I posted about this phone when I bought it and promised to tell about my experience after some use. So here is my story :)
Background
I needed to buy a new phone and wanted something unusual. Initially, I was looking at the Hisense A9. It’s an e-ink phone and, based on reviews, people love it. But the phone there is no official open source Android distribution available for it (although there is an unofficial LineageOS port). I just don’t like running outdated Android versions. I wish we had broader device support, like we do with GNU/Linux distributions.
A few days later I read news about the LineageOS 22.2 release and went to check out which models were supported from day one (it was December 2024). These phones are usually actively maintained, which means they’re usually good. I was surprised to see the F(x)tec Pro1 X there. Here is a good article from 2022 if you’ve never heard of it. To put it shortly, it’s a crowdfunded phone with a physical keyboard that had a lot of issues at release. I went to the unofficial F(x)tec Discord server and found out that they finally finished shipping the phone to all backers in November 2024! But some people already have more powerful phones and no longer need the shipped F(x)tec. They had a dedicated channel for buying/selling, so I managed to buy one in mint condition for 300 EUR.
Keyboard
The keyboard is awesome. I previously had the Nokia Asha 200, Motorola Droid 4, Motorola Photon Q, and a physical keyboard addon for my PinePhone, so I can compare. The one in the F(x)tec is by far the best. People who designed it clearly had a passion for physical keyboards. The keyboard is full-sized with Ctrl, Shift, and Fn keys on both sides. It’s very important for a slider because it allows you to type while holding it. The keyboard also has home row markers on F and J, and it’s natural to type on it without looking at it. The keys also very responsive - I never miss my inputs.
These days, physical keyboards are not very practical. Glide typing on touch keyboards is quite convenient. But I feel like I can type a bit faster and more accurately with a physical one. Plus, I really like the tactile feeling.
Screen
The screen is also great. Colors are very vibrant. It’s curved on the sides and I saw people reporting accidental touches while holding it, but it might have been fixed on the software side since I never encountered such an issue. And I actually like how the curved screen looks - especially with such a nice OLED panel and the Android dark theme.
Slide mechanism
It feels very robust, but I don’t like how it opens - it’s quite loud. I liked it more in my Motorola sliders. But what I like is that the screen is angled when you open it. It’s a much more natural than when the screen is parallel to the keyboard. Plus, you get a built-in kickstand :)
When closed, it looks like a regular phone. It’s not too bulky - I’d say it’s comparable to a typical phone with a protective case.
Fingerprint sensor
I hate it. It’s the worst place they could have put it. I constantly touched it by accident when gripping the phone. So I ended up disabling it completely.
Connectivity
Some units have issues with the antenna. I asked the seller to test the connectivity before buying, and it looks like my unit is unaffected. Can confirm that calls and mobile internet work fine.
Performance
The specs are quite low. But I don’t game on phones. I use it for calls, web browsing, messaging, and social media. It works smoothly, so it’s good enough for me.
Software
As I mentioned, the phone is officially supported by LineageOS. So I immediately re-flashed the stock Android 11 with it after testing the functionality.
Unfortunately, my favorite FUTO Keyboard doesn’t propagate the defined layouts to the physical keyboard - it’s always English. It works only if I select the default AOSP keyboard as my input method. But since I don’t need the sensor keyboard much, I just use the AOSP keyboard. It hides automatically when I open the physical one.
But even when the touch keyboard is hidden, it still leaves a tiny bar at the bottom of the screen when any input field is active. It takes extra space, and in horizontal layout, you don’t have much space to spare. So I installed the Hide Navbar module for Magisk which removes it.
Also, when the keyboard is open, the previews for running apps behave as if they’re in horizontal mode. But it’s a minor bug.
But there is one major issue I still haven’t figured out. Sometimes the phone just refuses to wake from sleep once every few days. I have to hold the power button to force reboot it. I asked about it in Discord and it looks like only one other person besides me has this issue. Others never encountered anything like this. The only thing I found in common is that they all install Google services, while I use MicroG. Not sure if it’s related. If you have any idea how to debug it, let me know.
Battery
Battery life is okay. I charge it once every few days, but I don’t have a lot of screen time. Also, I think the lack of Play Services improves it.
Camera
I currently can’t leave my house, so I don’t have nice photos to share :) But the camera is okay, even with the built-in LOS camera app.
There’s also a dedicated camera button. I think it’s convenient, but I don’t mind using the on-screen shutter button either.
Weight
It’s 46g heavier than my wife’s Google Pixel 7 (197g vs 243g). It doesn’t bother me - I barely notice the difference.
Headphone jack
I like that this phone has a headphone jack. I know I could just buy a Type-C adapter, but I don’t like to carry it with me. And I just can’t leave it connected to the adapter, since I also share the headphones with my PC.
Conclusion
I like this phone - it fits my use cases perfectly. I’ll continue to daily drive it. But it’s not a great value - you can buy a much more modern phone for the same money. And I wish its launch hadn’t been surrounded by so many issues. We need more niche phones.
Lemmy has a rate limit on uploading photos, so I’ve uploaded more photos in this Imgur post.
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sigh Everything reminds me of her. I miss you, Nokia N900!
Thanks for the review!
I’ve hated every phone I’ve used since the N900
The N900 with 128 MB RAM had better multitasking than my modern phone with 4 GB.
Perfectly integrated chat protocols.
Accessible Linux system.
First system to get Angry Birds.
The only negative was that it wasn’t completely open source. So much great work is lost.
