Smartphone thingy

Contract up with orange at the end of the month, need a phone that does this:-

1. tons of storage for tunes, either work with a docking station or bluetooth to one?
2. Good camera, still and video
3. tough
4. good screen
5. Needs too last for 2 years – ie not out date technology wise
6. sproggproof [tm]

iphone ruled out as with business contract I can get 24hr replacement on any other phone, so it would be stupid to have to shell out idosh when i do eventually kill it.

Any advice would be great as I have no idea about these things, apart from like the look of iphones screen etc, but not the price premium.

5. Needs too last for 2 years – ie not out date technology wise

Good luck.
I’ve just taken a Galaxy S2 on a two year contract and am aware that if I want to keep up with technology I’ll probably have to buy a sim free handset in 12 months time.

there’s a motorola defy 2 out I think

I doubt it’s all that advanced but supposedly sprog-resistant

My Defy has taken plenty of hammer for a year and a bit. Defy+ or new Razr would be worth a look(less dust/waterproof), but the big problem is they come with an older version of Android and Motorola aren’t good at getting new versions out, there has to be a decent market for a durable smartphone.

I’ve been looking for similar requirements and the nexus looks like it has a bit more longevity than the s2. I preferred the feel of it messing round with both of them, and quite liked the new Android OS.

mmm maybe a samsung Note could be handy, halfway to a tablet….

In theory I think the idea of halfway to tablet is a good one, but do you really think you could live with it on a day to day basis as a phone? If you carry a bag everywhere, then fine, but with jeans an a t-shirt, I just don’t see it.
It has got an AWESOME screen though.

Had my galaxy s2 for 3 weeks now and love it. glad i didnt go for the iphone

Good luck.
I’ve just taken a Galaxy S2 on a two year contract and am aware that if I want to keep up with technology I’ll probably have to buy a sim free handset in 12 months time.

I think apps make such a big difference to this though really.

We have a lot of phones around at work, and if you look at the Galaxy S2, whilst it is a bit faster and a bit shinier than my 2 year old HTC Desire, I don’t really need one at all. It’d just run the same apps slightly better.

The technological improvements are very minimal really (better screens, faster processors), and it still runs the same apps.

Similarly, if you look at a 1.5 year old iPhone 4, it isn’t so much worse than the iPhone 4s that you’d be worried about upgrading yet. Even the 3GS does the most useful 90% of what the 4s does.

Sprogproof is the hard bit, the rest is easy – most of the newer Android phones, the iPhone, or even the new Nokias.

Don’t even think about transferring music by Bluetooth, USB is the way to go.

My Nexus One is heading towards 2 years old now, the main problem techwise is the camera – it was noticeably less capable than my brother’s iPhone 4S. Otherwise the technology hasn’t moved on that much. I certainly wouldn’t worry about your new phone being out of date in 2 years’ time.

Google own Motorola so the updates should be starting to improve.

As above, work out what you need and what you can get.

Galaxy W looks good at the moment for a normalish kind of size and price. Big battery vs screen size too.

Don’t even think about transferring music by Bluetooth, USB is the way to go.

Or wifi.

Go for a 4 over a 4s they are much cheaper now that’s the 4s is out, I upgraded to 4s wish I hadn’t of bothered hardly any difference.

For the record I’ve dropped both in numerous occasions they are pretty much bullet proof.

Otherwise the technology hasn’t moved on that much. I certainly wouldn’t worry about your new phone being out of date in 2 years’ time.

+1 Just because something newer’s come out doesn’t mean things that work perfectly well are redundant. Just buy one you like and use it till it breaks, then repeat.

I quite liked the look of the Sony Xactive or something like that. It is waterproof and runs android icecream sandwich.

Damn tricky – seen and played with a note today, for scribbling on images etc would be very useful in meetings (ponytailed, blackpolarneck shirt wearing design content) leather case or gel case would probably solve all other bits. Problem is it’s frigging HUGE, which is good and bad. Had thought about getting a tablet for meetings etc as well, but maybe this would do the job.

Would also be nice not to have an iphone, every frigging design ponce seems to have one.

Need to find a phone shop where they let you demo themm for a few days.

The tunes part I assume the OP was meaning play music with bluetooth?

I do this everyday, it’s great. Either to a pair of nokia BH-505s, an MD310 attatched to my stereo, or a jawbone jambox in the garage/kitched etc.

#5 is the hardest part. TBH iphone’s about the only place to go there, the pace of change of hardware is much slower. Mind, any phone you get so long as you’re happy with it now, you should still be happy. And if it’s cheaper than an iphone, well you can afford to upgrade earlier if it becomes an issue?

