Thoughts about Passport hardware wallet

[NotATether]

FAQ says it will be $299

https://foundationdevices.com/faqs/?v=7516fd43adaa

That's... a deal breaker.  Especially considering this is supposed to be open hardware that you can build yourself, then what justifies the big price tag?

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[HCP]

Research, development... production costs of making what will no doubt be a limited run of essentially bespoke devices (even if they are built using "open" hardware).

There is always a fairly significant amount of time, effort and money spent on bringing a product to market... My guess is that they're just trying to recover these costs. Sadly, in a market that has two well established leaders which are already at significantly lower price points, it is going to be difficult for them to sell many units.

Imagine if Apple/Samsung were selling $500 flagship smartphones... and Google/OnePlus showed up with a $1000 smartphone... because that's pretty much what the Passport folks are attempting to do here

[DaveF]

Research, development... production costs of making what will no doubt be a limited run of essentially bespoke devices (even if they are built using "open" hardware).

There is always a fairly significant amount of time, effort and money spent on bringing a product to market... My guess is that they're just trying to recover these costs. Sadly, in a market that has two well established leaders which are already at significantly lower price points, it is going to be difficult for them to sell many units.

Imagine if Apple/Samsung were selling $500 flagship smartphones... and Google/OnePlus showed up with a $1000 smartphone... because that's pretty much what the Passport folks are attempting to do here

Making it worse is that most of the OS is coming from ColdCard and so is a large amount of the hardware design. Yes, they still have to do a lot of work / tweaks but they already know what and how things work, they just have to tweak it to what they want.

Hoping the price drops before release.

-Dave

[bob123]

FAQ says it will be $299

Ye.. that's a scam.
This device isn't even close to being worth 100$. That's a rip-off.

Imagine if Apple/Samsung were selling $500 flagship smartphones... and Google/OnePlus showed up with a $1000 smartphone... because that's pretty much what the Passport folks are attempting to do here

Not really.
It is more like: We have well known brands having flag ship smartphones for 500$, then a new brand no one knows brings out a new smartphone with the same specs and an outdated appearance, demanding 2000$.
That's an absolutely exorbitant price.

[dkbit98]

Make it for 10 bucks like you said you can.  

I learned math in school so I can count.
Coldcard wallet, as original product is also not so cheap like Trezor or Ledger.
Old calculator style is also not modern and attractive, and it's current price for Coldcard™ Mk3 is $119.97
Is that also a scam?  

It's easy to say imagination price for any product including Passport, but real facts are different.

Making it worse is that most of the OS is coming from ColdCard and so is a large amount of the hardware design. Yes, they still have to do a lot of work / tweaks but they already know what and how things work, they just have to tweak it to what they want.

Hoping the price drops before release.

-Dave

I would not buy it even if they drop the price, but my prediction is that price can only rise, as presale prices are often lower then regular price.

[HCP]

What the individual parts are actually worth is a meaningless metric really... Personally, I don't think iPhones and Galaxy S20's are worth USD$1000... and their internal components are definitely not worth that much... but the companies think that enough consumers think they are, and based on the retail sales volumes, enough consumers do think they are!

Is it a "scam"?... no, of course it isn't... Companies are free to charge whatever they like for their products, no one is forcing you to buy it. As long as it is a hardware wallet that delivers all the promised specs/features, then it's not a scam... arguably, it is "over-priced"... but it's not a scam

Having said that, I just don't see enough of a value proposition for this device to be worth $299... especially when you stack it up against competing devices like coldcard, trezor, ledger etc... which are less than half the price.

[dkbit98]

Some updates and images from Passport wallet.

Copper-plated interior frame:
https://twitter.com/FOUNDATIONdvcs/status/1319682611384639492

Forged from zinc-alloy:
https://twitter.com/FOUNDATIONdvcs/status/1316750097821114369

Video showing navigation menu:
https://twitter.com/FOUNDATIONdvcs/status/1317142594326040582

[dkbit98]

Passport wallet release sneak peak unboxing and testing video for their wallet:
https://youtu.be/_PacNqlz2Co?t=153

I am not sure how they are going to work with firmware updates in future, because Colcard wallet is not open source anymore and they switched to Commons license, so nobody can use their code anymore.

[DaveF]

I am not sure how they are going to work with firmware updates in future, because Colcard wallet is not open source anymore and they switched to Commons license, so nobody can use their code anymore.

As of now it looks like they have not changed their license on the github page: https://github.com/Coldcard/firmware/blob/master/LICENSE
Going with a bit of snark here but if Passport keeps their price @ $299. they probably will not have to worry because they are not going to sell that many.

It's big and expensive. Nice concept but I can't see them moving many at that price. $199 or $149 would be better.

Just my view.

-Dave

[dkbit98]

As of now it looks like they have not changed their license on the github page: https://github.com/Coldcard/firmware/blob/master/LICENSE

That is their old license, and now they have new CC Commons Clause license:
https://github.com/Coldcard/firmware/blob/master/COPYING-CC

I agree price is higher, but they use more quality materials than ColdCard and everything is made in US.

[DaveF]

As of now it looks like they have not changed their license on the github page: https://github.com/Coldcard/firmware/blob/master/LICENSE

That is their old license, and now they have new CC Commons Clause license:
https://github.com/Coldcard/firmware/blob/master/COPYING-CC

I agree price is higher, but they use more quality materials than ColdCard and everything is made in US.

