Mrs H and I have been satisfied Windows phone users for years, but as various providers withdraw their apps from the Store, I feel I should anticipate the demise of Windows phone by getting to know Android. I say Android because my perception of iPhone is one of needless expense. I'm sure you can anticipate that when push comes to shove, Mrs H will put me firmly in to bat.
Would anyone like to comment and/or recommend me a make/model I should look out for?
The phone will probably be bought new or used for less than £50 on Ebay or Gumtree.
TIA
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Agree about i-phone and expense.
Mrs B, my son and I all have Motorola Moto G variants. Mine an early one their's the latest variant - larger and with scope to add SD card.
All do fine for calls, text, WhatsApp, basic internet, navigation etc. If you want lots of apps then go for something with enough memory. I need to housekeep mine on a regular basis.
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>> The phone will probably be bought new or used for less than £50 on Ebay
>> or Gumtree.
And that would be a very severe mistake.
The best current value for money android phone is the Motorola G4 - 100 to 150 quid.
Last edited by: Zero on Sun 26 Mar 17 at 22:33
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He's very right.
The experience of trying to use an older, less powerful, phone with today's applications will cause your head to explode.
New and cheap [ish] is a better path.
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You are both right, but to throw another idea into the pot, I've bought two HTC M8s direct from China/Hong Kong in recent months (the second one just having been delivered) for friends.
Both were brand new in original packaging and took 10 days to be delivered by DHL to the UK and then Royal Mail. Cost? £139, including delivery.
See:
tinyurl.com/km3stzn
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>>
>> And that would be a very severe mistake.
>>
>> The best current value for money android phone is the Motorola G4 - 100 to
>> 150 quid.
>>
What that man said (above). Although we are getting the equally good but slightly smaller screen G4 Play for about £30-40 less.
People at work cannot be trusted with iPhones (I hate them anyway, can be said for both at times) so they get these. A few moans at first but now they are seeing their worth.
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>> People at work cannot be trusted with iPhones
Why?
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>> >> People at work cannot be trusted with iPhones
>>
>> Why?
>>
The state they come back in, scuffed edges, cracked screens and we cannot afford to write £600 off after 6-12 months. I'm sure they use them to knock nails in!
This is after issue them with gel cases and glass screen protector's.
We have 100 mobile users, and mass implementing cheap but decent androids makes my bottom line look healthy.
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Thank you for the replies. I might not know much but I can often detect good advice when it's given. A Motorola G4 is on its way to me as I write this. Be prepared for some inane questions.
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Sony Xperia, though I fear I am too late ...
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>> Sony Xperia, though I fear I am too late ...>>
Yet the only person I know who has one hates it with a passion....:-(
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I had a Xperia Z and now a Z3 (now 3 years old I think!) and have no major issues with them.
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Over the past few years I have had an Xperia x10i, SP and Z5 Compact, the latter is brilliant, so fast, great camera, great screen. Samsung seem to have cornered the mass market though the Sonys are more niche, IMO better and valued by most who use them.
One son has had a couple of Windows phones, wife, daughter and other son have iPhones two of which I have to set up, we also have three iPads, and there is nothing in the Apple OS that would move me away from Android.
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There are a lot of Chinese branded Android phones out there that offer very tempting specs for very little money, often with very good reviews. Be very wary though.
I bought an Elephone P9000 - a fantastic bit of kit with Octacore processor, 32GB storage, lovely 401ppi, 1080p display, USB C, wireless charging etc etc. It was a brilliant bit of kit. 2 day battery life, better reception on the same network than either my previous Nexus 5X or Galaxy S5. It was brilliant. For about five months. Then an Android update broke the recovery partition meaning the phone couldn't be further upgraded (or factory reset). Then the top 1/3 of the touch screen became unresponsive.
With zero meaningful support from the manufacturer (broken English emails referring me to bulletin boards where I could download unsigned drivers to get the phone to talk to a Windows PC), Amazon ended up refunding my money (and not wanting the phone back). As it couldn't be reset, I had to destroy it.
Of all the phones I've had and experienced, I do think Samsung are in a league of their own. You get what you pay for.
Never understood the Apple phenomenon. SWMBO and both kids are Apple fans, and have 3 iPhones and an iPad between them. They honestly think I'm just being petulant when I say I prefer Android, but I honestly do.
Last edited by: DP on Fri 31 Mar 17 at 15:27
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>> They honestly think I'm just being petulant when I
>> say I prefer Android, but I honestly do.
>>
My experience exactly, I agree with you totally except that Sony Xperia phones are better than Samsung in my experience, not as much marketing clout, though very refined products.
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>> My experience exactly, I agree with you totally except that Sony Xperia phones are better
>> than Samsung in my experience, not as much marketing clout, though very refined products.
>>
Don't have experience of Samsung phones but agree about Xperia, have just swapped an old Z for a new XA and have been very pleased with it.
