I’ve been very stressed lately and have been doing some window shopping to calm down. I’m interested in gadgets, but a lot of things can just be replaced with apps. I realize a phone won’t replace very large appliances like refrigerators or washing machines so I’m trying to scope my question to portable devices. So what are some portable devices or gadgets that their specialization hasn’t been replaced by smart phone apps? Extra points if they’re super useful and reliable.
Vicegrips. Wirestrippers. A light screwdriver with common bits carried on its handle like a Sidewinder. Rake lockpick. SDR. Elevator key. Punch. File. Multimeter. Multitool with good pliers. Crank radio. Survival guide. Poncho. Silver exposure blanket. Fire starters. Multihammer thing. MREs. Good flashlight. Beater laptop like an old x200. Serial console adapter. Flares. Camping stove. Throw it all in a bugout bag after you learn how to use them.
Wilderness beacon. Rarely any signal out there. Yes you can an arm and a leg for special service though
I know some phones are starting to work with satellite comms, so these may be replaced by cell phones in the near future. At least currently, I have several friends who still have wilderness beacons.
They’ll never replace PLB/EPIRBs unless they bake in 406Mhz and 121.5Mhz communication. Satellite devices aren’t reliable enough for SAR. I’d even argue that they won’t replace Satellite Communicators - battery life isn’t good enough and the connection stability isn’t good enough
Stun guns
Actual guns
Shank
The galaxy notes solved that… when thay were around.
Electric Toothbrush. Keeping up with Dental Hygiene is important too!
Own one. Definitely recommend it and ribbon floss.
Would love to have one, but my neurologist said even slight vibrations in my mouth can fuck with my epilepsy. That means a migraine because my medicine prevents seizures. Going to the dentist is an affair that wrecks me for the whole day.
It’s OK. My dentist thinks electric toothbrushes are too harsh on your teeth and shames anyone who even brings up the subject. So at least 1 dentist thinks it’s junk. He prefers soft bristles that you softly glide across your teeth by hand.
Soft bristles are pretty much the only thing anyone should use, regardless of whether or not it’s electric. Hard bristles are too harsh on your gums.
Hi-fi audio recorders with builtin microphones. As a bass player, I deeply resent phone mics and speakers.
Phones suck for anything audio related in general.
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They’ve been bad for calling people in my experience for years.
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You underestimate my ability to find and download new music to my player. It’s not that I can’t, it’s just that I forget to.
My hands.
- A pocket notebook and a ballpoint pen, for quick note taking. Edit: add to that a pocket watercolor set and a brush, for quick sketching
- A pocket book, for on the go reading
- My (mechanical) wrist watch
I don’t care if the smartphone can be used to take notes, to read and has an extra precise clock. I much prefer my analog tools. They don’t require upgrade, they don’t need recharging, no one will ever try to stole them (my watch is not fancy at all, it’s just mechanical ;) and, well, I prefer using those.
I’d argue phones are actually better pocket books. Assuming looking at a screen does not bother you:
- it’s much more compact, can be held in one hand and you can carry multiple 800 page books. I’ve never actually seen a pocket book that can fit in a pocket.
- you can adjust font, text size and brightness (some font choices in printed books are just terrible)
- does not need an external light source
- you can quickly look up words and take notes without needing external items
Requiring a battery is a downside but most reading apps consume very little power compared to other apps.
I’d argue phones are actually better pocket books.
It’s obviously a matter of personal preferences, which is absolutely fine.
As far as I’m concerned, I prefer print for these reasons, and for context I have been reading ebooks since I have owned a Palm Pilot PDA in the early 00s, so not reading them is a decision and a choice, it is not an allergy to them or to the tech:
- Print fully respect my privacy.
There is no tracking and no spying on my reading habits. That’s also why I read print newspapers and magazines as much as I can. - No remote deleting of ebooks after purchase.
Like Amazon and Microsoft already did. They refunded customers but that’s not how private property is supposed to work: I pay for a good, I own it its previous owner taht sold it to me can’t decide to enter my home to take it back, even if they were to leave some cash on the table. - No remote editing possible.
No matter if one book or one word in it suddenly becomes unpopular or offensive to anyone. - No notifications, social media, games, email, whatever, to distract me.
- Does not need external light either.
Try to beat day light and at night, or when the sun plays hide 'n seek, well, I have access to this revolutionary piece of high-tech called ‘lamps’ that are lying around absolutely everywhere in our home and, as far as I can tell, are also everywhere I may find myself wanting to read a book. - Does not need batteries, and no recharging.
The same with my watch, btw: no battery, just a spring I rewind every morning after I shower and when I put it to my wrist. It has been working wonder for years and its manufacturer has yet to send my a message telling my watch is tool old and I need to purchase a new model to get updates… because there are none ;) - Does not need app and system updates.
- Does not need Internet.
- Unlike a smartphone, a book itself does not need to be replaced every few years by a new one (aka creating always more e-waste). Talking about phones, here, not e-readers that may last many, many years.
