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Hardware Technology

Nothing Officially Announces Flashy Phone 1, Starting at $475 (theverge.com) 55

Posted by msmash from the new-gadget dept.
After weeks of teases, Nothing is finally announcing its debut smartphone -- the Nothing Phone 1 -- at a launch event today. From a report: Led by OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei, it's the well-funded startup's second product released following last year's Ear 1 true wireless earbuds. The big news is that the Nothing Phone 1 will be sold with a modest starting price of $475 USD (though it's not getting a widespread release in the US) when it goes on sale on July 21st. $475 gets you the model with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, while stepping up to $535 gets you 256GB of storage. The model with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage goes on sale later this summer for $593 USD.
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Nothing Officially Announces Flashy Phone 1, Starting at $475 More

Nothing Officially Announces Flashy Phone 1, Starting at $475

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  • Nothing is promising three years of Android updates and four years of security updates (released once every two months).

    That's a nice selling point but this is a brand new company with a brand new product, bit of a gamble that they will still be in business in 3 years and plenty of manufacturers simply stopped updates for old phones because they just can't be bothered.

    The fact this has a custom skin OS gives me even more pause. If it was straight Android like on a Pixel it would make more sense and I wish more Android models did just that.

    I do like the light strips on the back though that's a nice touch and would like to se

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by guruevi ( 827432 )

      They'll be hard pressed to continue doing updates when Google releases their latest OS that strips out support for those chipsets. Supporting Android anything is a development hell. I've supported this commercially for a few years, no support from anyone, not even the community cares enough or has the resources to troubleshoot obscure issues on common chipsets. I eventually simply re-flashed all my devices to pure Linux, but that's not really feasible for a phone.

      It's taken what, 10 years now and still no w

      • > They'll be hard pressed to continue doing updates when Google releases their latest OS that strips out support for those chipsets

        Have you seen that within three years of a product release? Lineage just deprecated some 8-yr-old devices for lack of CPU support. Which is a crying environmental shame.

        > still no working x86 or Raspberry Pi support.

        check out KonstaKANG

    • > That's a nice selling point but this is a brand new company with a brand new product, bit of a gamble that they will still be in business in 3 years

      This was my experience with the Essential PH-1. The founder got into some mee-too stuff, IIRC and the investors bailed. Good phone, worthless camera. A used Pixel with Lineage solves most problems.

      Somebody said the unlocks were released online but I have a bricked one and never figured that out.

  • When people pay their money and get nothing. Are they going to be able to get a refund? How is that going to work explaining you bought nothing and got nothing

    Reminds me of the days when people paid a thousand dollars for a Mac laptop box. The seller clearly stated they were selling the box and had many pretty picture. Some will fall for any scam.

  • $475 is not a modest price, bearing in mind that devices less than half the price do 95% of what these more expensive devices do, and just as acceptably well. Only worth the price if security patches and upgrades are guaranteed for several years. And if you are getting it not from a carrier - carriers are keen on installing a lot of bloatware that most people do not want or need.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Altus ( 1034 )

      It's basically the same price as an iPhone SE with the same amount of storage. Admittedly it has a larger screen than the SE but I would be willing to be the performance on the apple device is going to be pretty slick. Beating the low end price of Apple should be the starting point if you want to be competing on value.

  • Why do Android phones require so much RAM?

    • Most people will never notice a lack with less than 2GB. But if you regularly switch tasks, or do any kind of content creation on your phone, you will want more memory. I find that 2GB is acceptable and 3GB is more than fine for any mundane task, so to me that's about where the line is.

      That's still a lot of RAM for a phone in my mind, but it's not that much by modern standards.

    • They don't. It's just a relatively cheap spec bump that makes the product look better on paper. iPhones don't have competition in the iOS space so there's no point to Apple even advertising the RAM.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by GuB-42 ( 2483988 )

      Mostly because apps are bloated, and so are websites.

      They use way too many libraries, and every app get their own copy. No shared libraries except for system libraries. Like Electron apps that are actually browser based, which is already a lot of layers, but they also come with their own browser! Hundreds of MB are not uncommon for even the most basic apps. And of course, there is multitasking. The bloat is impressive, my old Nexus One with its 512MB of RAM did really well, impressively so for Java apps, Ap

    • > Why do Android phones require so much RAM?

      Java/Kotlin and a low barrier to entry.

      My password manager runs 160MB just waiting for a request for a few text strings. I could probably have done something similar on C=64 assembly back in the day in 40K. Not on the VIC-20 though!

      Also every fucking app tries running a daemon if you let it. I forget what absurdity was doing that lately for some store that I go to once a year but I uninstalled it when I saw it sucking 80MB doing absolutely nothing (for me, a

  • A modest phone costs sub-$100.

