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HTC's U11 was one of the better Android handsets launched earlier this year. While it wasn't flawless, it deliver excellent performance, clean and mean software and a camera that can rightfully compete with top-tier offerings from Samsung and Apple. For the 2nd half, HTC is launching an upgraded version of the U11, called the U11+, which keeps the high points of the U11 while also improving on its flaws. Source: https://www.androidcentral.com/htc-u11-plus The U11+ features upgrades over the U11, including a new 18:9 2880x1440 Super LCD display, a larger 3930mAh battery, and IP68 certifications, plus a new translucent finish which showcases the phone's interior. The U11+ runs Android Oreo with a slight twinge of HTC Sense that's mostly out of the way, delivering a near-stock experience. Edge Sense has also gotten some upgrades. Source: https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/2/16589218/htc-u11-plus-announced-specs-release-date-price-android-oreo The U11+ has no official US launch date yet but the phone will have a 4GB/64GB flavor and a 6GB/128GB flavor. The latter is coming to the UK November 20th for £699 with a European price of €799.

I'm a big guy with big hands. My thumbs can reach all 4 corners of my Nexus 6 without shifting. But sometimes I feel like I should give regular sized phones a try. Any recommendations?

Source: Forbes How many times is this Microsoft? First it was the Courier tablet then the Surface Mini both of which got axed and never saw the daylight and now Microsoft’s last stand on the smartphone market. But let’s not forget that Microsoft also killed Windows 10 Mobile development and all existing W10M phones are on extended support until 2019. Personally I would like to have a third player in the smartphone market other than iOS and Android. Unfortunately when companies like Microsoft (Windows Mobile 6.5) and RIM (BB10OS based on QNX) slacked off and just shrugged at the small competition namely iPhone 3G (because the first iPhone wasn’t even a real smartphone at launch) and T-Mobile G1 (world’s first Android phone) go big. I’m glad that Microsoft came into realization and decide to put the project back to the shelf because it’ll be a waste of money to develop and sell a device only a dozen people would want and it end up in a fire sale.

Remember back in CES 2014 when Asus announced and hybrid that could boot in both Android Jelly bean and Windows 8.1? The concept was great and idea of being able to use the tablet as an Android device and do more when plugged to it's keyboard with a real desktop OS was fascinating. That was the Transformer Duet, a device that never again saw the light of the day after that CES and the project was cancelled due to the opposition imposed by both Microsoft and Google. Enters Akyumen, a Chinese OEM that as decided to unveil the Holofone, a phone capable of dual booting between Android Lollipop and Windows 10. Yes Windows 10, not the handicapped mobile version that is ruining the lives of tens of thousands. Under the hood the phone sports a 7" 1080p display (hence the quotation marks on the thread title), a Intel Cherry Trail 8300 Quad Core SoC (or CPU?), 4GB of RAM, 5MP front-facing camera, 13MP at the back, 2910mAh battery, 128GB of storage, but wait there's more! built in, the device also has a projector capable of of projecting a 100" HD screen! O M G If you thought that crazy would stop there, then buckle up my friends cause i have yet to report the price: 750$. Ok, jokes aside the phone will be start at 750$ for a basic bundle all the way up to 950$ for the advanced bundle Now comes the bad news, or the moment where we should all raise our eyebrows in doubt before tossing our credit cards, Benjamins and coins at our monitors: the phone is available only for pre order, with a first batch shipping the first of September that as already sold out and the second batch set for November 5th. If this device really ends up in peoples hand at September, this may end up being the most exciting out of all 2016 to me. Wow, can't believe that it took a Chinese company to do what MS should have done ages ago. This makes me really happy to live in a period where such devices can become available. Now hopefully this company delivers, hopefully MS and Google won't attempt to block this too and hopefully the device will be good and will present great performance source: http://www.technobuffalo.com/2016/07/29/akyumen-holofone-android-windows-10/

Amazon: http://geni.us/nRK NCIX: http://bit.ly/1RjzivM Linus has always labeled devices as large as the Note 5 as stupid and not-well-suited for humans... But did the Note 5 change his mind?

