I don’t Have my L5 yet to check exactly but I believe the looseness between the sim tray and the…“door” part is intentional to allow for slight changes in tolerance between external and internal components of the phone. It may also be the case that the tray itself is a generic component, supplied with the sim reader hardware, while the “door” is supplied by the producer (Purisim) to match the chassis material and colour.
The SC under battery stands for “Smart Card”
@CWood is currently unable to post here for some reason, so I’m copying our DMs to here for everyone’s benefit:
Continuing the discussion from SIM & SD Card Tray Issue! :
Sorry, life came at me fast, haven’t been able to get back to you or customer support.
Here are photos of the tray inserted and properly. When I received it, it was sturdy and was flush with the phone. It was not like this. It felt a little off after a few times changing the sim and after close inspection, this was the problem. I don’t think it was a previous owner issue, and I feel this came about during my brief time with the phone. As stated, I am always careful with sim changes. I’ve been an Android owner since after my first flip phone, back in the day. The sim card trays have never been like this.
For some reason, it will not allow me to post in the primary thread.
10h
Hi. If it won’t sit flush with the frame, and if it prevents connecting to the network, and/or it bothers you, you should see about ordering a replacement tray.
Heads-up, the replacement will also have the “wobbly” cover, just like mine, and just like everyone else’s. (And just like my two Sony Xperias.) But yes, if it won’t sit flush with the frame, then something’s amiss.
Just to verify, your phone is the Evergreen model, right?
See:
Section 6.3 How can I tell the difference between the different production batches?
Information related to the Librem 5 phone and development kit, maintained and organized by the community.
==
It has been said that the batches before Evergreen had less refined tolerances in the physical design.
Considering that the sim reader is interfacing the outside of the body via the tray, I would think it would be part of a dimensional QA process and be in the correct position, pointing more at an issue with the tray.
Those sim and microSD combo trays allow for a number of incorrect orientation combinations which may have damaged the reader in some way.
I’d recommend testing with a completely different (and known good) sim card and then hit up Purism for a replacement tray.
If it still isn’t working at that point then replacing the reader is totally feasible and worth it, but would need to be done by Purisim most likely, unless you are a soldering Ninja.
@ Purism
I came across Sony Xperia 1. They use a different type of SIM tray that one could open without a pin/needle.
Maybe it is worth having a look at their design for the future iterations like Fir. On the one hand this could prevent these SIM tray issues. On the other hand it makes sense for a security focused device to be able to remove/exchange the SIM card and or SD Card without instruments.
I guess Sony went this path because they are very focused on Photography and so people can quickly access the SD card.
I think the industry is moving to eSIM though. So SIM tray problem goes away completely … but … what are the privacy issues with eSIM, if any? What other issues?
(I personally like to be able to move SIMs around between phones. Apart from the annoying incompatibility of SIM card sizes between devices, that works. Would it still be possible to do that with eSIM?)
Yes, in the case of the Librem 5, the uSD card is in there too.
I believe so. I’m using keepgo at the moment, and as I recall if the esim is downloaded to device B, device A’s stops working.
There are countries where you can still buy a SIM card in a shop completely annonimously. eSIM on the other hand will most likely be linked to a person.
There is also the advantage that if all your data is on the SD-Card + SIM card + PGP smart card, you can remove it/carry it with you without the phone more easily.
So (completely) moving to eSIM for Librem 5 makes in my opinion no sense.
That is an issue i.e. functionality that we would lose. Presumably you would need some way of erasing the eSIM, as the equivalent, but you may not have any assurances that a) it happens at all, or b) it happens effectively.
Another reasonably obvious security issue with eSIM is that, by definition, the eSIM has to be writeable. There must be active hardware inside the phone that can write the eSIM. No such hardware needs to exist with a physical SIM. The ability to write the eSIM is just one more relatively unnecessary capability that is there to exploit. (It is arguable that the SIM in a typical phone is writeable anyway but that may not be necessary and it may be more limited e.g. can’t change identity but can do things like store phone numbers.)
Maybe so but the industry could reach the point, at least in some countries, where all network operators only offer eSIM. It seems like eSIM would be the more intrusive option so, if you are a network operator, which are you going to prefer?
If that came to pass then the Librem 5 can’t really swim against the tide.
I guess the timing comes down to how many viable phones are still out there, in use, that have no eSIM capability.
