smartphone suggestions

I'm looking to buy a new smartphone with the following criteria:
- costs below £50 (I may be willing to spend a bit more if it's an exceptionally brilliant phone)
- has a good battery life (few days standby time)
- Good quality pictures on both front camera and back camera. Note it's not just megapixels I look at because that can be misleading e.g. if camera has high megapixel but poor quality lens will produce poor pictures.
- Autofocus on camera
- has GPS and AGPS i.e. can use google maps to navigate new cities
- preferably dual sim but not essential
- gravity sensor


So far the best I've found that fits this criteria is Vkworld VK700MAX
http://www.devicespecifications.com/en/model/7f6e396c

Anyone got any better suggestions?

mission impossible for $50 with those demands.

Sell some of your in game crap and buy a real phone....

Maybe look into what cell phone companies want to promote a new phone and offering some kind of special deal? Other way might be to buy a gently used second hand phone from someone that always jumps to newest phone.

Wish you best with your cellphone hunt















#space_flight ~ where pilots and players meet

minim said:

mission impossible for $50 with those demands.

Click to expand...

I already listed one which fits those demands - the vkworld vk700max

You can have a look at others on link below which cost below £50
http://chinesephonesuk.co.uk/?orderby=price

It all really depends what you want. For me brand is not important only the specs I listed above.

mastermesh said:

Sell some of your in game crap and buy a real phone....

Click to expand...

Not necessary as I can get a real phone which meets those demands given. Just wondering if there is one even better than the one I found.

Yoshii Lem said:

Maybe look into what cell phone companies want to promote a new phone and offering some kind of special deal? Other way might be to buy a gently used second hand phone from someone that always jumps to newest phone.

Wish you best with your cellphone hunt

Click to expand...

I don't go by what cellphone companies want to promote as I always get my phone unlocked and not from any cellphone company. I just transfer my sim to new phone as I like the pricing plan I am on i.e. I don't pay anything if I don't use my phone. So in a month if I don't use it I don't get charged anything and I don't have to buy minutes which I have to use within a specified period of time. Phone calls are a bit more expensive but overall cost works out less than any pas you go or monthly price plans.

Second hand is possible I suppose but why not just get new phone below £50 which fits what I'm looking for? and which has no wear and tear and hence longer battery life etc.

You could try to buy a Used Samsung Galaxy S5.
it has all you require - would need to buy it from a guy on craigslist or something

I just gave my old s5 away to a co-worker a few months ago who got drunk and droped her phone in the river on our staff tubing trip

Ok I've narrowed it down to three but will obviously buy only one of them but which one! Any suggestions or reasons welcome from these three:

Homtom HT16 costs £44
Fulfills all my criteria and has sony lens for main camera so good quality pics

http://www.gearbest.com/cell-phones/pp_413659.html?wid=11

Main Features:
Homtom HT16 Android 6.0 5.0 inch 3G Smartphone MTK6580 Quad Core 1.3GHz 1GB RAM 8GB ROM Wakeup Gesture GPS A-GPS Bluetooth 4.0
Display: 5.0 inch 1280 x 720 HD screen
CPU: MTK6580 Quad Core 1.3GHz
System: Android 6.0
RAM + ROM: 1GB RAM + 8GB ROM
Camera: Front camera 2.0MP (SW 5.0MP) + Rear camera 5.0MP (SW 8.0MP) with flash light
Bluetooth: 4.0
Navigation: GPS / A-GPS
Sensor: Gravity sensor, Proximity sensor
Features: Off-screen gestures
SIM Card: Dual SIM dual standby (Dual micro SIM card)
Network:
2G: GSM 850/900/1800/1900MHz
3G: WCDMA 850/900/2100MHz

Specification

Basic Information
Brand: HOMTOM
Type: 3G Smartphone
OS: Android 6.0
Service Provide: Unlocked
Language: Multi language
SIM Card Slot: Dual SIM,Dual Standby
SIM Card Type: Dual Micro SIM Card

Hardware
CPU: MTK6580
Cores: 1.3GHz,Quad Core
GPU: Mali-400 MP
RAM: 1GB RAM
ROM: 8GB
External Memory: TF card up to 64GB (not included)

