Best cheap smartphone?

[noobi]

Are any of the cheaper ones any good?
Was looking at the wildfire s, yes that cheap. But open to all opinions.

Thanks

[Gremlin]

What do you want out of your "smartphone"?

[Maha]

What do you want out of your "smartphone"?

Grammer-Check option?

[noobi]

What do you want out of your "smartphone"?

An easy to use calender/planner.
Good browsing capabilities.
Easy to navigate music player, expandable memory, micro sd, and a 3.5mm jack.
A fairly clear screen for reading text, not necessarily a large screen.
Ok camera, but doesn't need to have any sort of good video recording or playback. I have a laptop for watching movies.
A battery that will last the whole day, at least, with a good amount of use.

[ckai]

An easy to use calender/planner.
Good browsing capabilities.
Easy to navigate music player, expandable memory, micro sd, and a 3.5mm jack.
A fairly clear screen for reading text, not necessarily a large screen.
Ok camera, but doesn't need to have any sort of good video recording or playback. I have a laptop for watching movies.
A battery that will last the whole day, at least, with a good amount of use.

Be warned that most smartphones will definitely need to be charged at the end of the day. I really don't see this as a problem but some people hate not being able to charge their phone once a month.

Apart from that, the wildfire is a decent phone. I have heard people have problems with them but people have problems with all phones. It's certainly not one of them that are constantly failing.

You on contract? Open to change providers? The reason I ask is a mate was looking at moving into a smart phone and wanted to spend $200. I suggested opening it up to $250 since that's a good entry level. Then we stumbled onto this....no never mind, they don't sell it anymore. It was a phone offered by Skinny that was around $180 and had an decent battery. Irrelevant now though.

Whatever you do, you need at least a 3 inch screen. I don't care what anyone else says. You can get by with that size but any smaller is gonna annoy the shit out of you. Of course anything bigger is better.

Can't really offer specific recommendations. I did have a Samsung 5503 as my first smartphone and I out grew it very quickly and the screen size was the first to piss me off (2.2!).

[bogan]

An easy to use calender/planner.
Good browsing capabilities.
Easy to navigate music player, expandable memory, micro sd, and a 3.5mm jack.
A fairly clear screen for reading text, not necessarily a large screen.
Ok camera, but doesn't need to have any sort of good video recording or playback. I have a laptop for watching movies.
A battery that will last the whole day, at least, with a good amount of use.

Most of those are more to do with what apps you run, than what phone you get. I have an HTC legend, which is similar to the wildfire, and does all I need. Battery life is good for a few days with my limited useage (though I leave the wifi on).

I'd be surprised if the wildfire s doesn't meet all your requirements.

[Akzle]

for cheap: huawei or lower end galaxy.

for good: lumia, mid-new glaxy, htc.

[duckonin]

Are any of the cheaper ones any good?
Was looking at the wildfire s, yes that cheap. But open to all opinions.

Thanks

I have a wildfire s. Good for all of what you want it for. Phone can be touchy when texting. Small fits into pocket well with a ave size screen. Comparable to other phones rates very well. :niceone: Is worth what you would pay IMHO.

[SMOKEU]

LG P500 with Cyanogenmod. The screen is a little small at 3.2", but it's a great phone for the price. 512MB of RAM as well when most other phones in that price bracket have 256MB. My one is running Ice Cream Sandwich and overclocked from 600MHz to 748MHz and it goes pretty damn well.

[bogan]

I have a wildfire s. Good for all of what you want it for. Phone can be touchy when texting. Small fits into pocket well with a ave size screen. Comparable to other phones rates very well. :niceone: Is worth what you would pay IMHO.

the swiftkey app makes texting a lot easier imo...

[Swoop]

Grammer-Check option?

A good grammar check would be secondary to a spelling check.

[noobi]

Be warned that most smartphones will definitely need to be charged at the end of the day. I really don't see this as a problem but some people hate not being able to charge their phone once a month.

Apart from that, the wildfire is a decent phone. I have heard people have problems with them but people have problems with all phones. It's certainly not one of them that are constantly failing.

