Usable Smartphones?

Sunspark

I've decided to keep the A70. It's not a perfect device (oled is pwm for one and the software isn't Apple perfect), but I'm getting more used to it, and for the price it's a good value (the A70 is Note 10+ sized but 1/3rd the price). I spent most of yesterday in bed, and according to digital wellbeing I was on it for 12 hours, and this is before the matte skin for the screen has arrived. The M8's battery is now so dead that even when charged to 100% it powered itself off almost right away due to the colder temperatures in my place. I hope that California law for right-to-repair gets traction (will probably lead to replaceable batteries again).

In 2020, Apple is putting out a SE 2 and it will be interesting to see how that is for a compact. I do like compacts. If it works out, instead of a phablet jumbo phone, to pair the compact with an ipad mini for when a larger screen is needed.

Seanicus

I just want to report that I finally cracked after experiencing bad migraines with my HTC M8 and picked up an iPhone 11 yesterday. I've been testing it out on low brightness and so far it's been really good and appears to cause less migraines than my past iPhones (SE, 6s,7). I will report again if that changes.

Gurm

Seanicus this would be great. I am about to switch to an iPhone 7+ due to my M8 finally dying... but if the 11 is good I will happily go on payments with a phone that works for me. Let us know in a few days how you are feeling with it.

Also, was your HTC M8 on Lollipop or Marshmallow? I found that keeping it on Lollipop made the display 100x better than letting it update, but it is so busted now that I can barely use it most days.

deepflame

Bought a Google Pixel 3a and it is the best phone for ages now.

Had an iPhone 6 Plus before which caused strain immediately. I seem to have issues with Apple products in general. Apple TV dithers a lot as well and caused strain. Only iPhone which seems ok in the store is an iPhone 8 plus.

The Pixel 3a (not the 3) uses an Oled screen which caused a bit strain for one day but everything good now.

Have not seen any better phone in stores yet.

Edit: It is running Android 10, the one in the store also had Android 10. Comes with 9, but not sure if this was worse for the eyes.

JTL

deepflame Pixel 3 and 3a are both OLED.

Enjoy the new phone 😃

Kind of wish I had one.

deepflame

JTL Thanks! Yeah, but the Pixel 3 seemed worse for some reason. Not sure why. Maybe because it ran Android 9 (?).

The Pixel 3a is also way cheaper, so really happy with it so far.

Sunspark

deepflame The Pixel 3 uses LG screens. With the 3a it is Samsung only and for the 3a XL it is both Samsung and LG I believe. I had the 3a XL briefly and I agree with you it's a decent device. The only reason I sent it back was because the XL's screen wasn't evenly shaded. Android 10 for my device probably won't arrive till next year, enjoy. 🙂

Gurm

deepflame if Android 10 fixes whatever subpixel fuckery was present in Android 6->9, I'll be a happy camper. Like, I'll go pay actual cash money for a Pixel 3a. I wonder if Sunspark or one of the other people who has my type of eyestrain can try one and comment?

Sunspark

Gurm I'll check it out. If the Costco kiosk with their devices showing screen burn is still on 9, then I'll check them out at the Google booth at Best Buy after the weekend.

It's too bad OLED screens wear out causing colour shifts and image burn-in. LCD lasts forever but their backlight does not.

Incidentally I noticed today using the display tester app "banding, contrast, saturation" (swipe to adjust brightness, hold down to fullscreen) that my M8 is not presenting 24 bit colour properly. The gradient has defined circular edges and on the "real world photos" test for the dark image the M8 displays macroblocks on the water. On the A70 the gradient is a smooth blur and photo also blurs away the macroblocks. Interesting.

Sunspark

Took a look at the 3a XL, it was on Android 10.

Seemed usable, not worse than what I have which is good. I didn't spend too much time with it as the store was going to be closing soon but seemed ok. Kiosk did not have the non-XL. I recommend changing colour profile on that one to boosted and bumping up the text size a notch.

Gurm, if you decide to give it a shot, if you order it from Google's store you will have 2 weeks to return it should you decide to. You can also take a look at it at Best Buy. Remember you are not used to OLED today and you will need more than a few minutes to get used to it before deciding nah.

Gurm

I may give it a shot. Seriously, if they fixed this in Android 10, we should mount a campaign to figure out - it's open source, after all - what changed... and then push to backport it into Windows, XBox, PS4, etc.

JTL

Gurm The only problem with that is the amount of changes in Android versions are so large that the only person who could possibly know either a) works or has worked at Google or b) works for Samsung, LG, Huawei, etc. and undoubtedly they would probably both be busy. Not saying not to try, just keep that in mind.

diop

Gurm Seriously, if they fixed this in Android 10, we should mount a campaign to figure out - it's open source, after all - what changed... and then push to backport it into Windows, XBox, PS4, etc.

I agree. The issue is obviously that of control and access to the inner-workings of the software. This is why I am so surprised it hasn't been resolved on Linux as it truly is open, community-driven software. Nouveau is open source.

I believe that PA is open-source too (as well as many Android ROMs) so given how many years these problems have been in place it's funny that nobody at xda forums or similar could help.

What we can largely agree on is these issues are now ubiquitous on essentially all modern devices (TV's/Smartphones/PC's/Games Consoles). Are manufacturers using worse panels than in 2010? I doubt it, as we're being told year-on-year they're getting better all the time. Is dithering a necessity given the resolution and clarity of graphics nowadays? Even when using a bad phone or PC, tbh the picture isn't that much different to old tech in terms of clarity and colour (At least with my modest budget IMO). Also VGA could practically output HD resolutions over a decade ago.

Gurm

JTL Yeah, I'm painfully aware of how hard it is, but it's not unheard of. Certainly we could try to get someone at AOSP to look over the display stack, and if a culprit can be identified we can reverse engineer it and figure out a way (driver? dongle?) to compensate/fix it.

Gurm

Tried out a friend's Pixel 3 at lunch. It was... ok? Might be able to make it work for me. Definitely 100x better than most phones. Probably on par with an iPhone 7+/8+ for me.

Gurm

Gurm Interestingly, the Pixel 3 and 3aXL have the same DPI and screen tech. The 3a has a different screen spec. I'm going to try to go to Best Buy later and check one out...

Peter

Gurm
Did you manage to test the Pixel 3a?

Giunti

Hello I've been following the forum for about 1 year. I can't use the phone except Samsung S6 Edge Plus. I had to sell my Note8 after the pie update.

SeniorTaquito

I'm able to use a samsung galaxy s8+ running android 9 but have some strain on the note 10 which is running a later build of android 9. What's most noticeable is the One UI version which is 1.0 on the s8+ is 1.5 on the note10. Not sure if this is what's causing the strain. Does anyone know if I can downgrade to the build running on my s8+?

SeniorTaquito

SeniorTaquito to give an update... after using the note 10 sporatically over a week or 2, I can now use it without issue.

Ramboo

The best phone for the eye without any problem i have so far is the huawei p30 pro but you have to enable eye comfort mode and check on reduce flicker and make the color temperature slider on the middle. Also put screen resolution to FHD+, color mode to Normal (not vivd), from accessibility disable color enhancment. The brightness on 30% but this is up to the user preference.
(You have to update to latest EMUI which is 9)
Maybe some of the settings I changed are not relevant but that's how I managed.
I was thinking like others here that the latest android could have a cause but now i am sure it is not. So i narrow it to the GPU and the blue light intensity of that device and less to the color enhancment which can be adjusted easily.
Can anyone try huawei p30 pro and confirm it.

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