Rants are welcome, even encouraged :)
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The last 4 phones I had were just a mess. I am starting to loose hope of there being something that would work well. I just recently got a new phone, it’s a mess as usual. Maybe what I am experiencing is enough for a warranty claim, maybe it’s just a quirk to be dealt with…
Every couple years every newer phone I try is just worse and worse. I thought that maybe once PinePhone and available software gets mature enough…, but at this point, maybe other phones will just get crap enough.
My last good phone was ironically an ultra-cheap Lark Cumulus 5HD. It was just 50 EUR new. No lags, no crashes, swappable battery, a just works experience. 50 bucks…
Chronologically…
Moto G5s Plus
Great hardware, except that focus on my camera was kind-of broken, but I was too lazy to get that repaired under warranty.
But SW, god damn Motorola. Slow buggy mess. Crashes, freezes, battery drain. BUT, I was able to fix it with ✨a custom ROM✨
Poco X3 Pro
If you had any MIUI device, you know. Alarm clock may get killed optimized, ton of bugs to learn working around, built-in ads and spyware. Lots of it, based on blocked DNS logs.
HW - cheap and powerful. Average lifespan of the motherboard being whopping… 9 months. The phone ate 3 of them.
Moto G54 5G Power
Once again, great HW, SW not so much. The 3 button navigation was completely broken in high DPI and what made me return it - non-skippable updates. Just full-screen permanent update notifications. Only option: update. Nope.
Ulefone Armor 24
Few SW issues: Long-pressing dock icons while an app is open crashes “Quickstep”, in turn killing navigation (both gesture and buttons…). Alarm clock gets killed most of the time even with all optimizations off.
HW, least I think I should classify it as such: The phone has a chance to negotiate (?) 12V for split-second intervals using QC 2.0 (based on my USB tester) which it doesn’t expect, and throws overvoltage error. This happens with all QC-compatible chargers I tried, even the original one when used with OTG adapter.
The original one otherwise uses USB-C with PD, which works, sure. But after using it data transfer to PC via cable is broken until reboot.
I was very much a full-time phone person, but now it’s too much. I got a cheap touchscreen ThinkPad and use it with KDE Plasma (wayland). I was doing basically everything on a phone before, now I instead try not to, but with everything being an app, damn.
I have an iPhone. It’s pretty recent, but definitely not the most recent. No, I don’t know exactly what model it is. It’s an utterly boring glass brick that lets me find out stuff and say stuff and take pictures. It set itself up from my last iPhone like a clone emerging from a vat, and someday it will be fated to transfer its lifeforce to its brother-self-son. Such is the way of the iPhone.
It’s… fine. I got a red one.
Samsung Galaxy A35
I had the Samsung Galaxy A54 and it had issues with constant wifi disconnect and can’t be fixed even with factory resets, so I had to get a new one. (According to reddit, wifi issues are so common with A54) A55 does not exist in the US, so A35 it is.
Reason I didn’t get an S-series is because of missing SD card slot. Yes I’m this petty. I might’ve gotten the S24 Ultra if it had sd card slot, but corporations likes to be douchy, okay you play stupid games 🤷♂️. A35 is powerful enough anyways, whatever, saves me money too. I’m enjoying my 1TB sd card (that cost like $100 extra on top of the phone) that would’ve costed like $1500 total for in the S-series phones.
The only reason I still want samsung is because I want use a Samsung Smarttag to track my cat, amongst other items I want to track. And I hate iOS, so Samsung trackers are the only viable alternative to Airtags.
There’s not much special, its just a phone. Not flagship, but also not a shitty budget. Its “okay”.
Pixel 8. No complaints.
Stock ROM?
yup
Fourth year with Samsung Z3 (the flip one) It is totally awesome, the only downside is that protective foil starts to come off every year or so right in the middle. Will upgrade to Z7 next year 100%
Samsung Galaxy A02s. This thing feels like it isn’t that old, but damn sure operates like it’s old. Thing lags like a slug to where I’ve had performance lag in keyboard interfaces to even recording audio clips on Discord. It’s battery life is shitting the bed, even at 100%, it is down to 94% immediately even when it’s not used.
Samsung Galaxy A32-5G. This is my primary and I like it, still does fine and was worthy to slap an Otterbox protection case on it. Does what I need it to do and is reliable, it’s roughly 3 years old.
