phone Which phone should I pick?

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

Good evening

 

Since no one helped me over at Tom's Hardware, I'm gonna try my luck here.

A couple of weeks ago, my Lenovo A536 got stuck in boot loop and then got into recovery mode, which I haven't been able to leave, and my attempts to flash the OS only bricked it completely. I've been looking for a new phone since then. I don't want another low-end device, so I'll increase my budget. After many hours spent on comparing various devices, reading reviews and going through benchmarks, I was decided to buy the upcoming Xiaomi Redmi Note 5, which by their words should be available in my country by the next month. However, yesterday I've stumbled upon HTC U Ultra. According to what I've read, it's an unsuccessful flagship from the last year. It scored about 170K points in AnTuTu, 50K more than RN5 with its 120K. At about 8000 Czk (400$) in a reputable store, it is slightly more expensive than RN5, which when launched should be available from 6500 Czk (325$). I can't decide which one to buy. There are a couple of things I'm concerned about in case of the U Ultra. I have BT headphones, which support connection through 3,5mm connector in case I ran out of battery, so while I'm not happy about the connector's absence, I can get over it. What I'm more concerned about is the battery life. I don't expect the quad-core SD 821 to be very power efficient, so I don't know if the 3000 mAh battery will be sufficient, especially after some time. Another thing is OS updates. One of the things I like about Xiaomi is their support even for older devices. According to an article that I've read a few days ago, they're still updating phones up to 6 years old. On the other hand, almost every time I see a post by Huawei on Facebook, someone is complaining that once they release a new generation of smartphones, they almost immediately stop updating the previous one, and for example, the A536 I had before only received two small updates over the two and a half year I had it, so I don't know if I can trust HTC in this case. As for the rear camera, I found a few photos taken with both devices, and I think I like the pictures shot by RN5 a little bit more. I honestly don't care about the front one.

Which one do you think I should buy? 400$ is a little bit more than I first intended to pay, so if you think the U Ultra is not that much better for the extra money, I'd rather go for Redmi Note 5.

Thank you for all advice.

PS: Feel free to unleash the full power of your inner grammar nazis upon me. I'd like to improve my English, so if I made any serious mistakes, feel free to smash them over my head.  

[iNSUFFZ]

As far as I've heard HTC is laggy, most models that is, if you're willing to make that sacrifice for the sake of beautiful sound then go for that. Redmi n5 is fresh, you should probably give it a little time and read a bunch of reviews here and there before you buy it..if you're not in a rush just wait a bit..HTC U12 is scheduled to be released in May

PS: Your grammar is flawless, good job.

[Arcanekitten]

I wouldn't take a HTC phone. While not a inherently bad phone it doesn't do anything great. The Redmi Note 5 is a good phone and I definitely recommend it. Some other phones to consider.

 

-LG G6, greatly reduced in price since launch, has nice screen, Great DAC for audio and great camera's and a SD821. 7.0

-Moto X4 Is also a great phone but can't really comment on what specifically. Android 7.1

-Huawei P20 Lite Looks like a iphone X but then also the iphone X looks really nice. Features a fingerprint scanner and newest version of Android 8.0 with up to date specs.

 

Also little side note while looking for a phone. Phone's and benchmarks don't really matter these days. They used to but Qualcomm has come a long way and anything with a SD620+ or SD820+ will run smooth only will make a couple milliseconds difference at most.

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

I looked at those phones you suggested. While the LG G6's price has dropped a lot, it's still 450$ for the 32 GB version here. Besides, while the appearance of the device is not that important to me, the back of this phone is awful. I certainly won't buy the Moto X4. Not only it has worse specs than the Redmi Note 5, it also costs more, and even if the specs were better, I still wouldn't buy it. After my experience with Lenovo, I'll never buy another phone from them. I can't even remember how many times I had to restore the factory settings of my A536 because something stopped working. Every other owner of their phone I know has problems with their device as well, including my brother, who bought a top model from the Vibe series some two years ago. In my opinion, the P20 Lite at 420$ is overpriced, especially if you consider that the P Smart, a phone with nearly the same specs costs 170$ less. In case of P20 lite, you're just paying more for the iPhone X-like appearance, which I quite honestly don't like at all, iP X is one of the ugliest phones IMO. So the RN 5 is probably still my favorite. Any other suggestions?

