Worthwhile Low-to-midrange Phones

[koiulpoi]

Warning: badly-formed pseudo-rant incoming.

 

(I'm using Sprint pricing for this, of course)

 

All right yall. I'm a card-carrying Android fanatic. I carry a Note II, and my "laptop" is a TF300T. In the Android world, you have a lot of wonderful, high-end, expensive devices. The EVO LTE, the S3, the Note II, the Optimus G, etc. In my own humble opinion, the iPhone 5 can't hold much of a candle to any of these.

 

Where Apple is actually currently winning is, in the low-end and midrange. Why? The iPhone 4. Yes, it's a phone from 2010. However, it was really quite nice when it came out, and it's $0 now, and it has far fewer problems than some other flagship devices of that era (*cough cough EVO 4G cough*). And it runs iOS 6, which can basically be compared to Jelly Bean 4.1.

 

If you're the type of person looking for something in the "cheap to free" range, I can't see why you'd even bother with anything but the iPhone 4, unless it's a lateral move or a downgrade from your current device. What comparison do we have on the Android side of things? Well, let's go to Sprint.com and organize by price...

 

LG Optimus S: Was a low-end phone when it came out, and it hasn't aged well. Runs Gingerbread.

Kyocera Milano: Plagued with issues, including an abysmally small amount of internal storage for apps. Runs Gingerbread

ZTE Fury: Stay away from ZTE.

Samsung Transform Ultra: Not bad for $0, but I'd still recommend the iPhone 4. Runs Gingerbread.

LG Optimus Elite: Another mediocre Gingerbread device. Only free for new lines.

Kyocera Rise: Appears to have build quality issues. If you can live with that, it's not bad. Then again, Kyocera hasn't done much to earn my trust, with the Dura line having some severe issues at launch. Only free for new lines.

 

And, let's not forget, if you get these through most Sprint channels, you have to pay for a $50 mail-in rebate. So that Kyocera Rise? It's $19.99 + $50 = $69.99 out the door. When you could get, again, that iPhone for $0, and have a phone with better specs, better support, and a newer operating system. Makes it a bit of a hard sell, no? Especially when people find mail-in rebates to be rather repugnant. Raise your hand if you've ever gotten burned by them...

 

So, where's that killer inexpensive Android phone? There's a real market for it, and Apple is gobbling it up.

 

I say, find something like the Nexus 4. It's $299.99. The usual "smartphone subsidy" is $350, same as your Early Termination Fee. In other words, they could put that, or something similar, out for $0 on-contract. People would flock to it. The manufacturer makes more money, Sprint makes more money, and Google (who should be pushing for this) makes more money. So where is it? I would think the competition would be driving these prices down across the board, but they're not at all.

 

Instead, we have happy people in iPhones, and unhappy people in Furies and Rises.

[supert0nes]

Cheap to free? There's no such thing as free in subsidies, plus you can get a gs3 for almost free. The Iphone 4 doesn't have LTE so I don't view it as superior to low end Android phones with LTE. The Victory seems like a nice enough cheap phone. The S4GRU analysis said the radios on it were great.

 

BTW I don't see this thread lasting a day. Android vs. Iphone is so meh

[koiulpoi]

Well, yes. To get the most out of your subsidy, you should buy the most expensive phone possible

 

My point was not an "OS war". It was to comment on a vacuum taken up almost entirely by a single manufacturer, and how they have no real competition. Were it WP8 or BB10 to step in to that slot, all the better, but I don't have much faith in either of those, to be honest.

 

If you got "iphone is teh sux!!" from my post, well...

 

Anyways, the Victory is $49.99, plus an MIR. Telling people to spend $100 on a phone, when they can get one of pretty comparable specs without LTE for $0, it doesn't jive. Sure, it's got a dual-core processor, but the iPhone 4 has a higher screen resolution, a comparable camera, etc. The Victory is a nice phone, to be sure, but it's a hard sell.

[supert0nes]

Why would someone buy a junk smart phone? It makes no sense. Spend the extra $50 then. Our contracts cost so much money that the price of the subsidized phone 0 or $100 is almost irrelevant. I realize that Sprint makes a lot of money off of people buying these crap phones, but to the people of these forums, I hope they don't ever recommend any of them.

[Rocket87]

In my experience the galaxy 3 dominates the sales in the 200 range. While the 4s and 4 dominate the low end. The store i work at hardly sells any of the less than 100 androids. In my opinion there are 2 types of customers, the people that will pay fir the best and those that want free, there seems to be no middle ground even though most phones are priced in the middle.

 

Sent from my LG-LS970 using Tapatalk 2

 

 

[WiWavelength]

Why would someone buy a junk smart phone? It makes no sense. Spend the extra $50 then. Our contracts cost so much money that the price of the subsidized phone 0 or $100 is almost irrelevant.

 

Never underestimate the ignorance and impatience of the financially strapped consumer.

 

AJ

[koiulpoi]

@AJ: Exactly.

You'd be surprised how many low-income individuals will jump on the Phone Connect offer. Buy a phone connect ($0), get $100 off a smartphone. Oh, except it's $19.99/month, so the fact that you just signed a 2-year contract means you just spent ~$379.96. Somehow, this escapes people. All they hear is "iPhone 4S for free", or "Galaxy S3 for $100". It's incredibly foolish.

 

I completely agree, supert0nes. There is no good reason to buy near-$0 smartphone, unless you "need" a phone "now" because you "own your own business" (you don't) and have no cash on you. I've tried explaining the idea of "getting what you pay for" to people, and many don't want to hear it. They want free, and they want it now.

 

And the consumer expectation of the iPhone being a high-quality product, where most other phones are unknown, drives all those sales in to Apple's hands.

[peteyz24]

I would have to agree. Before I moved up to a smartphone I never had a phone that wasn't free. When I decided to move up to a smart phone I had no issues ponying up $300 for my evo 4g and then $200 for my s3. You get what you pay for.