Smart phones how confusing?

rjbell

rjbell

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my little one is growing up fast and i think we are not getting enough pictures. I work all day and the mrs spends most of the time with him, but has no camera. Her phone is ancient so want to get a smart phone with a tidy camera on it in hope she will shoot more. The choice is now endless and really confusing. Budget is £100-£150. Windows or android? Here's a few i've been looking at i would appropriate some help or other recommendations thanks.

Nokia Lumia 800
Sony Xperia Tipo
Sony Xperia U
HTC Desire C
Huawei Ascend G300
Samsung Galaxy Ace II
 
yes there is so much choice - google best smart phone camera - some phones have apps that take a series of up to a few hundred shots one after the other - ie:iphone 3gs/some samsung too
 
dexter35yrs said:
yes there is so much choice - google best smart phone camera - some phones have apps that take a series of up to a few hundred shots one after the other - ie:iphone 3gs/some samsung too
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Yes i done that and to narrow my search down. The spec of them all seem similar, but as we all know not all 5mp cameras are born equal.
 
Tipo is to small I think the u is a little better.
 
I have a desire s and the wife has a Lumia 710, the quality of photo's taken indoors is not very good. From the list above I would say the Nokia as it as a 8MP camera.
 
Definitely the Nokia as it has a Zeiss lens. Nokia are reknowned for taking photos as good as most compacts. If you're not worried about which operating system, go for a Nokia N8, the operating system is slow but reliable and it has a 12 mp camera with a Zeiss lens.
 
JayD said:
If you're not worried about which operating system, go for a Nokia N8, the operating system is slow but reliable and it has a 12 mp camera with a Zeiss lens.
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Outside the budget surely?
 
if you want a phone with a good camera surely the iphone has to be a consideration
i don't particularly like iphones but they are capable of taking a half decent photo

i have the htc 1x which was advertised on the strength of it's camera and to be honest it's not all that but then again i didn't get on the strength of it's camera so doesn't really concern me
 
iPhones = mega money! I have an HTC Desire S and it does a good enough job in daylight.
 
Nokia make the best cameras in phones. Unfortunately they make the worst actual phone. I had an N8. It was the most unreliable phone I ever had. It crashed constantly and I had to keep resetting it to factory and remove all data (which you couldn't back up properly via it's own back up or via a mac) every few months as it would just stop working. If you have a mac and no access to a pc then there is zero support for updating the phone or backing it up properly.

There is an outside chance the lumia being windows won't be as god awful as symbian (I used to love nokia, the e70 and 6310i were brilliant) The N series ones I've had have been dreadful.

I think a friend has the samsung galaxy ace. Photos seem ok from it. I've not seen them on a full size screen though.

I'd have a look on flickr for each of the phone models and see what the images are like. It's probably the best way of telling which ones are any good. Techradar also do decent reviews so I'd check on there too.
 
cosmicma said:
if you want a phone with a good camera surely the iphone has to be a consideration
i don't particularly like iphones but they are capable of taking a half decent photo

i have the htc 1x which was advertised on the strength of it's camera and to be honest it's not all that but then again i didn't get on the strength of it's camera so doesn't really concern me
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Look at his budget....
 
Why are people discussing megapixels. Surely on TP we know it's the lens that makes the difference. Most phones whether they are 2mp, 5mp, 8mp all have crap lenses.

FWIW I've got the Galaxy Ace and it takes pretty good snaps (turn the flash off though). Costs me £7.50 a month with more minutes and texts than I know what to do with.
 
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Having worked selling phones for about 7 years Sony and Nokia have generally got the better cameras. the N8 was amazing and probably pretty cheap now.

IMO i would go for android over windows tho which takes nokia out for me, but thats personal preference.

if you search for reviews of each phone on http://www.gsmarena.com/reviews.php3 they really test the phones and put up loads of sample shots taken with each one so that will help your decision.
 
I've got the Galaxy ace II and got to say I'm happy with it, camera pretty impressive too.


My wife has the ACE and as Patrick said £7.50 per month with all she needs and more from Car Phone Warehouse on their TalkMobile network (which apparently works off the Vodafone Network)
 
Of the ones you list, the HTC would be my choice my last two phones have been HTC and I've had no trouble with them. I've had sony xperias and the build quality was poor, the U model above has no memory card slot so you'd be stuck with max 4gb of storage which will drop as you add apps, important I think if photography is what you're after.
 