Network
Wireless Connectivity: 3G,A-GPS,Bluetooth 4.0,GPS,GSM,WiFi
WIFI: 802.11a/b/g/n wireless internet
Network type: GSM+WCDMA
2G: GSM 850/900/1800/1900MHz
3G: WCDMA 850/900/2100MHz

Display
Screen type: Capacitive
Screen size: 5.0 inch
Screen resolution: 1280 x 720 (HD 720)

Camera
Camera type: Dual cameras (one front one back)
Back camera: with flash light
Back-camera: 5.0MP (SW 8.0MP)
Front camera: 2.0MP (SW 5.0MP)
Video recording: Yes
Flashlight: Yes

Media Formats
Picture format: BMP,GIF,JPEG,PNG
Music format: AAC,AMR,Mid,MP3,WAV
Video format: 3GP,MP4
Games: Android APK

Other Features
I/O Interface: 2 x Micro SIM Card Slot,3.5mm Audio Out Port,Micro USB Slot,TF/Micro SD Card Slot
Bluetooth version: V4.0
Sensor: Gravity Sensor,Proximity Sensor
FM radio: Yes
Additional Features: 3G,Alarm,Bluetooth,Browser,Calculator,Calendar,GPS,MP3,MP4,Off-screen gesture,People,Wi-Fi

Battery
Battery Capacity (mAh): 1 x 3000mAh

Package Contents
Cell Phone: 1
Power Adapter: 1
USB Cable: 1
User Manual: 1

Dimensions and Weight
Product size: 14.30 x 7.20 x 0.90 cm / 5.63 x 2.83 x 0.35 inches
Package size: 16.50 x 9.30 x 5.20 cm / 6.5 x 3.66 x 2.05 inches
Product weight: 0.123 kg
Package weight: 0.375 kg



Homtom HT17 costs £56
Fulfills all my criteria and has samsung lens for main camera so good quality pics but not so good in dark in a review I saw but maybe that was due to user error perhaps not using flash...

http://www.gearbest.com/cell-phones/pp_357613.html?wid=21

Main Features:
Homtom HT17 5.5 inch Android 6.0 4G Phablet MTK6737 Quad Core HD Screen 1GB RAM 8GB ROM Fingerprint Sensor HotKnot OTG OTA Bluetooth 4.0
Display: 5.5 inch 1280 x 720 HD IPS Screen
CPU: MTK6737 Quad Core
System: Android 6.0
RAM + ROM: 1GB RAM + 8GB ROM. TF card up to 64GB
Cameras: Front 2MP (SW 5MP) + Rear 8.0MP (SW 13.0MP) with LED flashlight
Sensors: Gravity sensor, Proximity sensor
Bluetooth: 4.0
Features: GPS, WiFi, OTA, OTG, HotKnot
SIM Card: Dual SIM dual standby. Dual Micro SIM
Networks:
2G: GSM 850/900/1800/1900MHz
3G: WCDMA 900/2100MHz
4G: FDD-LTE 800/1800/2100/2600MHz

Specification:

Basic Information

Brand: HOMTOM
Type: 4G Phablet
OS: Android 6.0
Service Provide: Unlocked
Language: Multi-language
SIM Card Slot: Dual SIM,Dual Standby
SIM Card Type: Micro SIM Card


Hardware

CPU: MTK6737
Cores: 1.3GHz,Quad Core
GPU: Mali-T720
RAM: 1GB RAM
ROM: 8GB
External Memory: TF card up to 64GB (not included)

Network

Wireless Connectivity: 3G,Bluetooth 4.0,GPS,GSM,WiFi
WIFI: 802.11b/g/n wireless internet
Network type: GSM+WCDMA+FDD-LTE
2G: GSM 850/900/1800/1900MHz
3G: WCDMA 900/2100MHz
4G: FDD-LTE 800/1800/2100/2600MHz


Display

Screen type: Capacitive
Screen size: 5.5inch
Screen resolution: 1280 x 720 (HD 720)

Camera

Camera type: Dual cameras (one front one back)
Back camera: with flash light and AF
Back-camera: 8.0MP ( SW 13.0MP )
Front camera: 2.0MP ( SW 5.0MP）
Video recording: Yes
Touch Focus: Yes
Flashlight: Yes


