Smartphone! (mustachian....)

Life Hacking
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Hey all,
What smartphone do you use and how happy are you with it?

perfect for the ideals of capitalism, my smartphone (nexus 5X) refuses to boot 2 years and 4 months after purchase (and trust me, it’s not because of no battery :wink: ), so bye bye warranty.

when I go to digitech, smartphones of the CHF800+ category are slapped to my face. whoot consumerism :crazy_face:

Considering the following points, could you recommend me something specific?

  • max spendings chf 300, preferrably much lower (Nexus 5x was CHF 320 in 2016)
  • i was perfectly happy with my nexus 5x in terms of tech specs
  • no apple :smiley:
  • low-user of smartphone since no mouse & harware-keyboard^^
  • ofc no abo with it

Thanks :slight_smile:

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Great that you opened that thread. I actually look for a Mustachian smartphone as well. I was considering OnePlus - do you know that company?

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OnePlus 6 costs 629 CHF.
Xiaomi Mi 8 costs 499 CHF.

I’m actually considering my next phone to be an iPhone. Not a Mustachian choice at the first look, but I want it to just work and also for many years.

It’s useful to check how your phones rates in the benchmark before purchase.

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If you want new, Xiaomi is pretty good value/price, you can order from china directly via aliexpress or ebay. Otherwise, check out used phones off ricardo/anibis/tutti in your neighborhood, I’m sure you can find something interesting under 100 fr, flash lineageos or something to get rid of vendor crap and it’ll be good as new. Warranty is overrated as you’ve experienced yourself.

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I just checked and it costs 450-480 USD on AliExpress, which isn’t really much cheaper than Digitec, or am I missing something?

Yeah, “good as new”. The battery will not be good as new. This Lineage OS is probably not 100% compatible with your phone and will not be updated forever. But sure, if you want a budget option, a used flagship phone should do the trick.

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Well I bought Redmi a couple of years ago for like 40% less than swiss prices, but Xiaomi was back then pretty rare here and just a few shops stocking grey imports, incliding digitec. But yeah if you can find something similar for just a little bit more it’s better to buy locally as you won’t have to worry about import fees and even have 2y warranty (good luck with enforcing any warranty claims from a chinese shop except straight DOA)

Check the model before you buy

Lower end and many older phones (e.g S5) often come with removable battery, you can get a brand new for some more money. Don’t cheap out and buy it from ali/ebay though - it’s full of fakes, they’d probably work and even not explode but the capacity is often misadvertised as people can’t test shit

Or look for new devices, often people here sell practically new phones because they didn’t like the model after using it for a bit, with a good discount of course or noone will buy, and they can’t return as sales are final in Switzerland unlike EU

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Digitec has an offer on the Nokia 8 currently. 333.- instead of 419.-
Stock Android or very close, you will feel right at home coming from the 5x
Personally I am using a Nexus 6P

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I’m not sure if it’s really better deal than this one (CHF 201.–):

Here’s a comparison:
https://www.digitec.ch/en/Comparison/6428854-8713240

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Actually, I think I’ll take this one:

The difference is it has Android One.

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About iPhones…
I think they are good phones if you don’t mind the lack of the audio jack.
BUT… do not ever try to connect it to your computer. It will ask you to install the biggest bloatware ever invented:
iTunes.

Other than that, if no one is saying what they want to do with a phone, I don’t know how can I suggest which one to buy.
Taking a lot of photos? Check the camera.
Lots of selfies? Check a phone with a good front camera
Calling (?) : just get a 3410 :slight_smile:
Lots of stuff? Geta phone with a huge battery.

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I heard some words of praise for the Nokia 8. That apart form the camera, it’s better than flagships, because it doesn’t compromise to reach a sleek design, no curved screen or notch nonsense.

Yeah this Xiaomi A2 seems like a sweet deal, Android One = stock Android is definitely a plus. But u sure you need 128 GB? 64 GB model goes for 299 CHF.

I don’t like to listen to music on headphones, bad for your ears.

Doesn’t macOS come with iTunes preinstalled? Anyway, I have not plugged in my phone anywhere in years. My photos backup over Google Photos. Documents over Google Drive.

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You’re right. Even better. Only drawback it’s also 4GB vs 6GB of RAM, but I don’t care too much. I don’t play computer games and watch 4k movies on my phone.

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Personally I bought a Huawei P9 Lite and I’m very satisfied. If I remember correctly I bought it for 279 CHF two years ago.

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Yeah I bought a bricked one for 5CHF and unbricked it, good deal. Not a bad phone but I never really used it, I stuck with my S4 until I upgraded to my “Franken” S7 (130CHF S7 with busted screen + 130CHF screen), it is not waterproof anymore but I can take it apart using only a screwdriver now, I like things I can fix myself.

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Digitec sells the Sony Xperia compact from 2017 and 2016. I have this one and I would immediately buy it again.

Especially the cameras of cheap phones tend to be mediocre, but not in this case.

this one is another alternative

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Check Digitec comments, it doesnt look like it will come with Android One!

In that case I would just check if LineageOS is supported and use that.

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I’m curious about this. Is it the kind of unbricking you can do at home? (like a factory reset?)

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I bought a Xiaomi MI 5s a bit more than 15 month ago directly from China (banggood.com) for a bit more than CHF 200. There was a flat rate for swiss customs like CHF 35.- . I am happy with the phone. You can find better in that price range today but may be that banggood is not the best choice anymore as you can find xiaomi phones in Switzerland for a good price.

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It was a little more advanced than that, but not a lot lot (no special hardware required). But I have to say I got very lucky on that one.

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ChickenFat is roughly recommending what I’m doing, buying 1-year old Xperia compact phones for around 300.- and using them as long as possible.

Currently on a Sony Xperia Z3 Compact running Android 6. I’d recommend getting a somewhat waterproof phone because it will also reduce the dust that get’s into the phone making it last longer.

I keep my battery charged in the 40-80% range (with some outliers to 30 and 90%) because lithium ion batteries don’t like being empty or full.

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