Hello @7sigmaDave
It would be very interesting to have a look at your phone in details. The Librem 5 has been my only phone for almost 3 years, I’ve never had to reflash and, yes, some things got worse (omg I can’t read anymore folder names in the file manager!) but the absolute majority of things keep getting better and better. And I am no fanperson.
I can easily leave home with 40% charge and hold a 2 hour conversation without fear of running out of juice. Of course, I will get home at 20% or 5% depending on what else I have running.
I use a HP 712/60 with nextstep 3 times a week and it is the fastest-feeling computer I own. So I agree with you here. Modern software sucks. I honestly wish RAM prices to multiply by 10 just so software houses stop forcing developers to ship junk.
Purism, and most of our fellow forum-dwellers, do an AWFUL job at describing what the Librem 5 is.
You will NEVER get the battery life and the performance of a modern Apple or Samsung smartphone. Forget about it. Even if Purism would have access to a priority lane at TSMC, we would still not get the same battery life. The reason: freedom.
What sold me into the Librem 5 is the fact that, instead of having a huge SoC that does everything from GPS to RAM including the modem, we have dedicated circuitry for each task, and that means that you get more ICs running and they all consume power. Now, since we are running dedicated circuitry, we have all the means, as as community, to keep the Librem 5 up-to-date even if Purism goes under.
And, most importantly, this freedom also applies to software. Apple will force (is it still true?) you to use their browser engine, meaning that every single competitor browser is just a Safari skin. Of course, Apple has an army of developers optimizing hardware and software. What about us? We can run whatever we want. The developers of your browser are not forced to do extensive testing, making sure the software sleeps aggressively to allow the system to get into a low power state, etc.. If you are like most of us, you are probably running desktop Firefox.
I am a very advanced user - I’m the kind of person who has been running an email server from my living room for 5+ years, and that’s my MAIN email. And yet, no matter how hard I optimize Firefox (I don’t even let it download custom fonts!), Firefox is by far the worst culprit when it comes to power consumption. It is not your phone call.
Does Firefox suck? Not at all. But the Web sucks. Even our forum. What is the point of that stupid animation when the forum is loading? It runs at less than 10 fps on my Librem 5 and it pushes the CPU to the top. It conveys NO INFORMATION WHATSOEVER. Turn off your modem during that loading screen and the dots will remain there forever, destroying your battery life.
Use the Librem 5 for normal offline work and the battery lasts waaaaaaaaaaay longer.
And yes other things suck, too. sudo killall waydroid is a command I use everyday, because otherwise I’m afraid my Librem 5 will never suspend and will set my handbag on fire. Sometimes a lousy tab will also have your Firefox preventing the Librem 5 from suspending. But the same freedom we have to do whatever we want with our phones, the developers of open source apps have to not really care about making sure their applications sleep and wake at the same time, or to make sure they are not getting stuck in the background for no good reason, or that they won’t sleep when idle. It still happens to me to go to my handbag, find myself at 10% battery, everything hot, and then I do a top and there’s whatever piece of crap using 100% of CPU in the background for 2h.
So, in conclusion,
I usually charge my Librem 5 only to 70%, to preserve my battery and I never run out of battery. I keep an eye to make sure I don’t keep things that don’t need to be open open (iOS and Android will force background apps to sleep at some point), and that’s pretty much it. I made dozens of Skype and Signal calls from Waydroid in the past, I use my bank, I use the GPS/Maps, I make and receive calls, I watch videos, I listen to music.
But freedom comes with a responsibility. There’s no one policing the software you want for you. You must keep an eye. We got all the software for free. Our part of the deal is to use it well, submit bug reports, help the community. This is our part in the bargain.
So, maybe reflash, maybe have a look if there’s nothing in the background during your calls. My chats (2+ years of messages) come up instantly (maybe 300ms after I tap on a thread), so maybe something was eating up your CPU?
I’ve posted a few times about how I have my Librem 5 set, check if it won’t help you. And many here are happy to help you, but make sure you give us details…
- chat is laggy: this doesn’t help anyone help you
- chat is laggy when this and that and this program is running in this version or that version: this helps
And remember… the Librem 5 is about Liberty/Freedom. It’s not about 900fps gaming or 72h battery life. It’s in the name!