Hi there,
I’m using my Mudita Pure for 4 months by now. I bought it second-hand from someone (since I didn’t want to wait for it and I don’t preorder). Also, a little bit cheaper than new phone 
I am trying to get rid of my smartphone from my life. So I’ve made a plan:
- write down (in paper!) list of things I use my smartphone for
- cross out anything that is really not necessary in my life
- write down how can I do all of these things without smartphone
- mark all the things which cannot be done without smartphone (there are such things!)
This happened to be quite big task, but my personal list is as follows:
- calendar → paper calendar
- check out current time → a watch
- morning weather forcast → ?
- mobile token for 2FA in my work finance system → no replacement
- mobile app for private banking (especially 2FA) → one could do without, but it is quite costly
- personal finance tracker → ?
- notepad → physical copy (combined with paper calendar?)
- timetables for public transport → I can plan ahead, besides most of bus stops have their timetables, so I can manage with a watch. But still, I lose live info on delays
- alarm → get alarmclock + watch with an alarm
- keeping track of good habits → physical notebook?
- instant copy of important documents (which I get quite often) → can live without it
- Signal messenger → can live without it
- taking photos → can live without it. When really needed, like on a trip, I can take compact camera
- opening parcel lockers → ? (still no idea how to get it working, maybe by SMS?)
- dual SIM - one for work (mandatory), one for private → I still cannot resolve it. Unfortunatelly, switching from one SIM to another is no way for my situation. I need my private phone to be on at anytime, for safety and emergency support for my family and friends.
- listening to music → just get my good old MP3 player back
As you can see, I could safely manage without a smartphone, and even without a phone. So what do I need Mudita Pure for? Only three things:
- calling and texting
- tethering
- contacts
And that’s it - I don’t need those fancy functions like alarm, music, meditation timer or low SAR. In fact, I haven’t found any other “dumbphone” which had this sweet, sweet combo of tethering + no Internet client, which is odd, but just what I need.
Most unfortunatelly, I have to say, that even for those three basic features I found out, that I start see my Pure as unreliable. Why is that?
Well, one thing is for sure - the phone does call, text and tether Internet. But there are little, but increasingly annoying issues, that make my experience bad.
…First and foremost - calling…
For now, I use my smartphone and Pure at the same time. They have the same kind of SIM card from the same mobile service provider, so the comparison seems fair to me. I regularly find out, that at the same place and time, those two phones have different calling and signal experience. Most of the time, there is no difference, but from time to time, Pure has its issues, which add up to that I cannot rely completely on it. For example - I’ve had a call-in appointment for medical assistance. As I was on a call, I suddenly lost signal on Pure, so the call disconnected. After like 15 minutes Pure got it signal back (at the same place!), without any apparent reason. Maybe it is due to this “low gain/high gain antenna” switch implemented in Pure. IDK, but it is still worse experience than my most typical Android smartphone.
Long calls - I very often have to make long calls (40 min+). Almost every time, on a span of these calls, my callees tell me that “I lost you” (for a brief moment), or they didn’t hear what I say, or that they don’t hear me well. Few times I tried to call the same person, in the same place, from my Android phone and we didn’t experience these issues.
Long start time - this is most baffling issue for me. Sometimes I need to restart the phone or it just crashes. What is happening is that the phone starts quite fast, but for like a 20-40 seconds it does not get any signal. I think there is some issue, that the “signal module” starts some time after full start of the phone. In case of emergency - this is completely unacceptable. I believe that calling module should be absolutelly first to start at boot up.
No signal - for the span of travelling to many different places, also other countries, most of the time Pure has some signal. But there are arbirary, typically short periods (up to few minutes) of no signal without any apparent reason. It’s not that I live in the woods far from any antennae. At the same time (for these 4 months of use), I’ve never lost signal anywhere on Android smartphone (besides underground). I tried changing SIM card, fixing the SIM card holder etc. So I see this as purely Pure’s problem.
…then texting…
I don’t text that often. When I need to write a long message, I’d rather call instead. But the situation may be that I cannot call or for some reason don’t want to, so SMS module is quite important anyways.
I’ve sent tens of messages by Pure and in this I find some small, minor issues too, which add up to bad experience. I don’t call the lack of T9 dictionary, which is no problem for me.
For example - did you know, that changing letter typing to “Abc” doesn’t work in certain combinantions? Or that sending message combined with “no signal” issue doesn’t effectively inform user that the message has not been sent? Or that sending MMS to Pure gives this strange “☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐” message (instead of SMS with link and password for online MMS reading)?
Maybe you did, maybe you didn’t. These are not major issues, but they add up to a bad experience…
…and tethering…
So first of all, I have to admit I couldn’t fully understand how it will work before purchase. Now I know that it just is Pure->USB->PC connection, which is seen as ethernet connection on Windows 11. Fortunatelly, in Windows I can set that this specific Ethernet connection is metered connection.
I use tethering almost exclusively en route (bus, train, car). That is quite normal, that somewhere there will be no connection, so it isn’t that strange that it loses the signal.
So for comparison, I tried to get the signal from my Android device at the same trip. What is my impression is that statistically Android hotspot has had shorter timespans of no signal than Pure tethering on the same road. Once again - this is not an issue that I can report or catch “red-handed”. It’s just overall experience, and quite fair comparison with the competition I suppose.
I know that most of these issues are vague and can be (probably) fixed by some minor tweaks. I don’t have time and drive to report every issue anytime it happens, so I just want to tell you of my overall experience and impression. You know how it works - little details make bigger picture, and the big picture is what I want to share. I’ve realized, that I do not rely on Pure as a phone, but still try to use it.
