For me it’s the notification light you used to find on older phones, was particularly good to know if your phone was charged without picking it up
this post was submitted on 28 Dec 2023
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What I don't understand is why the notification LED was removed in the first place? It can easily be put under the screen.
The LED was so helpful, and it's so annoying when I don't see an important message for hours, because I haven't used my phone.
I'm guessing... they don't want us deciding whether to engage with our phones, they want us looking at them more. If that means less convenience for us we can get fucked
I think you may have a point, It's kind of weird how the first 10 years of smartphones, was an ever higher climb for better phones, driven by competition.
But now that everybody are dependent on the phones, they all agree on taking useful features away???
Fuck. You're probably right. It's all about nudging us towards the behavior they want.
It’s probably also a little safer with only system apis accessing system hardware. If you look at how the camera assembly is one piece and apps basically access the whole thing securely.
I used to have a custom ROM that would allow me to change the color based on which app had the most recent notification: FB was Blue, SMS was Green. Let me be prepared ahead of time if it was going to be important or not.
Even more than that, in early versions of Android this setting was baked in. I had colors set based on text messages, emails, etc. I think around 2.x was when the option was removed.
I remember and miss that. Any remember the original droid with the slide out keyboard ?
I don't know about the original, but I rocked a Droid 4 for the longest time. It's probably my all time favorite phone. I really miss how quickly I could type and the extra screen space I got from not needing the software keyboard.
Ironically I was grateful for a custom rom to turn off the light. It was useful but I hated it at night because at least on my phone it was stupidly bright
Nowadays most phones have OLED screens, which can easily replicate the function of the notification LED with the “always on” feature.
Yet there are often warnings that even with OLED AOD eats a lot of battery, not so with a notification LED.
The absolute newest OLED that can do 1Hz refresh are better. But that doesn't change that the removal of the notification LED was detrimental to the functionality of the smartphone.
OLED AoD eats a lot of battery because there's still quite a lot of information(and thus, pixels turned on) shown on the AoD. A single pixel blinking on and off would at most use the same power as a dedicated notification led.
Someone else posted an app that gives the feature back. If you turn off other aid features and just use the app it won't use more battery than a notification led.
What?
If the screen has 60hz or higher refresh, I'm pretty sure it will. The screen itself may not use much, but the DAC will still use power.
I haven't seen this actually tested, but many claim the difference in battery life is noticeable. I don't think it matters much what app you use, many phones come with an AOD app, and I seriously doubt a third party app is better.
Typo: aod feature. Always on display.
It's supposed to drop down to 1hz. The CPU refreshing a pixel of an OLED screen or a notification led is the same power usage. That is even if you have a notification led, the CPU could still be stuck refreshing it at 60 hz.
AH ok that makes a lot more sense. ;) As I understand it, it's only the newest top displays that can go down to 1 Hz. Or maybe it's just when in use they can't for some reason. I find the 1Hz capability to be extremely cool, so it would be great if it's a more general feature of AOD.
I really can't. I did it all. It just doesn't come near the tiny lil LED shining bright.
And yet they don't
Oh, in some cases the notification LED is physically there, but is disabled in software. At least I know that was the case with a bunch of Motorola phones, including my Moto G5s Plus.
I'm pretty sure mine has a tiny LED under the screen, that only shows very shortly on reboot. But as you say, it's disabled for some weird reason.
Because if you can read an LED notification system you have no purpose to pick up the cellphone.
Cellphones are not designed FOR YOU. They are designed by marketeers for you to use.
Once you realize this, all the anti-consumer shit makes sense.
I have no effing clue. Maybe to get us to actually look at the damn phone more often? Because of the people who're drowning in spam? Makes not THAT much sense. Probably to save a cent in circuit-design, because only the nerds were using the stupid LED? I really would like to know too.