Dr. Mrs. Dr. F. has a stalwart iPhone 4 that served her for years, but lately she has had to accept that her loyal digital buddy could be approaching its rainbow bridge. In the last year it picked up the habit of butt-calling random acquaintances while sitting untouched on a desk, snapping photos of the floor and the inside of pockets, greying out random portions of the screen and interrupting calls with fragments of other people’s conversation.
Well, last night it said goodbye. Mostly. Her car’s bluetooth still picks it up but otherwise the poor thing is an inert mini-monolith, unable even to cry for help.
On the plus side her plan includes a free replacement when you have had the phone for a while. So no problem! She can just zip through the local Apple store and get a new one. In and out in five minutes. No way her trusty little handset could have picked the worst day of the last five years to brick itself. Right?
Baud
What are Juicers view of the new iPhone? My contract is up soon and I’m wondering whether I should stay with Android or make the switch.
Betty Cracker
Oh man. Talk about bad timing! Mr. Not-Cracker has a crappy Android that is threatening to brick any day now, and the youngster and I are urging him to join us in Apple Nirvana, not least so we can provide more efficient tech support to him. Watch it bite the damn dust today.
RSA
I traded my iPhone 4 for my wife’s iPhone 5, and it took me a while to get used to the slightly larger size for one-handed use. I hope that the 5 doesn’t go away, because the 6 is just too big for the way I use it most often.
Betty Cracker
@RSA: I think there are two versions of the 6 — one just a little bit bigger and one a lot bigger? I could be mistaken; I didn’t watch the dog and pony show.
The Dangerman
Is it safe to assume the dearly departed will have an appropriate service to send it on it’s way (yes, what I’m referencing involves YouTube and a sledgehammer)?
I hope your Apple Store experiences are better than my recent one; I have an iPad mini, best purchase in years (excluding porn; hey, this is Balloon Juice) but it had an minor accident and I wanted to get the cracked screen replaced. Apple won’t do it but they will “kindly” sell me a new one at a discount. If I go to a 3rd party, warranties go away and, in theory, the tablet phone could be destroyed in the repair (per Apple). So, since it’s usable and apparently fully functional with a film protector on the cracked screen, I haven’t done the repair as the Apple folks might be telling the truth (i.e., popping the screen off could do nasty things).
I’m a little unsure why you would build a fairly fragile object and then not have some sort of approved repair if something bad happens.
MrSnrub
@Betty Cracker: Correct about the sizes. Mostly it’s an incremental release, which is disappointing. Our iPhones are 3 years old and we were looking forward to new tech, and are unenthused by what they’re showing.
MrSnrub
@The Dangerman: We replaced the iPad when it fell, but we went to a repair place for my son’s iTouch. Pick your poison.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Switch! Did you watch the presentation or any of the iPhone 6 videos? I am ordering one, and I skipped every version of the iPhone 5. *admitted apple girl here, but I do NOT have the money to buy all the apple toys I want.
I am getting this one.
The Dangerman
@MrSnrub:
I suspect I’ll roll the dice and go to a repair place; the “discount” on a new iPad isn’t that much of a discount…
…but finding a repair place has been tricky. I was in the Bay Area recently and saw all sorts of places with rather questionable looking credentials (and staff). Since I live in a college town, in particular a techy college town, I thought going to a local repair shop would be the answer but, for reasons too long to explain, it wasn’t. I’d kinda like to find an Apple Certified repair place (even if the repair involved isn’t Apple approved) but that means back to the Big City. It can wait.
jehrler
While not all together a great option, Apple does give you 14 days to return a product so, theoretically, you could pick up a a new lower priced iPhone 5S or “free” 5C and then exchange it for an iPhone 6 or 6+ between the 19th and 24th (assuming your local Apple store has them in stock).
Your carrier store may have similar return policies.
Tim F.
@The Dangerman: Applecare. They replaced my mini with a cracked screen for $50. They will give you a replacement for any reason, no questions asked, as long as you can bring them 51% of the old device.
Lolis
Google Nexus is the way to go. It is sold unlocked then you just shop around for your plan. I bought it for my mom and she prefers it over her iphone 4. Check out the reviews. I own an unlocked Moto X which is also good.
dmsilev
Can’t she just grit her teeth and revert back to a 20th-century lifestyle for a week or so? The New Shiny goes on sale a week from Friday.
