Yeah, that was my feeling on it too. Cute, but too itty bitty. I already have an android flip phone if I want that form factor.
It sounds like the Cubots would be ideal for you…IF you can find evidence of CFW unlocking your regional bands.
Sorry dude. Chin up - they nuked 3G here entirely. Which means none of the good, old phones work at all. I have a Nokia N95 that’s awesome but I can’t do squat with it as a phone any more.
I got mine off Aliexpress, fwiw.
https://www.aliexpress.com/w/wholesale-duoqin-f22-pro-phone.html
The phone itself is awesome. The T9 keyboard is ass (the membrane they used is just not good). I got mine in 2022 iirc. I cycle between my Samsung A20 (yes, it still works well, 9 yrs in) and the local equivalent of the TCL flip (android 8.1 based).
I actually just installed this on it and it’s blazing fast STT now -
https://github.com/maxmilneaus/tt9-whistle
Edit to add: I have the F21 (the smaller one, candybar). The F22 is about the same height and an iphone, except halfish of the width.
Hmm. I think the issue with all these phones is that the modems can support those bands just fine but they’re generally tuned for Asian and European markets. Predominantly because those sorts of phones sell en mass there, maybe.
For example, I have a duoquin F22 pro (think modern Nokia). I know that folks over on XDA have flashed CFW to region unlock them for US.
You might be able to find what you want (the Cubots sound like a near match) quite cheaply but you’ll have to check XDA for CFWs first. Quite a few of these phones ship with unlocked bootloaders and AOSP by default so they are pretty easy to tinker with.
Else… How do you feel about the JellyStar?
Ah, sorry. My bad.
I’ve been considering this one myself but it’s a bit funky
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTmbxHQRSZ4
Dunno what your bands are there but the spec sheet has B1, B3, B5, B7, B8, B20, B28, B34, B38, B39, B40 and B41.
Might be more US friendly version? If not, I know the folks over on XDA forum tend to flash custom firmware with these.
Hey you might like this while you wait
https://cubot.net/phones/smartphones/pocket3-specs/88?l=en-us
About $250 on eBay etc
Why should I give a flying fuck? I have 3 lenovo tiny boxes, a Rpi4 4gb I got pre 2020, a stack of old laptops and phones, a compute stick and 4 tablets. And if I want to tinker (and I do), ESP32 + CYD is hard to beat.
The Pi 5 does nothing for me that I can’t do faster or cheaper (or both) elsewhere. I could literally spend $20 on a WYSE thinclient to get something that’s 3-4x the pi while being comparable in power draw.
No…if I want a shiny, I’ll get a FPGA or a Commodore 77. If I want to thinker, I’ll get ESP32s. And if I want low power always on compute…well, I’m good thanks.
That should be well within reach of a local LLM.
If you’ve got a discrete GPU with sufficient VRAM, something like Ornith running on PolyStrata could be worth a shot. Try a Q3 size.
https://huggingface.co/bartowski/Ornith-1.5-35B-A3B-GGUF
https://github.com/VecSzn/PolyStrata
Hell, Tiny Ling 3 might be able to do it. Try a Q6.
https://huggingface.co/bartowski/Ling-3.0-tiny-GGUF
Another good option is Qwen3.5-9B. I’d try a Q4 or Q5.
Whichever model you choose, I’d also suggest a few MCP servers to give it access to reliable information rather than rely entirely on its internal knowledge.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/training/support/mcp
https://github.com/exa-labs/exa-mcp-server
https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/servers/tree/main/src/filesystem
If you’re actually running Home Assistant, its official MCP server is worth a look too.
https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/mcp_server/
I’d start with Microsoft Learn and Exa, then add the others as needed. You’ll need an MCP-capable client (which pretty much all of them are now - eg: llama.cpp web ui, OpenWebUI, Light Local Chat etc), and I’d keep file access read-only initially.
I’d personally use McProxy instead of adding MCPs singularly, but I fear I’m already over loading you with information.
EDIT: The PolyStrata recommendation assumes you have a discrete GPU with sufficient VRAM (unclear if you do?). If not, disregard Ornith and try Tiny Ling 3 Q6 or Qwen3.5-9B with ik_llama.cpp instead.
https://github.com/ikawrakow/ik_llama.cpp
Either way, both smaller models should be capable of the tasks you’ve described, particularly with access to the right documentation. Just verify any network or firewall changes before applying them.
Yes, quite a few, but it depends on what you’re trying to do with them. Any ideas?
They are the way to go, but hardware pricing makes it cost-prohibitive to match frontier capabilities, which makes decomp and recomp difficult. Or rather, they require more skill and take longer, introducing some barriers against the current floodgates being flung open.
We all know the eye-watering prices GPUs and RAM cost now, to say nothing of Unified Memory devices like the Strix. Most people just don’t have a spare $10K to throw at an inference box that can run (say) a 300B model at interactive (not batch) speeds.
Coming at this from another angle tho, I note that according to Steam stats, the most popular consumer GPUs are in the 8GB and 16GB range…which is smack bang in the VRAM range of what a good MoE (say, Qwen 3.6 35B-A3B) runs on (for 8GB) or arguably the best local dense coder (Qwen 3.8 27B) can live at. Which leaves us with a capable assistant and a capable coder.
I think there’s probably room for LLM improvement in the 8–16GB range too…and given that most consumer PCs and laptops live there, I’m sanguine the open-weight devs might make it happen.
But I also suspect the gatekeeping of high-end capacities is intentional.
We’re probably not going to have the ability to vibe code Mario into Elden Ring again…not without significantly more skill. Dunno.
Yeah, KaiOS is dead.
Here is what I have - there must be a local version https://opelmobile.com.au/product/touch-flip/
It’s Android 8.1. I installed a different launcher, small browser (SmartCookieWeb) and a few other essentials (banking app, QR reader etc). If you don’t mind the flip factor (the T9 keyboard is a dream on this one…and with TT9 Whistle, I have the best of all worlds)
EDIT: Found it https://sunbeamwireless.com/product/sunbeam-f1-orchid
US version is more locked down but jailbreak guides avail https://furbreeze.github.io/2025/01/23/sunbeam-f1-root.html