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Looking to buy a smart phone

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  • 26-01-2012 4:59pm
    #1
    yupyup7up
    Closed Accounts Posts: 845 ✭✭✭


    Hi all,

    I want to get myself a new phone and wanted to get some sort of smartphone but not sure what to get! I want to buy the phone outright without contract and sim free.

    I was looking at the iphone 4s but its ridiculously expensive to buy (€609)

    But I seen the HTC desire S sim free for just under €300. Are these phones good? I have used the Galaxy S2 and I really liked it.


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    #2
    cynder
    Registered Users Posts: 4,128 ✭✭✭cynder


    I have an xperia play its sim free, my daughter has the htc wildfire (i hate it) and hubby has iphone 4. out of them all i like mine the best.


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    #3
    TBi
    Registered Users Posts: 1,783 ✭✭✭TBi


    It depends what type of user you are.

    iOS and WP7 are for people who rather just use their phones as phones. They are more locked down but generally more stable and don't have malware. The interface is usually faster than android (for similar hardware).

    Android (on the desire) makes some trade offs for a more open system. It supports full multitasking but this can lead to slow UI and battery life draining faster than you'd like. You can do whatever you want but the trade off is that there is malware.

    I'm a 'geek' and i prefer WP7 or iOS. A WP7 device (Nokia Lumia, HTC Radar or TITAN) is comparable in price to a desire.


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    #4
    yupyup7up
    Closed Accounts Posts: 845 ✭✭✭yupyup7up


    I'm a software engineer and I can write apps for phones, but I doubt I will ever bother, but there are a few things I wanted.

    5mp camera with flash,
    decent enough music player,
    easy to text (I quite like swype and the texting on the galaxy S2, cant use the iphone properly!)
    wide range of apps (I use whatsapp and skype etc etc)
    wifi, gps and fast internet.

    I plan on using it on Three PAYG. with the €20 a month deal with all you can eat data


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    #5
    TBi
    Registered Users Posts: 1,783 ✭✭✭TBi


    I'm not a fan of 3. Meteor with 50MB per day for 69c (1.5GB per month) is more than enough for me.

    Any phone these days will do all you want.

    I prefer WP7 because it's very fast, getting in and out of applications is quick.
    Audio quality depends on phone but zune is nice and easy to use.
    Battery life is good.
    The keyboard is very accurate and easy to use, i like the iOS keyboard too but hated Androids default keyboard. Swype was ok for a while but i prefer a standard keyboard.

    They have WiFi, GPS and internet. App range is a little lower, whats app is available and skype is on the way.

    I'm sure you'd be happy with an android phone, but if you used a WP7 for a week then you'd understand why i rave about it. Also iPhone might be pricey but you get what you pay for, cheap android phones are just that... cheap.


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    #6
    Osmosae
    Registered Users Posts: 88 ✭✭Osmosae


    I've the galaxy s2, couldn't recommend it highly enough, but if you're not going for contract it's pricey. Swype isnt available for apple devices as far as i know due to apple not releasing their keyboard API's, there is an unofficial port, but it's not as good.

    If your a software engineer you'll have no problems messing with custom roms (the process of installing a rom takes about 10 mins 99% of which your doing nothing). You can also overclock your phone which will enable much better hardware response than an apple device in my experience (testing custom sgs2 against iphone 4 and 4s - neither of whom were jailbroken or customised however)

    I also like the ability to decompile an apk, change something i dont like about it, resign and re install with my own tweaks added (i dont do much modding but i dabble, and its nice to be able to do something qickly yourself rather than waiting on updates which may never address the issue)


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    #7
    srsly78
    Registered Users Posts: 7,157 ✭✭✭srsly78


    Osmosae wrote: »
    I also like the ability to decompile an apk, change something i dont like about it, resign and re install with my own tweaks added (i dont do much modding but i dabble, and its nice to be able to do something qickly yourself rather than waiting on updates which may never address the issue)

    If that was possible nobody would sell software for android (coz other people could decompile everything). Apps run through an obfuscator, you will not be able to decompile unless you have a debug build from the developer. Same story for commercial java development.

    I think what you mean is you like the way android is opensource, which is a completely different from decompiling apps.


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    #8
    Osmosae
    Registered Users Posts: 88 ✭✭Osmosae


    No i meant what i said, decompile the specific apk i'm looking to edit and resign it, apktool probably being the easiest but there are many methods. I wasn't however talking about paid applications, but this is of course possible


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    #9
    srsly78
    Registered Users Posts: 7,157 ✭✭✭srsly78


    Free apps are also obfuscated. You can only decompile a debug built apk, which you will only have if the developer was nice enough to give you one.
    -> http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/tools/proguard.html


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