  • Why get a Cheap No Frills New phone, when you can get a Premium phone for the same price, with better build quality and better specs, for the same price, because it isn't the current years model, and stores are trying to get them out of inventory.

  • Are they looking for sheeple to buy Yet Another thin, massive-screened, fragile 6"+ phablet that will break within a year ?

    Or will they cater for the people who think before buying, who want a thick, sturdy, rubberised, 4.5" screen, useful phone that can be kept in a back jeans pocket and will last forever ?

    6.55 inches ?
    FUCK OFF.

    • Why build that into the phone? That's what cases are for! That way when the case gets damaged you can just replace it rather than replacing the phone, I'm not as clumsy as I would have thought but I just know as soon as I decide to go caseless I'll shatter the phone. My iPhone - a 4 year old XS max (whatever physical size that is) - fits just fine in the pocket of even in my skinniest hipster jeans and the battery health on it still reports 85% which is more than a days' worth. Inevitably it will drop furth

      • Because having it built in means a sturdy phone, not a fragile phone in a sturdy case ( that you are apparently afraid of breaking anyway ).

        If you can fit a 6.5" phone in the pocket of your jeans and sit down comfortably, you, erm, have a more capacious ass than me.

        • Because having it built in means a sturdy phone, not a fragile phone in a sturdy case ( that you are apparently afraid of breaking anyway ).

          What's the difference? Either way it's fragile components in a sturdy enclosure, it's just that in my case the enclosure is replaceable, in yours it isn't.

          If you can fit a 6.5" phone in the pocket of your jeans and sit down comfortably, you, erm, have a more capacious ass than me.

          Why would you sit on your phone? You put it in the side pocket, even in 32" hipster skinny jeans it fits fine.

          • A case provides protection at the expense of unnecessary bulk that can better be provided by the phone itself.

            You put your phone in your front jeans pocket ?!
            If you can fit a 6.5" phone in the front pocket of your jeans and sit down comfortably, you, erm, have an even tinier penis than me.

            • A case provides protection at the expense of unnecessary bulk that can better be provided by the phone itself.

              Ok.

              You put your phone in your front jeans pocket ?!

              Yes.

              If you can fit a 6.5" phone in the front pocket of your jeans and sit down comfortably, you, erm, have an even tinier penis than me.

              Your penis is not supposed to be on your outer thigh, you should get that checked.

  • Why does this phone exist? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Zontar_Thing_From_Ve ( 949321 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2022 @12:51PM (#62697228)
    So I skimmed the article and it seems to be full of lists of features this phone has, but why does this phone even exist? What makes it so special that someone would want to buy it instead of a Pixel, Android or iPhone? How realistic is it to fear that this is just going to turn out like those Microsoft+Nokia phones from I guess about a decade ago where few ended up sold and almost nobody outside of phone or IT geeks like me even knows that they ever existed?
    • Relax. Don't you know you can't make something out of Nothing?

    • What makes it so special

      Incredibly bad marketing. No other phone in the world would be judged as much of a failure when you know nothing about it other than its name.

    • It's got a super kool name.

    • Well, there's the design. I can see people really liking the design with the integrated LED strips. Although for some people that may be superficial, for others that kind of stuff does make a difference in the buying decision. It's not my cup of tea, I'd be more interested if the phone was degoogled in some way, offering more privacy.

  • All that RAM is pointless, as hardly any apps will even utilize such an amount, and 6.55 inches of screen real estate is overkill. I'm perfectly fine with the 2.5 inch screen on my LG VX8300. Plus it runs Android, which, although customizable, is nothing but bloat and Google watching every breath you take and every move you make. Overall, no thanks. I'll stick to the VX8300 and BlackBerry 10.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • At that kind of price, it does remind me of the good times we all had with OnePlus1. Man... I miss the days of Cyanogen Mod.

  • Dumbest marketing in the world (Score:3)

    by thegarbz ( 1787294 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2022 @02:09PM (#62697496)

    Seriously who thought of calling it "Nothing"? That is insanely stupid marketing that may as well kill the phone without every needing to release specs or images of the device.

  • If you want me to care about a phone try...

    Creating one without a fucking hole in the screen. Is this really asking too much?

    Or making it so you can plop out the battery and put in a new one when it dies. Zomg so difficult...

    Besides the indicator lights on the wrong side of the phone and apparent inability to understand the VERY FIRST THING MOST PEOPLE do when they get a new phone is plop it into a CHEAP RUBBERIZED CASE case... What does this phone have besides "courage"? No SD card or 3.5 takes courage

  • Can't recommend anything coming out of a company like OnePlus. I care at least a little bit about being able to trust my OS and OEM.

  • I've never heard of the "Nothing" phone, actually. So my guess is it's been promoted by the "nowhere" promotions agency...

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