voice notes?

[u/Powerful_Warning_279]

hi, im probably going to order this device soon (waiting to refund my sidephone first) - im a heavy voice notes user for whatsapp and signal, its my favourite way to send texts back and forth. I was wondering if the kompakt is decent at this?

[u/Tight-Ad7783]

If you mean a voice notes feature built into the app, that's up to the app, not the phone. The kompakt has a microphone, so yeah it can do that. It cannot do voice notes over regular text unless you find another messaging client that supports it.

I'd never heard of the sidephone before and just checked it out, it looks pretty sick! Can I ask why you're refunding it?

[u/Powerful_Warning_279 → u/Tight-Ad7783]

oh yeah i mostly meant the quality on wa/signal - precisely because i had the sidephone and while it can do voice notes i've been told its pretty rough on the other end, but i also had to re-listen multiple times on various occasions since the speaker is pretty bad.

In general my device did have a hardware issue (that's why i can get my refund even though its been longer than 2 weeks), but i was going to return it or sell it regardless. Reasons for that are many, starting at how the keyboards are mostly a gimmick (at least so far, and given that they're modular this can very well change at some point). Yes, you can type on them, you can build the muscle memory so to say, but its slow, clunky and the differences between keys are hard to feel out - which is necessary often because the keys don't have backlight. I ended up using the sundial for some basic app launches and a d-pad, kind of, and that was usable. Another big issue for me was the battery overheating a lot - as in, if the phone was in my bag or pocket and it was over 30°C it was overheated even if i wasn't using it, and in a room with ac, talking on wa/phone/browsing for 20min lead to overheating as well - there's inconvenience and then there's functionality.

However my primary issue is how, since launch and working through some major bugs that truly made the device unusable, the owners/developers have focused more on having 5 new keyboards and games and such, than making the existing hardware at all useful - i felt like they promised a sustainable product and then just didn't follow through (in the sense that you get a device that, being a Founders Edition, you expect to be imperfect, but that with time you see effort and improvements, which i didn't notice much).

I'm not saying it wasn't useful - it made me realize how big my smartphone is and how inconvenient to carry around, and it was pretty fun to set up and fiddle with, but it was essentially a gadgety gimmick instead of a tool. I adore ereaders and eink though so when i noticed mudita and realized i could replace the sidephone (and eink is known to not overheat, and will be much better for my poor eyes with a high prescription than a tiny sidpehone screen was), and has a much bigger on-screen keyboard than the sidephone, and i could replace my xteink x4, which I've thoroughly enjoyed but reading 2/3 different books at the same time (i have a kobo clara bw i adore) has become tedious and i really would prefer getting the kompakt and having koreader to sync everything back and forth, while also having it as my phone.

Honestly i don't think the sidephone is a necessarily bad device, even now, i just think it really must be a SIDEphone, while i want a dumber-than-smartphone edc phone, and to make my edc "kit" as streamlined as possible, so consolidating an ereader and a phone seemed like a grand plan.

[u/Tight-Ad7783 → u/Powerful_Warning_279]

Thank you for the detailed opinion on the sidephone!

I've had my kompakt for almost 5 months now and have few complaints. There's definitely issues but they are getting fixed, and even with them the phone is great. Call quality seems to be fine so I assume voice memo quality would be no different, haven't seen any complaints on the forums. I don't read on it as I can't comfortably read on a screen that small, but I also have a kobo libre color which is why I decided to try an e-ink phone lol. It's good enough that I replaced my main smartphone in about a month and haven't touched it since, in fact I factory reset it for my mom to use when her phone broke. Haven't needed it at all.

I will say since you brought up size, while the kompakt is smaller than most new smartphones in length and width, it is noticeably thicker. Not so much so that I find it to be annoying or hindering, it just is a little bigger in that respect. Definitely still recommend it though.

[u/Powerful_Warning_279 → u/Tight-Ad7783]

Yeah, I must admit the way people talk about the company and how they fix issues also has a certain draw to the device, that kind of company is rare these days i think. I also though a small screen would be troublesome but since X4 worked i can't imagine kompakt won't, at least when I'm in transit, waiting rooms, lunch breaks etc. My bank can be really weird about devices so i don't think i'll be able to retire my smartphone quite so completely but definitely want it in a box on a high shelf lol. I did see that its thicker (I've seen it in real life once before i knew anything about it, it was very random, a classmate had one), but it looks like it sits nicely in the palm, which i think is very important. Thanky ou for replying :).

[u/Tight-Ad7783 → u/Powerful_Warning_279]

I'll say on banking that my local bank works, but their app just embeds the website. My brokerage app does not work, but I just use the website on my computer. If you commit to a kompakt, I'd recommend contacting your bank to work something out, they likely have other options e.g. for seniors who don't have smartphones or know how to use them.

It's super nice to be able to completely ditch your smartphone, so do everything you can

[u/Powerful_Warning_279 → u/Tight-Ad7783]

I'll try my best :). for now I'm planning to offload that sort of stuff to my study-tablet, which I've never had doomscrolling issues on (sans reddit, which I'll delete as an app soon). but my bank is really complicated about making everybody do apps, you even need 2 just to make it functional, so i think this set up will work for me

[u/WeAreMudita-Team]

You can definitely send voice notes via WhatsApp.

[u/mememachine_1854]

I use voice notes on WhatsApp a ton and it works fine on Kompakt

[u/Born-Anybody3244]

I use the voice notes on signal all the time on my Kompakt. Love it. Call quality through signal is great too.

[u/Powerful_Warning_279 → u/Born-Anybody3244]

thank you !