So here's another piece of Windows Mobile news from me! Some photos and specs have been leaked just before HP's reveal of their Elite X3 Phablet on the upcoming MWC 2016. In my last news thread I introduced the Lumia 650 and some of the folks said how the specs weren't really impressive so I really want to hear your opinions on this one! So the specifications should be something like this: 5.96-inch QuadHD display Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 Quad-Core SoC 4 GB RAM 32GB storage, microSD expansion up to 200 GB 16-megapixel camera on the back 8-megapixel front camera Windows 10 Mobile And a bunch of other features described in the article under sources. The device looks good to me and certainly doesn't disappoint with the specs or looks. I hope it's going to satisfy some users in the Windows Mobile market and bring new ones in! Sources: WM Power User

My ~3 year old Galaxy s4 has come to a disappointing end, not with a bang, but a whimper. I think the battery contacts have gone off somehow so its practically inoperable since its unreliable whether or not it will remain on. Anyway, I know that i want my next phone to be phablet, but I also want to carry over my 13.5 GB of music that is on my micro sd card to my new phone. The Galaxy Note 5 looks very enticing to me, especially with how sexy it would look with the mahogany dbrand skin, but I want there to be some way to use a micro SD card with that phone. Surely there's a case that plugs into the phone that one could put an SD card into? If not, I would appreciate some recommendations as to which phone i should get for the best phablet experience that has an sd card slot.

Written review on Pocketnow (video review is also in there) As much as Micheal Fisher, my favorite mobile tech reviewer, loves this device, it's a no-go for me. The fact that there's no expandable storage & no 128GB variant makes me want to stay away from this device. With the way I use my phone (taking lots of pictures, offline videos, lots of apps and games, etc.), I'd be out of storage in no time. At least the Galaxy S6 edge and Galaxy S6 have the 128GB variant, which I might choose if I decide to go with a Galaxy smartphone (the Galaxy S6 edge is the only Galaxy smartphone I'm thinking of choosing). The only 2 phablets I ever liked are the Galaxy Note 3 & Note 4. They somehow caught my eye and impressed me. I hope Samsung will add expandable storage in the Galaxy Note 6. If Sony, who's also using glass and aluminum body for their flagship smartphone, can add expandable storage on their devices, why can't they? P.S. my only choice this year is the LG G4, unless Microsoft and other OEMs make high-end Windows Phones and release it in Canada.

Looks like the much anticipated successor to the heaping piles of 'meh' known as the Gear smartwatches has been delayed to launch alongside the Note 5. Fancy moving bezel control akin your favourite James Bond watch? Check. Cellular radios to make calls off the watch itself? Check. Compatibility with other Android devices? Hah, almost had you going there didn't I? Rumour is, and with good precedent, that the Gear A (Orbis as its currently known) will be a Samsung device only affair. Why? I guess every Android Wear/Tizen/every custom OS hates having universal appeal and usability. Its what stayed my hand for a long time, as neat as some watches were they weren't worth the hassles of having to swap over ecosystems just to own them; no watch on the market really is worth it. Hopefully this thing runs Android Wear so everyone can enjoy it regardless of what Android device they have and hopefully Google takes a serious step in bringing Wear compatibility to more platforms. http://www.sammobile.com/2015/05/07/samsungs-round-smartwatch-delayed-will-launch-alongside-the-galaxy-note-5/

Oh boy, here comes HTC with more variations on what should have been their flagship phone to begin with. As we can see, it has a Quad HD display as well as 3GB of RAM and a 20mp camera. The E9 gets cut down specs. I'm trying to understand why they NEED to make such country specific devices instead of just minimizing how many variations they need off the bat, but oh well. I'm not running their product lines so I can't explain their reasoning. But here they both are. Enjoy? http://www.engadget.com/2015/03/29/htc-one-e9-plus-official-china/

