Mecha Comet is a modular Linux handheld coming soon to Kickstarter for $159 - Liliputing
Mecha Comet is a modular Linux handheld coming soon to Kickstarter for $159
Ooof. After having a pinephone, I know what 2 or 3GB of RAM can handle these days. Not much, really. Specially the moment you open the browser. I'm going to pass from any project that doesn't attempt to at least get close to this decade's standards.
My current Android phone has 4GB and it's really smooth. I've got 90 Firefox tabs open and several apps. I'd love to see that level of optimization in a startup, but more RAM will just mask the bad optimization.
As an ex-Andrpid dev, all this optimization is what killed the creativity. Every feature you currently have is hyperoptimized (even with dedicated battery optimizations turned off for the most popular apps), and as a result nothing you can't easily change is changeable anymore.
Want a widget that self updates every couple minutes by connecting to the internet? Can't have that, even if the user explicitly accepts it. Want to customize behavior of things in the settings? Nope. Want to hook into the phone memory and do crazy hacks? Not even with root. Want to keep running some checks to determine when to send a notification? Can't do that either, non-push notifications are all scheduled in advance.
Website currently lists 4gb
I think you're checking the Pro model. This one has a more powerful CPU and more RAM, and would have been a better option, except it had miserable failures to get it to boot or control the battery on launch, and development has been much slower than on the normal Pinephone, which although is woefully underpowered, it launched earlier and had a bigger support base. Pinephone Pro, while on paper being more powerful, stayed unusuable for rather long. I actually have both, and I haven't checked recently to see if the Pro is any better these days. The normal one while having a much better compatibility (a lot of things worked with very little troubleshooting), RAM was seriously an Achilles heel, and you'd notice it the moment you opened Firefox or attempted to launch waydroid.
Specially the moment you open the browser
I'd be curious, did you profile if it's for all pages or only some? I'd expect e.g. Facebook or Instagram to be more demanding than Lemmy or ProtonMail but to be honest I have no idea.
My phone has 3gb and it's fine. Don't leave 10,000 tabs open.
Can I just send you five years worth of „we’re sorry we’re behind schedule” messages and then ghost you instead? If so send me $159
My first thought: If this ever ships, I'll eat an outboard motor.
one cylinder 5hp or eight cylinder 300hp? Or maybe an electric?
the specs and the execution (2cm thick) seem reasonably bad, so i do think its pretty reasonable to manufacture in a small batch at that price
A little worried that with swapping those components like that, it's trying to be too many things for too many different groups of people instead of one exact thing.
I think all I really want is something shaped like this with a keyboard, like an old Blackberry that could be used as a terminal.
A little worried that with swapping those components like that, it’s trying to be too many things for too many different groups of people instead of one exact thing.
Isn't that exactly what made Raspberry Pis a massive hit? Being able to be so many different things for so many different groups of people, at a reasonable price point, maximizing the groups it appealed to?
I agree that id like a nice handheld terminal, but dont a lot of people like handheld emulation consoles? Hell both of those sound great to me. I would totally get both the game pad and keyboard if i went for it.
My real concern is that it would be garbage and/or the company would fold and support would become non existent.
Maybe i just got burned by pocketchip
Yep its one of the bigger issues. I wanted to get a uconsole, but ive heard the support is not the greatest. And the wait times are horrendous for the hardware.
Still have my Pocket CHIP. I look at it sometimes and sigh, thinking about what could have been.
There are a couple resources around to bring it up to something approaching working on the internet, but not much, and not complete, last I checked.
Thing was great for playing terminal roguelikes, though.
like the unihertz titan slim?
Very odd specs page: "256GB memory", "Face ID", "Advanced GPS", etc, To me this does not look trustworthy at all.
this would have been really cool 15 years ago
Funny story. LG made something with a similar concept about 10 years ago and it never really took off. The LG G5 was a modular smart phone that was supposed to have a bunch of cool modules, but they never came to fruition.
I had one, but mostly because I loved having a swappable battery. Never had to charge my phone, I would just have a spare battery charging on my desk and I would swap it out before I left the house.
Motorola had a similar phone. It was cool at the time, but just never took off. It was the Moto Z series.
Jolla had similar concept too at 2013. I had one and back then it was really, really nice phone. Maybe not in a sense that flagship models from big vendors were, but I really enjoyed the UI and modular options was a huge selling point at least for myself. Then they started to work with a tablet which failed on pretty much all fronts and the whole company practically disappeared.
I see a lot of negativity in the comments. And yeah, this thing probably isn’t something I’m going to get, but at least they are trying something that isn’t a generic rectangle of glass like all the others. I miss the days of fun gadgets.
I like the generic rectangle block of glass.
Don't understand why they insist on a physical keyboard.
I don’t mind it, but I also don’t hate that people are trying something new! Maybe it fails, but maybe it’s awesome!
