In-depth reviewDelaysSorry, Foundation, but I have to bring this point up first, before actually starting the review. I do understand that there is a pandemic going on and all sorts of issues around the world slow the supply chain down. However, most of these factors aren't new; so one could have predicted / calculated them into the ETA. I'm fully aware that
this was a preorder without guaranteed shipping date.
But instead of offering highly optimistic dates and pushing them back repeatedly, I would have preferred a: 'Sorry, we got caught off-guard and need 8 more months until completion'. If they would have managed to ship in 3 months regardless, I don't think anyone would have complained..
The shipping itself (to EU) was extremely quick and only needed 1-2 days through UPS. I haven't tried
shipping to a PO box, but didn't want to order to my home address either, so it took a bit longer to get my hands on it. Sorry for the long wait, everybody!
Version twoI am not even sure how to call their new device. Looks cool!
It will ship in two months from now [emphasized] roughly and as I said, I preordered it for a bit over 150 bucks which I find a fair price for such a device.
Personally, I will be more careful with company timelines and try to avoid a wording like here; instead I should have said '
they try to ship it in two months from now'. I hope that nobody who bought
Batch 2 after my review, got disappointed by my above statement not having held true. Personally, I'm never in a rush, but I felt responsible mentioning the delays, just because I repeated their optimistic 2-month timeline.
Unboxing / what's in the box? In comparison to
Founders Edition, you get the same SanDisk Industrial XI microSD HC 8GB card, however only a single one instead of two. Backups are encrypted, so I don't see a risk in keeping the single microSD with you on a daily basis (for updates and transactions on a device without camera), as long as you have the paper (or metal) backup stored in a secure location.
New this time, you get a double-sided USB-C cable (sadly no USB-A adapter included) to charge the device and
two microSD adapters. One allows you to plug the microSD card into devices with USB-C, such as Androids or modern laptops. The other one is made for iOS devices with Lightning connector.
Even though transactions can be made simply through QR code communication, the inclusion of these adapters allows people to do complete firmware updates of the wallet from their phones (through the new
Envoy app).
I believe this makes the device much more accessible since some people just don't have a proper computer.
You also get new Foundation Stickers, a set-up card that links to
https://foundationdevices.com/setup/ and also a nice 24-word seed phrase backup card which I recommend to use and laminate. It also has a separate section for a 20-digit 'backup code' which encrypts / decrypts the microSD backups.
If you are using steel washers to back up your Passport (recommended!), this means 2 washers (if used double-sided) suffice to back-up that code.
A few short words about the unboxing. The device came in the same white box like
Founders Edition with a simple, single security seal. The security model has not changed in this regard, so it makes sense.
link 1,
link 2.
The inner box is physically well packed and protected by adhesive bubble wrap and shrink wrap.
Design & materialsThe classic
white - gold - black color scheme was kept and even extended to the box, a detail I enjoyed. It received golden, metal navigation keys, which I planned to mod and black-out, since I assumed cheap spray-painted plastic, but this metal finish (anodization?) is actually really well made, so I'll keep it. The overall build is still solid, back cover comes off easily and snaps on firmly with the same magnet technique as before.
The only detail I'd criticize is the use of
piano black plastic inside of the small lip around the screen. It's most visible below the screen and of course, known to stop looking good after a while.
Why do car companies use piano black plastic as an interior material?SetupNot a lot has changed
from the Founders Edition setup procedure. In general, the whole GUI is mostly a colorful version of the
FE GUI, with the addition of being able to use the sideways buttons to change between 'accounts' (different derivation paths) and a few smaller menu changes.
The advantage of the microSD backup (that I mentioned above) over a seed phrase backup is that it will keep all settings, such as multiple accounts, multisig setups, and now new: Casa & Postmix setups.
For anyone really interested in the setup and general GUI look & feel, I have a 'walkthrough' (photo gallery) of every single step down below as well as instructions for installing the simulator and trying it out interactively for yourselves.
Battery The elephant in the room with the
Founders Edition was the battery. I should mention that while a set of regular Alkaline AAA's went flat super fast, repeatedly, during my initial setup and review process, over the last year I haven't had to swap them a whole lot. The whole workflow for signing a transaction from turning the device on to turning it off, can be done in under half a minute, keeping power consumption low.
It makes the usage more 'stressful' in a way though, and in the rare occasion of running out of battery on a holiday, you can't buy new ones, while you can always recharge a Li-Ion pack.
The
Batch 2 uses default Nokia BL-5C rechargeable Li-Ion batteries (you all know them). They have been around for almost 20 years and millions of these are available on the market, so I think we're pretty future-proof with this choice - regardless of whether Foundation Devices sells or doesn't sell replacements, stops production, or even goes bankrupt.
Over 250 million 1100s have been sold since its launch in late 2003
[...]
Battery: Nokia BL-5C
I can confirm that the device even works without a battery; just plugged into a USB-C power source.
While keeping in mind that
Founders Edition is supposed to be used with special non-rechargeable AAA Lithium batteries, I just assume most won't (due to price and availability) so I measured the battery runtime on a set of new Alkalines and the fully charged BL-5C that came with the wallet. Both devices were set to 100% full brightness, although the
B2 'full brightness' looks at least twice as bright as
FE.
On a fresh set of AAA LR03 batteries, at full brightness and mostly lying down doing nothing, the
Founders Edition shut itself down after
27:25 minutes.
The
Batch 2 managed to run for
4:33:03 hours on a full charge. I also did a lot of experimentation (for QR code scanning speed) for around an hour during that time.
ScreenMy main criticism in terms of build quality on
FE was the plastic screen; flush with the device, which came scratched (though it didn't pick up extra scratches that I noticed).
B2 has a recessed glass screen, which is also much brighter and has colors. It is more pleasurable to use and harder to damage. Big improvement here, I really love it!
Only drawback from
Founders Edition is that it appears to be a regular IPS LCD:
FD-KL-ASM-FG-DISPLAY-LCD-IPS-2-INCH instead of the security / auditability-focused
Azumo/Sharp 12616-06_T3 monochrome display.
I may be wrong about this, but most regular IPS LCDs usually come with a black-box driver chip. Hopefully, Foundation Devices were able to avoid that here, but I couldn't find detailed information about it.
CameraLike the screen, the camera was recessed, which should protect it from damages. Unlike the screen, the module used remained the same. I mentioned it in my summary, but unfortunately the new firmware appears to detect QR codes slower than
FE. It works very well when the QR code's resolution is not too high (more codes, less data per code), but struggles with more complex images that the old device handles like a champ.
I hope that Foundation Devices @zherbert @FoundationKen look more into this; fast readout of PSBT is what makes or breaks the Passport, in my opinion; and I must say that it's more reliably fast to use the
Founders Edition, especially when playing around with different wallets.
In general, my devices (PC, phone) are better at reading out QR codes from either Passport's screen when setting the QR code size to 'largest' (at the expense of scanning more of them), but such a setting is actually
lacking in the different wallet software I tried.
So, while it would be great for both Passports to perform equally (given same hardware), improvements to host software would also be welcome. Foundation Devices' own software (
Envoy) has a good QR code density though; more on it later.