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>> They honestly think I'm just being petulant when I
>> say I prefer Android, but I honestly do.
>>
A sign of someone who has been converted and then slowly realised that conversion has robbed them of freedom of choice, cost them money, and is unwilling to accept that just maybe the other people were correct.
Maybe the present day version of ' nobody got fired for buying IBM.'
The more I think about it, the better modern equivalent could be conversion to radical Islam?
From a committed Moto G user of 24 months - however I now wish I had 16MB internal - so many apps will not transfer to the 32 SD card.
Last edited by: sherlock47 on Fri 31 Mar 17 at 16:07
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>> however I now wish I had 16MB internal - so many apps will not transfer to the 32 SD card.
>>
I am sure you mean 16GB, my Xperia has 32GB internal so with a 32GB card as well it's difficult to fill it up with anything.
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>> >> however I now wish I had 16MB internal - so many apps will not
>> transfer to the 32 SD card.
>> >>
>>
>> I am sure you mean 16GB, my Xperia has 32GB internal so with a 32GB
>> card as well it's difficult to fill it up with anything.
>>
>>
>>
Well spotted - Blame the brain to finger communication protocol.
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>>, I do think Samsung are in a league of their own.
I just changed from Samsung to Huawei. In my experience / opinion////
The Samsung camera is better quality and easier to manipulate
The Huawei battery life is *way* better
I prefer the Huawei user interface though the lack of app tray is inconvenient
The Huawei fingerprint scanner is better placed, more useful and works way better
The Huawei gives you much more control over what and when apps run, and what access they have to your phone.
The Samsung implementation of the SD card functionality is rubbish. The Huawei less so.
The screen on the Huawei is lightly curved. Not sure what the benefit it supposed to be but it makes screen protectors an a*** to use.
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>> The screen on the Huawei is lightly curved. Not sure what the benefit it supposed
>> to be but it makes screen protectors an a*** to use.
I just googled Huawei curved screen protector and it came back with several results on Amaozon and EBay.
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Of course, its no problem at all if you live somewhere sensible.
However, it is here. Firstly naff all is easily available in country so you need to buy it from abroad. Secondly the process for buying from, say, Amazon or EBay would be....
Neither organisation exists in Chile so log on in the country of your choice.
Buy what you want.
Pay to ship it to Chile. Huge complication. Import tax always an issue.
Item gets shipped and arrives in Chile within 48 hours.
4 - 6 weeks later Chilean customs look at it and decide if they will let it in.
Or perhaps they need more information.
Or perhaps more import tax.
If any of those occur there will then be a handling fee also.
So if any of those apply they will write to you some time within the next month. Typiclaly you cannot reply in writing you have to go to their offices downtown and do it in person. That typically takes all day and is pretty much like visiting a DSS office in the grotty end of Birmingham on a busy day.
If none of those apply they will then send it to your house. That usually takes a couple of weeks.
Of course, if anything at all is confusing, complicated or difficult they will simply return it to sender. In a month or two.
A while ago my Father set the girls a can of baked beans and a packet of wine gums each. The wine gums were seized and it was demanded that I take a full ingredient list to their offices. And that I would pay £5 per day storage until it was resolved, and there would be a £20 handling fee.
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Of course, you can go and buy me one. Take it out of all its packaging so nobody thinks you're smuggling. Then protect it from damage somehow. Then ship it to me making sure its noted as £0 value and a gift. Of course you'll have to pay postage.
And then sometime within the next two months I will probably receive it.
Its an a***.
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So what does Chile do? It sells screen protectors for the Huawei which are flat.
Yes, the issues are obvious. But they do it anyway and then look at you like you're nuts when you point out the issue.
So then they try to sell you one which is simply smaller than the Huawei screen so that it avoids the curved bits.
And they think I'm being picky when I don't like that.
And then they will assure you that these are the official Huawei screen protectors and that the item I want to buy doesn't exist anywhere on the planet.
I get mad quite a lot. But it doesn't help.
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What exactly are you trying to say?
;)
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>> I prefer the Huawei user interface though the lack of app tray is inconvenient
I have a Huawei P9, 32GB with 128GB SD card. I think the camera is excellent.
The lack of app drawer annoyed me, now fixed by using a third party launcher (Action Launcher 3) which gives me the app drawer button bottom centre to display all app icons alpabetically, and I can also swipe from the left on the main home screen for a complete app list, which is actually easier than looking in the app drawer.
The thing I least liked about iphone was having to have an icon for everything.
I've had iphone, windows phone and Android and I choose Android. Windows phone was nice, the live tiles were much better than notifications and the camera on the Nokia 1020 was brilliant (better than excellent) but the non-availablity and decreasing likelihood of apps made me change.
I also have a broken Sony Z5 Premium (the big screen one). It still needs mending (screen) but it won't work either and I was going away so just bought a new phone. I actually prefer the P9, the Z5 is good but was just a bit too big.
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Which Android smartphone ? - Bromptonaut