The Galaxy Note 3 is the phone that arguably kickstarted the interest in larger phones, or phablets, with its fairly large 5.7 inch 1080x1920 display. But is it a good phone? Let's find out... Display The display is really nice, it is truly large enough to be able to enjoy watching a movie, reading a book or anything else you seek to do on a smartphone. It doesn't bode well against screen glare though - even on a higher brightness the screen is practically useless when there's a lot of sunlight. The display is suitably sensitive as well and has great viewing angles, ultimately, I would give it a 7/10. Software Here is my biggest gripe with the phone and what made me fall out of love with Android as a whole, Android manufacturers are including crap software and bloatware on their phones which are often impossible to remove without rooting and even then, removing the software and bloatware can sometimes cause serious problems. TouchWiz is ugly, clunky, resource-heavy and crash-happy to the point where I wonder why Samsung even included it in the first place. We also have to suffer the horrors of Knox; some sort of software security tool which will void your warranty if you attempt to root your phone meaning that you, as an Android user, are being limited which is ironic because the point of Android is being able to be free to do as you please. The sad part is that a lot of the bloatware that Samsung includes solely exists just to act as a tech demo for the phone which in practice seems stupid to me. The "tech demo app" for the Galaxy Note 3 is the note taking app, or, S Note - an app that works wonderfully with the included stylus but could just as easily be replaced by any other note taking app. I also feel disgruntled at the fact that this software is basically Samsung's excuse to bulk out the Galaxy Note 3 by including a stylus and a holster for said stylus. Why not make another version of the Note 3 which is slimmer or has a bigger battery so that we don't have to be stuck with a stylus that you'll only ever use a handful of times before getting bored with it? I do like, however, the multi-window tool which allows for multiple apps to be used at the same time, so you can watch a video on YouTube while playing a game such as 2048, but when multi-window isn't in use, it is truly an obstacle. You can accidentally press it and you'll have the little white menu appear or you could try and watch a movie and the arrow on wherever on the screen you moved it will block some of your view. But, it is actually practical, so I will let it off. I can really dig the eye scrolling tool, but sometimes it just doesn't work and you end up actually having to tilt your head to scroll instead of just moving your eyes. You also can't scroll to the side with your eyes, or rather, head which is disappointing because longer e-mails would sometimes require you to need to do that. Oh, and ignore the stock Samsung web browser because even though that supports eye scrolling, it's slow and it sucks. 4/10 Aesthetics, or look and feel Samsung made a phone which definitely looks better than a lot of their previous models with a silver border and a really thin bezel, the front of the phone has an LED for notifications which can sometimes be annoying when you're trying to watch a movie or show and you also have a half-decent camera at the front. The front speaker which is only used for calls does stick out, but it doesn't look awful, so I won't complain. What does look awful, however, is the flimsy faux-leather back. It comes off really easily and is too bendy for my liking because it just perpetuates the cheap image that Samsung are criticised for. The side of the phone is all-plastic with some chrome looking paint which does eventually wear off which is a shame because from a distance it can look really good. The various buttons on the phone are non-obstructive and it is clear which button is which due to their clearly different sizes and of course, there's the now-iconic home button and the non-physical 'back' and 'menu' buttons which really do come in handy and light up when pressed. That's cool. What isn't cool is that Samsung tries to tell everyone that their phones are sexy and trendy now before giving us this quite frankly awful looking charger port which requires a really wide connector to supply power to it. I can appreciate that charging can be done in no time at all thanks to the larger charger and wall socket, but if you plug the phone into anything else but the wall, as far as I've seen, the Galaxy Note 3 actually charges slower which is a shame because that means you can't transfer files to your PC or laptop while charging it fast enough to get out of the door when you need to. I also feel as if I should point out that the phone is not really scratch resistant and it picked up a few scratches from small drops which are very, very noticeable. 6/10 Hardware The Galaxy Note 3 is powerful. It has a meaty 2.3 ghz quad-core processor and an Andreno 330 GPU which allow for some solid mobile gaming so you can be certain that your favourite waiting simulators such as Clash of Clans and Boom Beach can run very smoothly. There are three variants of the phone, the 16GB, 32GB and 64GB models, all of which support expandable storage which quite frankly is fantastic and in my opinion, that's what the iPhone sorely lacks. Again, I refer to the colourful display which has great viewing angles and whatnot but is still defeated by screen glare. I also have to point out that the phone gets very hot under load sometimes which makes me question how cool this phone actually is. The cameras are underwhelming. There is no support for decent slow motion, the highest framerate you can achieve is 120 FPS at 720p - not exactly the best. The 4K footage you can shoot looks alright but again, not great. The camera app has a lot of features which take full advantage of both the phone's camera's fantastic sensors but is let down by a general lack of functionality in some places. Also, the focus is a load of garbage on the phone. If you like taking photos or play the selfie game then I would not recommend using this phone's camera. 7/10 Is the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 a disastrous phone? No. If you can get it for a cheap price then I would actually encourage you to buy it. But this phone is betrayed by poor hardware optimisation, middling software and DRM, a wimpy camera and other issues with the overall look of the phone. The design on the phone in some places is well and beyond flimsy which is a shame because Samsung also tried to make their phones look premium so that consumers wouldn't look the other way towards Apple, but in doing so, the phone looks worse by sticking to a plastic and faux-leather construct. This phone scores a total of 24/40, or, a 6/10.