[LogicWeasel]

Other than Xiaomi could look at the Honor 7x, or a mid-range Samsung like Galaxy A5.  Good value for the HW in the mid-range market and good battery and display pairing.  If you don't mind a new-old stock, or gently used unit, the Nexus 6P is a great combo of screen, battery, and function as well (and with Google, you get great battery and CPU optimization).

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

How should I compare the phones then, if not with benchmarks? As far as I know, all that AnTuTu does is stress testing all of the phone's components and then deduces final score based on results of all individual tests. This works in case of PC components, so why not phones?

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

6 hours ago, huilun02 said:

If we don't know where you are buying from to have a look at the options, all we can do is spam you with random recommendations and you will waste your time looking them up one by one to tell us why you won't be getting it.

 

That said the Redmi Note 5 is an excellent value buy if you are willing to wait. There is also the Note 5 Pro which sports a more powerful chipset, more RAM and dual rear cameras. Should arrive along with the non pro model. The extra $ may be worth it to you.

 

I'm not in or from Europe. I have never worked for a business that has anything to do with the mobile phone industry. I do not have a functional crystal ball. Advice offered with the best of intentions given my limited knowledge, insurance not included.

Right, I probably should have mentioned that I'm from the Czech Republic. Redmi Note 5 Pro will be sold as Redmi Note 5 here, while Redmi 5 Plus, which has already been available here for some time is the same device as the Redmi Note 5 for the Indian market because Xiaomi's logic... 

[Guest The Viking]

3 hours ago, huilun02 said:

Is there a nationwide enforced list of available phones and pricing that I can refer to? So I can look a your options.

standard european prices, but use their own currency

 

https://www.o2.cz/osobni/en/mobile-phones/

 

checked there and converted some prices, they mostly match the euro one.

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

 

Basically, all the phones that are regularly offered in my country and their prices can be found here: https://mobilni-telefony.heureka.cz/f:p:-8000/ . What this website does is it gives you information about a product, shows you the price range at which it can be bought and lets you read and write reviews, both about the product and about the shops that are selling it. My budget is 350$, so I've set the price range to less than 400$. The lowest price is often not accurate, as the shops that offer it for the least money are usually not trustworthy. 1$ is about 20Kč. I'm looking for the best price to performance ratio, brands are not particularly important for me, as long as the device works as it should and doesn't fall apart. 

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

14 hours ago, huilun02 said:

 As I said, I've spent quite some time going through the phones. I've seen the Nubia Z17 Lite too, but I've discarded it as a device inferior to the Redmi Note 5 because its AnTuTu score was significantly lower. Which again brings me to what I've asked on Thursday, why shouldn't I compare phones based on benchmarks? Does that not give me information about the phone's overall performance? It works in case of PC components, so why not here as well?

 

...what's wrong with the text? 

[dizmo]

Phone benchmarks are synthetic, much like synthetic benchmarks of CPUs; they give you a number, but it doesn't always translate into daily use performance. There are many many many other variables that come into play other than a simple number on how fast a CPU can run a task.

 

The U Ultra was one of the worst phones HTC has made in a while. I wouldn't get that.

That said, Europe has a ton of phones available that simply aren't offered in North America so I can't really make any recommendations.

If you can wait, the Axon 9 should be coming out soon. It was a beast last time it was released, so the new version should be better.

 

I too was put off with the text. Just use the default formatting. I also don't know why you'd choose to use a smaller font size.

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

8 hours ago, dizmo said:

 

 

ZTE phones are not commonly available here, In case of Axon 7 and many other models from the Blade series, there's only one shop offering them. Another thing is that the Axon 7 doesn't support the 800 MHz LTE band, which is the most important one here, and I don't think Axon 9 will support it either. Besides, I doubt it'll fit into my budget, Axon 7 still costs 475$, so I don't expect the upcoming Axon 9 to cost less than 700$. I'm a student without a permanent source of income. While I could afford a more expensive device, I'm sure you understand that I don't want to spend all my money on a phone.

