Suggest my Next Long Term Phone 25K and above ??

1. Budget?
25K and Above. But don't want something that would depreciate in price fast (ie.. dont want to buy overpriced phone just because it is new).

2. Display type and size?
4.0" and above with 250ppi or more, but can be held in one hand without much discomfort (I have medium sized hands if that helps).

3. Form Factor? bar, slider, flip?
Does not matter, but I guess Bar form is compact and popular for touchscreen these days.

4. Preferred choice of brand?
HTC, Sony, Samsung, Apple(only if priced reasonably as per the specs).

5. Preferred input method (QWERTY, touchscreen, numpad, touch-n-type).
Touchscreen

6. What camera option you want? Please specify need for flash, autofocus, front facing camera.
5mp with flash/autofocus is practically enough for me for Photos, but require good quality under low light condition and good quality 720p video recording atleast. Would not mind if camera is better than what I require currently.

7. Preferred operating system? (Android, Symbian, iOS, Windows Phone etc).
Android, iOS.

8. Preferred connectivity options (3G, Wifi etc)Please specify clearly.
Wifi b/g/n, 3G, 2G, Bluetooth(+A2DP), having 4G and LTEwould be nicer.

9. Preferred applications (Flash, Swype, GPS, etc)?
I use GPS/Maps a lot when traveling to new places. So must be able to find restaurants/shops in the area easily. I cannot type without swype keyboard.

10. Primary use of handset (multimedia, camera, mails, internet, gaming etc)?
Everything possible to do using a basic computer (except playing heavy GPU taxing games), must have good music and battery(should last a day with moderate use: 2hour calls, 30min-1hour browsing/maps on Wifi/2G, 2 hour listening to music, 30min-1hour playing games like tic tac toe, sudoku, reading documents).

11. Any specific mobile phones in consideration?
HTC Butterfly, Nexus 4(from US), One X+, One X, One S, iPhone.

12. Any other info that you want to share
I have been using HTC Desire over past 2 years (bought it at cheap price when it was already about an year old in the market). And am quite happy with it even now for usual calling and running small apps/games.
I am due for buying my next phone. I want it to last next 3-4 years atleast.
I might get to travel US in next 1-1.5 month. Also I am willing to wait for 1-2 months if it is worth to bring the price of phone down to a reasonable amount.

Based on the above situation, Should I buy it from India or from US. Even though carrier branded/locked phones are cheaper in US, but I have opinion that unlocked phones cost almost the same in both India and US (Correct me if I am wrong), plus you don't get Indian Warranty.

Big Thanks for taking time to read my post..
Advice based on the above requirement would be very helpful to me...

I would suggest GS3.
But IMO, it's better to wait and get Xperia Z or GS4.
Not sure how is HTC butterfly

If your going to usa you can get nexus 4.
Only con is you wont get service in INDIA

If you are willing to wait, then why not play "wait and watch" game, im sure with the injection of FULL HD displays in mobiles, either the existing price of the mobiles are going to come really down or due to some serious market competition FULL HD will come near 32K, till then save money and wait for the show.

and if you can't wait, then SONY SL is best for you in 24k.

sgs3 is better than xperia sl.i say wait for 1 or 2 months many phones are going to release.

Since you said 25k and above that means you can afford this? HTC Butterfly - Full phone specifications
44k for this, the fastest phone in the planet atm and will remain so for the next few months and will be futureproof for the next 2 yrs easy.

Also the Xperia Z with the near same hardware but a much better cam, water damage protection and sd card support is coming this march: HTC Butterfly vs. Sony Xperia Z - GSMArena.com

These two will remain the fastest devices for a few months as this the best hardware atm in short of the rumored Exynos Octacore with no sureshot launch date(may?).

^^ GS4 is rumored to launch with that SOC

theserpent said:
^^ GS4 is rumored to launch with that SOC

I think its more or less confirmed, SGS always launches with the best hardware samsung can master and that IS their next ultra high end SOC.

