Android under 25k for a Fellow Techie

meet6600

meet6600

Adept
1. Q: Budget?
A: 25k can stretch to 29k max

2. Q: Preferred Form Factor(flip, bar, slider)?
A: Bar

3. Q: Preferred display type?
A: Any

4. Q: Do you have any brand preference or dislike? Please name them.
A: NA

5. Q: Preferred input method (Touchscreen, QWERTY, etc.)?
A: Touchscreen

6. Q: Camera required or not? If required, please specify type like front camera/flash/etc.
A: Cam Yes but occasional Snaps. Flash 100% Required to be used as Flashlight

7. Q: Preferred operating system? (Android, Symbian, iOS, Windows Phone etc).
A: Android

8. Q: Preferred connectivity options? (3G, Wifi, Edge etc).
A: All

9. Q: What is your intended use for this phone(internet, camera, multimedia, mails, etc)?
A: Camera, mails and internet

10. Q: Any other requirements?
A: Good Battery is a must plus Nice Display

11. Q: If you have already considered a phone then please mention the model.
A: Mentioned Below


Hi Friends,

Please suggest a nice Android under 25k for my best friend. Need to buy one in next 2 weeks and I have checked following as Options:
1) Sony Xperia P ( Battery Life is a major downer though Fast Charging looks great. Read about Buggy ICS so not sure about stability. Rest all seems Great!)
2) HTC One S ( Indian Version gets S3 and it's good but not battery efficient. Have been using lots of hTC's lately so Sense UI now looks boring.)
3) Sony Xperia S or SL ( Looks Good and well rounded)
4) Samsung Galaxy S2 ( Old and Build turns me off)
5) Samsung Galaxy S Advance ( Buggy from Day 1 with Call Problems but 4.1 Planned so looks good)
6) LG Optimus 4X HD ( The One I really liked because of the Price. Only thing, I am not sure is that will it ever get to 4.1, which is not much of a bother but a con)
7) Sony Xperia Ion ( Dual Core and Over Priced but Nice Screen Size)
8) Galaxy Note ( Too Big so NO :))

I have mentioned all I could think of with the brackets affecting my recommendation to my friend, so friends please suggest something good. Also would prefer Official Phones in India so as to get proper warranty.

Usage will be Calls, SMS, Whatsapp, Casual Browsing, Gmail, Music, Once in a blue moon Camera & Reading Documents often. I personally Like LG one for the Price and Quad Core with decent battery though Xperia P only has issue of Battery. So Please suggest people which one out of above and if any, other options. Windows Phone 8 is off the radar and so is any Indian or Chinese Clone!

Thanks in Advance,
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
For your usage --
  • SONY XPERIA S / SL
  • HTC One S
Battery life is a rather touchy subject because unless you are the types who likes to watch a feature film while commuting to / from office, yak all day, set screen brightness to 50% and use it with abandon all of the above devices will stretch their stand by time to 1[SUP]1[/SUP]/[SUB]2[/SUB] -->2 days.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
manu1991 said:
Since you can stretch till 29k, stretch a bit more and get one of these:
HTC One X 16GB With 1 Year Manufacturer Warranty | eBay

Buy Samsung Mobile Phone India| Samsung I9300 Galaxy S iii 16Gb Marble White , Prices & Specifications, Review|Zoomin.com
Coupon: AMZNMOB
Price after coupon - 29.7k
Click to expand...

HTC One X battery back up doesn't make the cut so that one is out for me!

I find S3 Design too Bland so again can't consider that!

- - - Updated - - -

ALPHA17 said:
For your usage --
  • SONY XPERIA S / SL
  • HTC One S
Battery life is a rather touchy subject because unless you are the types who likes to watch a feature film while commuting to / from office, yak all day, set screen brightness to 50% and use it with abandon all of the above devices will stretch their stand by time to 1[SUP]1[/SUP]/[SUB]2[/SUB] -->2 days.
Click to expand...

In terms of Battery back up, in general how would hTC One S and Xperia S/SL do? And Will the Indian One S get JB Update?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
meet6600 said:
In terms of Battery back up, in general how would hTC One S and Xperia S/SL do? And Will the Indian One S get JB Update?
Click to expand...

^^ Should get the bump because its hardware is capable enough.

The SONY XPERIA S / SL will get the bump but expect it to be in Q2 2013.

If you are talking continuous 3G / Wi-Fi on, ~50% screen brightness and ~2 hours of calling along with constant screen on for reading documents not more than 6 hours OR so. The XPERIA S / SL will have a slight edge due to the 100 mAH higher battery capacity and a more frugal chipset at its heart.

