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by MYEUHD6 hours ago |
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upvoteby freedomben6 hours ago|
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Yeah I remember buying a OnePlus 7 Pro with 12 GB (!) of RAM like 7 years ago. The processor was also bleeding edge and that sucker ripped. It combined with stuff like termux was so capable that I used it to run all kinds of stuff that makes little sense on a normal phone. The day that phone retired (from drop damage) was heartbreaking*.

* It actually ran even longer after that as various utilities but not a daily driver, but when I didn't have it with me all the time the convenience slowly waned and it got forgotten

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upvoteby 8n4vidtmkvmk5 hours ago|
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That's the phone I was using too. Gave it to my wife a couple years ago and she used it until just a couple months ago when it too suffered a fatal drop. Very sad.

Good phone. I was worried about that pop up camera failing at some point, but it never did

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upvoteby freedomben4 hours ago|
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Indeed, that pop up camera worried me too but was never an issue. It survived lots of pocket lint, and even beach sand and was always reliable. I'd easily trade the current "notch" approach on most phones for a pop up camera (assuming similar quality).
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upvoteby robotnikman4 hours ago|
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Same. Oneplus showed that the pop up camera was a perfectly workable approach for the front camera instead of using a notch.
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upvoteby xp841 hours ago|
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Boy, do I miss the amount of diversity and innovation we used to have in cell phones. I remember having this phone [1] which put the camera on a little rotating thing so you could use the same one for front or back facing - obviously this either saves money or means they have twice the budget for the cameras as if they had two.

Obviously these cameras themselves were potato cameras compared to modern ones, but this design was still a great innovation and unique. We rarely get many design ideas that are that different today, as everyone mainly just wants to look like an iPhone, and Apple for its part only sits around obsessing on how they can make the iPhone's form more and more featureless and pure.

https://www.mobilecollectors.net/phone/6666/lg-vx-7000

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upvoteby ricw6 hours ago|
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Not an apples to apples comparison#. iOS uses way less ram than android, plus has memory compression. That’s why Apple gets away with less ram and much smaller batteries with equal or better performance.

# pun intended

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upvoteby MYEUHD5 hours ago|
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Of course it's not an apple to apple comparison, the iPhone 7 from the same year was 50% more expensive and had only one third of the RAM (2 GB)
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upvoteby 3 hours ago|
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upvoteby microtonal5 hours ago|
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plus has memory compression.

FYI, Android has had zRAM support since KitKat, which is from (checking notes) 2013. Same year as iOS.

iOS uses way less ram than android

Common measurements I have seen is around 40%, I wouldn't say way less, but it is definitely less. Still, 3x more for a model in the same year is impressive (and more than needed to be competitive with iOS) and we should give OnePlus credit for it.

Sadly a lot of low-ish to midrange phones are going back or sticking to 6-8GB today, thanks to the RAM squeeze and the efficiency of iOS is certainly helping Apple here. Certainly nobody is going to complain about the performance of the iPhone 17, despite only having 8GB RAM.

In Android, Samsung doesn't seem to suffer as much. You can pick up an S26 here with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage for 623 Euro, which is a nice midrange price. I guess there are benefits if you can produce your own memory.

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upvoteby basilikum4 hours ago|
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> 623 Euro, which is a nice midrange price [for a phone].

How did we get here?

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upvoteby layer83 hours ago|
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Apple is already past that, with the entry-level 17e starting at 700 Euro. The midrange regular 17 starts at 950 Euro. And according to rumors those prices are likely to increase in spring if not earlier.
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upvoteby robotresearcher3 hours ago|
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> entry-level 17e starting at 700 Euro

Which is 30% less than the original iPhone accounting for inflation.

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upvoteby robotresearcher3 hours ago|
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iPhone 1 launched at 649 Euros in France in 2007 money, or about 980 Euros today.

Given inflation and the increased utility of the smartphone, we're almost certainly at the lowest cost per hour of use ever for most people.

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upvoteby oarsinsync2 hours ago|
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> for most people

For most people, salaries have not kept up with inflation

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upvoteby xp841 hours ago|
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What's funny is that due in part to minimum wage laws (which caused some of the inflation) the lowest quintile is arguably the one who's kept up with inflation better than the rest, meaning there has been an improvement in the wealth inequality department. But nobody talks about it. Meanwhile I've lost like 20% of my buying power to inflation in the past 3-4 years even taking the meager raises into account.
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upvoteby inigyou4 hours ago|
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Our central planners allocated all the RAM to AI and almost none to phones.
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upvoteby ProfessorLayton4 hours ago|
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> iOS uses way less ram than android, plus has memory compression. That’s why Apple gets away with less ram and much smaller batteries with equal or better performance.

Yeah, by aggressively purging all my Safari tabs (and Apps) unexpectedly, during the most convenient times, like when I'm going through a tunnel on the train and my cellular connection is at its best. Still infuriatingly common on my 17 Pro with 12GB of RAM.

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upvoteby zenoprax6 hours ago|
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Regarding memory compression: isn't the use of `zswap` and `zram` commonplace on embedded Linux at this point?
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upvoteby asveikau57 minutes ago|
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Phones are skimping on RAM lately because of the price spikes due to the AI boom. Phones and laptops are sometimes debuting with less RAM than their predecessors of the same brand.
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