The phone situation nowadays is really retarded. More savvy customers have to deal with so many trade offs and make dozens of compromises. You rarely can buy a phone without any downsides for a reasonable price. The average Joe/Jane customer is clueless about this.
China rolls over the East (China, India, etc) and is quite popular in Europe now too with brands like Xiaomi/Redmi/Poco, Huawei/Honor, Oppo/Realme/Vivo/Oneplus. But most of them come with flaws.
Xiaomi puts ads in the apps on their phones and they don’t plan on stopping (it’s apparently a way of income to finance their Redmi line, iirc).
Both Xiaomi and Huawei don’t use stock Android with a launcher. They heavily modify it and put it on their phones as MIUI and EMUI. And good luck if you want to unlock the bootloader on a Xiaomi device.
On top of that they seem to have a weird way of prioritizing specs on their phone tiers. While the low/mid tier gets headphone jacks and microSD slots, they’re missing on their flagships (and their variants). Why? I mean, in case of Huawei I can understand it somehow. They give you dual SIM capability. And they make microSDs in a shape that fits nano SIM slots. And they make bluetooth headphones. Just like Oneplus when they suddenly removed the headphone jack…coincidence? I think not!
And Xiaomi is big into accessories, like REALLY big. You can buy Mi labelled battery packs, bluetooth headphones, smart lightbulbs, freaking air humidifiers, TVs - the list seems endless. Plus, build quality on their low/mid tier phones is garbage. Plastic all around. (metal frames make all the difference, look at Nokia, Razer and even some higher end Samsungs).
A plus for both of them is that they usually include a basic silicone/TPU case with their phones.
Now, you could go with a lesser known brand like Umidigi which offers almost stock Android. Their prices seem fair for the specs. Big downside: forget about updates.
And if we look at the “known” brands (Samsung, LG, Motorola, Sony, Apple, etc). They’re stagnating at best. There’s no real improvement compared to the last few years. Sony seems to go the long boy route with 21:9 displays, as does Motorola (and personally I think it’s just a means to look different than the competition, no benefits at all except for maybe that $900 Sony flagship which is meant for “video production”).
The latest thing LG announced was a flip case for their upcoming flagship that adds a second screen. The phone itself is boring af.
Samsung? Even their new Note 10 is boring. It’s meant for media creation (even comes with a video editor) but lacks in important points (like a too narrow angle on the lense). Michael Fisher pointed out that they probably thought the Samsung Fold would be their next hit and didn’t focus on any innovations for the Note 10.
Motorola? I loved the Moto G3. The entire G series was meant to be a budget phone with an amazing price/performance ratio. THE bang for the buck phones. Now they’re the main series with flaws and less exciting prices (if you don’t include their retarded One Vision series) and the Z/X series are either dead or so unimportant, they might not even exist.
Apple? Same old for a higher price.
Nokia could be named as one of the better choices nowadays. Except for the Evenwell bullshit HMD Global only makes Android One devices without any bloatware but with long software updates. Quality-wise they’re still top notch (among the sturdiest phones you can get, even in the budget tier). But they tend to be more expensive than the competition. The specs don’t match the price range.
On top of all that the market gets flooded with phones. Especially the low/mid tier is so full of phones, even within a specific brand it can be difficult to keep track. Samsung A, J, M, S series each with their own lineup (8 Mx0 models!!!). Why? How is your average consumer supposed to know what their differences are? What is this bullshit?
Samsung Galaxy M-Series
Being positioned at the mid-range and low-end segments, all models in the series have the essential features of a smartphone, and differ in size and design. The letter M stands for Millenial. However, new features are left out or other materials are used, with Samsung targeting Asian markets or the European entry-level market. The models are updated at least annually; minor updates or variants are displayed with name additions.
Why? An A40 and M40 cost around the same. They have roughly the same specs. The A series seems to be meant to replace the J series (low/mid tier) and the S series are their flagship devices. So why make a series that competes with a different series?
Now add Sony, Motorola, Nokia, LG, Xiaomi/Redmi, Huawei/Honor, Oppo/Vivo/Oneplus, Razer, Apple, Umidigi, Wiko, ZTE, Blackberry, HTC, etc who all have their own tiers and series. And all of them have differences, be they ever so small.
Then factor in availability and service provider support.
It’s a fucking shitshow. And that’s just for your phone.
Want a laptop? Desktop PC? Audio gear? A bike?
I’d argue that - even though it’s usually a good thing - there IS such a thing as too many choices.
Oh, and I forgot their retarded logic:
Make phones thinner.
That’s nice. But could we get larger batteries?
No, only thinner.
But, the hardware gets more powerful and the screens have a higher res. We need larger batteries.
No, only thinner. Remove headphone jack to make even thinner.
What? Why? Give us the headphone jack back and add a bigger battery. We don’t care if it’s a bit thicker.
No, only thinner. And make cameras stick out so the phone needs a case otherwise it wobbles around.
We’ve made our priorities clear. Please, listen to us. We want MORE, not less.
Okay, add more cameras that stick out of the back.
