Notkia: A New Kind of Linux Phone
Many of us millennials remember our first phones. If you were born between 1985 and 1990ish, odds are that your first cell phone was a Nokia of some sort. For all of you Gen-Z and Alpha kids out there, see the picture below.
Mine, if I recall correctly was the second from the right. The year was 2003. I was a junior in high school and my parents gave it to me for emergencies as I was driving around town to school and work. It was a good phone that did what it was designed to do — make phone calls — and nothing more. I’m not sure if SMS was even a thing at that point, but I never used it if it was. That would come later when I got the venerable 3310 and went off to college.
But of course time went on and we ended up with newer and arguable better phones like the Motorola Razr, the Blackberry Curve, and of course the iPhone.
Since then the world has moved almost exclusively to smartphones and haven’t looked back. The innovations and utility of smartphones are many, but there are some out there who don’t want all the bells and whistles (and distractions) that they offer.
For those people there are whole new lines of so-called feature phones — phones that are internet capable and that have access to certain services like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and the like, but are in an older form factor. But what if what you really want is your old Nokia phone back? Sure you can still get them from eBay and garage sales, but can you actually use them today? For now, yes, but not for long. Those old phones utilize the old CDMA mobile networks and there has been a major push by the major mobile carriers to shut down CDMA at the end of 2022. So if you can find a GSM Nokia phone than you’re probably good to go! But if not, are you limited to whatever garbage feature phone is out there? Maybe not…
Notkia
Now before you get your hopes up, this is just a project and is not in production. That said, it’s a really, really cool project. Notkia is more than a custom OS ROM, it’s a full on hardware replacement. It aims to upgrade the 168x line of Nokia phones with a custom PCB, a better screen, USB-C charging, wifi and improved wireless modulation. To top it all off, the phone runs full blown Linux!
Do I see this being available in the near future? No, not likely, but with so much work being done on Linux smartphones, tablets, and smartwatches, it’s nice to see someone putting in the work to make a viable open phone for those who don’t want those things.
Be sure to follow the project over at Hackaday if you miss your beautiful, old, nearly indestructible Nokia brick.