New Kompakt user, first impressions of a long time dumbphone user!

Mudita Products
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Hi ! I guess there are already quite a few similar topics. Please tell me if inappropriate !

As already stated in other threads, I have a 3+ decades history of screens addiction in general with a love-hate relationship regarding phones. I managed not to own a phone until 2013 (birth of my first child), then alternated between big brands, cheap brands, tons of self-control or more constraining apps, de-googled smartphones, old blackberry-like phones, nokia-like flipphones, RFID keys to unlock, etc. I never managed to find a satisfying solution. The most acceptable one for me was a non-smartphone plagued with bugs.

Anyway. I think you people nailed it.

The e-ink screen is just about right. Contrast on text is good. Responsivity is good. Resolution is good (yes, if you look at it very close you see it’s not a 300 dpi, but from a normal distance it looks good). It could have been smaller / less precise and would have been annoying to use. It could have been bigger and would have been too tempting to use with sideloaded apps.

It could have been slower and would have been dissuasive to use to the point that I would have written only the most important short messages. It could have been faster and would have made watching videos viable which would have been a major issue. (I can watch Youtube, Peertube etc. on my Note Boox Max e-ink device : that’s both a blessing and a curse)

The features-set is just about perfect to me. More features would imply more time tweaking. Fewer would be frustrating.

Sideloading is possible, which kinda saves me in the specific use case I absolutely need a particular app for my job. But friction is definitely good enough (needing a computer). Actually, one month ago, I didn’t know I would absolutely need this specific app for my work and would have said I didn’t need sideloading.

I ended up actually writing to people my actual thoughts. in an exhaustive way… !!! Whereas I would have got fed up quickly with my Nokia/HMD flip phone and whereas I would have just doomscrolled with a regular phone. !! (of course, it’s always better to actually call them which I used to do with my dumbphone but I still neglected quite a few persons :wink:

I feel it is 90% perfect as it is. What I still need is :

  • Music player : possibility to browse my directories and play according the the FILENAMES order (which include the number of the track). Otherwise I cannot play my albums. → I know it’s probably coming this year

  • Custom ringtone :wink: → I know it’s coming this year.

  • As I stated in another thread, just a couple more options to filter out the calls would be perfect. You can already block calls from unknown or hidden number. I would need something like a different ringtone/volume for those instead of just blocking (because sometimes I have to know some delivery guy/gal is attempting to call me).

  • I never enable the backlight because of my eyestrain and because I think it partly defeats the purpose of using an e-ink screen. → but at night I frequently have to check what time it is. Is it possible to use the physical button to check the clock with the backlight turned on temporarily ? It is very important when I have to wake up early for work without turning on a big light :slight_smile:

  • I find the virtual keyboard pretty good and was surprised to type at a pretty decent speed with it despite its size. I have one issue though : regarding the suggestions. The suggestions are completely relevant. BUT, I am using the French alphabet, which has some accents. For instance, an “e” can be “e, Ă©, è, ĂŞ, ë”. Usually the suggestions of words should include all the variants of “e” in the suggested words even if a generic “e” is already typed.

For instance I want to write the word “embêter”. If I type “emb” I may have the suggestion “embêter”. But if I type “embe” it won’t be displayed. It happens constantly.

That’s about it. Otherwise it’s perfect. The build quality seems pretty good. Sometimes I think “maybe the speaker and the mic could have been slightly better to be more satisfying”. Maybe it applies to the camera too. On the other hand, the price must definitely not be higher and this is quite a niche (ATM !!) product. So I guess you got the balance is right - almost perfect. It does feel good.

Cheers ! :slight_smile:

PS : perfectly worked out of the box with my French carrier. No configuration needed.

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I forgot, regarding the virtual keyboard / suggestions : another common issue is that, I you begin to type a word and mispell it, the correction / completion won’t be offered.

For instance, I want to write “loin”, I type “liin” because the “o” and the “i” are close to each other → I get no suggestion to correct it.

I want to type “bonjour” ; I type “bonh” because the “h” and “j” are close to each other → I get no suggestion to correct and complete it.

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For that single reason I got FUTO keyboard, some people recommend other alternative keyboards, too.

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Thank you so much for taking the time to write this. It is incredibly thoughtful and honestly a joy to read. :yellow_heart:

You captured something we hear often, that delicate balance between usable and not tempting, and it means a lot to see it resonate so clearly with a long-time dumbphone user. Your points about friction, intentionality, and actually writing real messages instead of doomscrolling really hit at the heart :heart: of why Mudita Kompakt exists.

You’re also spot on about the remaining 10 percent. Music playback improvements, custom ringtones, and more nuanced call filtering are already on our radar, and feedback like this helps us prioritize what matters most. The keyboard and language-specific suggestions are especially valuable insights, thank you for outlining that so clearly.

And we appreciate the realistic take on hardware trade-offs too. Balance was very intentional here, especially for a niche product that aims to stay human, not addictive.

Thanks again for sharing your experience, and welcome to the Mudita Kompakt community. It genuinely means a lot to us. :blush:

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My pleasure, thanks for your kind message !

I forgot something important : the system feels very reliable. I should have mentioned it at first ! I have used so many minimalistic pieces of software that were more buggy than complex ones :slight_smile:

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@bidinou do you have this setting enabled?

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Yep, it’s enabled ! I confirm I only get suggestions for words partly written (with no spelling mistake) - but as soon as there is a wrong letter, I get no more suggestion.

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I get it. I will ask the team when that will be fixed.

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Much appreciated, will make a huge difference !

Please note this is a distinct issue (though they aggravate each other) from the non-accented characters not showing suggestions containing accented characters.

(IMHO, this would be relevant if it didn’t work the way around to narrow down the suggestions to the relevant ones, but this might get too subtle – for instance, if I write “tre”, I expect to have a suggestion for “très”, “trésor” etc., not for “trente”.
But if I deliberately write “rê” I expect to have suggestion with “rê-” (rêve…) and not “re-” (requin…).
Well, not that sure because I could have selected the wrong accent, thus expecting to be suggested the proper spelling… Hmm…

This is very important because I frequently rely on the suggestion not to have to trigger the alternate characters popup. (there are tons of accents in French and having to select them is kinda time-consuming)

EDIT : also !! This applies to choosing a contact in the list. I have a friend with a Turkish name beginning with “Çi”. If I type “ci”, it is not displayed.

Cheers !

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I don’t know if a Turkish keyboard is on the roadmap. BUT I will ask.

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Ah yes, actually, I have spelled this Turkish name with a “Ç” which is also part of the French alphabet so that is not the problem :slight_smile: I meant that, if I type some characters from a name in my contact list, with the non-accented version of the characters, it is not displayed :slight_smile:

What I meant is that the filtering system could consider a character and its accented derivatives as the same one.

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Hey friend,

Welcome to the community! I was an avid MK user from the beginning and only recently made the switch to HiBreak Pro, but I still love this community … so I hope you don’t mind my response! I would recommend using the CalmMusic app that @davidray made. It works really well for eink and allows you to download music from YouTube and other sources offline. Completely private and compatible with eink. I originally was going to download the APK music file from MK to my HBP but I found this and I have been using it actively everyday… The other thing that I want to bring up is that if you are into degoogling I would recommend FOSSIFY apps because they all work well with eink and more privacy!

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