Librem 5 Shipping Batches

So since I ordered in august 2019 Im guessing mine will ship q4 2020? Im gonna have to get another spy brick in the mean time I guess.

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I just received an email stating I’d get an email in the next few weeks verifying my information. I think I’ll learn my ship-date then.

Though I doubt I’ll be in an early batch, I am happy for all the early backers. Share your pics and videos! This is finally happening :sunglasses:

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I wonder how much of a ripple this will have or will they (Apple,Google,MS,Amazon) try to muzzle it? I think the more rebellious this is seen, the more valuable the original phones will be. I can’t wait for mine no matter what I get, as long as I can upgrade the features. :penguin:

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I realized that after I re-read the business. They could have lead with the batches modifiable by the customer, though based on priority of the initial order. Yes, the message was there. It is easier to state things so confusing with the business of batching order variation stated in the beginning of the announcement.

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No.
As a rule of thumb, I’d guess:
Order 2017 --> shipping 2019
Order 2018 --> Q1 2020
Order 2019 --> Q2 2020

Nobody will be in the Fir batch (at least not automatically).
He says “… including the public plans for the second revision of the phone for context”

This is to say “look, we are transparent: we hope to ship a more energy efficient model v2 in Q4 2020 - don’t come back complaining later we didn’t tell you upfront”
If current orders can already switch to a v2 will be seen when we get our confirmation emails.

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Try this in the meantime. Discussed here. Still technically a “spybrick” but better than your average spybrick in my book.

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At this point in time, I would have no problem waiting on the Fir batch so long as they might commit to such a production. The downside of the announcement is what delay they put those through who initially defer in favor of the Fir batch and then don’t have such a batch planned. Hopefully, they will quickly voice their ability to go in with the 2nd generation and not leave those adopting for Fir some months out into Evergreen before noting that there is no further iteration yet pending and they have delayed in the wait to no avail.

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They wouldn’t state it if they were not pretty confident.
For comparison, during the initial campaign they did NOT commit to i.MX8 (but i.MX6), because of a lack of confidence.

The development of a v2 with a shrinked CPU is peanuts in comparison to what they did so far. Possibly they have a commitment from NXP that a shrinked CPU should be available by then. So, the worst I’d expect is the usual delay :wink:

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PinePhone general consumer variant ships March-ish. Depending on how early you need a new phone, you could opt for a PinePhone over a spy brick which would hold you over for 6-9 months while waiting for the v2 librem5 to ship

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Firstly: thanks to all the people working on this project. I understand that no one is as disappointed as you with this delay.

I can’t say I’m overjoyed. If I was writing a headline it would go something like “Librem 5 delayed until Q2 2020, pre-production units offered to placate angry mob”.

What really annoys me is the attempt to spin bad news as good news. Particularly galling is the claim of transparency when this delay must have been forseen some time ago. I suspected something had gone very wrong with the release schedule when the “runs on Librem 5” videos slowed, then stopped without a subsequent triumphant shipping announcement. Purism’s communication has been frustratingly bad, I still don’t know if video out will use HDMI or DP.

Having said that, Purism deserves credit for finding a way to (technically) live up to their promise to ship Q3 2019. I can imagine the panic that led to this somewhat bodged solution. I wish them well and urge them not to lose sleep over this. Purism seem to be genuinely trying to live up to their promises in the face of set-backs, for that they deserve our understanding and respect.

Me, I’ll probably opt for Fir and make do with my aging Jolla until then. More RAM in Fir would make that worthwhile (hint hint), in 15 months 3GB will be approaching laughable.

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IMHO this announcement is a nice try to gain more time to finalize the Librem5 phone since I would expect most buyers to wait for a stable and mature phone hardware and only some early adapters in need of a phone hardware will jump in to get the first batches.

A free phone is not an easy thing to develop so i think it is OK (to me) and somehow not surprising to need more time to finalize the phone.

I hope they have enough money to pay the production :wink:

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My assumption is that the first four batches will be much smaller than that. Together, I think they will account for less than 10% of the total shipments. They have individually-milled cases, and mechanical design iterations. The first two have PCB design iterations.

Hidden details: rampant speculation on batch sizes.

To me, it would make sense for Purism to order as few as possible of the first revision PCB. Judging by the recent pictures of the PCB, the first revision is panellised 2 per panel, so depending on the supplier they might have as few as 20 of those individual boards. I’d be surprised if Aspen is more than 100 phones.

Birch has another new PCB, so I think that will be a small batch too. It would be crazy to order 1000 new revision PCBs without first ordering a smaller batch to verify that they work correctly. Again, I’d expect closer to 100 than 1000.

They’ll also be refining the mechanical components; the case and the switch caps. Early revision PCBs can potentially be modded by hand to correct design errors, but if the outer cases of the phones turn up warped or with screw holes in the wrong place or something, then it might not be economical to modify them. An expensive error. So, they will definitely need to order small quantities of those sorts of things first.

Maybe the batch size of Chestnut and Dogwood will be based on small batches of mechanical components from a supplier? Or maybe they will be using them to ramp up their production processes and figure out how to assemble these phones efficiently in large quantities. It’s hard to guess. I don’t think they would just release two arbitrary batches of phones that aren’t driven by any particular requirement.

Edit: I assumed that the first two batches had PCB design iterations. It’s just occurred to me that this is not necessarily true. It could be that they are just different batches of assembled PCBs. I’m not in the mood to think it through again based on different assumptions.

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Me too please (Aug 25 2017) because the not knowing is killing me!!!

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Ah, you’re adorable :slight_smile: Ordering on day two of the campaign and wondering whether that will entitle you for Aspen. :grin:
Even if you are not, it will entitle you to fill a slot somebody leaves.

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My notification E-mail ended up in the spam folder.

Be sure to check yours!!

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Oh, honestly it was so long ago I forgot when they even started past being some time in 2017. I remember faking shock with my human resources department on the phone and making “I don’t want to talk about it, but I need my vacation pay released immediately” sound really convincing (well, it is my money).
Yaay!!:slight_smile:
Oh yeah, I’ve decided I’m going to take the aspen model if I qualify (yup, as per my previous comment, that’s what qualifies as serious thought for me: half an hour of listening to random happy hardcore and then just doing what I know I really want to)

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I’m surprised at the people complaining about Aspen. If it’s essentially the phone in the pictures from the Mastodon announcement, and the overheating issue is fixable with software updates, I’d be overjoyed to get one of those.

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I’m a little confused by the different batches shipping in different months. Is a “later” batch a more complete product than and earlier batch? Is an earlier batch phone going to be just as good as a later batch with just software upgrades as time progresses? Is the phone going to come assembled?

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I have ordered on October 2017, and I hope to have at worst Chestnut or Dogwood and beyond but not before. In any case, I hope that those who have the batches before Evergreen will receive special attention/privilege from Purism. Except in a case of volunteering, I think that a customer should benefit from the best quality (the final product from the qualified production line) and not from a product made in a protoshop.

When I read “Can I buy a better case later”, I find that abnormal. To buy or to replace free of charge ?

Pre-series beneficiaries should be able to be upgraded if they request it, as they have given the same amount as those who obtain the finished product, while having taken more risks at the start of the project, participating to the group effect that encouraged other backers to fund the project.

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SteveC: When did you buy your phone? It would possibly help others to know when they will receive their devices.

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