Until Tuesday I had a 3rd Gen Moto G Smartphone. A little bit big at around 5.8" but just fitted in my shirt pocket. Unfortunately I lost on Tuesday. It must have been in the house but even a dedicated search by Mrs B has not located it. Battery flat so won't ring. Maybe it ended up in the rubbish?
I don't want to spend a lot (eg Google Pixel) and definitely Android; I don't do Apple. Pretty much everything is 6" plus so well over 150mm tall. If I wanted a tablet I'd buy one!!
A Samsung Galaxy A20e looked to fit the bill but nobody has it in stock. There are a handful of Sony Experia models but they're old designs and again, difficult to find.
There are a couple of cheap as chips small form factor phones like a Alcatel 1 or Nokia G10.
I only use the phone for calls/texts WhattsApp - mostly using the web app with a desktop PC - and for streaming music to Bluetooth speakers. And in the car I use Google Maps - with Android Auto in the Skoda.
Given the price of either is well under £100 I'm tempted to chance it and see how I get on.
Does anyone else use a cheap phone? Or more generally, What Does the Panel think?
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My current phone is an LG K7 16Gb, bought in 2018 as a 2017 model. Cost me £80. I have an EE PAYG contract (£10 top-up per month, and each 3 months you get a permanent boost of +50mins or +500Mb data - currently get about 9Gb data and 300 minutes of calls. If I stop buying a £10 bundle the cash stays in the account and is then used on a per minute/Gb/text basis).
Still works fine, spends its life in the side pocket of my trousers.
Camera is mediocre, processor speed is mediocre - basically compared to a top-end phone it is mediocre but then it was £80! As an "iPOD" or web browser it is absolutely fine.
Current EE deals are: shop.ee.co.uk/mobile-phones/pay-as-you-go/gallery
When mine dies I expect I will be checking this out again.
Last edited by: Lygonos on Sun 30 Jan 22 at 09:31
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Whats your budget? IMHO you dont need to look further out than a later Moto G. than yours.
Samsungs have loaded Android overheads of dubious value, the Moto is the most stock Android you can get.
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>> Whats your budget? IMHO you dont need to look further out than a later Moto
>> G. than yours.
What he said, plus the Xiaomi range get good reviews.
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>>IMHO you dont need to look further out than a later Moto G. than yours.
shop.ee.co.uk/mobile-phones/pay-as-you-go/motorola-e30-payg/details
Decent phone? Spec looks good for under a ton, though how it works in practice I have no idea.
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>> Whats your budget? IMHO you dont need to look further out than a later Moto
>> G. than yours.
>>
>> Samsungs have loaded Android overheads of dubious value, the Moto is the most stock Android
>> you can get.
Might pay up to £200, certainly no more.
The problem with the current Motos is that they're too big - pushing 170mm.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Sun 30 Jan 22 at 09:45
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Try ebay, there's loads of refurbed phones on there for less than 100 quid. I bought one about a year ago, an S7, it's been fine since i bought it.
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>> Try ebay, there's loads of refurbed phones on there for less than 100 quid. I
>> bought one about a year ago, an S7, it's been fine since i bought it.
>>
That's another thought...
There are various 'renewed' phones on Amazon too and there's a Cex and an independent phone shop near the office. Might look in there if I've not bought the Nokia by Tuesday when I'm next in work.
At present I'm using an ideally sized Moto G 1st Gen as a back up. But it's not 4G and 3 seem to have turned off 3G round here; it's permanently on H or H+.
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>>and there's a Cex
AVOID AVOID AVOID
>> At present I'm using an ideally sized Moto G 1st Gen as a back up.
>> But it's not 4G and 3 seem to have turned off 3G round here; it's
>> permanently on H or H+.
H or H+ is better than 3G. The Networks are now starting to talk 3G sunset dates, not that far away either.
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>> >>and there's a Cex
>>
>> AVOID AVOID AVOID
Why do you say that?
Not used them for years when sourcing memory for legacy PCs used by my kids but they were OK then.
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Because the stuff (inevitably with mobile phones) is unmitigated tat with hidden issues.
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I've used them once in a while for a cheaper-than-buying-new source of some IT bit that I didn't really need but was curious about and that was OK.
I was looking at their purchase pages and worked out if I took in unused unwanted stuff from here I could get vouchers for about £250. But I know that some of the phones have really short battery life, and one randomly reboots.
I don't know if they test them enough when they buy them to find that out, or whether they factory rebuild or fully test them before they sell them but they are probably best avoided for buying phones from.
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Last phone I bought which was a cheapie but not rubbish, for the 'orticultural society, was a Nokia 2.4 32GB that cost £74 from Vodafone. Not sure if still available or would meet your needs.
There are still phones around that don't have NFC, watch out for that.
Last edited by: Manatee on Sun 30 Jan 22 at 10:36
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>> There are still phones around that don't have NFC, watch out for that.
Does NFC have any normal day to day use apart from payments?
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>> >> There are still phones around that don't have NFC, watch out for that.
>>
>> Does NFC have any normal day to day use apart from payments?
Payments? Thats enough of a reason to make it a must have,
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>> Payments? Thats enough of a reason to make it a must have,
Exactly that. And in normal times, any Tube use.
If I nip out to see someone I don't always have my wallet, but I always have my phone. When herself rings me to pick up some milk/bread or whatever on the way home...
Contactless is a raging success. Every payment I took on my village shop shift yesterday bar one, £1.10 in shrapnel for a Daily Mail, was card or phone. About 1/3 phone now I'd guess. I really thought the oldies (the main users of the shop) would resist but that's not the case.
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>> Does NFC have any normal day to day use apart from payments?