BTW, I seldom need to quickly look up a word either. When I don’t know a word and if I can’t figure out its meaning by using the context it is used in, aka surrounding sentences, I write it down in my pocket notebook (which also requires no battery, no upgrade, doesn’t track me either, etc.) and look it back at home in one of my… paper dictionaries (which don’t push ads into my face, don’t track me, and so on)
you can adjust font, text size and brightness (some font choices in printed books are just terrible)
This is the one advantage I find to ebooks in general (the reader is in charge of the display… depending the app used) but getting that freedom you also instantly lose access to the excellent page layout many publishers work hard on. Sure there are a few dickheads in the field but a majority are not at least those whose catalog I enjoy reading.
And, most ebook page layout is, well, what word did you use? Terrible? You would be right.
I’ve never actually seen a pocket book that can fit in a pocket.
There are (I would say I can fit most poetry books and many plays in my jeans back pocket but I don’t really), the idea is that those small books are easy to carry and are cheap (at least back in then they were supposed to be). It also depends a lot what one reads.
Edit:
it’s much more compact, can be held in one hand and you can carry multiple 800 page books.
I don’t need to carry that. On my desk I have dozens of books and references volumes opened at once (that would be expensive to do the same with multiple phones, right? ;) but I only carry with me a single pocket book so I can read on the go. I do not need my entire library, not even a couple 800, or even 1600 pages books ;)
Edit: if you’re willing to read more of my reasoning to stop using ebooks (I should say ebooks sold by Gafam, as I will still by self-published ebooks when there are DRM-free and there is no print available) and refocus my reading on print instead, I’ve published a couple blog post. Link in my profile.
About half of those issues are solved by drm-free ebooks (or piracy). True, a phone comes with extra work (charging, updating, upgrading every few years) so if you’re not already maintaining one you obviously won’t do it just to read books.
The rest is up to use case. I do need to look up words a lot (usually in other languages) and a bus stop after dark will never have enough light for reading. If you read at home I guess these aren’t issues, but pocket books are meant to be read on the road.
About the formatting there are some books which should absolutely not be read as ebooks cause you’ll miss out on things. But most books are a block of text split in chapters and paragraphs. A phone can absolutely support that.
Anyway, it’s mostly up to use case and preference as you say.
About half of those issues are solved by drm-free ebooks
My iPhone or Kindle will still track my reading habits when I read a drm-free or pirated book (which I tend to avoid as I want to support authors and publishers and I can afford to). For years, I have been using a Kindle that I disconnected from the Web after activation, it was working fine but then I realized we should not have to fight that situation to begin with: our privacy should be respected out of the box. Since I decided to not compromise anymore on that, well, I quit using those device. Like I said, it’s just a personal choice in favor of my privacy (not an allergy to tech itself, just to the way it has been hijacked to become a spying tool)
I do need to look up words a lot (usually in other languages)
So do I (be it in my native French and in the few others I pretend to speak). But like I said, I also never need to get instant access to a dictionary either. So it can wait I get back home.
and a bus stop after dark will never have enough light for reading. If you read at home I guess these aren’t issues, but pocket books are meant to be read on the road.
I would say (pocket) books are meant to be read and would not have any expectation on where and when people are supposed to be reading them. Then, I don’t read when I’m moving (I get sick). I will read at a bus stop or waiting in a line anywhere if there is enough light. If there is not enough, I will either write stuff in my notebook (even dim light is enough to jot down quick notes), or I will think about stuff.
About the formatting there are some books which should absolutely not be read as ebooks cause you’ll miss out on things. But most books are a block of text split in chapters and paragraphs. A phone can absolutely support that.
Typography and page layout was once a thing. It was considered kind of an art form even. I feel a bit sad to see it boiled down to some ‘block of text split in chapters’ but it could also just be a sign that I’m getting old and out of touch. Which is to be expected too ;)
Thx for the discussion, it was interesting.
After seeing the edits, it seems we have wildly different use cases/priorities. I’ll check the blog too, it seems interesting, thanks.
Typography and page layout was once a thing. It was considered kind of an art form even.
Honestly I’d love to see that because it feels pretty rare right now.
I carry a jailbroken Kobo with wifi disabled. That solves most of the issues you have described here. I sideload DRM-free ebooks. I can’t stand reading text on my phone’s LCD screen (and OLED is worse), but eink screens are totally different, my eyes like them.
Does not need external light either
Lamps exist
That’s exactly what external light means. If you need to sit near a lamp to read your book, then you are relying on external light.
Btw, I agree with the point in general you’re trying to make. Physical books and physical note taking still have a place and are often gone forgotten and underutilized. They can promote greater information retention, due to the tactile experience being mixed into the reading/writing experience.
I carry a jailbroken Kobo with wifi disabled
I used to that with a Kindle. See my answer to the other comment why I decided I did not want to do it anymore.
That’s exactly what external light means. If you need to sit near a lamp to read your book, then you are relying on external light.
The idea was that I do not need an extra light because, well, there are plenty all around but, you’re right, that’s what an extra light means. They’re just already there ;)
The idea was that I do not need an extra light because, well, there are plenty all around
The biggest counterpoint I have is simply that I enjoy camping. Good luck finding a desk lamp when you’re 5 miles into the woods. And I’m not wasting my flashlight’s precious battery life on reading.