On the price / quality thing. Yes...with a but or no...with a however.
It's a security device not thing to be displayed. It is probably going to be kept in a safe / locked cabinet / whatever. So is it better then just a cheap ugly piece of plastic?
So yeah the better quality materials have an advantage but it's still more then 2.5X the price.
Made in USA vs. Made is Canada it's all the same more or less. And I say this as an American. It's not like it's coming from the 3rd world.

As for the license, I wonder if you could argue that since the old one is still up there it's still valid.
Would probably be an interesting court case.

-Dave

[DaveF]

Bit of a necro bump here, but I was looking for another post and saw this one.
Checked the https://foundationdevices.com/ site and saw that they are shipping.
BUT they say ship in 7 - 10 days from order, so they might be 3D printing the cases as needed.

Anybody out there order one? As I said a few post up at $299 I am way to cheap to get one.

-Dave

[o_e_l_e_o]

I also don't plan on buying one for $300, but I did see this video a couple weeks back: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2zWGCCF8mo

It's a bit drawn out and could use some much better editing, but it gives you a good idea of how the device works. I quite like the validation process of scanning a QR code from their website with the device and then entering validation words, but I'm not sure how easy something like that would be to spoof or bypass. It has a boot counter, which is cool.

However, I really don't like that its standard back up is to a SD card, with the advice to store the decryption key for this back up in a password manager, all the while saying that writing down your seed phrase is only for "experienced users".

[dkbit98]

Anybody out there order one? As I said a few post up at $299 I am way to cheap to get one.

Shipping and customs would be expensive for me, but I would order one of this devices if I lived in United States or Canada, just for testing and comparing with other hardware wallets.
Passport is very similar with Colcard wallet, it uses their modified open source code and they have exact same secure element ATECC608A.
I even heard they gave away some free devices for testing and posting video reviews.

[dkbit98]

Passport hardware wallet by Foundation Devices is now one of the five hardware wallets (Trezor One, Trezor Model T, Bitbox02, KeyKey) that are reproducible when tested by WalletScrutiny.
Even Coldcard still isn't reproducible, and Passport code is based on Coldcard firmware but they created new repository and made some code changes (it would be interesting to compare two repositories).
Passport has been audited by Keylabs and there is bug bounty program if you find any bugs in their firmware or software

Latest Passport firmware version is  v1.0.6 and only thing that is stopping me to buy one of this nokia-like devices is price of $299 :/
https://github.com/Foundation-Devices/passport-firmware/releases



You can read full report and analysis in this link:
https://walletscrutiny.com/hardware/passport/

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Latest Passport firmware version is  v1.0.6 and only thing that is stopping me to buy one of this nokia-like devices is price of $299 :/
https://github.com/Foundation-Devices/passport-firmware/releases

I had forgotten all about this wallet, and I thank you for bumping this thread--in particular for showing the image with the "I do not consent to the search of this device" sticker, which I had to look for on EFF's website.  I love that, though I don't know what legal weight, if any, it carries as a statement to LEOs.  I also wasn't aware of the existence of EFF or much about the Free Software Foundation but bookmarked both of their sites to look at later.

But yeah, for as ugly-looking a wallet as this one is (it looks uglier to me than the first time I posted in this thread), the price is just way too steep.  By a factor of around 3, I'd say.  If it was going for $100 or less and I needed a hardware wallet or a crypto collectible, I might consider it if I had the extra money.  But $299?  Hell no.

[HCP]

It does seem expensive compared with other hardware wallets... but if it really does what it says on the tin, then it's a fairly decent solution.

It really does have some nice features, but given that I already have 3 or 4 hardware wallets, I can't really justify the $299 price tag just for a couple of "nice to have, but not essential" features

Maybe if Bitcoin moons to $100k I'll splash out for shits and giggles

[dkbit98]

It really does have some nice features, but given that I already have 3 or 4 hardware wallets, I can't really justify the $299 price tag just for a couple of "nice to have, but not essential" features

I always liked small electronic devices even before hardware wallets, and bunch of those devices are just collecting dust and maybe I used them only few times in my life.
This reminds me about one funny 2020 tweet from Jameson Lopp regarding possible problem with his hardware wallets collection ,
but having multiple hardware wallets can be used for improving security with multisig, and one device will die sooner or later so you always have replacement ready.


https://twitter.com/lopp/status/1288173904637435904

[SFR10]

only thing that is stopping me to buy one of this nokia-like devices is price of $299 :/

I agree with what @ETFbitcoin said, but another reason ^{[apart from being overpriced - IMO, it's worth around $150 at most]} why only a few people have bought it so far, has to be because of its limited cryptocurrency support ^{[personally, I only use BTCitcoin but that's not the case with a lot of users out there]}.
Does anybody know what's the "surprise gift" that's included on the FE ones?
Just found out it comes with an interesting ^{[probably not for everyone out there, but it brings back good old memories]} "secret" menu.

[dkbit98]

Does anybody know what's the "surprise gift" that's included on the FE ones?

I think this could be free Bitcoin whitepaper by Satoshi Nakamoto looking like a passport  (I hope Faketoshi won't sue them for this ), but I am not sure if that is actual surprise gift.
There are some QR codes in package coming in package so it could be some free sats or it's just links for Foundation website.

Just found out it comes with an interesting ^{[probably not for everyone out there, but it brings back good old memories]} "secret" menu.

Yeah, I saw that hidden famous retro game that every old Nokia user knows