[Latheesh]

Need a help!

I want to gift someone a basic smartphone

Current phone: old feature phone
Usage: call, whatsapp, watching youtube videos
Budget: Cheap and best
Brand: Some known brands

I shortlisted Samsung M2. I think it is priced ~7k for 2GB RAM:32GB storage variant, is there any other option?

Thanks in advance.

[sunbaj]

To 1+ users. Offer from 1+ for free battery replacement. Came across this thread in gsmarena.

https://www.gsmarena.com/get_a_free_...news-50688.php

[manim]

Originally Posted by Latheesh

I want to gift someone a basic smartphone

I gifted a school-teacher a few days back whose young children needed to attend online classes a Redmi 9A for Rs.7,000.

[Latheesh]

Originally Posted by manim

I gifted a school-teacher a few days back whose young children needed to attend online classes a Redmi 9A for Rs.7,000.

Thanks, I will check Redmi 9A. I typed Samsung model wrong, it is Samsung M02

[Latheesh]

Originally Posted by manim

I gifted a school-teacher a few days back whose young children needed to attend online classes a Redmi 9A for Rs.7,000.

I ordered Redmi9A. Thanks for the suggestion.

[sunsetorange]

Originally Posted by livyodream

I just need a phone with good camera and large screen and not Samsung.

Any recommendation for a Ex-Samsung Fanboy?

I am in the same boat. I have a Note 9 which fortunately has no issues, but which is 3 years old now and am looking to hand it over to my son for his online classes. There are not many better phones than a Note and none that come with the S-pen. I have become used to the s-pen quite a lot that I will miss it. To top it all, it still shoots great pictures.
The non samsung androids I have shortlisted are -
i) Vivo X60 pro + - Great camera.
ii) Mi 11 ultra - Great camera again.
iii) Oneplus 9 pro - Not so great camera.

On comparison with the Samsung S21 Ultra I still feel they miss something , especially the 10x optical zoom.

I'll be watching this thread to see what you choose.

[Rajeevraj]

Originally Posted by Oxy

Is that still available? How much did it cost you?

Originally Posted by ashis89

The existing S20FE came with Exynos processors. It was discontinued for some time and this 5G variant has been released now with Snapdragon processor.

Please share your experiences after using the phone for few days. I am looking to upgrade sometime next month and can't find anything more compelling

Have been using the S20 FE 5G for 2-3 weeks now. I came from a 3.5 year old Nokia 7 Plus and it is my first time with a phone this expensive, so in all ways this obviously has been a great experience so far. My usage is pretty much standard. The one thing that really impressed me and everyone else is the camera. I do like taking pictures and the camera on this is very good (based on my limited experience). Battery life is good and with a good amount of use goes down to 15% in ~28-30 hrs(Lot of emails, twitter, social media apps, ~1 hr of video). On the downside the default charger is a 15W one and is pretty slow.

I was on the look out for a phone in the 30K range for the last several months and was not keen on the Mi, Poco, Vivo and related brands. Almost bought the One Plus Nord 2 before I finalized on this. Lot of small but significant features.

One key thing to keep in mind with this if you plan to buy this is the weird price fluctuation. The prices on Amazon, Samsung Shop etc keep fluctuating between 48-55k, but then at regular intervals, discounts pop up. Sometimes it is an 8k discount on a 55k price which makes it 46-47k. Sometimes the discount pops up from a 48k price-This is the one to watch out for. I got it at the Amazon Freedom Sale. Was listed at 48k, with flat 6k discount and an additional 10% on SBI cards which made my effective price around 40k+

Currently I see it at 51k on Amazon and Samsung Shop with a 6-8k discount on HDFC cards and additional 2K discount through the app. So again brings it to 41K.

[sandsun7]

Originally Posted by Rajeevraj

Have been using the S20 FE 5G for 2-3 weeks now.