I wonder who this is made for?
The article calls it a "smartphone sized pocket computer", but that describes smartphones too; they already are pocket computers. And they've had decades of design and development behind them.
So... This device has a tiny touchscreen, and a keyboard, rather than having the whole thing being a touchscreen. So instead it has a modular bottom half... Which... Sounds like it's trying to solve a problem that would've been a problem in like... The 90s, maybe, but has been solved by using... A touchscreen that can change the type of input it is flexibly, like smartphones do.
It can't call, like a smartphone, despite being a smartphone sized device. It has USB A 2.0 sockets and an Ethernet socket... Which makes it once again sound incredibly out-dated, like a device found in a time capsule, because USB C is smaller and faster than USB A 2.0, and can potentially be used for damn near anything. Which includes connecting to the Internet.
Its battery looks very weak. Its CPU looks very weak. It has a tiny amount of RAM, and a tiny amount of storage. It is outclassed by any affordable, midrange smartphone, at nearly the same price too (if you avoid big brand names).
This device has a tiny touchscreen, and a keyboard, rather than having the whole thing being a touchscreen.
That's awesome. I still miss my Blackberry Passport (keyboard and large 1:1 screen).
For people who like a concept more than practicality. There’s maybe a handful use cases that this specific device fits in that isn’t covered better by existing tech, but I guarantee if that thing actually gets kickstarted and arrives severely delayed in several years, it’ll show up in a couple YouTube videos with people sort of uncertain what to use it for, and in the vast majority of cases it’ll end up in some drawers after having been used a few hours tops.
My thoughts exactly. I've seen several such devices already, probably the most expensive and over-designed one being the Apple VR, and it's always the same story.
Full-size usb, Ethernet and keyboard mean you can use it as a Linux computer, install arbitrary debian packages, run shell scripts, python scripts, and you don't need any dongles. This is the differential factor. You can't do the same on a smartphone, and it's not supposed to be a smartphone. Why would you need a separate sim card when you can simply tether Internet from your phone?
I get that this device isn't for you, but there are people who don't want to write and maintain apps through apps stores and simply want to copy simple scripts into a small device they can have with them. It's a niche market and good for them for trying to fill that niche.
I wonder what they use for charging port if not usb c...
You can do all that with USB C and a touch keyboard. There is no good reason under the sun to make a device that is this dated in concept.
Whatever the market is they're trying to fill, it'll be so extremely niche that this product is already a failure. It's not the first time some kind of ultra niche product from kickstarter failed before launch because except for a small handful even cared.
3gb RAM? 32gb emmc? This feels a bit like a raspberry pi project. Up the specs at least 6gb to at least no[t look like yet another microdeck with emulators, please... I like the concept, but as is, it leaves plenty to be desired
Netbooks need to come back with modern hardware.
If I need an ultra-portable computer one in a usable form factor would be amazing.
yet an other hardware from 10+ years ago. here we have an ARM Cortex-A53 from what it seems to be 2012. Maybe it is actually compatible with OpenGL 3...
Our beloved consoles from the 80s and 90s were built with off the shelf parts, this is no different. Custom hardware in a niche market would lead nowhere.
this comparison is really bad. consoles built with 6502s could get away with it, since everything they ran were games crafted in assembly to fit the timings to the last clock cycle. this product is supposed to run modern graphical software.
I would pay more than 1000$ at this point for a modern high DPI open device with mobile internet compatibility and all drivers in mainline kernel. Just give me good hardware, I can handle the software on my on, tank you 🤭
If you want all drivers in the mainline kernel, you clearly cannot handle the software on your own. The reason why linux phones suck are the drivers that are either bad or don't exist. The desktop (or palmtop I guess) environments are pretty usable if you run it on something with good drivers (like QEMU - my favorite phone).
I've learned not to get my hopes up with kickstarters but I'll keep an eye on this one
I'm still too dumb to learn... Ask me about my OKPad! In fact, ask me for my OKPad. Please, take the god awful thing off my hands!
Ok.... I'll bite....but for me to take it off your hands I'll need to get a $50 deposit, and another $100 due after it's arrived to me, you can pay shipping and duties as well...
I like the form factor, but seeing the issues with supply on hackberrypi and uconsole, im hoping they dont have the same issue. Lots of people like that form factor (including myself).
I'm intrigued. And although I read the article, I'm not entirely sure who or what this is for. It's cool, but... what?
I feel like this would fit in some unexpected areas of mobile computing. Music, interfacing with other equipment (e.g. industrial computing), or other places where people might normally take a full laptop where that's kind of overkill.
I'm not really sure, and I kind of wish I had a need for one.
I think it's for the Hacker News crowd that's always clamoring for smaller phones, or phones with a physical keyboard. Potentially for parents to give to their young children, to be able to contact them without getting them addicted to screens right away.
Not sure how big those markets are though.
