Best Posts in Thread: Cheap Phones - Are they a good deal?

Cherry Mobile doesn't manufacture phones. They go to a manufacturer which creates a line-up of phones for companies such as Cherry Mobile to choose from. For example, the same phone being sold as Cherry Mobile in the Philippines could also be sold as X model by another cell phone vendor in India. Cherry Mobile just slaps their branding on the phone the order. How else are they are able to release so many different models being a small Philippines vendor?

These manufacturers are probably using much the same components and even the same factories to build some of these "cheap" phones as the more expensive phones are using.

One benefit you get from this is that the specs on these phones move quite fast as opposed to other vendors which do control their manufacturing and have a much slower release schedule.

To me, these things are just PC's in a different form factor. If we are talking about PC's, "cheap" isn't very descriptive. You really need to be talking about exact components. Is the processor cheap? Is that a problem? What is its capabilities? Why do you need a faster one?

As with PC's, a faster and more expensive PC isn't necessarily better for you. It depends on what you use it for. And if you have specific uses, then you need to be specific on what components you need to add to get the functionality you need.

For example, if you are running heavy video / graphics, then a good video card is more important than the main processor and RAM because the graphic processing can get moved to the video card which may have its own processor and RAM.

Sure, there are varying levels of quality even from the same component manufacturers. Server chips from Intel are generally a lot more expensive than desktop chips from Intel because servers go through a heavier load and need to be more reliable.

For most of us, we just need to find out where that bar of "good enough" is and aim for that. You'll probably find that you don't need to dish out over $300 for it. This is especially the case for someone who currently doesn't own a smart phone and won't be a power user.

In this particular case, free is a great option. But as a secondary option, the phones sold by the local vendors are pretty good.

 

I probably should have made this more clear, but (at least in my mind) I was referring to the featured phones. That means, you're probably talking around $175+ for a new release or maybe as low as $125+ for a featured phone which is about to be discontinued to make way for the next batch of releases.

The $50 phones with 512 MB of RAM are junk and are barely smart phones because you can't run much on them. They also have crap displays which break easily.

As for specific components, such as the processor, you get a wide field to choose from. You don't have to look at just Cherry Mobile. You could also look at MyPhone and the long list of other players in the space. Between all of them you'll probably find something which comes close to what you are looking for.

It's a game of bottlenecks. If you only have enough RAM to run your operating system then your system is going to fall down no matter what processor you have. Next you need to have enough RAM to run a typical list of applications. Once you have plenty of RAM to run a reasonable list of applications, then you start looking at the processor. As you have pointed out, there are a lot of phones on the shelf which don't have enough RAM to run a typical app load (and many don't have enough storage either). But each of these phones probably have a "good enough" processor for basic usage. To recap, on low end ($50) phones you don't have enough RAM and you don't have enough storage even for basic usage, but the processor is probably okay. If I'm buying a high end phone, I probably don't even have to look at RAM. On a low end phone, RAM is your bottleneck and the first spec to look at.

The hardware manufacturers are always releasing updated hardware. It would make sense that they work with the top brands, but there are so many now that these brands aren't the only customers. How often does Apple release a new batch of phones? Once a year? A couple times a year? The component manufacturers are still improving and building cheaper in between and the smaller brands can take advantage of this by continually releasing phones with different configurations and features. Cherry Mobile adds new phones like every month. That doesn't mean a new top of the line Cherry Mobile will be better than a year+ old Iphone, but this faster release schedule is their only other play other than being super cheap.

I'm not trying to compare $50 phones to $600 phones. I think the better comparison would be more like a top end Cherry Mobile to a budget release from a top brand. Maybe you find that you can get different specs (you want quirky features that Samsung is too good to add) and a bit cheaper than an alternative from bigger brands.

That said, I'm running on an old POS laptop, a mobile connection which is capped at 1GB / day of bandwidth (including up and down) and my $160 Cherry Mobile (I have had it for probably a year and a half). Some people would shoot themselves faced with these constraints. I have learned to get by on a budget.

 

I'm too lazy to locate attempts at materials lists, but that's the next stop for this sort of discussion. There are things we do know though.

The chips powering these phones are all going to come from the same manufacturers. There are only so many companies with the capability to make them. My phone is a Cherry Mobile which today costs maybe $100 new. I believe it has a Samsung chip in it. The glass is also the same as you'll see in phones which are much more expensive. I have put this thing through some big drops without breaking. Most of the rest of the components are fine with "good enough" as long as they're reliable for the typical consumer cycle of a cell phone.

This is exactly how I would build a P.C. as well. Maybe I wouldn't get the most optimized components to squeeze every bit of bit of performance possible for my gaming (I'm not a gamer) but the system would get the job done.

The cell phone industry is quite mature. Cell phones are a solved problem. I wouldn't buy a hybrid tablet here as that's an emerging field which the market leaders are only just now getting right.

Chip speeds have stalled. Moore's law is close to the end. Storage speeds are good enough because it's solid state (faster than a hard drive with spinning disks). The first spec I look at is the RAM. This is the most important component for deciding how your phone is going to perform for basic usage. 512mb is basically unusable as a smartphone. 2gb is where I would want to start, but 1gb will work.

From there it's all personal preferences. I don't use the camera. For my usage I don't even remember how much storage my phone has (16 GB I think) because I don't save much on it. I know I have plenty of space left after over a year and a half of usage. I don't play games. Most people only use a handful of apps and I'm the same.

 

I bought a Chinese Lenovo ( New cheap Lenovo 4G model MTK6592 Octa Core 2GB RAM 5.0'' 1920x1080px Dual SIM WCDMA 13MP Camera 16G ROM Android4.4 ) or so the specs say. Had it 2 years has never given me a problem and battery lasts 2 to 3 days with normal use. In the mean time my wife has had several phones which she says are rubbish, or is it how they are used. I always make sure there is enough RAM on a phone or pc, otherwise everything will slow or freeze. I use Chrome, as it allows me to synchronise my my phone and all my pc's and laptops. I also have virus guard on my phone. Don't know if this is really necessary, but my thinking is if all my computing is synchronised maybe my phone would be a weak link. Maybe a techy can advise if I'm right or wrong, not really a geek, but trying.

 

Apparently the browser on a phone works differently than it does on a desktop. I have 100+ tabs open on my phone. I guess I sort of use open tabs like bookmarks.

These tabs don't continue running in the background like they do on a desktop though.

Edit: I use Chrome for both the Phone and the desktop.

 

Believe it or not, one of the two Myphone or Starmobile made a phone with RCA jacks so you could mirror the screen on a TV. Really low tech but it worked on low tech TV also.

My comment about my Sis-in-law's phone was that it ran on Gingerbread 2.3.6 and it does practically anything a new phone can do that you really need done. The svr544 GPU is rarely found in bargain basement phones any longer. Her phone runs fast on 1 GB ram. My point is that the newer operating systems and the programs specifically written for them are what requires more ram. Kitkat was revolutionary in that it was a light operating system that didn't need a huge amount of ram to operate. Windows phone is very light also. Try opening up 15 webpages on your phone and see how it acts, if you have a powerful new phone have the bread and cheese ready for grilling the sandwiches.

 

Since I had my cell phone stolen while in Lapu-lapu I only carry the cheaper cell phones. I wouldn't spend over 5000 pesos on a phone just in case the phone decides it needs a new home. Basic spec's for the phone would be something like quad core, 8 GB memory, LTE cap. , 4.5 " screen, of course with android.