Media Formats

Picture format: BMP,GIF,JPEG,PNG
Music format: AAC,MP3,OGG,WAV
Video format: 3GP,AVI,MP4
MS Office format: Excel,PPT,Word
E-book format: PDF,TXT
Live wallpaper support: Yes
Games: Android APK

Other Features

I/O Interface: 2 x Micro SIM Card Slot,3.5mm Audio Out Port,TF/Micro SD Card Slot
Bluetooth version: V4.0
Sensor: Gravity Sensor,Proximity Sensor
Google Play Store: Yes
FM radio: Yes
OTA: Yes
OTG : Yes
Sound Recorder: Yes
Additional Features: 3G,Alarm,Bluetooth,Browser,Calculator,Calendar,E-book,Fingerprint recognition,Fingerprint Unlocking,FM,GPS,Gravity Sensing,Hotknot,MP3,MP4,OTG,People,Sound Recorder,Wi-Fi


Battery

Battery Capacity (mAh): 3000mAh

Package Contents

Cell Phone: 1
Battery: 1
Power Adapter: 1
USB Cable: 1
Back Case : 1
Screen Protector: 1
English Manual : 1


Dimensions and Weight

Product size: 15.35 x 7.80 x 0.80 cm / 6.04 x 3.07 x 0.31 inches
Package size: 17.50 x 10.00 x 5.30 cm / 6.89 x 3.94 x 2.09 inches
Product weight: 0.113 kg
Package weight: 0.400 kg


Homtom HT17 Pro costs £74

http://www.gearbest.com/cell-phones/pp_423246.html?wid=11

Main Features:
Homtom HT17 Pro 5.5 inch Android 6.0 4G Phablet MTK6737 Quad Core HD Screen 2GB RAM 16GB ROM Fingerprint Sensor HotKnot OTG OTA Bluetooth 4.0
Display: 5.5 inch 1280 x 720 HD IPS Screen
CPU: MTK6737 1.3GHz Quad Core
System: Android 6.0
RAM + ROM: 2GB RAM + 16GB ROM. TF card up to 64GB
Cameras: Front 2MP (SW 5MP) + Rear 8.0MP (SW 13.0MP) with LED flashlight
Sensors: G-sensor, Proximity, Accelerometer, Gesture sensor, Fingerprint sensor
Bluetooth: 4.0
Features: GPS, WiFi, OTA, OTG, HotKnot
SIM Card: Dual SIM dual standby. Dual Micro SIM cards
Networks:
2G: GSM 850/900/1800/1900MHz
3G: WCDMA 900/2100MHz
4G: FDD-LTE 800/1800/2100/2600MHz

Specification:

Basic Information

Brand: HOMTOM
Type: 4G Phablet
OS: Android 6.0
Service Provide: Unlocked
Language: Multi-language
SIM Card Slot: Dual SIM,Dual Standby
SIM Card Type: Micro SIM Card


Hardware

CPU: MTK6737
Cores: 1.3GHz,Quad Core
GPU: Mali-T720
RAM: 2GB RAM
ROM: 16GB
External Memory: TF card up to 64GB (not included)

Network

Wireless Connectivity: 3G,4G,Bluetooth 4.0,GPS,GSM,WiFi
WIFI: 802.11a/b/g/n wireless internet
Network type: GSM+WCDMA+FDD-LTE
2G: GSM 850/900/1800/1900MHz
3G: WCDMA 900/2100MHz
4G: FDD-LTE 800/1800/2100/2600MHz


Display

Screen type: Capacitive
Screen size: 5.5inch
Screen resolution: 1280 x 720 (HD 720)

Camera

Camera type: Dual cameras (one front one back)
Back camera: with flash light and AF
Back-camera: 8.0MP ( SW 13.0MP )
Front camera: 2.0MP ( SW 5.0MP）
Video recording: Yes
Touch Focus: Yes
Flashlight: Yes


Media Formats

Picture format: BMP,GIF,JPEG,PNG
Music format: AAC,MP3,OGG,WAV
Video format: 3GP,AVI,MP4
MS Office format: Excel,PPT,Word
E-book format: PDF,TXT
Live wallpaper support: Yes
Games: Android APK