>>
When you come down to The Big Smoke, how do you pay for your tickets on the Tube. Not Oyster?
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>> When you come down to The Big Smoke, how do you pay for your tickets
>> on the Tube. Not Oyster?
I still have a couple of Oyster cards but these days I use my contactless debit card.
Same in Greggs.
Genuinely unclear what bonus there is in using the phone.
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Its not a bonus, its an alternative/backup,
NFC is also now being used to connect your phone to other devices without having to enter in a raft of details
Last edited by: Zero on Sun 30 Jan 22 at 12:04
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Have you tried looking down the side of the sofas arm, between the arm and seat.
Also under and beside your car seats and under the sofa in case you dropped it and accidentally kicked it under when getting up.
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yeah down the side of the car seats is a fav....
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>> yeah down the side of the car seats is a fav....
Mrs B's regularly goes down there in the Berlingo. Sure I never went out to the car again after I got home from work. Had been therein the Fabia and, as I was mostly driving t/f Wales, we used that on Wednesday.
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>> Also under and beside your car seats and under the sofa in case you dropped
>> it and accidentally kicked it under when getting up.
I came in from work on Tuesday at about 17:15. When I walked into the house it was in my shirt pocket and rang; Mrs B on her way home after a dental appointment.
While we ate I used it to stream to the Bluetooth speakers in the dining room.
We were planning for an early doors departure on Wednesday to a funeral near Wrexham. Didn't watch TV. I went upstairs to my study and faffed around on here and other sites. I think I had it with me then.
Sorted out suitable clothing including polishing my black shoes. Went to bed early.
On Weds morning I could not find it. Rang, as I normally do if it's misplaced, but it went straight to voicemail. Both of us, and our daughter, have searched the house from top to bottom.
Zilch.
I'm sure it will turn up one day.
Not the first mobile I've had vanish but others involved either the car (left on roof?) or the bogs at my old office in Chancery Lane (dishonest co-worker from another floor?).
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>> NFC is also now being used to connect your phone to other devices without having
>> to enter in a raft of details
I think if you've got a passport with a chip in it the phone can be used to transmit some details to verify ID. There's certainly some use of phone based tech when (eg) sorting out Settled Status.
I see a lot of people using phones to pay in shops. Having never had an NFC phone I'm not yet persuaded it's essential for me.
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>> I see a lot of people using phones to pay in shops. Having never had
>> an NFC phone I'm not yet persuaded it's essential for me.
That would have got me a cheap phone when I was shopping for one last August. There were at least a couple of sub £50 'bargains' that turned out not to have NFC.
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>>A Samsung Galaxy A20e looked to fit the bill but nobody has it in stock. >>
GiffGaff lists this model in its refurbished phones section at £173:
tinyurl.com/2p83n3tn
There's a mention in one comment above about Xiamoi. I've had the Mi9 T Pro for about 18 months and it's proved a great phone so far. Paid £300 - a bargain at the time in view of its specifications.
Now up to level 11, models wise.
tinyurl.com/2p86bc3v
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Google Tech Radar for best cheap phones.
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When I had iPhones and sometimes mislaid them down seat cushions, I could use Find My Phone on a PC or iPad. The phone would make some boring ringing noises, but job done.
I was much pleased when I got my Android Huawei phone. On mislaying it a few times, I'm delighted to discover that not only can I use my smartwatch (all of £26 worth) to find it, but also that the phone now uses a little girly fairy voice repeatedly singing "Coo-ee! I'm here!!".
Which I like better, frankly.
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One issue with cheaper/simpler phones is that they only have Android Go Edition in which not all Apps are supported.
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Update.
Tried a Nokia CO1 which I've now had for around 4 weeks.
Not good enough. Android lite seems not to support connection with the Skoda's infotainment system. It also has the charge socket on top which makes it a PITA to manage in the car's phone mount.
When using it to stream to the bluetooth speakers it goes all stuttery.
Moto G31 on order.
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A son was adamant that he would not buy Apple as they were too expensive.
Over the last 5/6 years I have lost count of the £800/£1000+ phones he has bought & re-sold.
2 weeks ago he relented- the current Android phone was cracking up (as had many before) and he therefore splashed out on an I-phone 13.
On the family WhatsApp he was pilloried by everyone because he stood by his Android buys even when he was suffering grief over the years - sound failing, having to re-boot, dropping calls etc etc.
A new Android seemed to fix it but 6/9/12 months down the line the varied failings came back.
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Well my Poco X3 NFC was under £200 a but over a year ago and it's still working like new, and it gets a LOT of use (though not as a phone, nor high end gaming - though I believe it's fairly capable in that department). I have 290 apps on it, it has 256Gb internal and a 512Gb SD card, both fairly full, mostly with stuff I really don't need to carry but I do cos I can (largely films and music for holidays and flights etc).
As seems usual for me, it will likely be replaced well before it needs to be, with something at a similar price point. In fact I nearly hit the Buy button on this one yesterday - tinyurl.com/25vsmzsh - an absolute steal for the spec, as it was only £181 yesterday - it's back to £329 today - and it was only really the lack of an SD card slot and a headphone jack (I find wired ones generally much better than the wireless ones I have) which stopped me. That, and I'm wasting too much drawer space with old but perfectly serviceable phones :-)
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>> Well my Poco X3 NFC was under £200 a but over a year ago and it's still working like new, and it gets a LOT of use >>
See:
tinyurl.com/2p8dzb9y
for the links with Xiamoi and Redmi.
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>> Until Tuesday I had a 3rd Gen Moto G Smartphone. A little bit big at
>> around 5.8" but just fitted in my shirt pocket. Unfortunately I lost on Tuesday.
Update please.
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Cheap & Cheerful Mobile Phones - Lygonos