The Dangerman
@Tim F.:
Next time, no doubt. I thought if I as very, VERY careful, shit couldn’t happen. Well, I forgot about Murphy and his law. It wasn’t even that bad of a fall but it square on the corner and a pristine screen is spiderwebbed.
jake the antisoshul soshulist
@The Dangerman:
My son does screen repairs. Apple products are a little more complicated and expensive than most Androids, though Samsung is pretty expensive too. If Applecare does it for $50, go with them. He pays around $100 for the replacement screens themselves for Apple and Samsung. For $50 they are likely just replacing the cracked glass and not the full screen.
The Dangerman
@jake the antisoshul soshulist:
As mentioned to Tim, next time, no doubt, lesson learned. I just checked and you can get Applecare within 60 days or purchase but I am well outside that window.
WereBear
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha heh heh (deep breah) hahahahahahahahahahaha!
Yeah right.
I always get the AppleCare because it’s a good deal considering there WILL be questions with a new operating system, there will be things outside our control, and it will do something flaky I don’t have to put up with when someone who can fix it in five minutes is available.
Citizen_X
Bury it in the lunar regolith. Wait four million years, dig it up, and maybe it’ll call Jupiter.
wolfskin
@WaterGirl:
There’s really only one reason for me to reject an iphone, and that’s the inability to replace the battery. (Still true?) I go through at least two batteries per day. I use GPS and a tracking app to map turtling routes here in the Athens GA area, and observations by voice recorder and photos. These sap the battery quickly. I hardly ever use mine as an actual phone.
My samsung galaxy 3 has clearly demonstrated an inferior reception ability. And I live in a weak reception area. So thought I love the samsung in all other respects, my two years is almost up and I’m looking for something that has good GPS and better reception in low reception areas.
You don’t know me from Adam, though I’ve enjoyed BJ for years now. Still, any suggestions?
Tim F.
@jake the antisoshul soshulist: You are right, $50 is a deal for fixing a screen. I tried replacing an iPad screen myself once and some nights I still wake up screaming. Apple desn’t fix it. Cracked screen, water damage or left in a car that got cubed in a car crusher, they give you a brand new unit for $50. Your old device goes to the grey market, a trash bin or a hazmat bag depending on how much of it still works and how the pieces smell.
Cheryl from Maryland
Applecare — my lightening charger BROKE off INSIDE my iPad mini. The Apple people pulled the fragment out with tweezers, so I was saved at no charge. Never again — you just don’t know what can happen.
Tim F.
@wolfskin:
Oh yeah. Use a case with extra power to double the life and carry a portable charger in your pocket to double it again.
Amir Khalid
I wish I could add to this discussion, but I’m only a newbie smartphone user — I bought a not-the-latest model Lenovo like, seven days ago, and I’m still getting used to it. The cleverest thing I’ve done with it is improvise a tether to keep it from falling to the ground out of my shirt/jacket/trouser pocket.
Here’s the thing I don’t get about them: how come they’re so addictive? If you get on a train here and look around, you’ll see more than half the other passengers futzing about with their phones. Me, I can happily go for days at a time without using a phone. And the internet experience on a smartphone is not so tempting that I can’t wait till I get to my laptop instead.
Redshift
Yes, very bad timing, having it due on the day Apple fans are lining up to get features Android has had for a year or two, but with better marketing.
/obligatoryAndroidsnark
Actually, I’d be interested in hearing what’s exciting to those who were excited by the announcement. The reaction from the Apple developers at work seemed to be more “meh” and “I’ll see when I get my hands on it” than “WANT!”
Jamey
@jehrler: @wolfskin: Get an (or some) Juicebox or other alternate battery cases and swap them out.
Shakezula
It’s not breaking down, it’s achieving sentience.
C.V. Danes
@Baud: Stay with Android. I made the switch from Blackberry to an LG G2 early this year and love it.
Betty Cracker
@Amir Khalid: Your fellow passengers are reading Balloon Juice!