Other Features

I/O Interface: 2 x Micro SIM Card Slot,3.5mm Audio Out Port,TF/Micro SD Card Slot
Bluetooth version: V4.0
Sensor: Accelerometer,Gesture Sensor,Gravity Sensor,Proximity Sensor
Google Play Store: Yes
FM radio: Yes
OTA: Yes
OTG : Yes
Sound Recorder: Yes
Additional Features: 3G,4G,Alarm,Bluetooth,Browser,Calculator,Calendar,E-book,Fingerprint recognition,Fingerprint Unlocking,FM,GPS,Hotknot,MP3,MP4,OTG,People,Sound Recorder,Wi-Fi


Battery

Battery Capacity (mAh): 1 x 3000mAh

Package Contents

Cell Phone: 1
Power Adapter: 1
USB Cable: 1
Back Case : 1
Screen Protector: 1
English Manual : 1


Dimensions and Weight

Product size: 15.30 x 7.76 x 0.79 cm / 6.02 x 3.06 x 0.31 inches
Package size: 17.50 x 10.00 x 5.30 cm / 6.89 x 3.94 x 2.09 inches
Product weight: 0.165 kg
Package weight: 0.370 kg

Well everything is relative but I thought by good quality pictures you actually ment good quality pictures. If you want mediocre pictures that you are not going to look at later and for sure not print then you are prolly good with those phones.

You might want to try GSMArena.com to lookup and compare phone specs. They have a photo-quality comparison that should be useful based on your criteria.

I just got an LG G3 used from a friend and looking quickly at the specs of what you posted, I'm pretty sure the G3 is better (screen & camera) in spite of being from 2014.
Lesser known brands often have issues with software not running properly or being listed as incompatible.

Should really clarify your requirements. "Good" pictures - considering some don't think that any phone can take good pictures, while some would be happy with an old flipfone from 2005.

Battery life - you should be less interested in standby time and more in usage time. A phone which lasts 5 days standby and 1 hour with screen usage is useless compared to one which lasts 1 day SB & 4 hours usage.

For £50 too, your requirements are substantial. It's gonna be a false economy anyway, when the cheap phone breaks in 3 months and you need to spend another £50.

My recommendation?

Moto G 3rd Gen

Yes, it's 2x your budget (£129, would be cheaper in a month after xmas). But it'll last, ticks all your boxes.

I use that exact one as my work fone, and it's fine. It's not a brilliant one, but it will work forever, battery will last for days without a charge, it's 4g with good signal strength. No complaints. Again, it won't take pictures which are anything to shout about but find me any non premium phone which can (and even then..).

minim said:

Well everything is relative but I thought by good quality pictures you actually ment good quality pictures. If you want mediocre pictures that you are not going to look at later and for sure not print then you are prolly good with those phones.

Click to expand...

Indeed everything is relative

For my purposes taking pics and sharing via whatsapp or posting facebook etc those phones listed above would probably produce good quality pics for my purposes. A lot of the time I reduce pic quality before sharing to reduce file size. So having even higher megapixels is not really needed although they can sometimes produce better pics depending upon what other components are used.

Remember I'm going for the budget phone i.e. less than £50. Obviously with that amount your gonna be limited with some of the specs from high end phones but higher specs in my opinion is totally unnecessary e.g. higher processor speeds since all these phones listed will produce almost immediate response when actually using them.

Also specs don't always give the full picture e.g. having higher processor speed does not mean that phone will be automatically faster because actual speed/response of phone is dependent other thinsg as well.

SnowLeopard said:

You might want to try GSMArena.com to lookup and compare phone specs. They have a photo-quality comparison that should be useful based on your criteria.

I just got an LG G3 used from a friend and looking quickly at the specs of what you posted, I'm pretty sure the G3 is better (screen & camera) in spite of being from 2014.
Lesser known brands often have issues with software not running properly or being listed as incompatible.

Click to expand...

Thanks for that link. Gsmarena have a good concept of allowing you to compare pics. I really like it However not all the phones they list they have pic samples for e.g. lg g3. Also many phones are simply not listed in their database e.g. homtom

Which version exact model or version of lg g3 did you get? Looking at some of the specs and prices I can see on internet it's beyond my budget of £50 and higher specs not always needed as mentioned above.