You on contract? Open to change providers? The reason I ask is a mate was looking at moving into a smart phone and wanted to spend $200. I suggested opening it up to $250 since that's a good entry level. Then we stumbled onto this....no never mind, they don't sell it anymore. It was a phone offered by Skinny that was around $180 and had an decent battery. Irrelevant now though.

Whatever you do, you need at least a 3 inch screen. I don't care what anyone else says. You can get by with that size but any smaller is gonna annoy the shit out of you. Of course anything bigger is better.

Can't really offer specific recommendations. I did have a Samsung 5503 as my first smartphone and I out grew it very quickly and the screen size was the first to piss me off (2.2!).

Charging once a day isnt much of an issue, worst case is I charge it through my laptop which I have with me most of the time anyway, being at uni.

Yes, im open to changing providers, some sort of plan around 20-25/month would be ideal. Otherwise ill stay on prepay.
I dont mind paying for the phone outright, I imagine plans that cheap dont give a discount on phones anyway.



From what I can tell the LG P500 is more or less the same phone as the Wildfire S, having the same processor, same screen resolution, same internal memory. Only advantage is the HTC has Sense.
Smokeu, do you know if the wildfire S be modifiable in much the same was as your LG? Is there a noticeable difference in performance with the overclocked processor?
The first thing I do will probably be to put ICS on the phone.

[SMOKEU]

Smokeu, do you know if the wildfire S be modifiable in much the same was as your LG? Is there a noticeable difference in performance with the overclocked processor?
The first thing I do will probably be to put ICS on the phone.

I don't know anything about the Wildfire S, sorry. There is an unofficial Cyanogenmod port for the P500 with ICS 4.0.3 which is the one I installed. The difference in performance with Cyanogenmod compared to the stock Gingerbread is like night and day. The phone is much faster than with the stock OS, and battery life is significantly improved. After I overclocked the CPU I noticed a small overall performance increase.

There are a few bugs with the Cyanogenmod port for my phone. First, the camera preview doesn't work so I can only see the pic or video after I've shot it. Secondly, the gallery keeps crashing whenever I use it but that doesn't matter as there are some very good free gallery apps on the Play Store.

[duckonin]

the swiftkey app makes texting a lot easier imo...

:niceone: Thanks for that. I shall try it out.

[mashman]

I got one of these things (http://www.mobicity.co.nz/samsung-p1000-galaxy-tab.html)... not the most discreet thing in the world, but it beats the shit out of hitting the wrong buttons when sending a text and even though I play music for most of the day I have to charge about once a week (used to be longer but I gingerbreaded it and it ain't so battery friendly these days, a year old now too)... I hate widdle phones and their shitty batteries. You can fit it in the back pocket of yer jeans and it bounces well :innocent:. Angry birds is much easier too :).

[Padmei]

don't get a motorola milestone. great at everything but making phonecalls

[noobi]

Any opinion on the Huawei Ascend G300, http://pricespy.co.nz/product.php?e=1209188.
Considering the slight difference in price between the G300 and the wildfire S, the difference in specs seems quite substantial, 4 inch screen and a better resolution, 1GHz processor.

[Asher]

Im looking at buying a new smartphone too, around the $400 mark. I might grab a Nokia Lumia 710 although i have never used a windows phone before it seems like the best phone for around that price.

[sil3nt]

With telecom shutting down the CDMA network I guess I also need a smartphone.

I wan't one with a decent camera though so my options are limited.

Obviously needs to be cheap as well. :bleh:

[SMOKEU]

Im looking at buying a new smartphone too, around the $400 mark. I might grab a Nokia Lumia 710 although i have never used a windows phone before it seems like the best phone for around that price.

Nokias are shit. Stick with Android.

[Asher]

Nokias are shit. Stick with Android.

Everything ive read about it says its better than the closest android phone (galaxy ace plus)

[SMOKEU]

Everything ive read about it says its better than the closest android phone (galaxy ace plus)

Still nowhere near as well supported as Android.

[cc rider]

Up for a mob too.

What about a Galaxy I?