Note 4 and Note 5 are cool and sleek updates but I don't see any reason to upgrade from my Note 3. This phone is the longest one in my possession so far. Anyone in the same boat as me?

NCIX: http://bit.ly/17clXDU Amazon: http://geni.us/3iPM The Nexus 6 feels like a pretty solid device, but Linus' conclusion about it may surprise you...

is any Linus video on "phone vs tablet vs phablet" ?

This is my first review, so bear with me. A few days ago, I went to my local mall, which has an Apple Store, a Microsoft store (actually, a kiosk with a Surface Pro 3, a Yoga 2 and a Lumia 1520, but it's not labeled as a kiosk) and a T-Mobile store, among other things I didn't care about on that day. I wanted to visit the Apple store to see the 5K iMac, to test out OS X Yosemite, and confirm that I wanted to run away from iOS as fast as I possibly could. Let me just get something straight: I hate Apple, specifically iOS, but I like to keep an open mind to new tech. I don't hate Macs as much, but you know something's wrong when the $5,000 model of the Mac Pro took a while to render a few 3D buildings in Apple Maps. So, lets jump in, shall we? Retina 5K iMac After waiting a few minutes for a scrawny college kid to stop making googly eyes at it, I walked up to the iMac and started messing around. Being the nerd I am, the first thing I did was check the specs. I was using the base $2,499 i5 model with 8GB of DDR3 1866MHz RAM. I closed the window and— got a spinning rainbow. If you're unfamiliar with Macs, this means lag. I opened System Information again and closed it and had the same lag. I counted 4 seconds (later, I compared this to all the other different Macs, none of which had this issue) before my pie chart-esque friend left me. My dad's 2008 black MacBook can close that window faster. Anyway, I browsed the web, pulled up some high-definition images, and took a selfie or two. It preformed fine. As for the screen, it was better than the regular iMac, but not $899 better (over the 2.5K iMac with the same configuration and nVidia graphics). Of course, being just an amateur photographer and really only using a PC for basic functions, I'm not the target consumer. For someone like me, the regular iMac is fine. OS X This section will be short, as I didn't play around with it much. For the new look, it's fine. The icon shapes are inconsistent, the level of opacity is sometimes distracting and the overall OS looks MUCH better on a Retina display than on a lower resolution display. But hopefully this new minimalistic, flat look will FINALLY kill that hideous skeumorphism of old. iPad Air 2 I was really unimpressed by the iPad Air 2. But first, lets talk about what I did like. It was CRAZY thin (although the Dell Venue 8 7000 has it beat) and light, (Nexus 9 has it beat there, albeit not by much and at a smaller, but more pleasant size) and I still think that the 4:3 aspect ratio is the best for tablets; your TV is for video and movies. It was very fast, but that gets into what I don't like: it only feels like a faster, lighter, thinner version of the iPad 3 I already have, and that doesn't scream "I'm revolutionary, spend another $500+ on me!" As for iOS 8, it's basically iOS 7 with a few UI tweaks, custom keyboards (which still take about 3 seconds to load and are really buggy) and web extensions, so pretty much a prettier, slightly faster Android 4.0. iOS 7 was like iOS 6 with a new UI, which was in turn just iOS 5 with passbook, which was in turn… well, you get my point. iOS is severely lacking in the innovation department. iPhone 6 Plus First thought? WOW, is this slippery! I wouldn't feel good about using this without a case, which kills me as I hate cases. It's also pretty thin and light, but with MASSIVE bezels. Seriously, the Galaxy Note 4 is noticeably smaller than the iPhone, and the Nexus 6 is only a hair taller (though considerably wider). Overall it just feels like a bigger, thinner, lighter