There is now an option for those still queuing to see their regular Librem 5 (hopefully by the end of this year) to upgrade their order to the USA version — which “should ship in 3 months” from now (info from support).
I would actually be keen to upgrade. But it looks like, although shipping in 3 months is expected, there is no guarantee. Indeed, when I was placing my Librem 5 order in December 2018, the expected shipping date for it was April 2019.
I am wondering if Purism could commit to the guarantee to ship Librem 5 USA in 3 months from the date of upgrade. This means, if for whatever reason, in 3 months it cannot be shipped, the order would be downgraded back to what it is now (with the upgrade money refunded) — expecting regular Librem 5 by the end of the year.
You should officially contact support@puri.sm and ask them about the downgrade option.
As neither phone is (yet) a stocked item, and particularly in the current environment, there will never be an absolute guarantee about schedule or shipping.
I did. They did not answer that specific question, and simply re-iterated that L5 USA is expected to ship in 3 months.
That is understandable. What they could do though is to guarantee refund/downgrade back.
The whole point of upgrade would be to get it in 3 months rather than end of year of even later. I would hate to end up in the position where L5 USA is shipped simultaneously with regular L5 in which case I would rather have the latter.
Support won’t be able to give you a 100% guarantee simply because while we are starting Librem 5 USA production now, there is still a risk that some problem could crop up in production that could delay things. At this point we believe that, barring any unforeseen problems we should hit shipping parity for Librem 5 USA in Q2 2021 and be able to maintain stock after that.
On a related note, does the librem 5 USA use the same drivers as the Librem 5? I know it’s almost identical. Mainly trying to figure out if there are other risks associated with the LIbrem 5 USA vs the Librem 5.
well I think the point @dpr made is what I’m thinking. Wait for L5 USA to reach shipping parity. @Kyle_Rankin and the blog post said it should reach shipping parity in Q2 2021. So, to me that is between April 1 2021 and June 30, 2021. Since it is already May, We basically will know if it reaches shipping parity in another month or so.
I ordered my L5 in Oct 2018. So, I’m assuming I wouldn’t be in the que until at least Dec 2021 or Q1 2022. If shipping parity of L5 USA by June 30 2021 (with 10 day shipping window) I could theoretically have an L5 USA the first half of July this year.
So, for me it means, waiting another month or 2. Decide if I want to spend the extra money of L5 USA and if all holds according to schedule above, I could have my L5 6-9 months earlier then if I wait for my regular spot in the que. The additional cost is what is getting to me, so I just need to think about it.
Well, that is already not in line with the current “3 months” estimation from the support (i.e. early August 2021).
That is my current plan (unless Purism commits to dowgrading/money back if the 3-month estimation slips). If, at any point before shipping my regular L5, Purism says “We have L5 USA in stock. Place/upgrade order and get it shipped immediately” then I will do so.
However, the whole point of pre-ordering is to get it earlier (and, likely, at a lower price) than those who place in-stock orders. Say, if shipping parity is reached in October, but, by upgrading now I either get it in August or allowed to downgrade back, then I would upgrade now.
Of course not. Once you upgrade, you’re locked in the higher tier. You’ll probably get yours before the regular L5 starts shipping again, but there’s no guarantee when that’ll be, and there’ll be no refund if it doesn’t happen within the projected 3 months they are unable to commit to.
If downgrading to your original order were an option, Kyle would’ve made sure to highlight this in his response rather than ignoring that part of the question altogether.