my cell phone finally died - what to get?

I love the concept of android. Unfortunately they feel like a cobbled together mess to me.

I just bought my first real cell phone two weeks ago; it's an iPhone 5s. It works well and it was $100.
 
wagdog said:
I love the concept of android. Unfortunately they feel like a cobbled together mess to me.

I just bought my first real cell phone two weeks ago; it's an iPhone 5s. It works well and it was $100.
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Stop looking at Samsung and LG phones and Android will stop looking at a cobbled together mess to you.

I would rather hit myself in the yambag with a sledgehammer than deal with Samsung's TouchWiz or LG's UX. If I got one of their phones the first thing *I* would do is root it and put CyanogenMod or another ROM on it. That's me, though, and I don't expect normal people to do that.

Look at ZTE, OnePlus, Motorola, Nexus, and Pixel phones for a cohesive Google-designed experience, especially the last three there, because Motorola, Nexus, and Pixel hardware is excellent.
 
mikesr1963 said:
My wife has a Samsung something with the edge to edge screen. Has a stylus that inserts so you have it all the time. Great phone except for the battery. She's charging all the time. She bought a second battery and charger so she can switch them out instead of waiting for the phone to recharge; still it doesn't last for poop.

I'm on my second iPhone and my battery goes all day just like the first one I had. Because of that I'm a solid iPhone man.
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My wife has the S7 Edge, uses the shit out of it, and has no problem with battery life. I have the Standard S7, which aside from the screen is the same. I use the "Always on screen" function (always shows the clock even when locked), I've been on it since 7 this morning, when it only had a 72% charge because I forgot to plug it in last night, and I'm at 22% after listening to music from it via Bluetooth and using the wifi all day...

I'd say the battery life is just fine.

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Oh, one BIG reason to get a Nexus or Pixel phone:

Monthly upgrades for YEARS. Every month on the 5th Google-made devices get an update that at the very least brings security fixes if not bug fixes straight from Google. A lot of other-branded devices get two or three major updates and that's it. Google guarantees major version updates for two years from release and security updates for a couple years beyond that. The Nexus 6 was two-years-old in October and I should be getting the 7.1.1 Nougat update later this month, which is beyond the two year mark.
 
Chances are your wife is cheating on you.She's getting banged by another dude..
You need to go to stealth mode and not tip your hand because she'll bullshit\gaslight you..

A few tips...

Get yourself a Sony voice recorder to record the screaming episodes..
Hire a private investigator.....
Lock down a crack pot lawyer
 
I just read on Forbes that the new Samsung S8 will not have a headphone jack either, like the iPhone 7.

Is that a deal breaker for some of you?
 
So I was told that the Samsung Galaxies did not have the option of replacing the batteries. At least the Samsung 7. Or was it the Samsung Edge or the waterproof one?

I know that the iPhone can't replace the batteries easily. That was when I switched to Android LG - G3 about 2 years ago. I was getting stuck traveling and not having access to certain apps. I use my airline tickets on my cell phone and the thought of having it die while traveling in the midst of an airport horrified me. I carry an extra battery and battery back up charger with me.

Because of that I wound up getting the LG V20. Is it anything special? Two lenses on the back for normal and wide angle shots. Not a big deal. Has some sort of sound enhancement DAC or something on it - no big deal. A 2nd screen that sits on the top like an extra tab for shortcuts. No big deal.

The decision maker for me was I can easily swap out the battery when I need too.
 
12Pack said:
So I was told that the Samsung Galaxies did not have the option of replacing the batteries. At least the Samsung 7. Or was it the Samsung Edge or the waterproof one?

I know that the iPhone can't replace the batteries easily. That was when I switched to Android LG - G3 about 2 years ago. I was getting stuck traveling and not having access to certain apps. I use my airline tickets on my cell phone and the thought of having it die while traveling in the midst of an airport horrified me. I carry an extra battery and battery back up charger with me.

Because of that I wound up getting the LG V20. Is it anything special? Two lenses on the back for normal and wide angle shots. Not a big deal. Has some sort of sound enhancement DAC or something on it - no big deal. A 2nd screen that sits on the top like an extra tab for shortcuts. No big deal.