For a more comprehensive breakdown, head here --
Hope this helps, Cheers!
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
ALPHA17 said:
^^ Should get the bump because its hardware is capable enough.

The SONY XPERIA S / SL will get the bump but expect it to be in Q2 2013.

If you are talking continuous 3G / Wi-Fi on, ~50% screen brightness and ~2 hours of calling along with constant screen on for reading documents not more than 6 hours OR so. The XPERIA S / SL will have a slight edge due to the 100 mAH higher battery capacity and a more frugal chipset at its heart.

For a more comprehensive breakdown, head here --
Hope this helps, Cheers!
Click to expand...

Thanks for your input and Even I do check GSMARENA a lot, it is just that hTC One S has S3 which to me is the deal breaker of sorts. Internationally One S is the best but here they messed it up big time. First a price no one could think off and now no word about S4!
Sony looks good for now but any new launches or any S4 Chipset under or around 25k? The Reviews and benchmarks of almost every Snapdragon 4 Phone are simply great with impressive Battery efficiency. And what about LG 4X? Many sites which have reviewed it have given positive ratings and it's priced good too. H/W wise too it's better. Any ideas?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
@meet6600, please reconsider the Windows Phone based devices because if your friend is going to use the phone for documents and official business then the integration of the Outlook and Office 365 systems would greatly benefit your friend.

Also pricing seems to be very, very tempting. Almost 'A steal' if the NOKIA Lumia 920 debuts at ~25000/- (plus taxes) and Lumia 820 ~20000/- (plus taxes).
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Upvote 0 Downvote
ALPHA17 said:
meet6600, please reconsider the Windows Phone based devices because if your friend is going to use the phone for documents and official business then the integration of the Outlook and Office 365 systems would greatly benefit your friend.

Also pricing seems to be very, very tempting. Almost 'A steal' if the NOKIA Lumia 920 debuts at ~25000/- (plus taxes) and Lumia 820 ~20000/- (plus taxes).
Click to expand...

Well If this becomes real then Bye Bye Android :) But for the time being I guess Sony Xperia P & S will do. Lets see what happens in 2 weeks! Would check out LG with my friend and also check Xperia's Thanks!
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
ALPHA17 said:
meet6600, please reconsider the Windows Phone based devices because if your friend is going to use the phone for documents and official business then the integration of the Outlook and Office 365 systems would greatly benefit your friend.

Also pricing seems to be very, very tempting. Almost 'A steal' if the NOKIA Lumia 920 debuts at ~25000/- (plus taxes) and Lumia 820 ~20000/- (plus taxes).
Click to expand...
Android office product work very well with Microsoft docs (I use polaris office) plus you have google docs on the web . Most people would use docs on their phone sparingly because its very difficult to create/edit it on a 4inch screen. I don't think its should be a major parameter when opting into a platform. Same goes for outlook. There are excellent apps on both platforms from most major mail providers(gmail,hotmail,yahoo etc), you would'nt find yourself using outlook a lot. If Nokia Lumia 920 comes at a low price it would certainly be very attractive, but with windows 8 phone's future uncertain I would advise caution before buying Lumia . Microsoft announced they wont be providing windows phone 8 backward compatibility for older Lumia devices and the new Windows 8 RT tablets have'nt really been a success. So app developers aren't really enthusiastic about the windows phone 8 platform. The number of apps for android and iOS are simply not comparable to the ones on windows.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
GrimReaper said:
Android office product work very well with Microsoft docs (I use polaris office) plus you have google docs on the web . Most people would use docs on their phone sparingly because its very difficult to create/edit it on a 4inch screen. I don't think its should be a major parameter when opting into a platform. Same goes for outlook. If Nokia Lumia 920 comes at a low price it would certainly be very attractive, but with windows 8 phone's future uncertain I would advise caution before buying Lumia . Microsoft announced they wont be providing windows phone 8 backward compatibility for older Lumia devices and the new Windows 8 RT tablets have'nt really been a success. So app developers aren't really enthusiastic about the windows phone 8 platform. The number of apps for android and iOS are simply not comparable to the ones on windows.
Click to expand...

There is a reason people involved in business still tote around a BlackBerry device. Even after the advent of iPhone and Android devices.
WP8 has deep integration of Exchange, Office 365's Outlook e-mail, Hotmail and Live Mail on Windows Phone. WP8 further has excellent integration with the popular Gmail and Yahoo Mail. All this results in an e-mail client that is more capable and efficient than other platforms. To name a few, contact management, contact synchronization, message management, message synchronization, file management, attachment management, folder management, conversation thread management, and e-mail search, are significantly better on Windows Phone e-mail. The difference is far deeper than appearance. If you handle e-mails with some degree of sophistication, you will appreciate the difference.