Lesser known brands here in uk maybe but in some other countries they are well known. Plus lesser known doesn't automatically mean they are bad perhaps people just being sheeps in following the crowd. Plus sometimes brand names don't really mean anything, well not to me anyway. Depends what you want for example a friend of mine goes to harrods for his shopping and will always have the latest iphone or samsung. Personally I wouldn't buy anything from harrods out of principle due to it being a "posh" place. I'd rather go to primark Each to their own, whatever makes you happy
The phones I've narrowed down to give an almost immediate response, produce good pics and within my budget. Well first one is the second one has fingerprint identification and seems to do that pretty fast. The third one I'll probably rule out due to cost and doesn't have all that better specs compared to the second one the HT17.

i tried doogee and i'm quite happy best support i can imagine, also in german or whatever even over amazon

mostly x5 pro ... good stuff, 75$, long time ... or buy another in advance, happy finish if shit goes wrong



and yes, if you want pictures i suggest you buy a camera instead of a phone

All I can say is that if this is your first smartphone and you want a bad experience then go with those no name cheap ones. It's a pity tho because they can really be great tools and last for years if you get a decent one. Now you will only get a bad experience with them.

Regarding you reducing the size of the images before uploading. You said it yourself that megapixel isn't everything. The higher quality phones will take a lot better pictures in low light conditions/indoor than that phone even if set to 800x600 res. There is just so much more than hardware to good mobile phone photos.

If you had asked this question a couple of weeks ago, I would have had some suggestions.

Now :

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/11/16/us/politics/china-phones-software-security.html

http://blog.anubisnetworks.com/blog/ragentek-android-ota-update-mechanism-vulnerable-to-mitm-attack

Looks like many of the cheap china phones (some rebranded with western brands) are sending info to china servers and have other hidden problems.

I can only say you get what you pay for the devices. Pay peanuts, get monkeys (or in this case, crap / backdoor'ed by design devices).

You may want to consider older models of HTC / Samsung / Motorola, etc.

theProphet said:

if you want pictures i suggest you buy a camera instead of a phone

Click to expand...

Not true. If you're taking high detailed photos, yes. Other than that, phones offer amazing cameras already.

golddude said:

Not true. If you're taking high detailed photos, yes. Other than that, phones offer amazing cameras already.

Click to expand...

True that, but this doesn't go for all phones. There are a big difference from the top end to the no-name ones.

Like a great film maker and storyteller once said "it's all about getting the shot". If you have a DSLR packed away and there is no time to unpack it it's always better to have taken that shot with the mobile phone than having no shot at all. He's using the new Samsung S7 and sometimes if he doesn't state it it's hard to know if it's shot with the phone or the DSLR.

Yeah to be honest, I don't care enough about photos to carry an expensive camera around. Usually just drunk selfies or pictures of rainbows hahah.

I agree with minim tho - there's a reason "brands" exist.

George, when you do go for one of the chinese ones I'd love to hear about your first impressions / longer use impressions. From all my friends who've bought cheap phones they replace them 2-3 times a year... my HTC10 is still running like brand new, and my HTC M7 was still running well despite being 4 years old.

what you should also look for I'd say is 4G support and the posibillity to upgrade beyond android 5.1...or else you've got some MAJOR security holes

I'll do a more detailed reply tomm for some of the issues raised above but for now would be useful if i got the following info as I was thinking of actually buying one now so that i get it before xmas rush. Always useful to have opinions before buying something so thanks for all replies, it's appreciated.

theProphet said:

i tried doogee and i'm quite happy best support i can imagine,

Click to expand...

Can I ask which exact model you bought? and how long you've had it now? and any other issues/minor bugs/qualms or improvements they could have made etc Always good to see actual opinions

Aio said:

George, when you do go for one of the chinese ones I'd love to hear about your first impressions / longer use impressions. From all my friends who've bought cheap phones they replace them 2-3 times a year... my HTC10 is still running like brand new, and my HTC M7 was still running well despite being 4 years old.

Click to expand...

If I do get one will let you know. Can I ask which exact models these cheap phones were (or if you don't know exact model as much details you can provide?)? always good to know actual history of products and usage when making buying decisions.