No "FAKE" "OCTA" core chip for the S4. Just Quad A15. With a better GPU than the "fake 8 core" chip.

Note 3 will be first Galaxy device with that "makes all Samsung fans weak in the knees fake octa" chipset :mrgreen:

randomuser111 said:
No "FAKE" "OCTA" core chip for the S4. Just Quad A15. With a better GPU than the "fake 8 core" chip. Note 3 will be first Galaxy device with that "makes all Samsung fans weak in the knees fake octa" chipset

Samsung will have 4xA7 and 4xA15, if all the cores are activated on the same time it will beat S4, but lets not speculate now.

tkin said:
Samsung will have 4xA7 and 4xA15, if all the cores are activated on the same time it will beat S4, but lets not speculate now.

Not speculating. I have the info from a friend with sources inside Samsung.

randomuser111 said:
Not speculating. I have the info from a friend with sources inside Samsung.

Oh please, not this now, I see everyday a hundred guys all with such sources, there was charlie in semiaccurate who did fine for some time, sources, then got busted bad when GTX6xx came, lets wait and see, Samsung galaxy series has always been the fastest phone from launch to the next 6 months minimum, SGS 1/2/3 all wore the crowns, no reason to doubt a company's track record.

Thats upto u whether u want to belive or not. But you shall find out on S4 announcement day. And whoever said S4 won't be the fastest ? The quad core A15 chip in S4 will be as powerful as the "fake" octa chip. And with a better GPU. S4 would be around 20-25% faster than Z/HTC M7 and other flagships in terms of raw cpu performance (though that might be negated by Samsung's touchwiz). GPU wise they will be more or less comparable.

Also IMO Quad A15 is better performance wise than fake octa as that will switch to quad A7 for browsing and make it lag. Just like in the One X and other Tegra 3 phones.

You should understand that new chips take time to go from sampling to production. Last year Samsung fans were jumping with joy when Samsung announced Dual A15 chips in January or so and all Sammy fans expected that in the S3. But on launch day ? Tai Tai Phiss

And I'll say another thing too. S4 won't remain the fastest phone for 6 months. Wayyyyyyyy less than that.

what about the note 2 ?

randomuser111 said:
Thats upto u whether u want to belive or not. But you shall find out on S4 announcement day. And whoever said S4 won't be the fastest ? The quad core A15 chip in S4 will be as powerful as the "fake" octa chip. And with a better GPU. S4 would be around 20-25% faster than Z/HTC M7 and other flagships in terms of raw cpu performance (though that might be negated by Samsung's touchwiz). GPU wise they will be more or less comparable.

Also IMO Quad A15 is better performance wise than fake octa as that will switch to quad A7 for browsing and make it lag. Just like in the One X and other Tegra 3 phones.

You should understand that new chips take time to go from sampling to production. Last year Samsung fans were jumping with joy when Samsung announced Dual A15 chips in January or so and all Sammy fans expected that in the S3. But on launch day ? Tai Tai Phiss

And I'll say another thing too. S4 won't remain the fastest phone for 6 months. Wayyyyyyyy less than that.

Whoa boy, ok one by one:
1. You keep saying fake octa cheap, why is it fake, afaik it has 8 cores all of which may run at the same time on demand. So A15~Krait, now 4xA15+4XA7>>4xKrait, logic, yeah a few cores are weaker than the others, now A15~2xA7, so this chip will have the processing power of almost 6xA5(just a basic DMIPs comparison).
2. The GPU on Exynos quad is 3-4 times faster than Mali 400MP, so the GPU may end up being better than Adreno 320.
3.

Also IMO Quad A15 is better performance wise than fake octa as that will switch to quad A7 for browsing and make it lag. Just like in the One X and other Tegra 3 phones.

