Important Things to Consider before Buying a New Mobile Phone! – Part 1

New Mobile Phone – Most of us have very short attention spans. That translates into our phone usage behavior as well. With the rapid development of the mobile space, we always want the best and change our phones quite often. With so many options on the Android side, many of us have this question “How do I choose a phone?”. While most of the users would go for the most popular smartphone, it doesn’t hurt if you take a well-researched decision when buying a new phone. There are many top 5 and top 10 articles on the web. What this article attempts to do is to empower you as a user to take that decision with the guidelines that we set out.

Hardware vs. Software – Which is more important?

Hardware is king!! – Not so much!

It is quite rare that we find that perfect mix of hardware and software in a smartphone which runs on Android. As we have discussed in numerous post before, the openness of Android is both its strong suit and also, it’s nemesis. For example, take the plethora of Chinese based company phones like Xiaomi or Meizu. The hardware is incredible, and it is quite unusual for the amount of tech that they put on the phone, and the prices that they charge makes the phones a bargain buy. Where these manufactures falter is the software side of things. Most of the phones fail to get any future updates, and the ever-important security patches are also not pushed through. Whenever someone asks me to recommend a phone, I would usually ask them to steer clear of the phone which doesn’t promise you software updates. One of the significant things to look out for is software updates for at least two years. The promise of updates will at least keep your phone safe and secure.

Software is king?? – Not so much either!

That being said software is not the only deciding factor. Good hardware is also essential. The lower end Motorola phones have proper and regular software updates, but that doesn’t mean you should get that phone. All major smartphone makers promise software updates and even going for a discounted previous year’s flagship might work out for you. Of all the major phone manufacturers Motorola and Nokia have committed to regular software updates at a faster rate than other makers. These manufacturers can push updates due to their simplistic approach towards Android. And of course, there’s Google with its Pixel line up and previously Nexus models. These serve as a hardware platform to showcase the software ability. So our recommendation is to always go for a Pixel phone no matter how costly it is. Nah! We’re just kidding. Whenever a phone is launched if the manufacturing company does not mention much about software updates it is better is stay away from that phone. In this connected world where privacy is necessary outdated software and security patches have no place in our lives.

Let’s buy an iPhone then!! – That’s an option but…

Perfect smartphones don’t exist, but something that comes a bit closer to it is the Apple iPhone. We can explain ourselves before you accuse us of being Apple fanboys or iSheep. Since both iOS and iPhone are developed by Apple themselves, there is a sort of uniformity on these devices. Apple also makes their own chipsets which blow the competition out of the water. This level of performance is pretty rare to find in a smartphone. This can be said about the Google Pixel line as well. While until last year Google relied on other manufacturers to make their phones, with the acquisition of HTC’s staff Google has made its intentions clear. They are going the Apple route. Another great example is the Microsoft Surface line. The latest iOS version is riddled with bugs. But hopefully, Apple can fix it.


Final Thoughts:

This article was supposed to cover all the important aspects of our view before you purchase a smartphone. But we realized it’s a much broader and a vast topic. So we decided to make it a series of posts which lay out some buying advice. We did mention that we wouldn’t recommend a phone on this list, but if we were to recommend a device, it would be from either Nokia or Motorola for a budget or a mid-range phone and a Google Pixel 2 or 2XL if you can afford it. No prizes for guessing there. Tell us your thoughts in the comments section down below.
Image Credithttps://www.yomiprof.com/2015/05/you-can-now-exchange-your-old-phone-for.html

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