I travel with both my iPad and Windows Phone. Unless I am using my computer, I usually reach out for the Windows Phone for e-mails instead of the iPad, despite the fact that the e-mails on iPad have so much better readability. To just read a recent e-mail, the iPad is an obvious choice. But you don't just read a recent e-mail. Work e-mails have history and threads, and they need to be searchable, and fully synchronized with your computer, and that's where the Windows Phone shines.
Click to expand...

The NOKIA Lumia 920 has a 4.5" screen (larger than all Android offerings in that range) and it is better built than most phones (personal experience). The only Android phones that can beat the Lumia's in construct and body rigidity are --
  • MOTOROLA Defy series
  • SONY Acro S
  • Androids that are labelled as tough-Droid's.
I would say Windows8 looks bright, at-least on the mobile front. If the Lumia 920 has ~2 Million pre-orders, something is very right.

Windows8 is not backwards compatible because the kernel at the heart of the OS is no longer the old CE series, it has more in common with the actual desktop OS's kernel. That said a lot of important features that were missing in the original Windows Phone Mango / Tango devices have been added, e.g. --
  • USB plug-play instead of dependence on Zune for media transfer
  • Expandable memory because of the above
  • NFC support
  • Wireless charging
All these are hardware-centric changes and that is why the OS is not backward compatible with the older devices.

App development is not strong because of the 'Chicken OR the Egg' conundrum the developers are in along with potential customers.

The major App publishers / developers have already ported applications onto the Windows8 platform and the market is better with fewer applications, at-least unlike Droid devices you need not go through a ton of bogus / cloned and generally speaking outlandish applications to one that feels and performs good.

Amazon.com: b. Weiss' review of Nokia Lumia 920 4G Windows Phone, Black (A... -- user review and some of these are diamonds in the rough compared to the jingoistic stuff we get from the major publishers / review sources.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
ALPHA17 said:
There is a reason people involved in business still tote around a BlackBerry device. Even after the advent of iPhone and Android devices.
Click to expand...

I believe that reason has something to do with BB having a hardware keyboard ;) (easier to touch type) . 'Documents to go' is one of the most popular blackberry office app, which goes to show that office apps other than Microsoft's office are just as good for docs .And the same goes for outlook, android has excellent free alternatives like k9 mail. So comes the question "would you buy a windows phone just for office and outlook mobile" ? I did mention in my previous post that Lumia 920 in that price range is very tempting ... And hardware definitely beats android phones for that price ... but for a buyer there is a major practical consideration where windows phone 8 is found lacking badly and that is the number of apps . For android you can find an app for just about anything and there is a good probability that its for free. Just visit any site and you will see that they would have apps for iOS, Android and Blackberry but very rarely for other platforms. And lack of apps will heavily limit your usage of Lumia's exceptional hardware. They would have had a decent number of apps if it were backward compatible with WP7, but because it isn't WP8 has to start from scratch. The 'chicken and egg' problem you mentioned will determine WP8's future. Many articles I read have mentioned that MS has been struggling to attract enough third party developers to their platform. Heres a quote from Endgadget
In 2012, an OS is only as strong as its ecosystem, and regardless of Microsoft's best efforts to sell the platform to big-name developers (and even amassing over 100,000 apps to date), it's been an ongoing struggle for Windows Phone to appear relevant enough to attract popular titles.- courtesy this article
Click to expand...
And with a new OS being launched by Samsung and Intel MS definitely will have a hard time getting developers on to their new platform. I am not saying Lumia 920 will fail . There is a good chance of it being very successful and competing with android. But I would say now is not the best time to go in for a wp8 phone. If it fails to attract enough app developers in a short time it will go the way of WP7, a phone with great potential that failed. I am making this post from a windows 8 laptop. If WP8 is even moderately successful I ll definitely get one. But for now I'll just wait and advise the same for any prospective buyers.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
i hav used s2 for about more than 1 yr and yes m absolutely satisfied by each & every feature offered by that phone...

  • Good Camera
  • Best Screen
  • Slim & Attractive deign


But wid some problem..

  • Bad battery life...(If u r living on earth u can charge it any time):yahoo:
  • Note 2 has got far better screen i mean its best screen till(Out of budget):annoyed:
  • Device got a heating problem(After abt 15-20 mins of gaming)

If u neglect these probs or having any alternatives for these probs Juz Go For It...:clapping:
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Back
Top