Boy oh boy, so a quad core A7 will lag in browsing, what will that browser windows run? Crysis? A7 is 75% as fast as A8 but lower power consumption and having all the features of a modern A15 core but a smaller pipeline and throughput, think of this as a weaker version of A15 to run browser pages, now a single A9 can run a browser, 2x can run a game, 3x/4x can do everything, so 4xA7~3xA9, so what can a 3xA9 do, ohh, it can play HD games easy.
4. Yeah I understand it takes time for a new chip to come, but A15 is near ready and I doubt Samsung will release a Galaxy without it, maybe it will delay launch late, but don't see anything in qualcomm's line up either.

Oh S4 won't be fastest, Tegra 4 is almost ready and if specs are to be believed that chip will kick some @$$.

1. While it "in theory" can use all 8 cores but in Samsung's implementation it does not. Also those 4 A7 cores are companion cores and not main processing cores. So an octa core chip will be one with 8 x A15 cores or 8 x A7 cores. This is the reason we don't refer to Tegra 3 as 5 core chip but 4 core. And nor does it use all 8 cores during benchmarking but only 4 A15 cores. So at the end of the day it is a quad A15 chip.

2. The GPU part I confused s4 chip with octa one. Sorry. S4 Gpu will be around 25-30% more powerful than Adreno 320.

3. Remember that 4xA7 are power saving companion cores and not meant for performance. So you WILL notice a SIGNIFICANT difference when browsing on A7 instead of A15 cores. It's like saying a Porsche Cayenne with hybrid engine feels just as fast on the highway when using its electric motor as it is when using its V8 petrol motor. It's not a proper comparison, but you get the idea.

4. I repeat, no fake octa in S4. It will be first seen in Note 3. And why will Samsung even worry ? It's not as if the quad core A15 chip in the S4 is any slower than the fake octa one.

And lastly, I wasn't taking about Tegra 4.

1. ARM has something called big little mp, which can engage all cores at once, we still don't know which one the Exynos will use, but fine, let it be quad core.
2. As I had said.
3. Plase go here and read up on Arm A7, A9, A15 and compare features and DMIPs, the calculation I provided is solid, A7 is by default power saving, now Exynos's A7s will be clocked at 1.2GHz, so compare total throughput, and you'll see 4xA7~3xA9: List of ARM microprocessor cores - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Also on that car analogy, do you think web browsing is that taxing? First I can browse web fine on my Nokia 5800, with a 434MHz CPU, yes, with opera mini, and with a 128MB RAM and I can safely use upto 3-4 tabs of image based pages or 10-11 pages of text based pages like digit forum, so there's no way 4xA7 can't power the browsers, now flash was the most CPU hogging, but its dead, and new browsers ca use hardware acceleration i.e run on the insanely power GPU, so the CPU won't matter much.

4. Fair enough.

Butterfly is a really a very good phone but I can't say how good its battery backup is.But as we all know Note 2 is difficult to handle with one hand, so I think the same would be the case for Butterfly.
Xperia Z looks good, but can't say much about it as it hasn't arrived till yet.
Apart from that if you wish to make a purchase now and you feel that butterfly is big then get One X+ eyes closed(or One X if you are tight with the budget)

You can get a Galaxy S3 for 27000...the prices have dropped today! !!!

swiftshashi said:
You can get a Galaxy S3 for 27000...the prices have dropped today! !!!

Looks like Xperia Z is coming soon, samsung be afraid, be very very afraid.

You should get an iPhone 5 or a Lumia 920 mate. The Droids get outdated each day. ICS - Nov '11, JB 4.1 - Jul '12 , JB 4.2 - Nov '12. Key Lime Pie should most propably arrive at the next Google I/O. iPhone 5 and Win Phones get timely updates.

tkin said:
Looks like Xperia Z is coming soon, samsung be afraid, be very very afraid.