Sorry, if it sounds too good to be true, it usually is. If you can't make this stuff at scale, no way you could sell it at $160 a unit.
They just use really low spec hardware…
While I hope I'm wrong, I agree this thing will go the way of most Kickstarters. It is interesting, but it will never have appeal outside of the hobby space, and the cash needed to get this thing off the ground will be immense.
I'm intrigued simply because it's not Android but the keyboard and gamepad are better done with existing products like the click keyboard and Gamesir.
I like how Linux has been picking up lately. Finally.
It's just a matter of time as so many corporate products and services enshittify. That, plus FOSS' main issue is the average person not having any idea what it is or what it means.
It's the year of Linux, just as it has been every year for the past thirty years!
It looks cool and all, but its probably going to have like 400mb of ram and an rp2040 like every other linux handheld device.
I would really love a return to a concept where you have a tablet that docks into a full size laptop form factor. Even better if the dock can have a graphics card.
Agree. Sometimes I want a tablet, sometimes a laptop but I don't need or want 2 separate devices of that size. I recall quite a few Android projects (Mirabook, Project Linda) that would use a phone with a laptop dock but I'd prefer a phone as a standalone device and a secondary, larger & more powerful, device that can have multiple forms.
This is super cool! I’ve wondered what sort of device can I use to essentially have a phone but only interact with my own services and guarantee to some degree it isn’t calling home. This seems like a good choice for this problem :)
Looks suspiciously like a smartphone with an external KB plugin
Pretty neat, but probably not something I'd buy
I keep saying the same about the iPhone but they keep making new ones
Well that looks cool. I just hope I would have use for such device.
I wonder how they plan to keep updating this Mechanix OS after initial sales slow down
It's going to be just like my pocket chip and die quickly after in terms of software support. Where I had to run my own hacks and also run archive debian repositories for the hardware itself only for the flash to die a year afterwards. I can say though it was the coolest device I had and hacking it was really neat especially with the UI and scaling apps on the device.
Those look really cool, I would be pleasantly surprised if they ever came to fruition
If that keyboard module isn't extremely securely attached on there, I can 100% guarantee it is breaking in my pocket.
Would have much preferred if they were going to have just one base unit with keyboard. Other modules could fit over that.
Basically Android is Linux but......in weirdest way if i must say.
Now....we just need to make it modular right....????
I feel like it’s almost too generic to be useful. All the “standard” attachments make it a thing that already exists (and those things are usually much stable and supported). If they get enough 3rd party attention prior to launch, that could change.
I wish they would have spent the time and effort just committing to the smartphone idea. Linux and the Linux community could greatly benefit from more open source smartphone devices.
My interest is piqued, but it doesn't have a native usb-c? Only old usb-a? Am I reading that right? The c is a part of one of the attachments? Don't love that.
Would love something like this for field notes, though for my uses a eink screen would be preferable. Hopefully this or the equivalent takes off and we can start getting fun variables in the future!
What I like about this is that I could theorhetically install a non-QWERTY keyboard instead of being locked to such an inefficient layout. Yes, eventually you can learn to touch type, but learning it would be nice to have the keys since it will be a nonstandard layout at that size & when you hand it off to other folks, it’d be completely unexpected to hit q & get a '.
Hopefully gphoto2 will run in this. It would make a less bulky intervalometer than the one I built with a raspberry pi and an attachable display.
ugly and bulky, when linux is on a form factor like the new razr or samsung z flip phones then Ill care
Too bad it's packed full of features I don't care about and lacks ones I do.
These handhelds are cool but I think I'll skip this one.
Looks nice and I'd like it even more, had it an USB-C port with display output.
But even in the current configuration it's a nice gadget at a reasonable price point.
4 GB RAM is not exactly great for a kind of desktop computer (even with Linux), but using this thing as a server with a built-in keyboard and display would have saved me some trouble I faced with unresponsive RaspberryPis.
plastic garbage
Gross. Why would they launch on a scam platform like kickstarter?
Let me know if they launch on crowdsupply
i cannot see a use case for this. just get a steam deck instead
A user after my own heart.
Technically the Deck is more expensive but that's exactly what I did, went with a Steam Deck.
There's also Samsung DeX or other desktop-like experiences from an Android device.
Why the fuck would a handheld need an ethernet port?
The pro-linux developers just can’t stop designing things to their own specific needs and skillsets. No concept of designing & marketing for a wide audience.
The pro-linux developers just can’t stop designing things to their own specific needs and skillsets. No concept of designing & marketing for a wide audience.
You mean the wide audience that's already catered to by every other tech company?
How can this possibly present a problem? People with specific needs developing new hardware - seems like a great idea to me. I can definetly see a use for this sort of device for network people. It could function as a travel router when needed. Another more obacure use could be penetration testing. Just because you can't imagine a use case doesn't mean it's useless.