The decision maker for me was I can easily swap out the battery when I need too.
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I think all of the S7 variants are both water "resistant" and have non-replacable batteries. I know both my standard S7 and my wife's S7 Edge share those traits in common.

For those having battery life issues on their galaxy, there are two apps that are mandatory. One is the Samsung package disabler ($2.99) that allows you to kill all of the bloatware safely without rooting your phone, and the Qualcomm Snapdragon optimizer (free) that shows you EVERYTHING going on with your phone, categorizes it, let's you see the battery hogs and which ones are useless turds you can disable etc. They are invaluable, and between the two can hugely increase the performance while greatly extending the battery life.

Samsung Pay is a great example: it runs nonstop in the background, taking enormous resources, despite being totally useless since it has yet to roll out to a functional service. It's also redundant and stupid considering the already existing and proven alternatives. Just shutting that POS off made a noticeable difference across the board.

Plus, you can still use it if you want by simply starting the app from your drawer or a shortcut. Nothing goes away, it just stops running 24/7.

Keeping the screen brightness dialed back a touch goes a long way as well. These AMOLED screens on the S7 are crazy bright. As blind as I am, I can't view the screen at full brightness comfortably. It's way too bright. That's a huge battery sucker.
 
GilmourD said:
Stop looking at Samsung and LG phones and Android will stop looking at a cobbled together mess to you.

I would rather hit myself in the yambag with a sledgehammer than deal with Samsung's TouchWiz or LG's UX. If I got one of their phones the first thing *I* would do is root it and put CyanogenMod or another ROM on it. That's me, though, and I don't expect normal people to do that.

Look at ZTE, OnePlus, Motorola, Nexus, and Pixel phones for a cohesive Google-designed experience, especially the last three there, because Motorola, Nexus, and Pixel hardware is excellent.
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I get where you're coming from & honestly one of the things I've come to dislike about the android poweruser community too' the 'just flash a rom' default response to everything. People go searching for a solution to an issue online and half the time, the only thing they get is 'flash a ROM!' as a solution. You acknowledge it in your post but we often forget that most people don't want to go under the hood and monkey around, they just want shit to work. I don't blame my non-techie friends that run back to iPhones when they have a bad experience with an Android handset.

At this point in Android's lifecycle, vanilla Android is pretty damn complete & UI overlays should be a thing of the past.
 
GilmourD said:
Stop looking at Samsung and LG phones and Android will stop looking at a cobbled together mess to you.

I would rather hit myself in the yambag with a sledgehammer than deal with Samsung's TouchWiz or LG's UX. If I got one of their phones the first thing *I* would do is root it and put CyanogenMod or another ROM on it. That's me, though, and I don't expect normal people to do that.

Look at ZTE, OnePlus, Motorola, Nexus, and Pixel phones for a cohesive Google-designed experience, especially the last three there, because Motorola, Nexus, and Pixel hardware is excellent.
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You said "yambag" L.M.F.A.O!!!
 
Lerxst said:
I get where you're coming from & honestly one of the things I've come to dislike about the android poweruser community too' the 'just flash a rom' default response to everything. People go searching for a solution to an issue online and half the time, the only thing they get is 'flash a ROM!' as a solution. You acknowledge it in your post but we often forget that most people don't want to go under the hood and monkey around, they just want shit to work. I don't blame my non-techie friends that run back to iPhones when they have a bad experience with an Android handset.

At this point in Android's lifecycle, vanilla Android is pretty damn complete & UI overlays should be a thing of the past.
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Honestly, that irks me, too. Have I done it in the past? Yes. Do I think everybody should do it? No.

The thing between iPhone and Android, to me, isn't a technical difference, though. It's a cognitive organization thing. I simply don't get along with iOS. I don't like having every app dumped on the desktop. I like widgets. I use apps like WiFi Analyzer which work perfectly well on unmodified Android but Apple blocked the permissions required for such apps and you'd need to jailbreak iOS to get them to work. Plus I can use whatever launcher I want, even one that looks like iOS. Android just presents me with more options for what I do.

