Ubuntu Touch 24.04, VoLTE, and Devices in the US
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I looked at the most recent devices available for VoLTE and Ubuntu Touch 24.04. Currently, I see the following:
Volla
Fairphone
Pine Phone (?)The shop pages for Volla and Fairphone take me to their European pages, and I am not entirely sure if they ship to the US (or make it successfully through to their destinations). I'm hoping to include possible daily drivers in the US market in some form or fashion. Pine Phone looks like more of a beta testing phone right now, but I could be wrong. I'm curious whether these phones are accessible for those in the US or if we need new ports for the US market. Any help or recommendations are appreciated!
In the meantime, I'm still trying to see what can be done to potentially get VoLTE on the Google Pixel 3a if anyone wants to help. Of course, any work on the Google Pixel 3a may depend on your carrier supporting both VoLTE Roaming and the Google Pixel 3a.
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@atarilinux I'll start by saying that VoLTE, while being used daily by some, sounds like it should still be considered in beta across all devices.
You're right that Volla and Fairphone don't sell outside the EU, at least for now. @AppLee recently mentioned that Volla is looking into official network support in North America, so who knows, maybe they'll sell phones here one day.
Meanwhile, there is Murena, a third party vendor, that will sell Fairphones to NA, or third party shipping services, which I know little about, but will ship here for a markup.
There are also Fairphone 4 phones on eBay from a vendor called NeverMSRP that I considered for a bit. They seem to have good reviews.But there are also people using Xiaomi phones with VoLTE, including in USA I believe. Poco X3, Redmi Note 9 Pro, and maybe others. The ports for these phones seem to be solid and supported. I found those phones hard to find domestically, but careful searches on eBay yielded international vendors who'd sell to Canada, though tariff stuff may be complicated in USA.
And then Brax3 phone and Furiphone FLX1 are both making ports of UT, though we're awaiting details. Both play well with USA networks though.
Hard time to make a decision, with VoLTE and 24.04 still in progress, but we can at least help each other be aware of the options and make the most informed decision possible.
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Thanks! Yes, that is the main reason why I created this post. I wanted to assist anyone in the United States who may be interested in Ubuntu Touch as a potential daily driver and wanted to test VoLTE capability.
There's some great information in your post. I've been searching for some phones in case we can't get VoLTE working on it, it gets dropped by the carrier, etc. I'd definitely like a workable backup, but finding one that I know has official support has been a bit difficult.
I will keep looking and see what I can find out. If I come across anything, I will post here too!
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@atarilinux @wally
Maybe you will be interested in Daniel Pratt's tests with T-Mobile in the USA on a Poco X3 NFC ? -
This looks very interesting and promising! Thanks for sharing! I've added it to my list of devices to look at in case the Google Pixel 3a doesn't get off the ground with VoLTE.
What version of Android does this use? I heard Xiaomi uses a certain type of super partition. I'm wondering if a Xiaomi porter may have already enountered the same issue as what was going on with the Google Pixel 3a's Android 12.1 partitioning. I could be wrong, but reading up on things, some of this sounds similar.
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@atarilinux
It uses android 10 version with a repartitionedsuper.imgFor more details : https://github.com/ubuntu-touch-surya/ubuntu-touch-surya/releases/tag/stable-repartition
About pixel 3a android 12 partitionning, i don't know.
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Thanks! Just trying to think what I can reference from other ports too!