What defines a smartphone?

I know what a dumb one is... I have several

[Asher]

I ended up getting the nokia luma 7100. Not regretting it so far, prefer it way more than motorola defy and it was $330 down from
$550 at bond and bond

[SMOKEU]

Up for a mob too.

What about a Galaxy I?

What defines a smartphone?

I know what a dumb one is... I have several

How much have you got to spend?

[avgas]

Up for a mob too.
What about a Galaxy I?
What defines a smartphone?
I know what a dumb one is... I have several
Highly Recommend Galaxy S1. Good bang for buck. I still love mine. Seems to do everything quite well.

[noobi]

I ended up buying the Huawei Ascend G300 from noel leeming for $249 inc. They list at $299, but I said that bond and bond are doing it for $249 and they matched it without question.

So far I can't complain. 4 inch screen, 480x800 resolution, 1GHz processor, 512mb RAM, 2.5Gb internal memory.
Essentially the same specs as the Galaxy S and the HTC one V, while being ~$100 cheaper. Only place the Galaxy is better is where it comes with optional sizes of internal memory. I use a 32Gb micro SD, cant imagine why you would need more space on a phone.
Its also a better processor and larger screen than the iPhone 3G, 3GS, and 4, and much much cheaper.

Battery seems to be faring much better than expected, but I havent been using it for calling, so that could drain it much faster. Charged Saturday evening, I spent all day yesterday playing around downloading apps, and setting up calenders and stuff, and showing it off to the GF, and its got ~2/3 battery left.

Its expected to get a factory Huawei ICS update later this year.

[cc rider]

How much have you got to spend?Approx $300-400 on a mob, as I have to buy a new laptop too, this one is shagged :(


Highly Recommend Galaxy S1. Good bang for buck. I still love mine. Seems to do everything quite well.Thanks avgas. I did make the mistake of reading reviews on the Galaxy 3... I want one.
How much does the S1 cost in NZ?

[SMOKEU]

Approx $300-400 on a mob, as I have to buy a new laptop too, this one is shagged :(

Thanks avgas. I did make the mistake of reading reviews on the Galaxy 3... I want one.
How much does the S1 cost in NZ?

http://pricespy.co.nz/category.php?k=103#rparams=l=s90076357

The Galaxy S is a good phone once rooted and Cyanogenmod installed.

[Gremlin]

$199 for a Samsung Galaxy S3? Ok, so our souls were sold to Telecom (2 year deal) and it's corporate... not bad going though. If we were bigger the phones would be free...

[avgas]

Thanks avgas. I did make the mistake of reading reviews on the Galaxy 3... I want one.
How much does the S1 cost in NZ?
About $250-$300 last time I checked.
Just make sure you get it updated firmware. When I got my S 9000T originally it had old firmware and Android 2.1 on it. Used the battery up in less than 1 day. Now with the new firmware and newer OS (2.3) seems to last about 3 days.

[The Everlasting]

Well I have owned/have the following cheap smartphones:


Vodafone 858: The cheapest android phone you can get(sells for $99 atm),screen is 2.8,processor is too slow,not enough ram,but still a good phone.
Galaxy Mini S1: Good phone,but screen quality is not great
Optimus One P500: A great phone,especially cos you can get it for around 170!! The screen is much better than the above.
For around 250 you can get the Sony Ericsson Live with Walkman,which has 512 ram and 1ghz cpu,and can run android 4.0.4,has a 5MP camera with 720P video recording.

So when looking for a smartphone,get one with at least 512 ram and 600mhz processor. I have owned both android and windows phones,and android is far superior in every way,windows has the same restrictions you get on an apple phone,for example bluetooth that you cannot use to transfer files etc..wtf??

[skippa1]

Have had the
Palm Treo x 3 different versions (poo's)
Blackberry Curve(ok)
HTC Snap(ok)
HTC Trophy (poo's)and now a
Samsung Galaxy S3(awesome)

Andriod is the way to go, Windows is poo's and Apple tie you up with their software and pay apps.
If you are on contract you can usually get a good upgrade if you twist their arms.