My wife is a college professor and knows her way around computers but still prefers iOS. It's just the way her brain is organized.

Samsung needs to stop fucking with shit and just put out stuff that works instead of exploding phones. LG needs to work on their build quality instead of trying to shoehorn shit into their skin that nobody asked for.
 
Motorola used to be good, then they got bought by Lenovo. No promise of updates, questionable design choices. Loved my original MotoX but wouldn't recommend them now.
 
Punchy said:
Motorola used to be good, then they got bought by Lenovo. No promise of updates, questionable design choices. Loved my original MotoX but wouldn't recommend them now.
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Agreed.

Moto build quality is second to none. The actual hardware is STILL fantastic.

The problem is that they laid off almost the entire software team in Chicago and all software will be maintained by Lenovo, now. No bueno.

The only way I'd buy Moto hardware now is if it's a Nexus/Pixel since Google would be handling the software updates.
 
Unless you want to burn your face off, don't get anything by Samsung. And Windows phones only have 1 app available, that being Windows itself.

beavis0

Theres so many decent phones out there for around $150 its very hard to decide, can't say I envy you.

I myself have an iPhone SE, and its damn good.
 
Does anyone have experience with OnePlus phones?

I've been eyeing their OnePlus 3T phone. Snapdragon 821 processor (the latest & greatest), 6GB RAM, up to 128GB storage (no SD card slot), 16MP front & rear cameras, and the new Nougat 7.0 OS that the Google Pixel phone uses.

$479 for the 128GB version of the 3T. That's about $300-$400 cheaper than a comparable Pixel/S7/i7 phone. :eek:

Drawbacks are it's not water & dust resistant (though I watched a video where a guy put one in a sink full of water for 3 minutes, came out working fine), the camera is very good but just not quite on the level of the Pixel/S7/i7 phones cameras, and it will only work on AT&T or T-Mobile networks.


Let's say I want this phone, and go with AT&T as a carrier. How does that work? I buy the phone, take it into an AT&T store and have them install their Sim chip? Or is there more to it than that, hidden fees and whatnot?
 
I have a One Plus 3 and love it. Best phone I've ever owned. They do nothing original, just take the best features of all the other manufacturers and blatantly steal them. Then put it in one package for half the price of the other flagships. Their version of Android is great, very much stock Android with a few subtle improvements. No bloatware at all (I'm looking at you Samsung). The Dash charging is amazing. It charges very fast anyway and holds a charge well. It's basically a Pixel for half the price.

The only thing that annoys me a little is that they released the 3T just 6 months after the 3. It's the exact same phone with a minor processor and battery upgrade. The 3 was so successful that I think they realised they underpriced it and launched a follow up with slight upgrades for $100 more. Cheeky. So we 3 owners are no longer the latest and greatest :mad:
 
Jbird said:
What networks can you get those for?

I'm still seriously looking at entering the cell phone world, but deciding on Verizon/AT&T/Sprint/T-Mobile, and which phone to actually spend my hard earned cash on is daunting.

I'm leaning towards either AT&T or Verizon, as both have a slightly better coverage near me in my little hick town.
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I've had sprint long ago like perhaps 2003/04 then I had t-mobile for a while and now verizon since 2009 I think. With t-mobile my bill always fluctuated by as much as 1.50 or so, perhaps once even like 2.50 and coverage was ok but even in my house sometimes calls would drop and I'm in mid town...that coulda been an issue with the motorola flip phone though

With Verizon the bill does not waiver, you know exactly what your bill will be each month and coverage is second to none...the best. My brother has At&T and every time we have been way out in the boonies off roading or camping I have got reception when he has not and it's never been the other way around. I've even had some reception down in canyons before, their coverage is impressive.
 
From a hardware perspective I can tell you that the Google Pixel, Samsung S7 and LG phones are all running the same components, but it's the software that differentiates them. I've been a loyal HTC user for many years (and now they make the Google Pixel) and have been very happy with them. Their Sense UI is the best and their Themes app makes customizing the phone very easy to do. That being said, I am VERY interested in the Google Pixel, and now Verizon has a deal to get one for $10 a month, which will save me some money too.
 
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