Amir Khalid
@Betty Cracker:
If I told them I was the Amir Khalid, would that make me a star?
boatboy_srq
@wolfskin: When it came time to upgrade, I was torn between the iPhone 5, Galaxy S5 and the HTC One. The iPhone comes with a hefty price tag, and the two ‘droids differed mainly in build quality and stuff I’ll never use a phone for (an 8MP camera on the Galaxy? Srsly? I’ll stick to the DSLR for my photos, thanks). I went with the HTC One and haven’t looked back: it’s solid (where the Galaxy had that nice, shiny, scrapes-off-on-everything finish) and has proven surprisingly durable and efficient (one charge lasts all day through weather alerts, GPS mapping, Pandora listening and more apps than I thought I’d ever want or need). It’s a nice loud RED, too, so I’m less likely to lose it in car/desk clutter.
Belafon
@C.V. Danes: The G2 and the Galaxy S* have been really good phones.
jehrler
@wolfskin:
May I suggest these.
monoprice.com/Product?c_id=108&cp_id=10831&cs_id=1083110&p_id=9283&seq=1&fo…
They allow you to charge anything that charges via USB and it also has a 2.1 amp port to charge your iPhone faster and to charge your iPad.
We have several of these and they are high quality and can recharge an iPhone 5S twice+ and about 1/3-1/2 of a charge on iPad (depends on model).
Monoprice makes good quality stuff and they are very responsive if there is a problem.
schrodinger's cat
My contract with Verizon is up and I am thinking of ditching them, I have been with Verizon mainly due to inertia and was wondering if any other carriers offered a better deal. Also, does anyone have any experience with no contract phones and using them with a calling card ?
Iowa Old Lady
I misread “car’s Bluetooth” for “cat’s Bluetooth”, which would have been much cooler.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@wolfskin: Samsung is the only phone I know of where you can change batteries. So I got one of these (Anker 15000mah external battery pack) works quite nicely for all these new phones that don’t have removable batteries. Which is all of them.
My iPhone4 was my first and last iPhone. I now have a MotoG that cost me $199, and it does all the same things my iPhone did save for break within the first six months of owning it. Never again, Apple. Oh, and fuck iTunes with a chainsaw.
PhoenixRising
@wolfskin: Part of the reason you’re going through so much power is that your phone has poor reception, so in addition to your GPS activity, it’s struggling to reach those towers every 45 sec or whatever the setting is on those.
I’d get someone’s downsized iPhone 4 & a solar case with emergency crank, but that’s me. Cheap, including about my electrical use.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@Amir Khalid: I don’t know what everyone else does with theirs, but I use both the Nook and Kindle apps on mine and read books when I have a few minutes of downtime. Frankly, I hate cellphones and the only way they justify their existence is with book apps and GPS.
boatboy_srq
@schrodinger’s cat: I was with Metro in FL, and I’m with Boost in NoVA. I was content with Metro, but Boost has been really good to work with. No fuss, no muss, and unless you’re calling Bangladesh the rates are pretty decent. There’s no limit to voice or SMS usage and data gets throttled (not cut off) at whatever “max” you go with. Phones aren’t cheap (shop Amazon instead of Boost’s own site) but plans are practically priced. Just curious: why in this age of all-you-can-eat talk’m’text are you using a calling card?
schrodinger's cat
@boatboy_srq: I am not, I just want to know all the options that are out there, been with Verizon for over ten years and just trying to figure out the lay of the land before I switch. Verizon does not have unlimited anything.
Linnaeus
My iPhone 4 is still going strong. It’ll be a while before I can afford a new phone, so I hope that continues.
JR in WV
We got an Android tablet first, while still using trakphones. I like it a lot, it’s the biggest one, but still so much smaller and convenient to travel with than the traditional laptop.
Different strengths. Better for viewing and reading, not so hot for typing longer posts. In Europe I used it to translate English to and from Spanish and French, like a miracle! Now I could delete those dictionaries, but having loaded them, I hesitate. Besides, I may run into a Spaniard or Frenchman who needs help communicating, right?
Then we got Verizon/Samsung Android phones, mine is a little bigger than Mrs J’s both are good at being tiny computers and have great reception in fringe areas, like the Arizona desert. We also got a little gadget, forget whet they call it, it’s a tiny wireless router that connects to the Innertubes via cell towers, you can drive down the road while your companion uses the internet to find the next best place to eat with Google map/Tripadvisor.