and faster iPhone 4 with iOS 8. Again, nothing that screams "Spend $749 on me!" Nexus 6 After we went to the Apple store, I decided to step into the T-Mobile store, which, in hindsight, was odd, as my provider is AT&T, who had a store literally directly above T-Mobile. But whatever, when I walked in I was very surprised to see the Android of my eye, the Nexus 6, on display (Right past the seemingly obligatory 2 iPhone 6s and 2 iPhone 6 Plusses). I played around with it, and my first thought was that it wasn't nearly as big as I thought it was. I could totally see myself using it. T-Mobile's device holder had it in a death grip, so I couldn't hold it, but the exposed part of the frame and back felt pleasant to the touch and not in any way cheap. Lollipop is amazing, and is VERY fast with no lag at all. Maybe it's just because I'm used to a slower-than-molasses-flowing-uphill iPhone 4, but it seemed like everything flew across the screen. This phone DID scream "BUY ME, I'M ONLY $649!" (I actually forgot to play with the device I went into the store to test out, the Note Edge, because I was too busy enjoying the Nexus 6 and Lollipop. They had it though, I checked before leaving. No way I'm paying $900+ on a Samsung phone, or any phone) Conclusion/TL;DR I'm done with Apple. They've turned into a more evolutionary company instead of revolutionary, and that kind of company doesn't deserve my money. I will be picking up a 64GB Nexus 6 to replace my iPhone and iPad (the portability factor of the latter, the productivity factor will be replaced by a desktop) when it comes back in stock/I can afford it. I will also be building my own PC as planned, running Windows 8.1. Do you agree with my conclusion? Do you like my review? Thanks for your time!

So i have decided to get a new phone, specifically a phablet. I am currently using a moto g (1st gen) and am really starting to dislike the small 4.5" screen. After using a friends Galaxy note 3 i absolutely loved the large screen and have hence decided to get something a little bit bigger. I will need to buy my phone unlocked and off contract as I currently h=hav a phone plan (sim only though). My budget is around $400 AUD. The two phones I have been looking at the HTC One Max ($450) and the sony Xperia Z ultra ($400). I am leaning towards the One because of the front facing speakers and aluminium constriction, and I think the 6.4" Z ultra might be bit to big for me. So can anyone help me choose, or suggest alternative devices?

So reviews are out for the Nexus 6 and since it now has a price tag of 650 dollars I was expecting high tier specs and features. Main points that I've gathered. Battery life is not good. In some scenarios the battery life might even be worse than the Nexus 5 (in most it is slightly better though). Performance is just what you'd expect from the Snapdragon 805. No surprises there. The camera doesn't seem to be anything special although I haven't seen proper comparisons against for example the Note 4. It's the same sensor as in the OnePlus One which is not bad, but due to software limitations the Nexus 6 can't shoot in anything higher than 30 FPS, the H.264 profile used is not that high quality, the OIS seems rather poor and the sound is mono. It does 4K though so there is that. The display is bad (terrible maximum brightness, the display is horrendously oversaturated even compared to older SAMOLED phones). It's also pentile so if you take that into consideration when counting the PPI, it's actually lower than the Nexus 5's PPI. Less accurate colors, lower PPI, far worse brightness (and thus outdoor visibility). Bottom line: The Note 4 is superior to the Nexus 6 in every single way except TouchJizz. Good job fucking up your entire line of Nexus phones Google... It takes a lot of work to make something as good as the Nexus line as bad as it is right now. What the hell were they thinking? Sources: Anandtech GSMArena