I’ve been using Google brand phones since the g1. The Nexus 4 and the pixel 7 were the worst build qualities. The screen on the seven fell off three times and then finally died. I’ve switched to a Samsung.
Gigaset GS5 from Germany.
Overall it is a solid phone. Stock Android, Headphone jack, dual Sim, a micro SD card slot (not a dual Sim or SD card tray), and a replaceable battery.
My grips with it are all surrounding the charging circuitry. It doesn’t do fast charging and when charging while also using the headphone jack it will induce noise.
Small phones pleaseeeee!
Every time I buy a new phone I’m devastated to learn that I can’t get anything usable with one hand.
I need a 5.5 inch phone, anything bigger is hard to use, anything past 6 is impossible with one hand
Oh, you’d absolutely hate my phone: https://www.gsmarena.com/ulefone_armor_24-12602.php
Look at the dimensions, especially thickness and weight. Ironically though, it feels better in hand than a large thin slab. Thin phones are better smaller.
If you’ve seen that Energizer P28k thing, this is larger and heavier.
That’s some battery. How long do you get between charges?
I try to keep it around 20 - 80 %, that’s 2 - 3 days. Fully charged, (by the way, there is more capacity beyond “100%”), 4 possibly even 5 if going to like 5%.
But I use it heavily.
Also, that flashlight at the back can actually drain it quite fast. Hell, if you have like 30% it can’t keep it on full power steadily, it starts flickering a bit. It gets completely disabled <20%. Earlier if you use it in the camera app. Ideally, if you want to use it combined with the camera you’ll have > 50%.
You may be able to charge your laptop from it if it supports 5V charging. It can supply 10W. To get some idea, my ThinkPad L390 yoga is currently consuming 3.73W as I am typing this.
But as I wrote, good luck charging it, though my unit may be defective. I don’t have another one to compare to.
pixel 8 running graphene
pretty decent
fingerprint sensor is mid as hell, but cameras and screen are super nice
Just in case you know, is there a way to lock network bands in Graphene (couldn’t find an answer). It’s basically why I limited my selection to MediaTek this time around, but some custom ROMs might have that on different SoCs possibly.
I know it’s fashionable to hate Apple here, but switching from android to iPhone was the best decision Ive made. They just work. All of them. As a software guy, I spend my time making computers do stuff, so my phone needs to just work
Currently iPhone 15 Pro.
I replace every 2-4 years so I can give it to my kids another 2-4 years
- iPhone 13 Pro
- iPhone X
- iPhone 6+?
- iPhone 5?
Moto G Stylus 5g 2023. I’m satisfied with the hardware but Android has its own issues and it only gets 1 major version update, to Android 14, which it’s running now. Main new feature of the 2024 version is wireless charging.
Samsung Galaxy S9. have replaced the battery twice, got it at launch. skipped the s8, had s5 and s7 prior. it’s not rooted, user lawnchair launcher and love it. will drive it til it dies.
I’ve had three Google Pixels now and they’ve all developed problems with just freezing up or shutting down randomly. Won’t be getting one again. Also, the smaller versions keep getting bigger with every iteration. What’s the point? I want a small phone.
Currently on a Samsung note 8, and aside from wear and tear, I’m pretty happy with it. I’ve replaced the battery, the camera glass, the rear glass, it has a bit of burn in on the screen, and is beginning to have some issues with the power button registering double clicks instead of only one. Actually pretty easy to work on if you have messed with electronics before, mix of glue and screws to disassemble.
My next logical phone would be a Sony Xperia 1 mark vi, but that isn’t really available for the US (I’m on AT&T, and they have a white list), so I’m just staying with my Samsung for now as there aren’t really any flagships with headphone jacks, expandable storage, and decent repairability.
I’ve been a droid/moto fanboy since my first droid phone, but I have tiny hands and the newer models are just too big. It’s annoying as can be.
So this last cycle, I swapped to a S23. It’s a better size - could stand to be a bit smaller, but I can generally use it with one hand. But I just don’t like it. Samsung added a bunch of their own stuff on top of the android stuff, and it’s constantly asking for new permissions for different privacy policies and other things.
I’m also so upset that I lost gesture controls. And the fingerprint sensor is a laugh.
On the plus, the camera is really good and the battery life surprises me sometimes. It’s a fine phone, but I miss my motos. Still, I’ll keep it around for another few years and pray there’s something more compact that will come out. Or the razrs will get better.
