Minimalism has found its way into my pockets. I’m watching it carefully, trying to figure out what will be its next step. A lot has changed recently and I can’t wait to see what’s next!
Wallet
Somewhere in 2011, I got my wallet scaled down from a sizable 1" brick into a nice, tiny pack that forces me to keep it tidy. There is no space for coins, excess of banknotes (1 max) or anything else for that matter. Every new item in my wallet replaces one of the existing items, so each thing has to be really useful to land in there. The wallet is sleek, barely visible in my pocket and so comfortable that once in a while I have to check if it’s still there (is it really a drawback?). Paper money is so yesterday.
Cameras
As a photo geek I used to own a DSLR, SLR, a party-camera (HP 320 FTW!) a couple of lenses and all sorts of lighting equipment, but as years went by, I lost more and more interest, slowly getting rid of my gear and considering replacing bulky DSLR with something smaller. They say that the best camera is the one that is always with you, after all, so I decided to get myself a Canon G12. Nice and much smaller, almost pocketable. A few months later I’ve finally acknowledged that I barely use it, because it was still pain to carry it around. Smaller doesn’t mean small. Separate charger and pretty slow reaction time didn’t help. I’ve decided that it’s time for a drastic change, I wanted something REALLY small.
Tablet + MiFi
I got myself a Nexus 7 back in the day when it still shipped with 8GB of memory. It was (and still is!) a very decent device. Prompt updates from Google are always nice and I consider a 7" device to be the best form factor out of all touch devices I had a chance to get my hands on so far. Several of my blog posts were written on it and countless hours were spent browsing internet / reading books / chatting with people. I’ve even used it as a sat nav for cycling due to a pretty chunky 4400mAh battery that lasts considerably longer than my phone. The lack of built in GSM support was a PITA that forced me to buy a MiFi device to provide internet on the go for the tablet. Another device to carry around, charge, remember to take with me. Not good. Also the size of the tablet was starting to be an issue for me - small enough to put into my jacket pocket while exploring city (try to do that with iPad), but not small enough to keep in my jeans pocket while in the pub, etc. Time for a drastic change.
Phone
For the past 2+ years I carried ZTE Blade with a custom rom and overclocked processor from the day 1. It is a really pleasant phone that can be bought for £60-£70 these days. Decent screen (480x800, 3.5") and not that terrible specs, but nothing amazing, especially in 2013. It did the job, especially paired with the tablet. The battery lasted for 3-4 days, mainly because I tried to use tablet for all multimedia tasks. Tablet+Mifi+phone combo worked well most of the time, provided quite pleasant experience (both tablet and phone running on the newest Android 4.2.2), but you can’t always have all these devices with you. Also, the battery started acting weird since I upgraded from 2.3.7 to 4.2.2, so I had to use either an old SonyEricsson phone or a tablet as a backup alarm clock. Not good. Time for a drastic change.
Looking for a solution
I looked at all the issues described above and came to one conclusion: It’s time to get rid of all that big, bulky, inefficient stuff and replace it with something much smaller, yet better quality. I’ve short listed my requirements:
- has to be a phone - I want to have one device that Does It All™
- very good camera - I’m getting rid of my Canon camera, so I need a replacement
- good specs - the phone waits for me and not the opposite
- good screen - I want to be able to read a book on it on the go, perhaps watch a film on a plane
- very good battery life / extended battery option - what’s good a powerful phone if you can’t use it?
- good price - I don’t want to spend a fortune on it
I found only one device that ticked all the boxes, a phone that I customised (as with every electronic piece of equipment that I own), that runs beautifully and meets all my needs - Samsung Galaxy S3.
One device for all digital needs
I got it used from eBay for a decent price and bought a MASSIVE 7000mAh battery for it. I’ve replaced the stock software with nightly CyanogenMod 10.1 to get experience as close to Nexus device as possible. It’s a beast. Snappy, pretty, taking amazing photos (for a phone) and lasts forever on a single charge. Quoting classic, “on a scale 1-10 it’s a definite win”. I’m still getting used to the size (change from 3.5" to 4.8" is not a small one), but I’m sure it’s not going to be a problem after a few weeks.
All in all, I retired my camera, tablet, MiFi and two phones and replaced it all with just a single device. WOW.
Another options?
Samsung S4 has better specs and available 7500mAh battery, but is much more expensive. Samsung S4 mini or its successor could perhaps replace my current setup. I’d probably trade smaller overall size for smaller screen (obviously) if the rest of specs stayed decent. There’s a bunch of phones that match my criteria with the exception of battery life, which is a shame. I don’t understand phone manufacturers creating devices that barely last 1 day of moderate usage. I can’t be the only person who wants to be sure that no matter what I do during the day, I’m still going to have some battery juice left before going to bed!
The future is bright
Currently I’m waiting for Google Wallet to become available in UK to test it and perhaps get rid of another thing to carry around. I doubt I’d stop carrying my wallet completely (it’s not only credit cards!), but who knows.
Another, more interesting application would be to replace my laptop with my phone, using this dock. It features HDMI port, 3 USB ports, AUX out and micro USB for power. I use external screen most of the time anyway and I’m sure that S3’s specs would be good enough to run tools that I use for web development. Canonical is working on an operating system that combines Android and Ubuntu Desktop. Can’t wait to see it happen!
Do you feel like your devices own you? Did you recently got rid of a bunch of electronics? Show your story in comments below!
