I think the main thing is that for this kind of money you have a lot of options. You could even buy a GPD device that is an actual full blown pouch sized laptop and buy a regular iPhone for the same price.
[–] Shank 4 days ago
[–] Grombobulous 4 days ago
When I travel solo I take my AYN Odin 2 Portal with me for gaming. That thing has a battery that’s twice the size of a typical smartphone and it can play games pretty much all day before the battery dies, while my phone is in my pocket fully charged ready to be useful at my destination.
If I played games on my phone during the plane ride I’d arrive at my destination with a seriously depleted battery and charging anxiety, or I’d need to travel with a spare battery.
Is this setup bulkier than an iPhone Duo? Sure. The AYN Odin 2 Portal is also a $230 device.
[–] larme 4 days ago
OTOH I have used my iPhone pro max for development for a long long time. The trick is to use a always-on linux VPS pairing with many excellent terminal emulators on iPhone (e.g. blink.sh).
Essentially I'm using iPhone as a thin client to visit a true linux development machine, and both of them play their roles perfectly. While other solutions while trying to be both roles with a single device failed miserably.
[–] wyre 4 days ago
Why would I want the ergonomics of a small laptop when a folding phone and bluetooth keyboard is much better?
What software do you need that android cannot support? Surely ssh or tailscale can fill that gap.
[–] Grombobulous 3 days ago
[–] koziserek 3 days ago
[–] Klonoar 3 days ago
Eventually you will come to realize that the desktop/laptop app paradigm is wrong and that Android and iOS have it right.
[–] Grombobulous 2 days ago
If every device could be Linux-based with good touch screen and phone UI I would prefer that.
I have done this! I currently carry a GPD Win Max 2 around, but let me be clear about some elements of this: the keyboard on a sub-device is just as important as any other, and the keyboard on GPD devices is not great. A sub-device has to be maintained and charged and given love and care just the same as any other device. The amount of times I have found my cute linux laptop dead when I wanted it, outdated, or randomly signed out of services is quite high (and this is with an onboard LTE modem). Carrying around a folding (or even non-folding, like a Magic Keyboard) is lighter than a sub-device, will last significantly longer in terms of charge/battery, and does not require any of the secondary device maintenance that is needed with one normally.
To me a folding phone is an absolute no-brainer in terms of why it is useful. You can get a very, very good keyboard for cheap, or try many, and completely eliminate the need to carry a second device.
Another huge use case I have is transit/travel video playback. I do not normally want to bring an iPad or even a secondary laptop during travel, so this effectively deletes one more device that I have to charge, update, bring adapters for, etc. It is effectively all of the benefit of having a tablet at all times, a sub-laptop at all times, and requires absolutely no additional charging or maintenance.