I had bought this phone in mid May '21 after extensive research on the internet . Amazon had listed it at 48K then with a coupon discount of 4k and additional 5% cashback using ICICI amazon pay credit card.
So far the experience has been very pleasing. very good build even though with polycarbonate back, Blazing fast with no lags, ad free, excellent and fully customizable UI, decent battery life which can last a full day easily, and a top notch rear camera. As Rajeev said, the camera is outstanding in good lighting and very good under low light. Have taken some very pleasing portraits too with this even though this lacks a depth sensor. Macros too comes out pretty well using the 3x optical zoom lens.
The only real con compared to competition I could find is lack of fast charging. I did buy a 'super fast' 25W fast charger from Amazon.in and it is serving me well now, charging from 30% to 100% in around 50 minutes to an hour's time. When using super fast charger, as expected the charging is really quick up to 80-85% and significantly slower then on.
All in all, I am very happy with the purchase and hope I can use this for atleast 3 years trouble free.

[PapaBravo]

Originally Posted by Latheesh

I ordered Redmi9A. Thanks for the suggestion.

Good Choice. I bought this for my octogenarian father. He was using a feature phone till now. The use case is only video calls with my son & sharing photographs on WhatsApp. Both the above functions have to be assisted by the caretaker. It has been running good so far.

[deathwalkr]

After using LG's flagships over the past few years, i sorely missed the DAC when i had to let go of LG and bought myself a Samsung S20FE5G.

I tried to live with it over the past few days, but my ears would not let my forget the music that used to come out of the LG phones.

Dusted off the v40, charging it and thinking of using it purely as a Hi-Res DAP

I loath to carry around two devices but i will have to adjust with that.

[dragonfire]

Originally Posted by deathwalkr

I tried to live with it over the past few days, but my ears would not let my forget the music that used to come out of the LG phones.

What headphones do you use with that? Is there a perceptible difference in quality? Am surprised.

[dezpo]

Originally Posted by deathwalkr

So something weird happened to my phone today. All outgoing and incoming calls got barred.

Checked call barring, forwarding, DnD settings...checked my sim in another phone and it works fine, Checked another sim in my phone and same issue.

Reset network settings, tried changing bands to gsm etc etc.

It's a Lg V40 on Android 10.

Loath to do a full factory reset but i guess i don't have any other choice.

Am i missing anything?

Had the same issue with my LG G7.
Last google app update had some issue, the latest update should fix this.
Someone on xda forum figured this out:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/l...ssues.4325893/

[Oxy]

Thanks for the S20 FE 5G reviews guys. However, with the S21 FE 5G scheduled to launch globally on the 8th of September (which means it should hit the Indian markets by end of September max), does it make sense to buy the S20 FE 5G now? Of course the S21 FE 5G is likely to be much more expensive at launch.

[deathwalkr]

Originally Posted by dragonfire

What headphones do you use with that? Is there a perceptible difference in quality? Am surprised.

Sony's WH-1000XM3 are what i use. Not audiophile grade but serves my needs very well. But forget that, even in my car i could note the differences easily. I tried ignoring it but couldn't. It sounds fine when what little mp3s or even FLACs come up in my playlist, but once the hi-res files and dsd files pop up, the difference was night and day, which is expected i guess.

Popped the memory card back in my LG and it's a car music DAP now.

Originally Posted by dezpo

Had the same issue with my LG G7.
Last google app update had some issue, the latest update should fix this.
Someone on xda forum figured this out:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/l...ssues.4325893/

Oh man! I had totally forgotten about xda. Could have saved 50k

Who would have thought a google app would cause my calls to not work! Can i sue google?

Thanks for sharing the link. Keeping it as a digital audio player/backup phone for now.

[dragonfire]

Originally Posted by deathwalkr

Sony's WH-1000XM3 are what i use. Not audiophile grade but serves my needs very well. But forget that, even in my car i could note the differences easily. I tried ignoring it but couldn't. It sounds fine when what little mp3s or even FLACs come up in my playlist, but once the hi-res files and dsd files pop up, the difference was night and day, which is expected i guess.

Does the phone's DAC matter when you are using wireless headphones? I think not. Your headphones have a DAC in it so when you connect wireless headphones, the phone transmits the digital signals to the headphones and the headphones DAC decodes it. Your LG's Quad DAC is sitting idle, right?

Audio experts, correct me if I am wrong.