If anyone on the thread’s interested in an SGS2, I’m selling mine…see my post in the classifieds.

Damn tricky – seen and played with a note today

Got a Streak (5″ screen) at work, too big, and yet too small IMO. Need to either jump up to a tablet or be a bit smaller.

But it totally depends how you use it. If it spends most of the time in a breast pocket, manbag, or on a desk, then the size isn’t an issue? However if you regularly need to trouser it, that’s the difficulty.

I had an HTC Desire HD, it was a great phone until I washed it with my cycling gear.
I then bought a Defy +, as its waterproof, it runs Android 2.3.4, the Motoblur interface is not as nice as the HTC Sense, the camera is really poor, and depite being IP67, there is a large amount of dust under the gorilla glass, I keep meaning to speak to Motorola about this.
Whenever I use my wifes HTC Incredible S, the Motorola just feels 2nd rate.

Galaxy S2. Or wait six months for the goodies at CES to be released in the UK.

ok – samsung or htc it is. Bugger all to choose between them to be honest. Really trying to work out if Autocad WS will even be vaguely usable on a Samsung Note :S

Apps that I’m likely to use are:-

Autocad (even if just for viewing drawings and confirming dims)
Some form of remote desktop (to save files from PC to cloud)
Sketchup (if and when it’s available)
Photoshop

Seems like maybe I should go for a tablet and a phone – grrrr

Apple iPhone 4 – get the top of the range model.

my contract for my galaxy s is due for renewal at the end of the month, so i just ordered an S2 as an upgrade today. 24 month contract, but the handset’s costing me nowt and my monthly charges are actually gonna be 30% lower than i’m currently paying (for the same package basically too).

There seem to be deals to be had at the moment. Long gone are the days when I wrote to the managing director of my then provider to complain that my renewal deal was twice the cost of the new customer deal they were offering and got a personal letter back plus a phone call from a minion giving me the deal I wanted. Yes I am that old/bolshy.

Just renewed contract for a 25 percent cut in monthly cost, a much better range of services and a Desire S for free instead of the 100ukp they were quoting on the website. Whole call took 4 minutes.

I was in a similar positiona a few weeks ago. I didn’t want an iPhone (baaaaaaaa) and nearly bought the Galaxy S2. Right at the last minute (when I found how big it was) I switched to the Galaxy W.

This is my first Smartphone so I’m no afficianado but it does the phone bit well (a must for me) and everything just seems to work. The screen is excelent and battery life fine. I charge it everynight anyhow so haven’t had any problems in that area.

I like it cos it wasn’t mahoosive and/or heavy or bloody expensive and it seemed to do what they all do pretty well.

Went from Galaxy S to Galaxy S2, very impressed, it’s like the same phone but fractionally better in every way. Slightly better camera/screen, much better GPS, slightly lighter/slimmer.

The tech isn’t going to be eclipsed too badly though. Battery tech has barely moved in the past 5 years, the camera is limited by the lens and CCD size, which can’t change hugely due to phone size.

One thing the SGS2 needs is a better firmware from Samsung releasing, the current one munches battery stupidly fast when WIFI is turned on. My SGS1 (with DarkyRom on) could last 5 days of mild use without charging, the SGS2 needs WIFI leaving off to get even close to that.

The next leaps will be quad core processors and 4G, can’t say either will make much difference from my perspective.

I didn’t want an iPhone (baaaaaaaa) and nearly bought the Galaxy S2.

Love it. You didn’t want to be a sheep and get an iPhone, so you went for a Samsung Galaxy which everyone on this thread seems to have some variant of 😆

Marketing is a wonderful thing eh?

After playing with the S2, Nexus and 4s this week I have decided to go with a Giffgaff sim and rooting my Desire for a month or two to see how it goes. If everything works nicely then I will have everything I need from a smart phone for £10pm. Despite the new devices being nice to play with they didn’t really offer anything more than my Desire except the camera, if I am only paying a tenner a month for my phone I could afford a nice compact or something anyway.

I can’t believe anyone that had the original galaxy s actually upgraded to the S2, I’ll never have another Samsung phone after using that thing. I’m sure its much better and they wouldn’t make the same mistakes but there will still be the same headaches with updates to the OS.

6. sproggproof [tm]

We’ve just bought my wife a Sony Aperia Active after No.2 son (9 months) managed to wreck her previous, 2 month old phone. She’s trashed quite a few phones over the years by dropping them/etc…, so we’re hoping this ones last a bit longer…. Only had it a week, but looks fairly robust. It’s quite small though and doesn’t have a qwerty keyboard, so not as easy to write e-mails or texts. Will let you know how we get on….