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Comment by dmoy | Hacker News Reader

What I want is a frame.work equivalent repairable and parts-replaceable smartphone. I know it's not practical right now because the commodity and consumer-purchaseable parts that go into a framework laptop don't exist for a smartphone analog right now, and the phone would probably be unacceptably large for most people. But I'd buy it if I could just replace the flash myself every 3-5 years, battery every 2-3 years, etc, and have security updates.

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Project Ara [0] was exactly that, but unfortunately Google shelved the project.

It would be really nice to have such a phone though!

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Ara

What's wrong with the Fairphone?

Fairphone is repairable but not upgradable.

Not to mention getting one and its parts outside of the EU is difficult and/or expensive. As a North American I'd be happy to hear if this is different now.

Fairphone 4 is supposed to come to the US.

For people in the US it's not really available. Also phone vs laptop. While there is some overlap, I think of the two as different devices for different use cases.

Can you replace the flash in a fairphone? (If you can, and at near-cost for the flash itself, then it sounds like I'll try to buy a fairphone)

Dang it looks like you can't. It's soldered into the main module? And they don't sell replacement parts for it. You can only send it back to the company. Which I guess is better than nothing.

But also can't seem to figure out how to buy it lol

I want a thick and strong chassis, the ability to pick which (camera) sensors are plugged in, standardized Single board computers, and add in batteries. Phones should be DIY projects with Cheap off the shelf components.

The PC equivalent.

If only they would try to make that work. I don't vape, but have noticed those that do seem to take customizing their pens pretty seriously by changing out certain components. I heard someone describe it as like a Jedi building their lightsaber haha. I'd like to do this for a phone for sure, but it'd be hard to get manufactures on board I think.

like a Jedi building their lightsaber, but more addictive.

I have a sneaking suspicion it could easily be done but then the big smartphone dealers wouldnt have you captured on the new phone treadmill.

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