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

Alright, I've borrowed a Huawei Y6 (2015) from my friend. It's almost as bad as that Leninovo I had before, but at least I don't have to use that old brick I had since it died. I just hope it doesn't take Xiaomi too long to finally release the RN5. 

[Guest The Viking]

15 minutes ago, Methanol Ethanolovicz said:

Alright, I've borrowed a Huawei Y6 (2015) from my friend. It's almost as bad as that Leninovo I had before, but at least I don't have to use that old brick I had since it died. I just hope it doesn't take Xiaomi too long to finally release the RN5. 

yeah the Y6 is a really old phone. At some point in 2014/2015 it was a bestseller in the sub-100 euros category, but that's where it remains, a sub-100 euros phone. For 50 euros extra you can get one of their "Lite" phones which are really good budget phones, such as P8 Lite 2017, P10 Lite or P Smart, all costing 180-230 euros. The Lite ones go on promo frequently for 160e though.

 

No, I'm not recommending anything, no. I'm just saying, yes, the 2015 Y6 is a trash phone, but for its price, you can't expect much 

[williamcll]

On 4/15/2018 at 8:49 PM, Methanol Ethanolovicz said:

ZTE phones are not commonly available here, In case of Axon 7 and many other models from the Blade series, there's only one shop offering them. Another thing is that the Axon 7 doesn't support the 800 MHz LTE band, which is the most important one here, and I don't think Axon 9 will support it either. Besides, I doubt it'll fit into my budget, Axon 7 still costs 475$, so I don't expect the upcoming Axon 9 to cost less than 700$. I'm a student without a permanent source of income. While I could afford a more expensive device, I'm sure you understand that I don't want to spend all my money on a phone.

Redmi Note 5 is out for ~110 euro for basic model (3GB RAM 32GB storage) ~140 euro medium model (4GB RAM 64GB storage) ~170 euro (6GB RAM 64GB storage)

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

1 hour ago, williamcll said:

 

I've already said that I'm from Europe. As far as I know, the device is currently only available in India. 

[lsstefan]

1 hour ago, Methanol Ethanolovicz said:

I've already said that I'm from Europe. As far as I know, the device is currently only available in India. 

https://www.honorbuy.com/218-xiaomi-redmi-note-5

 

I ordered my Mi5s from them last year. Fast shipping no issues. Prices are in $, which is much much lower than Euro and also it ships from EU, so no customs.

They have a promotion now for Mi Mix 2 with free shipping and I'm waiting for my carrier to offer me something good, or else I'm going for the Mi Mix, cause at 400$ it's a steal.

Btw, it's not worth to get the 6GB ram Note 5, I suggest the 4 GB.

Browse their website, they have a good price for Mi6 and Mi Note 3 also.

[lsstefan]

8 minutes ago, Pangea2017 said:

Xiaomi have different versions of one phone. With the Chinese version not having LTE band 20 it is useless in europe.

Hmm good point. My Mi5s(w/o B20) works in Romania, but after checking Wiki it seems Orange has B3 and B7 in Romania so maybe that's why.

Czech Republic has B3 and B7 on T-Mobile, so it might work, or wait for Global Version of course.

The Mi Mix 2 from their website has a plethora of LTE bands.

[Methanol Ethanolovicz]

So the Redmi Note 5 is finally available here, and I was amongst the first ones who bought it. The price dropped to 300$ from the original 350$ just before they started selling it, so that's good for me. I think that for its price it exceeds its category, the UI is swift, performance more than sufficient, photos shot by its camera are pretty good (at least in the daylight) and the build quality appears to be great. It would be perfect, if only it had a USB-C connector.

 

There's one last thing I'd like to know though. I'd like to keep the language set to English. However, this way Google only displays articles from foreign sources. I'd like to have articles from both Czech and foreign sources. Is there a way to do that?