Sadly, Samsung has nothing to be afraid about. Most Indians will still choose Note 2 over Xperia Z. And when S4 arrives, it will out sell the Xperia Z 5 to 1 minimum.

randomuser111 said:
Sadly, Samsung has nothing to be afraid about. Most Indians will still choose Note 2 over Xperia Z. And when S4 arrives, it will out sell the Xperia Z 5 to 1 minimum.

is it so? then why has Samsung lowered the price of S3 to 28k (16GB)

But about the 5:1 thing, i absolutely agree with you.

randomuser111 said:
Sadly, Samsung has nothing to be afraid about. Most Indians will still choose Note 2 over Xperia Z. And when S4 arrives, it will out sell the Xperia Z 5 to 1 minimum.

Like how my friends would go for nVidia GT640 over HD7770, or intel i3 over 5800k, samsung has done one thing good, promotion, when note 2 came I saw ads in every newspapers, magazine, everyday, also they erected demo booths in every location that attracted a crowd, at one day I saw over 4 demo booths, and with hands on experience comes buyer's trust and confidence, I had never seen such a booth from sony(except maybe one or two in festivals), Sony is the reason for its own demise

How about Nexus 4?

pratyush997 said:
How about Nexus 4?

Still best value under 20k but no warranty and Z has better features like cam/screen etc.

tkin said:
Like how my friends would go for nVidia GT640 over HD7770, or intel i3 over 5800k, samsung has done one thing good, promotion, when note 2 came I saw ads in every newspapers, magazine, everyday, also they erected demo booths in every location that attracted a crowd, at one day I saw over 4 demo booths, and with hands on experience comes buyer's trust and confidence, I had never seen such a booth from sony(except maybe one or two in festivals), Sony is the reason for its own demise

Sorry for off topic but just want to explain why you don't see such promotions from Sony.

Basically as you know, since 2006 Sony was going downhill steadily due to wrong decisions made by the then CEO. Don't wanna discuss what he did but it benefited Samsung/LG and cost Sony truck loads of money and reputation as well. Since 2009-10 finance was completely screwed up, piling losses et all. After Kazuo Hirai san took over in 2012 Sony has been recovering well enough and losses have been cut down pretty much and this April they should post about 1.5 billion Dollars + profits. So currently (and last year too when Sony took over Sony Ericsson) they do not have much cash lying around for marketing. Most of the cash has been spent on R&D and acquisitions for long term interests. This year's product line has also been made for one target - to earn profit and NOT market share. Which is why the focus is on high end and mid range phones this year on. Same with TV, camera and other businesses.

So after they return to profit this year and Sony Mobile acquisition and restructuring costs are recovered they will start to chase down Samsung/LG and aim at increasing their market share in all business segments by spending HUGE cash on marketing.

So until 2014, we won't see much marketing push by Sony. For the Z and ZL though, Sony has decent amount of money set aside for promotion globally.

The second half 2013 devices though, will receive better marketing. Especially in the USA. Those phones will mark Sony's BIG comeback in the US market.
Still, nowhere on the same level as Samsung though.

randomuser111 said:
Sorry for off topic but just want to explain why you don't see such promotions from Sony.

Basically as you know, since 2006 Sony was going downhill steadily due to wrong decisions made by the then CEO. Don't wanna discuss what he did but it benefited Samsung/LG and cost Sony truck loads of money and reputation as well. Since 2009-10 finance was completely screwed up, piling losses et all. After Kazuo Hirai san took over in 2012 Sony has been recovering well enough and losses have been cut down pretty much and this April they should post about 1.5 billion Dollars + profits. So currently (and last year too when Sony took over Sony Ericsson) they do not have much cash lying around for marketing. Most of the cash has been spent on R&D and acquisitions for long term interests. This year's product line has also been made for one target - to earn profit and NOT market share. Which is why the focus is on high end and mid range phones this year on. Same with TV, camera and other businesses.

So after they return to profit this year and Sony Mobile acquisition and restructuring costs are recovered they will start to chase down Samsung/LG and aim at increasing their market share in all business segments by spending HUGE cash on marketing.