Of course, you can surf the web with the phones, but the tablets and laptops are better for many things, maps for one example. I do use the phone to look up scheduled events while in town, etc…
$20 the wireless router was. I understand they want to encourage customers to use their cell networks instead of ISPs to connect to the tech world. We didn’t have an ISP in the desert, the little gadget wasn’t intended for watching long youtube videos, but for surfing how to install a new whatever it was there for you.
That said, we’re paying far too much to Verizon, and will for another 14 months, but we will be getting a smaller package with limited calling and data. We probably make like 8 calls a month, paying for unlimited was in retrospect stupid.
@Amir Khalid:
Amir,
You ARE a star!
Keep up the good work from SE Asia!
Best to all,
JR
Cervantes
@schrodinger’s cat: Except gall.
wolfskin
@PhoenixRising:
I actually realized awhile back that in very low reception area my android was insisting on using global networking. I switched to CDMA/LTE and that relieved the enormous drain you’re talking about. Apparently the phone did exactly what you’re talking about under Global. But Android keeps asking me if I want to switch to Global, which I don’t want to do. Software updates haven’t fixed that problem in over a year.
I appreciate the recommendations so far – I noted that the HTC a member of our VFD has can get signals through Verizon that mine cannot. Didn’t know about the battery situation life! I actually don’t have trouble changing a battery, so long as I can do it.
RSA
@Betty Cracker: That’s my impression, too, as @MrSnrub confirms. Some of my work is peripherally related to human factors, and I think that the larger size is will be problematic for some iPhone users.
Roger Moore
@The Dangerman:
They’re designed for ease of manufacturing, which these days means using means of attachment like clips, glue, etc. that are intended to go together easily but not to come apart easily. If they designed the thing to be easy to repair, it would be a lot more expensive, to the point that it makes more sense to make it easy to build and cheap to buy and replace rather than expensive to build and easy to repair.
Cervantes
@RSA: Possible, but one should not assume that the larger sizes come without new usability tricks.
Roger Moore
@Redshift:
It sounds as if Apple is doing phone based payments right. The rub seems to be that their system is secure enough that it will actually reduce fraud and consequently reduce card transaction fees. That’s a big enough deal to make it worth merchants’ while to buy new readers, which means that their transaction system has a chance of taking off.
Mnemosyne
@schrodinger’s cat:
I’ve been with Virgin Mobile for years now. They use Sprint’s network, so if people in your area say Sprint has good reception, you’ll be in business. I had to pay list price for my iPhone 4S (which was a little painful) but I pay $30 a month for 300 minutes, unlimited data, and unlimited texts, with no contract. When I was trying to figure out if I should get an iPhone, someone here figured out that, even with paying full price for the handset up front, I/we would save $150/year over getting a contract phone.
They also offer tons of Android phones, so you don’t have to go Apple unless you want to.
Mnemosyne
@RSA:
I’m slightly worried about the new size because I have small hands. I guess I’ll have to go to the store and play around with it in order to make up my mind.
Dcrefugee
I’m an Android guy — been flogging a Droid Bionic on Verizon since they came out almost three years ago. But I wanted a Nexus 5 badly, which Verizon won’t support.
Last month, I finally bit the bullet and got a Nexus 5 via Credo Mobile, on Sprint. I live out in the boonies east of SRQ (Hi, Boatboy…) and was worried about signal. Verizon fairly sucks out here, but AT&T was much worse. So far, I’m pleasantly surprised with Sprint. Headed out to Wichita later today, so we’ll see how it does on the road.
The Bionic lurved it some battery. So far, so does the Nexus 5, but that *may* be signal-hunting. So far, I’m very pleased with the upgrade. And no moar VZW!
YMMV…
Redshift
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Huh? Most Android phones have removable batteries; the HTC One is somewhat unusual in not having that.
Amir Khalid
Can you get a prepaid plan for a smartphone in America? I went with that here, which with my minimal expected usage should save me a buttload of ringgit.
burnspbesq
@wolfskin:
Lay in a Mophie external battery. The one that sells for $129 will fully charge an iPhone three times.
Yeah, I’m in. Going full bore, the big one with 128 gigs of memory. The bet is that extra screen real estate will make reading on it easier.
