Wish List 2021

I've found myself with some free time, so let's talk about tech.

My Phone

I've got an old phone. I'm rocking the OnePlus 6T, a 2018 phone from a Chinese manufacturer. Although it's aging, it suits my needs. Most importantly, there isn't any phone out there with the specs and price to offset my interest in keeping my phone for environmental reasons. I don't want to get on a soapbox here, but buying a new phone every 2 years has a larger carbon impact than keeping your old phone. The other reason is the cost, as a lot of the flagships are around $1000. I have that kind of money but it seems silly to upgrade when my current phone can do basically everything they can do.

Still, I look at current tech dreamily and wonder what if...

Dream Phone:

• Screen: Dynamic AMOLED 2X or Super Retina XDR
• Antenna: 5G
• Camera: Good camera software
• Feature: Face ID
• Feature: In-screen fingerprint reader
• Feature: Wireless charging

Samsung's Galaxy S 21 screen has 1300 nits brightness and 2,000,000:1 contrast ratio, which is about the same as Apple's iPhone 13 screen. Both operate at 120 Hz, which is nice.

Good camera software is huge. Specs like megapixels don't matter anymore. I'd take the iPhone X's older 12MP camera over my 6T's newer 16MP camera any day. At this point, it's purely software that makes for good lowlight pictures, image stabilization, and color reproduction, rather than megapixels or (as far as I can tell) focal length. Apple is king of the cameras, with Samsung close behind. It'd be nice to have a good camera again. As for number of cameras, 3 is pretty standard now.

Apple's Face ID still seems to be the best implementation of a 3D face unlock mechanism. Some Android phones have 3D face unlocks, but they don't seem to have the security of Face ID. I'm pretty sure my 6T's face unlock is 2D and can be fooled with a photograph of my face.

Face ID would be nice, but it still can't compare with the security of a fingerprint reader, especially given that everyone is wearing a mask nowadays. Surprisingly, the iPhone has no fingerprint reader while even my basic 6T has a fingerprint reader in the screen.

Wireless charging is the last thing on my list. It's also quite standard, but my current phone doesn't have it, so it's worth mentioning.

Everything else I don't care about. Storage, battery, etc. I don't care about. They're all pretty good. I'm never going to use all 256 GB available on some phones. My current phone has around a 9 hour battery life. The long-lasting iPhone 13 Pro Max's 12 hours isn't really make a huge difference to me. Either way, I'm charging my phone every night and putting on battery saver before I get to bed. I'd like an audio jack, but everyone's getting rid of it. I don't know enough about chips to say which processor is best, and my current phone was fast enough when I bought it. Operating systems are all good. Android isn't fragmented anymore, not really and iOS has so many good features I'd consider it, despite the walled garden.

We're really getting to a point where any mid-tier phone is good enough for me.

For some lulz, let's look at my last phone wish list post from 2011:

• OS: Stock Android 4
• Processor: Quad-core
• Expandable Memory: Micro SD slot
• Display Tech: Super AMOLED Plus
• Display Resolution: Full HD
• Display Size (horizontal): 4.3 - 4.5"
• Thickness: <9mm
• Battery Life: 10 hours talk time
• Charging/Connectivity: Micro USB or MHL
• Video Out: Micro HDMI or MHL 
• Back Camera: iPhone 4S or Nokia N8 quality
• Front Camera: 5 megapixels
• 4G: LTE or T-Mobile HSPA+
• Design Other: Camera button, Kickstand
• Other: Gorilla Glass or Fortified glass screen , DLNA, NFC,  Pixel Qi?
• Price: $200

lol. We've grown fond of our huge phones now, but I do miss camera buttons and audio jacks and $200 flagship phones.