I have a tendency to buy something and then use it till it dies. So long term reliability is a key factor for me. From one person I know who has bought cheap phones he has had a good experience with them. He's into buying cheap Chinese phones for gifts too, I'm tempted to ask his friends how they got on with their cheap gifts as well but it's a cheeky kind of thing to do plus he's only given them as presents recently so i'll wait a few months then see perhaps how they getting on.

The only people I know who replace phones every few months are the ones buying high end phones to show off they have the latest as a status kind of thing. Also the ones who replace phones when their price plans allow them to.

johan roadkill said:

what you should also look for I'd say is 4G support and the posibillity to upgrade beyond android 5.1...or else you've got some MAJOR security holes

Click to expand...

I do keep 4g in mind but it's not a key factor for me.
Could you elaborate on these major security holes you speak of? I'd like to know more details on that

GeorgeSkywalker said:

I do keep 4g in mind but it's not a key factor for me.
Could you elaborate on these major security holes you speak of? I'd like to know more details on that

Click to expand...

here are some of the more severe ones
http://www.techworld.com/security/androids-6-biggest-security-flaws-2016-3622116/

older versions are still vulnerable to a lot of flaws.
due to how android is distributed and developed fixing these kinds of flaws takes forever compared to IOS where there's only one manufacturer using the system

only downside of android vs IOS I'd say

I don't know how it is in England but in Norway they are now building down/reming 3G cell towers and have very high 4G/LTE coverage. Soon 3G is all gone and then it must suck to have a phone not supporting it. I would guess you could compare the coverage or read something about it if you google it. I think most phones that are sold now have 4G/LTE tho so shouldn't be a big problem.

minim thats a good point you raise there.

In uk some are predicting the phase out of 2g and 3g by 2020.
This is a good article on the subject:
http://www.analysysmason.com/About-Us/News/Insight/Decomissioning-2G-and-3G-will-force-operators-to-share-networks-at-a-national-scale/

There are many issues if one operator here phases out 2g or 3g then they are likely to loose some customers as they may switch to an alternative network provider.

Interesting point from above article:
"EE, the UK's largest MNO and leading 4G operator, now has more traffic on its 4G network than on its 3G network, despite the fact that only 35% of its devices are 4G-capable."

With only 35% of its devices 4g capable doesn't seem probable they will switch 3g off just yet. Personally I think it'll take a bit longer than 2020 because by that time we will probably have 5g and 4g will be a legacy system but it'll take time to roll out 5g to it's full potential. Anyway if worse comes to worst and 3g is phased out and i have a 3g phone I'd just gift it to a friend abroad where I'm sure they won't be switching off 3g anytime soon and to someone who does not mind second hand gifts and having only spent around £50 i wouldn't have lost much.

Here in Norway it doesn't work like that I think. It's more like if they install new 4G towers they install them much closer to eachother than the 3G towers since it's needed for the same coverage (basically higher frequency=lower range but more trafic). If they install 4G gear to a 3G tower it seems that sometimes they disable to old 3G hotspot at the same time so it's slowly building down the capacity. Might be to free up some of the frequencies but idkn. Their interest is to keep costs at a minimum so I don't think it will take long time before they stop replacing broken 3G equipment.

All this is speculations tho but I can see how bad the coverage has become compared to what it was before they where building out 4G.

Anyways, having the possibility of running as much networks as possible is great for coverage and battery consumption also. Sucks to not have a signal if you could have. A phone with low signal automatically boosts their output power to reach the tower and this cost energy and standby/talk time.

I haven't seen much on the chinese phones but doesn't almost every phone sold the last few years have 4G/LTE support?

Yeah I'd be surprised if you could find a new phone on the market which doesn't have LTE, Chinese or otherwise.

4G has only really been useful in the UK in the last year or two - I still have huge portions of the sales territory I cover which doesn't have 4G (and sometimes no signal whatsoever). Can be extremely frustrating trying to do work on the road

Having said that, 4G is very useful for hotspotting your device and using it as portable wifi - beats most hotel connections by a mile.

Aio said:

Having said that, 4G is very useful for hotspotting your device and using it as portable wifi - beats most hotel connections by a mile.

Click to expand...