The issue is whether to take the subsidized price or not. I’m likely to be spending 15-20 days a year in the UK for the foreseeable future, and the idea of swapping in an O2 SIM on final approach into Heathrow and avoiding AT&T’s exorbitant international roaming charges has considerable appeal. On the other hand, the $450 subsidy will cover a lot of exorbitant international roaming charges.
Aimai
@wolfskin: i finally got a battery pAck cover for my iphone 5. I love it. It charges with the phone overnight and then drains itself first before the phone.
mattH
@wolfskin:
Best phone batteries out there are in the LG G2 and the Galaxy Note 3. They are both large, 5.2 in and 5.7 in respectively, but in spite of that have killer life in those very very large batteries. The G2 has a soldered-in battery, the Note 3 does not. The Note 3 has a microSD card slot, the G2 doesn’t. Don’t buy a G3, they changed the screen and it eats battery.
All things considered though, you can follow jehrler ‘s suggestion and just get yourself an external battery pack and keep your current phone. They can often charge your phone 2 or 3 times on a full charge.
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: I see some ads for it, but no one I know uses one. Plus I live in a somewhat rural area, where the reception can be spotty if you are not one one of the major carriers.
dmsilev
@Amir Khalid:
Yes, though it’s not the norm. T-Mobile, for instance, has a plan which is pre-paid talk and/or data. I have a dumbphone which I use only seldomly, and that’s what I went with. I buy $10 worth of minutes once or twice a year, and I’m good.
mattH
@Dcrefugee: The Nexus 5 was built without the antennas to run on Verizon’s network. Kinda dumb, but I use T-Mobile and am pretty happy. BTW, Sprint coverage bites in the West.
As an aside, we never heard about DougJ’s experiences with Straight Talk before he went incognito. Still wondering if he had an ok time or didn’t use it.
Xantar
Tim,
When I lost my iPhone 4, there was still 3 months left on my contract and the iPhone 5s was due to launch. I took my brother’s old Blackberry and used that for a while until I could buy the new phone. The Blackberry was excruciating to use, but it served well enough.
You can probably find cheap dumb phones on Craigslist to use temporarily.
Mnemosyne
@wolfskin:
Someone else mentioned this up-thread, but if you’re tramping around outside with a backpack or something, a solar charger might be worthwhile. I’ve seen them at places like REI.
Mnemosyne
@Amir Khalid:
My Virgin Mobile plan is prepaid.
Just One More Canuck
@Amir Khalid: Even better, you’d be a valued commenter
Dcrefugee
@mattH: I’ve seen that, but my research points to VZW’s flat refusal to allow the Nexus 5 on its network…
BethanyAnne
I’m excited to try the 6’s, and see which fits best. Probably the larger one. I’m very large – I wear XXL gloves, and it will be nice to have a phone scaled to me. I’m currently on a 4, and it doesn’t have low power Bluetooth. I have some Bluetooth tags that I can’t use because of that. The Apple Pay looks really cool; any step up from plain magstripe tech is a big upgrade to me. I can put my few secondary cards into it and thin my wallet out. Going with the 128 option, I can probably also retire my iPod classic. I have about 70GB of music, and that lightens my purse more. I guess I can see how a developer or a person on a 5S might not care, but this upgrade is a pretty big deal for me.
mattH
@Dcrefugee: Very well could be the cause of the decision to leave the antennas out, Verizon won’t even let a current customer with an out of contract 4G Verizon phone switch to prepaid, only 3G.
burnspbesq
@BethanyAnne:
Don’t throw away that iPod classic. There will be a market for them for a long time. I’m holding on to mine with the idea that in the next couple of years, the price of terabite SSDs is going to come down enough that swapping one into the iPod Classic will be a viable project (my music library is about 2.6 terabytes).
C.V. Danes
@Belafon: Yep, although I was a little annoyed that LG came out with the G3 like 2 months after I went with the G2. From what I have been reading, though, the G2 might still be a better match for me.
But really, the argument in Android vs. Apple is about choice. In the Android market, there a many different types of phones with many different form factors to choose from. With Apple, the only choice you have (or will ever have) is the choice that Apple provides you. Not much of a choice in my book :-)
C.V. Danes
@Xantar:
Having went from a blackberry to a G2, I can see why you would say that, but the one thing that the blackberry excelled at was in creating text. I truly miss the physical keyboard when it comes to emailing and texting.
