Jolla C, the good the bad and the ugly

asked 2016-08-08 11:10:11 +0300

Nrde
1103 ●20 ●25 ●26

updated 2016-08-09 11:12:56 +0300

jiit
2678 ●32 ●58 ●59

  admin

After3 weeks of Jolla C I will try to list some the issues and impressions I have had with it. (and even though this sounds slightly negative, I still enjoy using my Jolla C more than anything else so far, except the Jolla tablet which is just a joy to use, really excellent tablet)

• form factor: It's just slightly too big for my hand size and Sailfish combo. On the other hand I have gotten more used to it with these 3 weeks. Jolla 1 could have been slighty bigger so maybe the perfect size for my hands would be something in between.

• WLAN. it's worse than Jolla 1 at least when it matters and I can see differences. At work I hardly get any signal anymore, Jolla 1 was a lot better. Jolla C connects and disconnects constantly lighting up the screen every time (a bug) and I get only one bar max at my desk. Jolla 1 was comfortably 2-3 bars all the time.

• BT, when connected to a car everything works as before, relatively quick connects etc. But for some reason when starting Nokia Here (wego) the bt volume drops to 1/3 of what it was. Even if Here did not make any audio output. i.e. if I just want to look at the map while driving I have to constantly adjust the volume from the phone to keep the music/podcast volume audible.

• camera isn't that great, but maybe expected quality for a 75€ phone.

• speaker is better than in Jolla 1, louder and fuller sound. Jolla 1 was tinnier sounding.

• overall speed / usability is more or less the same, maybe the extra ram helps in some situations but I haven't had the need to push the phone to the limits so far. Still I think the browser could make better use of the extra ram, and 2 years more recent SOC would have given some noticeable speed boost.

• USB and 3.5mm connectors seem to not be the best quality. Not all of my USB cables work anymore, they seem to be more loose than before or with Jolla 1. Also my headphones (also when connected to my bike intercom) seem to crackle a lot when the connectors move indicating the connector is more loose than before. Maybe there's some other explanation though.

• overall feel of Jolla C is on par or slighly below of what Jolla 1 feels like. But it's more comfortable in the hand because of the shape of the back cover is more rounded. The feel is less solid though.

• the screen is better especially in brighter environments. Jolla 1 was unusable in direct sunlight, Jolla C is better but still not perfect. Somewhat usable anyway. It being slighly sharper (or more pixels) doesn't really make that much of a difference. The screen felt worse for the touch in the beginning, but I've gotten used to the feel of it already.

In summary I could say that Jolla C wasn't as good as I expected it would be, some of the things can't even be fixed with sw which is a shame, but luckily the problems are not the most important aspects for me anyway. Hopefully the issues mentioned above can be fixed in future updates and the HW problems don't escalate too much from what they are now (connectors)

If I was to design a phone or next Jolla HW I would use these guidelines. - much improved camera (so I could get rid of my 2 808's) - reasonable audio quality (N9 and N900 have really good audio "path") - same level speakers is ok - 1080 5" amoled screen, tiny bevels (making it slightly smaller than Jolla C) and N9 style always on screen - good antennas/connectivity (2.4, 5GHz, N, AC, LTE) - 3GB ram (and make good use for it), qualcomm 6xx or faster, faster GPU

But yeah, it's not going to happen so maybe porting side of Sailfish community will allow me to have such a device sooner...