Im using it even in my house as main connection. Stable 80Mbit connection with 20ms ping. Not better than fiber but I can't get it here. Beats DSL any day

Just get an old nokia like I have. Who needs cameras and shit? phone calls and snake do the job

I've been a bit lazy in typing up my response to above. I'll get around to it sometime.

For now though here's a bit of fun exercise - I've bought my phone and have been playing around with it for over a week now. One of the pics below is taken with my smartphone (I opted to get the cheapest smartphone that fit my criteria for £44), Can you figure out which one is taken with my phone? Note all pics have been modified so that they can be uploaded to forum, all original images were too big to be uploaded without modifying them. Also all pics are taken with a smartphone.

pic a


pic b


pic c


pic d


pic e

slither said:

Just get an old nokia like I have. Who needs cameras and shit? phone calls and snake do the job

Click to expand...

I had a samsung note 1 or was it 2 (Samsung GT700) for many years which was excellent never really had any problems with it around sept/oct ish last year I decided to give that away as a present and get myself a simpler phone. So got a nokia, one of the new models but was very basic phone make phone calls, sms etc and listen to radio. No smartphone features at all. Problem was after a few months I realised I wanted the other features like gps, pics, social media, etc. A basic simple phone may be good for a while but in the long term was not very adequate at least for myself. You may be different and be able to live with one for long term that's your choice. Each to their own

the-unknown said:

Looks like many of the cheap china phones (some rebranded with western brands) are sending info to china servers and have other hidden problems.

I can only say you get what you pay for the devices. Pay peanuts, get monkeys (or in this case, crap / backdoor'ed by design devices).

Click to expand...

If your worried about security and privacy what you really want to be worried about is American secret services who may potentially have access to everything regardless of what device or software you are using. Look up snowden and his leaks.

As to the peanuts and monkeys comment I think you are even less informed than myself about current state of affairs with regard to tech and chinese tech. Also possibly a little biased against the chinese because interestingly you state "(some rebranded with western brands)", hence you are aware many of the phones that you use i.e. western brands may be manufactured in China anyway e.g. iphone. If China has been manufacturing smartphones for other well known brands don't you think with time they would have the expertise and capability to develop their own brands?

The image of a baked beans factory comes to mind. Where they make baked beans and at the end of the production line are split into two lines one for a more expensive brand and one for a cheap brand. Both made in the same factory and exact same way with just different labels and prices.

In short China has come a long way and in many regards is a world leader in innovation and technology. For example China has the fastest supercomputer in the world (and its successor is also in the pipeline also by China), China has its own space station and sent astronauts to it last year, has the largest solar energy capability in the world (government seems to have been spending huge amounts into developing solar) etc.

Aio said:

I agree with minim tho - there's a reason "brands" exist.

Click to expand...

To some extent yes but it's a bit more complicated these days. For example sometimes brands or labels are just successful at marketing in a particular way e.g. as "designer" and so charge a premium for that. Doesn't always mean they are better or more deserving.

For example as I mentioned above the image of a baked beans factory comes to mind. Where they make baked beans and at the end of the production line are split into two lines one for a more expensive brand and one for a cheap brand. Both made in the same factory and exact same way with just different labels and prices.

Aio said:

George, when you do go for one of the chinese ones I'd love to hear about your first impressions / longer use impressions. From all my friends who've bought cheap phones they replace them 2-3 times a year... my HTC10 is still running like brand new, and my HTC M7 was still running well despite being 4 years old.

Click to expand...

Ok here goes. I bought a Homtom HT16 which cost me £44. Got this around mid december so I've had it for a while now and have been using it every day.


Initial impressions
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I bought it from gearbest.com. It had good delivery info on it's website and I could track where it was before it was even sent out which was good although basic. When it was shipped they sent an email with details and tracking number. Company used in my instance was postnl a netherlands based company. With postnl I found their website tracking info not very good. After a bit of research online I found they seem to send all packages to their netherlands distribution hub and then to where its supposed to go sometimes via a different carrier in my case was royal mail. When they send it to netherlands they don't give much info. I therefore used an app on my smartphone called "Deliveries" to track it which gave information on the package quicker than the postnl website or gearbest website order detail tracking, also better than some online generic parcel tracking websites.