C.V. Danes
@BethanyAnne: I guess my question is, why not move to Android? There are many choices of Android phones out there which will give you the option to find something that matches you, instead of having to conform to whatever Apple decides to put out.
mellowjohn
i’m so old that i remember when newer mobile phones got smaller and smaller.
burnspbesq
@C.V. Danes:
You’re implicitly assuming that Apple’s one and only offering will never “match” any consumer’s preferences. There are several hundred million reasons to question that assumption.
Cervantes
@mellowjohn: That was before screen size was a consideration. Other than the screen, and the battery, components are still getting smaller.
mattH
@C.V. Danes: Easy of use when it comes to syncing coupled with market capture. My mom decided that she wanted larger font on her phone and bought an S4. It certainly did give her bigger font, but she didn’t like that she couldn’t get all of her music on with one press. I offered to side load them, but she just went back to the iPhones instead.
Mnemosyne
@mattH:
Yep. People who are tech-savvy have a really hard time understanding that people who aren’t tech-savvy just want a piece of technology to work as seamlessly as possible. They don’t really care about processor speeds or screen pixels as long as the thing actually does what they want it to do when they want it to do it.
For better or worse, Apple products are for people who don’t want to have to think about the technology (and I saw this as a 20+ year Apple user), so they’re willing to put up with what tech-savvy people see as “walled gardens” or “crippled technology” for that convenience.
Cervantes
@C.V. Danes:
You’re right, Apple offers a variety of devices that run iOS; and at the same time does not make iOS available to other hardware manufacturers. What difference does this make to you, the customer?
CONGRATULATIONS!
@C.V. Danes: I use Android and I’m not going back, but if you want to use your phone as a music player there is not one single Android device out there that has sound nearly as good as the Apple product.
Villago Delenda Est
Planned obsolescence…it’s on the Apple menu!
RSA
That’s me, too, even though I have above-average tech-savvy. It’s just that the tech I’m interested in doesn’t include phones or laptops.
ETA: I think it’s probably something like a mechanical engineer who doesn’t do engine mods on his or her car.
Calouste
@The Dangerman:
Get a Nokia. I’ve dropped mine face down on a parking garage floor from about 6 foot up, and the only thing you can see are a couple of tiny scratches on the shell.
muddy
I don’t have a smartphone, and know little of coverage, but this seems interesting. Unlimited data?
C.V. Danes
@burnspbesq:
I suppose, in a “you can choose any color as long as it’s black” sort of way.
@Cervantes:
The difference is in wanting to own a phone whose form factor meets my needs, instead of having to alter my needs to conform to the only form factor Apple provides. My G2 has much more screen real estate than the iPhone, which fits the fact that my eyes are 50+ years old instead of Apple’s target 20-something hipster demographic. Also, if my needs or desires change, than I can more or less simply switch to another Android device that better meets my needs. I don’t have to pray to the Apple gods that they produce something that works better for me.
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
That may be so, but that’s not enough for me to want to become a captive of Apple’s walled garden :-)
C.V. Danes
@Mnemosyne:
This much is true, in the same way that most people are not motor-heads and just want their car to start reliably and get them where they need to go without worry. My experience is that Apple products work very well when used within Apple’s “walled garden”, but you step outside of that garden at your own risk.
The problem is that we live in a world where you do need to think about technology, as the recent “picture-gate” demonstrated, and where Apple was like “Problem? What problem?”
The Other Chuck
@C.V. Danes:
Annoyingly enough, the iPhone 6 does not come in black.
Cervantes
@C.V. Danes:
The “any color as long as it’s black” thing is more myth than history.
As for:
I gather you are happy with your non-Apple hardware and operating system. That’s good.
Some of the things you say are a bit of a mystery to me — but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
John M. Burt
Tsk, if you’re going to canimorphosize a telephone that way, you need to do it properly: “her loyal digital buddy could be approaching its 256-color rainbow bridge.”
