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  in my quest to learn to wrestle myself away from addictive, brain-melting social media, my partner (who had recently bought a ~$50 little nugget himself) began to nudge me towards a dumbphone. i was really not into the idea at first, but i started to come around after both reading articles about the profound effects it can have on mental health and feeling the weight of being constantly reachable starting to crush. i wound up digging for feature phones (basically flip phones that run modified versions of android; a severely lacking market in the US unfortunately) as i found that my only real hangup in the first place was access to music streaming, and stumbled upon the kyocera 903KC and its brother, the 902KC. the 903KC was the only japanese feature phone known to work on US cellular, with the 902's track record a little more spotty but overall mostly untested. it felt like a challenge. 
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waiting for it to come in the mail, all the way from hana-san (shoutout ebay seller fussysilver) who tossed my darling little phone nude into a thin bubble mailer to be manhandled across the atlantic, was AGONIZING. i nearly had a heart attack when i got the delivery notice and saw the thinnest, tiniest, daintiest envelope possible nestled in my storm door. but it was here!!!
im obsessed with the keyboard (which is backlit with nice clicky buttons) and external display. the camera takes nice photos too. the outside still needs some sticker decorations...
so far as i can tell: both models were released around 2019, with the only difference between the two being that the 903KC is designed for y!mobile, and the 902KC for softbank (two major japanese cellular carriers). the 902KC is seemingly only compatible with tmobile and their mvnos. they both run on android 8.1/oreo. my SAVING GRACE was finding a full translated manual online. i never would have figured out the buttons without it!!
ive used deepl to translate these so many times and still dont remember what most of them are. at least tethering is easy to pick out.
i had virtually no issues setting my phone up on mint mobile; i did have to configure my apn, but those are easily found through a carriers website and the settings mint provide work. the operating system runs as quickly as an android flip phone could, and though i dont use the browser much, the cursor comes very much in handy when it comes to sideloaded apps--and it works pretty much flawlessly.
the body of the phone itself also seems quite sturdy (which i guess explains hana-sans confidence in its international survival abilities). it came in poorer condition than i expected, with some plastic chipped off one of the shells corners, and minor (..and major) scratches just about everywhere imaginable. but it continues to hold up well to my negligent abuse.
really the only issue ive run into are semi-frequent system crashes, which could be explained by a variety of things like age, general wear and tear, sideloaded apps, etc. so i cant really blame them on the phone itself without a better frame of reference. that, and the GPS doesnt seem to function at all. ive seen mention of a workaround for it but have yet to try it; in the meantime i hotspot to my old google pixel when needed. (thats also how i took these photos.) i also cant seem to send or recieve photos thru the default sms app, but using google messages has fixed that issue.
overall, i think the 902KC was a good investment despite its issues, especially if youre a nerd like me and get excited about niche tech that nobody else cares about.
plus, it has a charm strap for my cute black jack kewpie.
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06/27/02: website created (latest)
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