Source:http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/128050-motorola-tipped-to-launch-6-3-inch-phablet-in-q3-2014

Is Steve Jobs turning in his grave? Seems like apple are abandoning their very set style of design and going to be throwing stuff at us to see what sticks Source: http://www.siliconrepublic.com/digital-life/item/34079-apple-believed-to-be-workin

I personally don't think 1080p screens, or quad-core processors for that matter, on smartphones are really that useful. However, having the extra column of tiles would be pretty handy. I've embedded the "leaked" picture of the Lumia 1520 (right) beside the Lumia 1020 (left) below. Source: http://www.wpcentral.com/nokia-lumia-1520-phablet-revealed-first-photo

with the announcement of the LG G2 recently, what are people's opinion of the device?? It's rumoured that the Nexus 5 will be based off it, so do the specs/design interest you?? the volume/power buttons on the back of the device is certainly a new twist, and also that bezel is soo thin thoughts????

Pricing: NCIX: http://bit.ly/1eNNP15 Amazon: http://georiot.co/44Dv My review of the HTC One Max comes from the perspective of someone who has never actually used a phablet before. It was definitely a little different! It grew on me. I really appreciated the screen size and improved battery life, but I'm still using the One as my daily driver.

LG has shown its new phablet, the G-Pro, which is rumored to have a 5.9-inch IPS display, the largest yet from a major phone manufacturer (yes, that does not include Dell ) It's supposed to come with its small-bezel, rear-button design, and inside it will be a Snapdragon 800, 3GB of DDR3 RAM, and Android 4.4 KitKat. Source and more information: http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/02/lgs-g-pro-2-pushes-phablets-to-5-9-inches-shoots-4k-video/ Also, is it just me, or do the words "too big" ever actually go together in a sentence?