- Print fully respect my privacy.
Books.
The kindle app might be convenient but it’s shit compared to an actual book.
Books are my fondest indulgence as I age. I’m an absolute Aztec history dork and a screen doesn’t do any Mesoamerican codex justice.
I buy more odd art books than I should.
Do you have any recommendations ?
Art books or Aztec history?
I inherited my mum’s first edition copies. She worked in publishing and had some great stories. She met Tolkien and Ian Fleming through her job.
So, no, kindle, you cannot compete with that.
She met those two? Plus first editions?
Damn that’s awesome
Sidenote, a huge thank you to the lady at Barnes & Noble who pointed this book out to me. I had no idea it even existed. I knew about Lord of the rings. I just didn’t know about this exact edition.
Almost any gadget to some degree.
Mobile phone has a lot of features for sure, you can have anything from cameras to navigation, flashlight, MP3 player etc but none of those features can really match to a purpose built device.
Mobile phones get especially crippled when you’re days out without a chance to charge.
Mobile phones get especially crippled when you’re days out without a chance to charge.
For some reason, US options for large-battery smartphones are limited, but there are a number of manufacturers in China that make very-large-battery smartphones. These are sometimes described as “ruggedized” and also have a large, durable case. There’s a class of “ruggedized” laptops, like the Toughbook, that fill a similar role for laptops (though those are pretty pricey).
https://www.amazon.com/DOOGEE-MAX-Smartphone-22000mAh-Unlocked/dp/B0BRQ3KKQK
https://chinagadgetsreviews.com/oukitel-wp100-titan-rugged-smartphone-with-built-in-projector.html
These have batteries maybe four or more times the capacity of a typical smartphone.
It’s also possible to carry a USB powerstation. That’s a little obnoxious for day-to-day carry, but if you’re going to be away from electricity for days on end, you’re probably going to be carrying some kind of gear anyway, and there aren’t any limits on how much capacity you haul that way.
While it’s not an electronic device, my wife says makeup mirrors. Yes, you can reverse the camera and use your phone as a mirror, but she says it’s not as good as a real mirror.
Phone cameras are kind of useless for makeup. It’s just good for checking if your hair and lipstick are in place, also if you have food on your chin.
Pagers for Hospitals.
To be clear: Hospitals use pagers because they use a longer (and much lower bandwidth) wavelength, which is affected less by things like thick fire-resistant walls. Hospitals are built like bunkers so that things like fires don’t require the entire building to be evacuated. Pagers can still reliably get signal even in the basement of a hospital, when behind multiple fire-resistant walls and solid concrete floors. Texting has effectively replaced pagers for 99% of the population. But hospitals still use them because reliability is prioritized in the medical world; No hospital wants to lose a patient because a doctor was in the basement and didn’t get a text.
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This is funny, just yesterday I randomly found phones with built-in VHF/UHF radios on Aliexpress. To be fair, they look super clunky and are very expensive for off-brand Chinese phones ($800+), but they do exist. I wonder who buys them.
CB radios are still widely used by truck drivers. Listening to the CB on long trips can sometimes be very entertaining.
Even if you use a radio without a license, most of the time, nothing will happen. The FCC (at least, before 2025) wont care if you talk to your friends using radio without a license.
Caveat to this: If you use these radios on amateur bands without licenses, you should expect legal problems. Operating them on FRS, MURS, GMRS, or PLMRS bands is far less likely to upset anyone.
Laptops! I have a gaming desktop computer and also a gaming laptop that I use if I’m going to be somewhere other than my house for more than a day. Mobile games pail in comparison to what can be played on a decent gaming laptop. I wouldn’t even think about trying to run even a rudimentary 3D game on my 3~ish year old smartphone which has 3-5 seconds of input lag for everything LMAO
Another light-emitting device: laser pointer. I don’t know of a phone that comes with an LED laser; it’s probably only a matter of time, but even then it’ll probably be - like a lot of other things - a handy-to-have-in-an-emergency app, but not a practical substitute for a real laser.
AGM Glory G1S
Thermal camera?? Yeah, Ok, you may have something there.
What’s an LED laser?
A laser where the light is generated by an LED, as opposed to the more historical synthetic ruby or (argon or other) gas laser.
Original lasers were a tube with a fully reflective mirror on one end and a partially reflective mirror on the other. Some single-wavelength light emitter was inside - synthetic ruby, or a (noble? Not sure if they were always noble gases) gas. Electricity excited the light emitter, and it’d bounce around and back and forth between the mirrors, one of which was set up to allow light of only one polarity to pass. Then there’d usually be a focusing lens to account for spread you couldn’t completely control with the mirrors, and that’s how you’d get Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation.
We still do this for big lasers, but for small applications LEDs can be used to generate the coherent light, and you still need a lens because the LED is still basically just a kind of LED flashlight; the lens focuses it into a beam.
Thank you, I did a quick google but all I was seeing was articles explaining difference between an LED and a laser, none were saying you could use LEDs to make a laser.
