Sony tws, but I’ll be replacing them with new ones.
If your $30 earphones break before their batteries do, maybe consider buying something that does not break in a year of use?
When I shopped for wireless earbuds, I spent a half hour comparing the top brands (most expensive), so I ended up asking the clerk what he used (saw one in his ear). The ones he recommended were $20 and they’re great, sound decent, and last all day.
Sometimes cheap is just as good.