Anyway it arrived considerably ahead of the gearbest estimated timeline which they gave before I placed the order. The package was quite small but well packaged. On opening everything seemed to be in place and all items that were supposed to be there were there. Also the phone came with a screen protector already corrected placed on it i.e. no bubbles and correctly placed. The gearbest website mentions all that you receive with it but failed to mention it comes with screen protector so that was a bonus.

Phone worked fine and was very responsive i.e. no lag when scrolling screens. Some apps were already preinstalled but had significantly less bloatware than my samsung note that I used to have. So that was also nice. I was able to install all my apps I wanted without any issues or problems. Phone was still very responsive most of the time e.g. scrolling in facebook instantaneous except sometimes was a lag loading video or other content (which could be due to other factors rather than phone hardware). Also that kind of small lag also occurs on my pc when using facebook.

What I didn't like was 1) some app icons had a purple border around them 2) app icons were a bit chunky and larger than what I personally prefer.
To solve both these issues a downloaded a good "launcher" app from playstore. After which icons were perfect no ugly purple border and small size and generally more customisable and better looking and were now possibly in a higher resolution.

Longer use impressions
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I wish I had more issues or problems to report but so far have not been any except one which I'll come to a bit later.

All the apps work fine including gps on googlemaps, social media, whatsapp, youtube, camera and pics are decent, email works fine. I did have one problem when I installed greenify and set some options within greenify. Greenify is a battery optimisation app and supposed to be good but it caused my phone calls, sms, and social media messages to stop working completely. Which I guess does save battery life but not what I would consider an ideal solution lol. Anyway I unstalled greenify and found everything worked again.

I was thinking battery life or battery on this phone is not very good but I may have been mistaken. Anyway here is the story. I have percentage turned on so next to the battery icon it shows percentage wise how much charge is remaining. From 100% it rapids decreases then will get stuck at a particular number for a long time e.g. 89% (this number can be different each time). First time I noticed this I thought there was something wrong, so desperately started using youtube to maximise battery usage to make it go down! which it eventually did to my relief

Anyway I've noticed it gets stuck at a particular percentage more than once so for example it may get stuck at 94% then at 78% etc. Also doing some research online smartphone battery charge doesn't degrade linearly but is generally sharp initially then gradual near to none then sharp again near the end of it's charge. That's the general pattern so I guess it fits that. Sometimes I only get a 1-2 hours before it gets down to 80%-70% and hence time to recharge again.

So I was thinking it's a crap battery. I've been meaning to test it by running it to zero and hence see if the battery life percentage displayed is accurate. So yesterday I continued using it and it didn't run out. I used it around 1.5 hours of listening to radio whilst traveling, around 3 hours of social media mostly reading facebook news/science articles, some videos and some posting comments. Also sent a few sms messages. Wasn't able to use it more as I had other things to do. So idle most of the time and overnight.

This morning I used it for about 30-60 minutes of social media battery life at start of the morning was 54%. Then decided to use Youtube to drain it as fast as possible. After about an hour of watching youtube in full screen mode hence could not see battery life indicator I went out of full screen to look at battery life and noticed it's 1%. Don't know how long it had been at 1% before I checked. So went back into full screen youtube mode and 1 hour 56 minutes later it finally decided to switch itself off. Note screen did not just go blank but it automatically went into shutdown just as when you manually turn it off.

So my conclusion I might as well turn the battery life percentage off and ignore the display as its completely unreliable.

So apart from battery life the phone so far seems to be working fine and I am happy with my purchase. I would have liked a battery life that lasts longer but that's the problem in general with all smartphones.

Update. With regard to the battery life remaining indicator I did some further testing. I discharged it completely another 3 times, so a total of 4 times now. The first two times I could use the phone well over an hour before it stopped working. However, the latest two times it stopped working when it reached 0%.

So perhaps your supposed to drain the battery completely the first few times and I wasn't using it right or it was a problem specific to my phone only, don't know.

Anyway seems to work as it should now. This last complete charge/discharge cycle lasted about 3 days. With a fair bit of use. Yesterday watched youtube videos for about 2 hours. This morning facebook for about 3 hours which mainly included reading science articles, with a few posts involving video.