A phone for hackers / makers

[gdavies]

After browsing the web for a phone project that has died out where people could get blocks to add function to a mobile phone I came across this little gem and thought I would share it and see what others think, It is not a smart phone but i do think it could be a fun thing to play around with

wouldn't let me post a direct link but the phone is called wiphone by indego

 

[FAST6191]

So someone added SIP functionality (no mobile phone/cell phone/3g/... inbuilt, only wifi) and a battery to an ESP32 (new and possibly rapidly rising programmable chip, one of the few things I have seen in recent times that might one day sit alongside the arduino, pic microcontroller and raspberry pi in name recognition/market saturation) and think it is going to do things for people.

I could see some benefitting from it, indeed if it had even basic options to make mobile phone calls then my bomb making distributed fun would have little limit. As it stands I struggle to see why I would use this over said arduino, pi, pic chip, clones thereof or the like other than it coming as a full wifi enabled battery sporting thing out of the box. Minor options if you say wanted to control some custom setup (heating, audio, security, kitchen requests...) in a business with a phone wired into the complicated phone setup but most just have a tablet for that if they need it.
To that end back to looking at de googled phones.

 

[gdavies]

I personally quite like the idea of the GPIO pins been accessible, there is not much to stop this from been a flipper zero but a phone shaped version, guess it is more the idea that it is designed to be messed around with

 

[FAST6191]

I am still seeing this as a solution in search of a problem, or at least a very niche thing, rather than a device for its own sake, neat implementation of a common take (see something like the teensy family with their ability to fake being USB input devices but also basically be an arduino when it only had a basic serial port on its USB) or something I can take and run with vs just getting the baseline esp32 and using that instead. Not the first time my imagination has failed me though so if I am overlooking something obvious by all means showcase said failing.

Oh and forgot to mention last time that buzzword for "get blocks to add functionality to a phone" was modular. I liked that idea from both a repairability and expandability standpoint but seems every breakdown of why a project doing it failed was too expensive.

 

[User154]

I think the Fairphone deserves an honourable mention here.

Not the same in that you can't add functionality but its internals are all purposely split into easy to replace modules which they sell on their website making it very easy to repair.

The price/performance ratio is not great, however it's a fairtrade device. All materials to make it are sustainably sourced and everyone involved in every step of production gets paid a fair wage.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

After browsing the web for a phone project that has died out where people could get blocks to add function to a mobile phone I came across this little gem and thought I would share it and see what others think, It is not a smart phone but i do think it could be a fun thing to play around with

wouldn't let me post a direct link but the phone is called wiphone by indego

I remember a smartphone was being worked on that did this, it had modular blocks on the back for the camera, SoC etc. that were user replaceable. But it turned out to be vaporware, nothing ever came out of it sadly, it was a neat idea. Maybe Framework will come out with a smartphone eventually.

 

[Quanrantyl]

The Wiphone by Indego looks like an interesting project that could be a lot of fun to play around with. It allows users to add blocks to the phone to customize it and add new functions, which could be a great way to experiment with technology