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Thinking about the Librem 5, why is it so expensive?

1 points by jay_kyburz ↗ HN
There have been a few news stories and articles recently of people walking around some Shenzhen market putting together phones from components very cheaply. How hard would it be to put together a "Linux phone" that was only $200 instead of the $700 for the Librem 5.

7 comments

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dman
What software stack do you intend to run on the phone?
zunzun
Would you please post a few links to the news stories and articles you mention? I would very much like to read them.
jay_kyburz
I've been looking for the one I read earlier in the week but can't find it. It must have been from some big site because there was a video of the presenter walking around with a local, then they put the phone together in a MacDonalds right near the marker where they picked the components from.
rickcogley
We can still pre-order at a little discount, until 31 Jan. I'd love to see the business actuals for this device. Apple charges this level or more for theirs, with have the world's largest economy of scale. Purism is tiny by any measure, compared to Apple, so I would speculate they are not taking a big margin on it. Am I off base?
jay_kyburz
No, not suggesting that they were taking a big margin, I was thinking that I don't want a very powerful phone, I recently chose a Nokia 3.1 and have been very happy with it ($250 AUD), but would also like it to run Linux instead of Android. All I want is a phone calls, sms, camera, maps, and browser. (And a few other minor things like clocks and alarms and things.)
inspector14
Shouldn't their slogan be

"At last, a modern smartphone you can truly own." ?