So until 2014, we won't see much marketing push by Sony. For the Z and ZL though, Sony has decent amount of money set aside for promotion globally. The second half 2013 devices though, will receive better marketing. Especially in the USA. Those phones will mark Sony's BIG comeback in the US market.
Still, nowhere on the same level as Samsung though.

Hmm

I took my LG L9 to the store the other day to see if I can get a screenguard, a customer there saw my set and was impressed, the shopkeeper jumped out and started babbling how LG Mobiles are cheap chinese, I didn't speak a word but later the shopkeeper forced a galaxy s advance to that guy, goes to show that samsung is giving them better margins as well.

T

tkin said:
Hmm

I took my LG L9 to the store the other day to see if I can get a screenguard, a customer there saw my set and was impressed, the shopkeeper jumped out and started babbling how LG Mobiles are cheap chinese, I didn't speak a word but later the shopkeeper forced a galaxy s advance to that guy, goes to show that samsung is giving them better margins as well.

I guess he was rather trying to clear his S Advance stock.. Or dint have any L9 stock on board.

the.one said:
I guess he was rather trying to clear his S Advance stock.. Or dint have any L9 stock on board.

Nope, had a L9 right there on display, like Phillips TVs, they'll try to sell the item with the highest margin.

Very true tkin, Samsung offers highest margins and hence we see all stores pushing samsung products :banghead:

But i would prefer Xperia Z

D

randomuser111 said:
Very true tkin, Samsung offers highest margins and hence we see all stores pushing samsung products

Atleast you can't go wrong with samsung. Some other brands are selling phones with poor battery

and laggy UI. Samsung is at least an all round performer.

dixit8611 said:
Atleast you can't go wrong with samsung. Some other brands are selling phones with poor battery and laggy UI. Samsung is at least an all round performer.

really?

dixit8611 said:
Atleast you can't go wrong with samsung. Some other brands are selling phones with poor battery and laggy UI. Samsung is at least an all round performer.

Show me a samsung phone with 2150mah battery, except note, which is not a phone.

dixit8611 said:
Atleast you can't go wrong with samsung. Some other brands are selling phones with poor battery and laggy UI. Samsung is at least an all round performer.

You got to be kidding me

As if touchwiz UI is awesome

V

i cant use a samsung phone without custom rom even for a week.

vishurocks said:
i cant use a samsung phone without custom rom even for a week.

Try the LG Optimus 3 UI for a change, I find its UI to be the best, fluid and easy to use.

D

Sam said:
really?

yes, galaxy s2, s3, note, s advance all are good in camera, battery backup, display and audio.

tkin said:
Show me a samsung phone with 2150mah battery, except note, which is not a phone.

galaxy s3 and grand has 2100 ma battery and galaxy s2 and s advance too have good battery backup.

pratyush997 said:
You got to be kidding me
As if touchwiz UI is awesome

I am sorry but dropping an android phone because you don't like the launcher is the dumbest reason i have heard

. You can always go for apex and nova launchers.

vishurocks said:
i cant use a samsung phone without custom rom even for a week.

OH really,

T

If you wanna buy the mobile now then the NEXUS 4 is the best choice.

If waiting ain't an issue. Get Xperia Z.FTW.

dixit8611 said:
yes, galaxy s2, s3, note, s advance all are good in camera, battery backup, display and audio.

galaxy s3 and grand has 2100 ma battery and galaxy s2 and s advance too have good battery backup.

I am sorry but dropping an android phone because you don't like the launcher is the dumbest reason i have heard . You can always go for apex and nova launchers.

OH really,

Grand: 190PPI+Videocore, nuff said, SGS II overpriced, SGSIII great phone.

D

tkin said:
Grand: 190PPI+Videocore, nuff said, SGS II overpriced, SGSIII great phone.

Agreed.....

and now GS3 is available at 28k so it is one among the best phone out there.