My son has the G300, it's a good smart phone but I'd rate the camera as poor
 
srichards said:
Nokia make the best cameras in phones. Unfortunately they make the worst actual phone. I had an N8. It was the most unreliable phone I ever had. It crashed constantly and I had to keep resetting it to factory and remove all data (which you couldn't back up properly via it's own back up or via a mac) every few months as it would just stop working. If you have a mac and no access to a pc then there is zero support for updating the phone or backing it up properly.

There is an outside chance the lumia being windows won't be as god awful as symbian (I used to love nokia, the e70 and 6310i were brilliant) The N series ones I've had have been dreadful.

I think a friend has the samsung galaxy ace. Photos seem ok from it. I've not seen them on a full size screen though.

I'd have a look on flickr for each of the phone models and see what the images are like. It's probably the best way of telling which ones are any good. Techradar also do decent reviews so I'd check on there too.
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Flickr cleaver thinking batman!


The lumia 800 is the front runner, i'm a little put off its not android though. Thanks you i won't make my decision today.
 
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Why not get her a phone and a camera with a £150 budget you could get her a £50 point n shoot and a phone or go 2nd hand for the phone and get her a better camera. As for the choice of phone id definitely go android over windows.
 
eddyc said:
Why not get her a phone and a camera with a £150 budget you could get her a £50 point n shoot and a phone or go 2nd hand for the phone and get her a better camera. As for the choice of phone id definitely go android over windows.
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I know a compact would be better but she would leave it at home, with a phone i know she will have it on her. Android would be my 1st choice but she doesn't even know what an app is, she has no facebook/twitter account, she will use it for a bit of browsing no and then and the lumia is meant to be pretty fast internet and a decent lens.
 
eddyc said:
Why not get her a phone and a camera with a £150 budget you could get her a £50 point n shoot and a phone or go 2nd hand for the phone and get her a better camera. As for the choice of phone id definitely go android over windows.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't worry too much about not being Android, all the usual apps (facebook, twitter, whatsapp etc) are available on Win Phone and email/browsing is pretty good as well, and there are also plenty of games. Everything a young user might want.
 
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Lumia - not sure what the 800 has, but my 900 has a Zeiss lens... Does a pretty good job when it needs to, but it's not good in anything but the best light. The little "flash" (leds) is pretty powerful though, but obviously gives horrendous shadows etc.

Windows 7.5 is also pretty good as an OS, easy to use and there's lots of apps out there - not as many as the iPhone, but hey, who needs 38 GPS mapping apps?
 
OutLore said:
Lumia - not sure what the 800 has, but my 900 has a Zeiss lens... Does a pretty good job when it needs to, but it's not good in anything but the best light. The little "flash" (leds) is pretty powerful though, but obviously gives horrendous shadows etc.

Windows 7.5 is also pretty good as an OS, easy to use and there's lots of apps out there - not as many as the iPhone, but hey, who needs 38 GPS mapping apps?
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Lumia 800 seems quite similar.

Main camera

Camera sensor (main camera resolution)

8.0 megapixels

Carl Zeiss Tessar lens

Yes

Camera resolution

3264 x 2448 pixels

Main camera focus type

Auto focus

Camera F number/aperture

2.2

Camera features

Dual-LED flash
Touch focus
Auto and manual exposure
Geo-tagging
Auto and manual white balance
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Iphone 4 has inherent problems with the signal, ie it hasn't got any. That's why the 4s was brought out so quickly.
 
The lumia 800 was given 4 stars at techradar at its £400 you can have it for less than half this price now. Weighing everything up it seems pretty good.
 
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JayD said:
Iphone 4 has inherent problems with the signal, ie it hasn't got any. That's why the 4s was brought out so quickly.
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The iPhone 4 signal story was an overblown hype, and it suffers from the "death grip" to about the same extent that the Galaxy S3 does (ie not much, but try hard enough and it can be induced).

The 4S came out more than a year later, the 5 came out only a year after the 4s. iPhone 4 was June 2010, 4s was October 2011 and 5 was September 2012.

By your reasoning, the 4s must have had more problems as it was out a shorter time before the 5 was released.
 
By my reasoning all iPhones are just overhyped rubbish! Most of the new Sonys, Samsungs and HTC's run rings around the iPhone 5! Bigger better brighter screens, better processors, better RAM, better storage, iPhones are over-hyped.
 
