My very old donated phone, an original Samsung Galaxy S (Gti9000) is getting very very slow so I’ve been considering an upgrade, or at least a newer phone. At the moment I don’t use mobile internet, I spend about £40 a year on calls and texts on GiffGaff.

I was looking at a sim-free Galaxy S3 mini from Argos for £120, but discovered that I can pick up a much newer phone from Amazon for much less money. The Doogee dg310 is only £63 for instance.

So, does anyone have any experience of this kind of thing? Is it worth the risk? When Mrs NBT’s similarly aged Galaxy S gave up the ghost we replaced it with a ZTE Blade 3 from Argos and it’s been OK if obviously cheaper than the Galaxy, wondering if the Doogee or equivalent Cubot might be a step too far?

One thing that does crop up is that these phones run on 850/2100 GSM for 3G, will that make a difference if I do decide to take the plunge into the 21st century and go for a data plan?

Why bother with odd far-east brands with unproven backup when you can walk into Tesco or a dozen other places and buy a Moto E, or stepping more upmarket, Moto G. Both are up to date, just varying specs. Moto G is a very good phone at any price.

partly because the Moto G is more expensive than the S3 mini, doesn;t have a removeable battery and doesn;t accept an SD card – if you can find me a MotoG for £63 I’ll buy it. Cheapest I’ve seen is over twice the price. Did look at the Moto E but the reviews say the (fixed focus) camera is shit.

bump for the morning crowd…

Good thread, I need to get a cheap smart phone as cracked my old one.

I just watched a review on youtube and it gets a good review.
[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQ2k_t1lNyo[/video]

I’ll see if anyone recommends anything else or I’m buying a black one today.

Just buy a cheap Nokia non-smart phone?

Again I’ve considered that but I do use the wi-fi capbilities to synchronise contacts and use the calendar and so on. I suppose a lot of the calendar side will work without a smartphone e.g. free sms reminders from google and so on though.

If you do get one Dobbo, let us know how it goes. What’s your current phone?

I had a Nokia Windows phone (through work) which got smashed at Dalbeattie a few months ago which I wasn’t sad about as I hated it. I’ve got a basic Nokia 113 that’s as bad as you’d expect for anything apart from using as a phone, the good point is the battery lasts a long time, even texting is a total pain on it as the text goes large!

Just want a cheap Android smart phone now.