Intro I think I've had enough time with this to give some reasonable thoughts on its pros, cons and general usability for the average consumer. At least I think I have. And given what I'm reviewing, if some of you wish to keep the flaming to a minimum that would be much appreciated, as this kinda isn't the thread where its needed. But beyond that, I hope this is useful for some of you. Usage It is a 5.5" phone that flies against everything Apple has ever said they would do. Mainly cause the market is awesome and people really wanted larger and larger phones, and while I still think that 5.5" is ludicrous for a phone I have gotten very used to how it feels and how it works in daily use. IMHO the design is spot on and it works, I wish it didn't have the blasted camera bulge and I wish aluminum wasn't so slippery, but so far I've used it with and without a case and all things considered I still feel fairly confident in my abilities to hold onto it in daily use. I will say that its too big for one handed use on any level at all, its absurd honestly. The "reachability" they added feels tacked on and not very well implemented, to the point where I rarely use it if I am having one handed difficult. Maybe a future iOS will properly integrate large form factor use for phones, but iOS 8.1 is still going to be hit or miss depending on how big your hands are and how use to big phones you are. Display The display, in a word, is AWESOME. 1080p is great on this form factor. 1440p? Ehh...We're really at the rate of diminishing returns with phones this size and panels like this. I'd rather see a larger emphasis placed on panels that draw less power and are packing better static contrast ratios, but the iPhone 6+ panel is pretty damn awesome with what colour accuracy and contrast it has. This is one of the best panels I've seen on a phone, and upgrading from a 4.5", 720p panel equipped phone to this was a major difference in clarity and usability. Design Its a thin slab of aluminium that weighs almost nothing in your hand since its spread out over a large area. Does it bend? Well, I'm 6 1 and 260 pounds. I've used it in pockets with and without a case. Its as flat as the day I took it out of the box, so if there really is a #Bendghazi issue with these phones, I'm not getting it. Nor am I going all Flexmaster and genuinely trying to fold the thing like a house of cards. I went Space Grey after considering Gold, since IMHO its the best looking this time around. I miss the darker tones of the iPhone 5's black, but such is life that they dropped it. Like I said before, its slippery as hell and offers no real texture to get a grip on, but it hasn't been too detrimental to my use yet. The curved screen I am indifferent towards. My Lumia had one as well and it never really impacted things apart from making it difficult to find a screen protector that actually covered the entire portion of the screen both flat and curved. Camera The camera. Apart from the phone being so thin it needs a bulge, this camera is awesome. Specs? 8MP. f/2.2. Nothing glamorous and to be perfectly honest, they don't need to be. The OIS works well, the slow motion is amusing to implement and have fun with, all in all this is a very competent camera that works well in almost every situation, and even handles evening use like a champ. The interface is serviceable, but the swiping to get at different functions is getting cumbersome because there simply are so many options now. The manual controls are basic and nothing special, but since Apple opened up the APIs you can get apps that can adjust everything except the aperture, and to be frank on a phone with this small a sensor and these optics, I would prefer to keep it wide open anyways, but thats just a personal preference. Here are some sample videos and photos, all from the camera: iOS It is iOS. Either you like it or you don't, nothing has really changed when it comes to this. A few cool additions are the entire suite of Health apps which allow you to track whatever you wish. Steps, sleep, sodium intake, heart rate; pretty much anything and everything health related can be fed into the APIs which gives you a centralized way to view these things. I personally like how it integrates with MyFitness Pal and Jawbone UP to keep track of my sleep AND my nutritional intake so I can actually see how I'm doing without needing to go see a doctor just to see if things are in check or if I'm too high or too low, allows me to self monitor which is great. The multitasking method is now the lovely cards that PalmOS had, something I really like, and its relatively easy to use if not cumbersome as hell if you have multiple apps. And honestly, with the way iOS handles resource management, you can have whatever you want open and not worry too much about slowing the system down. The 1GB of RAM...whatever. If it was going to be an issue, I'd have come across it by now, and I haven't. Apart from 2 restarts when I had to update my network settings, this phone has been rock solid and has yet to crash for any obscure reason. Battery Life Ignore the plugged in since last charge, it was in for all of a minute so I could pull off a few shots for this review, because otherwise that usage is 100% bang on and accurate to what I've been getting so far. Most days I come home around 9pm with 40% left on battery, and if I am on a "light" day I can end the day with 70% left, which is enough to last me the rest of the next day as well. ITs so good at charging too since it can soak up the iPad chargers ability to pump out more juice, so if I get up at 5 in the morning with 10% left, I can plug it in, go gym, be back 2 hours later and most of the time its above 90% charge. This is something that ALL phones need. I have a few tablet chargers that put out more power, let me use them on my phone for speedy charging when I need it. Conclusion This is a decent if not great phone. It has issues, what phone doesn't. The whole "iOS being locked down" means nothing for 99% of normal users, maybe it means something to us, but to be honest I wasn't that disgruntled over not being given the same level of abuse that Android can be had with. I went from Android to Blackberry to Windows Phone and now am on iOS. My honest opinion? Use whatever the hell you think is right for you. See what fits your needs and your budget and offers the best features for what you care about. I bought this phone off contract and still saved 500 over 2 years because my monthly plan is so cheap. But thats me. I didn't have to spend what I did on a iPhone 6+, but c'est la vie. I'm happy with what I have, because it fits my needs and even my workflow WRT to work and play. I like it. I think its cool. Its one of the few phones (Nokia N95, BB 9000, Nexus One) that I really, really enjoy using and having with me. I do think the 5.5" screen size might be a turn off, so I'd honestly suggest you try these in store, borrow a friends, get a feel for the larger screen sizes. You might find that you despise something this big, you might find that the tradeoffs are worth it. For me, the larger battery + OIS was worth it, and I've yet to regret it. P.S. Some of the images look blurry because I ended up using thumbnails and not the proper files, I'll go fix that in a bit