Didn’t have the greatest battery life either, but that’s has since become the norm
It had video out, and could connect mouse keyboard and monitor, and either go full desktop or just use the mobile apps.
The performance was equivalent to the Pi 1, it had a related SOC, and that was very good at the time
I found the physical keyboard unusable, too small for my fingers and I don’t have particularly big hands.
I find that these keyboards are meant to be used while holding them. So you only type with your thumbs.
Yes but I still found it slower than typing with one hand with an on screen keyboard and I use the Fossify keyboard with no auto correct.
What keyboards have you tried?
Physical smartphone keyboards?
Yes :)
Nice! I wish we had more unusual phones like all the crazy dumb-phone designs in the 2000s. I always wanted an LG Wing for exactly this reason.
I agree, moreover I find it quite useless to have a fancy stylish phone, when you have to wrap it in a rubber (or worse, leather) case, making it identical to all the others.
That’s great! Very neat. Thanks for sharing
It’s nice to see what could have been… Mine suffers from a lack of connectivity, can’t even use it on Wi-Fi without constant disconnects.
My previous keyboard phone was Nokia N900 which was incredible, if a bit small. I find the Pro1x to be too large for my hands, a phone about 4.5 or 5" would be ideal.
Ah, you have the antenna issue 😢
I read that it’s possible to fix with a hardware modification, but it’s very difficult.
I find the Pro1 X to be too large for my hands; a phone around 4.5–5" would be ideal.
That’s unfortunate - there aren’t many modern alternatives. Even the F(x)tec is a bit outdated by today’s standards.
Thanks for posting this review, I didn’t know it was supported by lineage now. I am a lover of the keytwo from Blackberry and since then have been looking for another keyboard phone. I’ve considered this multiple times but it is a bit old software wise. I may take another look now!
I almost bought one of these when they were new(ish), and given what a clusterfuck the fulfillment turned into I’m kind of glad I didn’t, as much as I’d like to have a physical keyboard phone now.
I will say this about on screen keyboards: Swipe typing is horseshit. If you actually intend to seriously write anything and you’ve got any kind of vocabulary whatsoever, especially a colorful and/or jargon-laden one, you have a zero percent chance the fucking thing is going to be able to guess all of the words you were going for in a sentence. “Convenient” doesn’t enter into it. I rank both this and autocorrect/autosuggest on phones as instruments of active evil; they have the net long term effect of restricting people’s thought and capability for self-expression because the designers can simply dictate which words the things do and don’t know, and even with the best will in the world nobody can predict all the words somebody might want to use in every language. And the majority of the public at large absolutely is too lazy to seek a workaround or alternative and will simply conform to meet whatever limitations their pocket rectangle inflicts on them. See also: The number of twits who have already replaced parts of their real world lexicons with TikTokisms like “unalived,” or can’t articulate any emotion without using a predefined emoji icon.
So there is a reason that since day one, keyboards on every other text producing machine never worked this way. My current phone has no physical keyboard, but its swipe and autocorrect are firmly set to off.
I guarantee you nobody’s swipe keyboard would have been able to complete this comment, because it would have tripped over “TikTokism,” and certainly also “horseshit” and “clusterfuck.”
Autocorrect used to be so good. All I want is a fricking a lookup table for number of letters and with the combination of letters what the most likely options are to be.
Its been ever since they added Auto-Finish, that I think it has become so absolutely terrible. This idea that the phone can predict for you and type out your sentence for you.
A: it makes everybody the same and kills individualism B: It implies the company is stalking you enough to know you and that’s creepy and not what I want in a product I should be choosing for myself.
And now we just have the bigger version of autocomplete that now is being sold as some genius answer machine when we know the default human is most certainly not.
The first time I used a swype keyboard it seemed good, but somehow the English dictionary has become polluted with non-English words and like a million different names etc
Good point! Another issue is that only FUTO and FlorisBoard currently offer FOSS swipe implementations, both of which are in alpha. The AOSP keyboard doesn’t have this feature - it’s exclusive to Google Keyboard.
I really like phone with physical keyboards. Is there any other models beside this and Planet Computer that have physical keyboards and are somewhat okay?
Minimal Phone: https://minimalcompany.com/collections/frontpage
That doesn’t look remotely comparable.
True, but it does have a physical keyboard.
I have my eye out for this. I miss my physical keyboard
Seems cool, thank you for the review.
Thanks for sharing the review!
Did you end up using eBay to buy it or another site? I’ve only seen a few listed, and the prices vary pretty severely.
Bummer about the fingerprint sensor location - but luckily not a huge deal. Overall it seems like a decent enough phone if you want a keyboard.
I bought it from someone on the unofficial Discord server. They have a dedicated channel for that. It felt a bit shady, but at least the prices are fair.
Thanks for the review. I had a Nokia C6-00 back in 2011-2012 as a hand-me-down from my mom and I absolutely loved the keyboard. Then phone designers ditched it and I frankly had a chip in the shoulder about it.
That’s why the first time I saw the F(x)tec I fell in love with it and almost bought it. However, I had reservations about the specs and the price so I didn’t preorder. Seeing it had issues on shipping I’m glad I didn’t.
Nowadays, if I really need a physical keyboard in my phone, I whip out one of those plasticky membrane keyboards from AliExpress or, if I’m feeling fancy, my Keychron.
Cool, I never heard of this, but it’s a great review. Thanks!
Wish these were still for sale. I really wanted one!
You can still buy one from backers. Since deliveries only recently finished, many units are still in near mint condition.