JayD said:
By my reasoning all iPhones are just overhyped rubbish! Most of the new Sonys, Samsungs and HTC's run rings around the iPhone 5! Bigger better brighter screens, better processors, better RAM, better storage, iPhones are over-hyped.
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Boring.
 
philgale said:
Having worked selling phones for about 7 years Sony and Nokia have generally got the better cameras. the N8 was amazing and probably pretty cheap now.
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Wife has had two sony smartphones Xperias and to be honest any attempt to take a photo of a child with the camera on it and you'd miss, the camera is just so slow to find focus, its the same on both of them, the pictures themselves are ok, but not as good as the htc desires ive had in that time!
 
JayD said:
By my reasoning all iPhones are just overhyped rubbish! Most of the new Sonys, Samsungs and HTC's run rings around the iPhone 5! Bigger better brighter screens, better processors, better RAM, better storage, iPhones are over-hyped.
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Aah, that explains your prejudiced (but false) statements about the iPhone 4.

I would guess you don't have any real experience to actually back up your dislike?
 
Yes I do. I went from Nokias, to Sony Ericsson, and was persuaded to try an iPhone 4. Found it small screened, and slow, and no I didn't have a problem with signal, but a lot of people I knew who had the 4 did have problems. Perhaps that was because no one ever phones me. :( I also think IN MY OPINION that anything by Apple is all about the hype and keeping up with the Jones's. I now have a Desire S, not the best phone by a long shot, but for how I use a phone, it beats the iPhone 4 into a cocked hat!
 
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JayD said:
Yes I do. I went from Nokias, to Sony Ericsson, and was persuaded to try an iPhone 4. Found it small screened, and slow, and no I didn't have a problem with signal, but a lot of people I knew who had the 4 did have problems. Perhaps that was because no one ever phones me. :( I also think IN MY OPINION that anything by Apple is all about the hype and keeping up with the Jones's. I now have a Desire S, not the best phone by a long shot, but for how I use a phone, it beats the iPhone 4 into a cocked hat!
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LOL, while there are a number of Android phones that are as good as, (and even superior in some aspects) the iPhone, the Desire S isn't really one of them.

It's almost a budget phone, and I really can't think of one way it betters even the iPhone 4.

You disliked the 3.5" 640x960 pixel screen , so you bought a 3.7" 480x800 screen that "beats it into a cocked hat"!

Really?

If you had suggest an S3 or one X, probably even an S2, but a Desire S?

Come on, android, iOS and win phone all have advantages and disadvantages, but try and stay rational with your arguments.
 
It's much faster! 768ram 1ghz processor. And considering its a "budget" phone (in your opinion) how come its bigger, and faster than the very premium iPhone prices? You're obviously an apple afficianado, I'm not into anything really, I just don't like to see people paying such premium prices for a rather standard product and all because of the hype. You have whichever iPhone you want, no one will ever persuade me they offer better value for money than an HTC one X, or an S111, etc. And if you want to get down to the nitty gritty, you laugh at my choice of a desire S, even though you laughingly joke about it only being a 3:7" screen compared to the 3:5 of the iPhone 4, you don't get my point do you, its value for money! IPhones are not value for money.
 
Right, am off to sleep, early start depending on the weather.
Carry on extolling the virtues of the iPhone if you want, and belittling other phones, I'll read it on the morrow.
 
JayD said:
Right, am off to sleep, early start depending on the weather.
Carry on extolling the virtues of the iPhone if you want, and belittling other phones, I'll read it on the morrow.
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:dummy:


At the end of the day a phone is a phone is a phone...

Can you speak to people on it... job done...

I agree, smart phones are groovy...I have a samsung note - it can be fine, but it does suck juice from the battery... but at the end of the day if you have an all singing all dancing phone, but cannot use it.. then it is a brick..
 
JayD said:
even though you laughingly joke about it only being a 3:7" screen compared to the 3:5 of the iPhone 4, you don't get my point do you, its value for money! IPhones are not value for money.
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It actually isn't value for money, as a user of all 3 types, (Android, WinMo, Apple), the one thing that Apple offers is value for money.

Take your Desire S as an example, launched March 2011 and having a sim free price of £435, is now worth £42 from Mazuma.

The iPhone 4 was launched the year previous (June 2010) and is still £116 at Mazuma, the comparable iphone to your Desire S by launch is the iPhone 4S (Oct 2011) is still £210 at Mazuma.

For value for money, both the iPhones are better value, the 4 will have cost a buyer £383 from launch till now, the iPhone 4S is better value at £289 and the Desire S worst value at £393.

A person who bought a 4S in 2011 would be over £100 better off now than if they had bought a Desire S.

Don't confuse apparent cheapness with value for money.
 
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