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Comment by ogre_codes | Hacker News Reader

While they gloss over it, the price on this seems a bit steep. It's in-line or worse on most features than the iPhone SE and is likely quite a bit slower—it's limited to 3G in the US—and it's $150 more expensive. Seems like the more environmentally friendly move would be simply buying a used/ refurbished iPhone for half the cost with better performance.

> Fairphone hopes that its phones can stretch that length of time to between five and seven years, in part by making phones that aren’t disposable by design.

Does anyone have a 5 year old Fairphone? How are they able to keep software updates coming while every other Android maker is making a huge deal out of 3 years of support?

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Fairphone employee here. As I just replied to a different thread: We are trying (and struggling) with continued software support for our five year old Fairphone 2. The Android 9 is currently in beta and my colleagues are trying to address the last remaining issues for Google certification.

For details read https://www.fairphone.com/en/2020/06/18/fairphone-2-gets-and...

For context Android 10 was released over a year ago.

This has been explained in the article:

> Qualcomm is no longer supporting the chipset in the Fairphone 2, we have to make Android 9 comply with all of Google’s requirements ourselves

That's why it took longer and why it's not android 10.

Qualcomm is basically the bane of android software upgrades it seems.

The price is steep relative to other phones, but nothing else competes in terms of repairability (fairphones are the only phones to have got 10/10 from iFixit) or the supply chain equity. So it's not trivial to compare its price to that of others.

I went for a Fairphone 3 because I could afford it, because I support its values, and because its spec is more than enough for me. Six months in and I've no doubts about whether it was the right decision. I'd very much recommend it.

I don't disagree.

I'd love to see stats on device longevity versus the iPhone. In 3-5 years. I do get frustrated with having to replace devices every few years, but I don't think I'd make the same choice you did. Paying a premium for a device which is tied to a 2 year old version of Android with 3G is a tough pill to swallow.

I highly doubt an iPhone SE will last for another 5 years though.

The two oldest of my three, I bought new in 2016. One is on its second screen assembly and battery, the other on its first, and I'm building up stock against eventual unavailability of new replacement parts.

Ask me in 2025 how well they've held up.

The current SE was released earlier this year with the same SOC as the iPhone 11 (A13 Bionic). At least for OS support, you can anticipate support for 5 years based on Apple's general treatment of their phones (the primary exceptions were the first few models, when the hardware changed drastically between each year).

I'm of course talking about the first SE, which is easily found refurbished/used on the market.

The SE 2 won't be found on the second hand market anytime soon.

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