This rambles a bit, but just want to share my initial impressions.

I just received the Essential PH-1 two days ago. I used the student discount. It included the 360 degree camera and USB headset for FREE. Ordered the phone on Tuesday, received it Thursday via UPS (I live in the SF Bay Area, Essential shipped from their Palo Alto location).

Even though it is likely to be orphaned soon, I got the PH-1 for the value. I refuse to pay $1000 USD for a mobile phone that will at best get one Android OS update. If I had that kind of cash I would go premium, like Vertu. Essential assures that they will continue to provide full version step updates of the Android OS in a timely fashion.

I am with Verizon. I simply put the SIM card from my old Verizon handset into the PH-1 then turned it on. The phone booted up, joined the Verizon network with my phone number, no issues. I could see the IMEI and ICCID in my online account information right away.

I had to update the phone OTA to Android 9 Pie. Went fine, no issues.

I Verizonized the phone by installing Verizon Message , and SMS/MMS were fully restored. Contacts, call history were restored from backup of the previous phone via my Google account.

On a side note, Verizon no longer offers 5GB of free Cloud, so I will use Google backup and Verizon Message to archive the PH-1 data.

Very simple, bare bones phone as far as apps and features. In my hands, fast and no issues with the reported touch screen lags. Feels solid, made of gorilla glass, titanium and ceramic. Don't know about the inside frame.

The screen is a bit small for me, plus I have fat fingers. My last couple of phones had larger screens, so still adjusting to less real estate and tinier icons/fonts.

The camera works fine in good light. I have not tried any night time shots yet. I do see what people mean about the coarse quality in low light, but why would you try to photograph something that can't be seen clearly? I saw a post about using a Google HDR port as an alternative to the PH-1 camera app.

Based on the signal icon, does not get as good reception as my old Verizon phone. The signal strength is excellent though, so maybe the PH-1 icon has a wider range than other handsets?

I noticed that there were no choices selected for preferred mobile network. I first tried Global, then 4G/LTE. Both showed LTE to the left of the signal icon. I settled on Global, since that is what my old phone used. Also makes me feel worldly until I really do take that trip oversees and bring my phone lol.

At first my backups were not showing in Google Drive. The phone showed that Contacts had been backed up, everything else said 'waiting for backup.' I tapped on the app backup section and it showed details on which had been backed up and when. So a conflict of information. I did a factory reset, connected the phone to AC power and turned on WiFi. Now the phone showed that everything had been backed up, but still cannot see anything in Google Drive. Have contacted Essential. Why is there no MANUAL backup command in Android??? Right, use the ADB method, but not so easy and convenient, is it?

The PH-1 has USB DAC, my first experience with no headphone jack. I don't like Google Music, so I tried Musicolet, Onkyo and HiBy. All had very different sounds, believe it or not. Essential recommends Tidal, because the PH-1 supports MQA. My purchase came with a three month trial of Tidal.

The PH-1 has 4GB RAM, 128GB internal storage. Should be plenty for me, even with all my music in there.

My last phone was an LG, so I wanted to install screen knock on the PH-1, but could not because it uses LCD not AMOLED/OLED.

Have not dropped it yet, and do not plan to use a case. I don't like cases.

Summary:

PROS--

The PH-1 will get more than one Android update, no bloatware, simple and clean lines and features. More affordable than phones offered by the major US carriers. The USB DAC is a plus, once I find a good music player :-) Student discount, free headphones and camera accessory (have not tried the 360 cam yet though). Supports MQA format.

CONS--

Not the very latest hardware (eg uses LCD screen tech). Cannot be purchased locally (except for maybe Sprint?). Not everything was ready for prime time, like the backups.

Last, I wanted the Vivo, but can't get it in the US :-( Tony Stark has one. I do math like Tony Stark, I want the same phone.

Thanks for reading. I will post an update after I have the unit for a while, and have tried the 360 camera.

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