I’ve in all probability examined near 100 low cost telephones over the past 9 years, and I’ve by no means actually needed to fear about bringing a backup in case issues go awry. Budget telephones are often sluggish however work effectively sufficient. But I virtually instantly regretted not bringing a spare smartphone after I took the HMD Fusion on a brief journey to a different state.
The first pattern of this Android telephone stored freezing and restarting itself on the best way to the airport. Then, additional fueling my panic, it might boot up the house display screen however my passcode would not work. “Passcode is incorrect.” What? Thankfully, a compelled restart would set it again to regular. However, for the whole lot of the weekend of my pal’s marriage ceremony in Kentucky, the Fusion would restart itself consistently. It additionally refused to launch Slack—although that will have been a blessing as work was off my thoughts that complete time.
HMD stated it couldn’t replicate my points, so the corporate despatched me one other unit. It’s been completely advantageous. It’s arduous to instantly shift gears after being so pissed off at this black monolith, however this can be a first rate $300 telephone. It additionally has a trick up its sleeve that no different telephone has right now: mods.
Return of the Modular Phone
HMD won’t be a reputation you are accustomed to, so to recap rapidly, it is a Finnish firm that licensed the Nokia model to churn out Nokia Android smartphones and have telephones (aka dumb telephones). It started doing this in 2017, however earlier this yr, the corporate introduced that whereas it might nonetheless make Nokia telephones, it additionally plans to craft telephones below its namesake (which, by the best way, stands for Human Mobile Devices). Its function telephone enterprise continues too, with greater collaborations like The Boring Phone and the Barbie Phone.
The HMD Fusion is a kind of gadgets (there was additionally the Skyline and the Vibe). It has a give attention to repairability—simply take away a handful of screws and you may substitute most of the elements, from the battery to the display screen, and the corporate plans to hold these elements for 7 years. (Much of that is wanted to stick to imminent legal guidelines within the European Union.)
But what makes it actually stand out are the pogo pins on the again. In reality, the entire again of the telephone appears to be like as if it is incomplete. That’s as a result of you possibly can connect “Outfits,” as HMD calls them. These modular parts can change the telephone’s look with totally different coloration backings. They do not magnetically stick like iPhones and MagSafe. Instead, these Outfits are like instances, and the pogo pins do not simply switch energy however knowledge as effectively.
Photograph: Julian Chokkattu