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The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

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Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#71

Post by sarnu »

sellweek wrote: post #62
TeMPOraL wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A very interesting video, thanks! So the question is, how can I get my hands on something from Shenzhen that works? I've seen people importing Chinese smartphones that are equivalent to high-end products on Western market but for half a price. But could anyone share some tips on finding and getting a device that may be more functional than what you can buy in Europe/US?

Well, if you're in Europe, find some info about VAT and customs duty rates and limits for imported goods and how individual customers pay them. Here in Slovakia, for example, if I buy anything over 20€ from China, it will be held by the post office until I come and pay 20% VAT on it and if it's more than around 140€ (I don't remember the exact amount), I have to pay duty too.

There is a EU-based shop of dx at http://eud.dx.com/. At least, they ship via the Netherlands. Not as fast as a typical EU-based shop but it takes out the hassle with customs

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#72

Post by vvillena »

Alterlife wrote: post #60
ofcapl_ wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't want to start here any flame war or something, but that's the main reason why I've switched to Windows Phone OS - for 100$ - 150$ You've got the system that runs like a charm (I'm not smartphone power user so all apps I need are available in Windows Store)

I HAD a windows phone (Lumia 620) for about 6 months before I gave up trying to get used to it and went back to Android. The animations are just too slow and annoying for me to get used to. There needs to be a way to turn them off. The phone wasn't laggy. It's just the animations that got on my nerves.

The animations in Windows Phone hide the loading times. The phone wouldn't be any faster without them.

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#73

Post by pja »

sellweek wrote: post #63
pja wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heck, my Nexus 4 is still perfectly usable. The only real motivation for me to upgrade is LTE (which has finally rolled out to my city in the UK).

What's your experience with Lollipop? Mine had pretty large problems with 3G and Wi-Fi signals after upgrading.

I’m running Cyanogenmod 12.1 & everything has been fine so far. Haven’t tried the official Android L releases.

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#74

Post by wtbob »

beefsack wrote: post #6
wtbob wrote: post #4

I'm really sad that it won't have CyanogenMod; that was the biggest reason that I purchased a One. It's a real shame that there was that whole fight over exclusivity in India (IIRC, it sounds like CM's fault, but I'm not 100% certain). I'm interested to read details of how the fingerprint unlock works. Remember that a fingerprint reader is insufficient to be secure, as fingerprints are low-entropy and relatively publ…

If they don't lock it down and is similar to the One, then it should be incredibly easy to switch to CM. I'm running CM12.1 on my One at the moment and it's leaps and bounds better than the stock CM11S ROM that comes with the device.

Have you found a trustworthy source for the holo interface for CM12?

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#76

Post by crdb »

smcl wrote: post #68
crdb wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depending on how heavy your use is, you should look at the Xiaomi Mi4i. I picked it up as a Nexus 5 replacement solely for the ridiculously large battery (3100mAh or 72% more than the similarly sized iPhone 6 and still 6% more than the 6 Plus). It's slimmer and more solid (the N5 has a tendency to get dented), and arguably has better specs (it definitely deals with Skype, my only performance hog, much better). When I…

I'm in the EU so I suspect it maybe a little easier to pickup a Xiami phone. 3100mAh is pretty impressive by the sounds of things, so as long as the power consumption hasn't scaled similarly that could be an interesting option. I'll check it out!

Watch out not to get the Mi 4 by accident. The Mi4i was launched this year and was basically designed to be a "premium smartphone at emerging markets prices" whereas the Mi 4 is the "China flagship", whose design is a stretched iPhone 5S (you might like that though) just like the Samsung Alpha. It's a lot more expensive and as far as I'm concerned unjustifiably so. i stands for "international".

I don't think the power consumption is as smart as the N5; it def drains about the same in airplane mode as not in airplane mode, whilst the N5 basically became as good as switched off. On the upside power management seems much better when it comes to dealing with networks; maybe I was on the wrong frequency bands. The N5 battery was shockingly bad; after a year and a half I was getting barely 1.5 hours of use out of the thing. Great when you're stranded in Tokyo and relying on Google Maps and Translate...

FWIW my iPhone 4 from years ago is still the most durable phone I've owned. I still get a good 3 days battery out of it (it's our guest phone) and it can go weeks on airplane mode in the drawer. But when you've tasted a 5" screen and multitasking, it really is too little...

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#77

Post by tdkl »

kijin wrote: post #69
tdkl wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sony z3 compact is the one you're looking for. Sadly it's one of the dying breed of non huge phones with flagship specs and good software (just don't upgrade to Lollipop, it's junk).

4.6 inches and 129 grams! We're getting closer... As for the software, I don't really care as long as I can wipe it and replace it with Cyanogenmod. Just checked and it seems that Cyanogenmod supports the Z3 Compact. Thanks for the suggestion.

Caution with unlocking the device, when you do, you loose the proprietary DRM data for the camera and picture optimization by Sony and the quality drops massively. You can't regain them (or at least this wasn't the case a year ago). So do some research on this before, not sure if this can be avoided now.

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#78

Post by tomjen3 »

alimbada wrote: post #64
tomjen3 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if that only takes six months the phones isn't going to be interesting by the time you can actively purchase it.

You buy phones for their "interesting" factor rather than actually wanting to use it as a phone? If so, you're probably an extremely tiny minority in that regard...

By not interesting I mean a better version from some other company will be available.

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#79

Post by paublyrne »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #33
hellweaver666 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Keep dreaming. The sad fact is, the majority of consumers do not even know what half of those features are for let alone need them. We, the techies of the world do not define these products any more - our mothers, uncles and children do (and all they want to do is take acceptable looking selfies, share them and send the odd text message.

I don't have high hopes. Just had to vent out. What also irks me is that all that consumer-defined hardware is pushing human ability to weather stress and annoyances. I sometimes really wonder if the proliferation of underpowered, laggy phones isn't turning into public health problem. I sometimes get to fix my mother's laptop (also used by my sister). It came with Windows 8, but it runs it so slow that personally, I'…

Just try and imagine that scene from Star Trek - an away team tries to scan derelict starship with a tricorder, only to have it hang up, reboot and then complain that it won't work because it can't connect to the cloud. Ridiculous, isn't it?

We're not in the 24th Century yet!

Re: The OnePlus 2 pushes the boundaries of how cheap a flagship phone can be

#80

Post by tdkl »

SimplyUseless wrote: post #58

In all of the comments, I see a lot of excitement about the "features" the company is able to pack for a "low" cost. I would like to say this in simplest possible way -- One plus one support model and execution is poorest of all phone makers -- The emphasis and culture in the company is to grow fast without concern towards individuals paying still very high prices for their phones but not getting the worth. The half…

Sounds like a Nexus by Google, so ...
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