James K. Polk, Esq.
swappa.com/buy/apple-iphone-4s-att/us
You can get a AT&T iPhone 4s (mint condition) for like $180. If you are on Verizon, they are quite a bit cheaper ($130 for a mint one)
Personally, I would get an LG G2 (ebay a new one for ~$300), nearly the exact same size/weight as a iPhone 6 with a 5.2″ screen, 32GB memory. The battery life on the thing is famously good (the battery is 65% bigger than a new iPhone)
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@WaterGirl:
We also skipped the 5, though I was tempted. I’ll be getting the boy a 6 (the little one) as soon as they come out. Mrs. Heyduke’s and my phones seem to be holding in there, so we (at least I) will wait a while.
boatboy_srq
@schrodinger’s cat: Boost: unlimited talk and text and 5 GB of data (before throttling) is now $45/mo. No extra fees, nada. All you have to do is buy the phone. It’s an entirely separate bill, but pay it up front (or pay ahead) and you have no worries. Boost is Sprint now (Free Markets™. Humbug) and hung off Sprint towers before the acquisition, so while it IS Sprint at least it’s a major player.
@Redshift: I think HTC fixed that for most models after the first HTC One. My HTC One SV has replaceable batteries (I even got a spare and a charger for it). I do see that the HTC One M8 does not have a user-replaceable battery, though… :(
James K. Polk, Esq.
Also, if anyone is off contract, StraightTalk is a fantastic way to save money if you have a unlocked phone (most carriers will unlock your phone for free if you are out of contract). $45 / month, unlimited talk/text with 3GB data before throttling.
It uses AT&T’s towers, so you get decent LTE coverage and excellent 3G / voice coverage. I’ve moved most people I know onto the plan, people save about $60 a month on average ($720 a year!)
ThresherK
Tangent: I grabbed an LG Gpad after all the advice given me here and other places. Tested to confirm it fit in my coat and jacket pockets. And for the coastal elite notheast where I live,I chose VZW.
Groucho48
Just thought I’d mention that the Microsoft store is currently selling an off-contract T-Mobile Nokia 521 for 50 bucks. This is a Windows phone, different from both Android and Apple. It isn’t a flagship phone but it works fine. It’s the phone I got for my grandkids to use. It’s a smaller phone and it doesn’t have top-notch specs, but, it works fine as a phone, as a camera, and as an internet device. Most games are playable. Battery life is adequate. T-Mobile doesn’t have as good coverage as Verizon or AT&T, so, if you aren’t in a metro area, that would be a concern.
magurakurin
@Mnemosyne:
I am so tired of this meme that the Android OS somehow needs “tech savy” to run. It’s total bullshit. A fucking blind monkey can use an Android phone or tablet, same as and Iphone or Ipad. If you love Apple great, but stop droning on about how “it’s just easier” that’s just crap. They are fucking toasters, if it makes your toast, job done.
Mnemosyne
@magurakurin:
Hey, if you think you can explain to my mom how to work the Android phone my brother got her, be my guest, because none of the rest of us have had much luck. When she had an iPhone, she got herself up and running on it without any help, but she’s constantly complaining about how she can’t figure out where things are on the Android phone.
BethanyAnne
@C.V. Danes: Well, there are several reasons, I guess. Apple has spent a decade proving to me that they will sweat the details. There’s a level of trust built up by now. Malware on iPhones is less than 1% of infections. Apple phones get several years of OS updates. Android devices get updates sporadically, whenever the vendor bothers, which I gather is rarely. Lots of apps come out first for Apple, then *maybe* for Android.
I have been very happy with Apple, is the basic reason. They get that user experience comes first, then a list of features appears that support the UX. Android looks like phones from engineers. Tons of features, but the UX is secondary or forgotten entirely. It can do everything! Sort of, if you can figure out how. And why.
I don’t understand why I would want to choose from 99 flavors that all taste half baked when there’s one vendor that makes sure their 2 flavors are damn good.
Cervantes
@BethanyAnne:
Four decades in some cases; and their engineers are just better.
To paraphrase what a quintessential Apple person once said about Microsoft in its heyday, the worst thing about their people is that they have absolutely no taste.
Platosearwax
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
“I use Android and I’m not going back, but if you want to use your phone as a music player there is not one single Android device out there that has sound nearly as good as the Apple product. ”
I have to disagree with that. To my ear, my Sony Z2, using the proper music player, sounds way better than any iPhone I have heard (all of them through the 5’s). I would say my old GS3 International that had Wolfson audio chips sounded better as well.