Can you recommend a phone for parents

mickoneill31

I'm looking for a phone for my parents. They're not very techy at all. My dad currently has a very cheap Windows phone which he doesn't like and my mam has an old Nokia non smart phone.

I'm familiar with Android and can configure a phone with the essentials to make it simple for them. Myself and my brother will be paying for them so we won't be buying the latest and greatest super expensive models.

All they really need is
Phone, texting, decent camera, viber and maybe a small bit of surfing for my dad. Battery life is also a consideration. I know no smartphone is going to have life any way comparable to my mams old phone. They're not heavy users so they'll get one day easily and maybe two per charge.

They're both on Vodafone so I had a look at the HTC Desire 530 and the Smart Prime 7. I'm leaning towards the 530 as it has a bit more RAM and 16GB rather than 8GB storage, but it has a smaller battery.

Is there anything around a similar price point that would be worth considering. We don't have to buy them from Vodafone but if we buy them from another company they have to work with Vodafone sims.

StereoSound

I bought my parents brick phones and their thrilled.

Zombienosh

HTC 530 and Vodafone Smart Prime 7 seem pretty similar, same processors/chipset. HTC is 159 and VF is 129.

mickoneill31

Zombienosh wrote: »

HTC 530 and Vodafone Smart Prime 7 seem pretty similar, same processors/chipset. HTC is 159 and VF is 129.

Yeah, but I haven't seen them in action yet. One of them might have a better screen. That'd be important. And they're only two options from one vendor. Somebody might have a better option that I haven't considered.
As for the difference in RAM & Storage. I've been googling and 16Gb is only about £4 on Amazon so if everything else was similar I'd go for the Smart Prime. They won't be running many apps.

A brick phone isn't an option. I've been mmsing pictures to my mam over the last few weeks and she sends them on using MMS. Then when they travel abroad they avoid calls as it's expensive. Skype / Viber type apps fix that pretty well and are pretty reliable these days if they connect to WiFi. Time to enter the 21st century.
They take lots of photos so I want them to backup automatically when they connect to WiFi. I can set that up and make it invisible for them.

mickoneill31

Thought I'd finish of this thread with an update. I didn't get any great replies so I searched around myself.

Got them a Cubot X16 from Amazon. Worked out at €125 each

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cubot-Android-MTK6735-Standby-Smartphone/dp/B016UMF2TA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1466346152&sr=8-1&keywords=cubot+x16

I'm very happy with them. Really nice looking phone, lovely screen and performance seems great.

It has some cons though that I've noticed.

1: It doesn't support 802.11ac WiFi. No big deal. It supports 802.11n which is fine.
2: It doesn't have a fingerprint scanner. Didn't expect on on a cheap phone.
3: It doesn't have NFC. Won't really miss that. My folks wouldn't know what that was anyway.
4: For some reason the Android buttons (Back, Home, AppsList) are non standard. Home is still in the middle, but back is the right button and the left button is Settings. To get the AppsList it's a long click on home.
5: It has android 5.1 installed. No idea when (if) Marshmallow is coming.

If I was upgrading, I'd have no problem looking at the higher end Cubots if this cheap model is anything to go by.

gazzaman22

mickoneill31 wrote: »

Thought I'd finish of this thread with an update. I didn't get any great replies so I searched around myself.

Got them a Cubot X16 from Amazon. Worked out at €125 each

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cubot-Android-MTK6735-Standby-Smartphone/dp/B016UMF2TA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1466346152&sr=8-1&keywords=cubot+x16

I'm very happy with them. Really nice looking phone, lovely screen and performance seems great.

It has some cons though that I've noticed.

1: It doesn't support 802.11ac WiFi. No big deal. It supports 802.11n which is fine.
2: It doesn't have a fingerprint scanner. Didn't expect on on a cheap phone.
3: It doesn't have NFC. Won't really miss that. My folks wouldn't know what that was anyway.
4: For some reason the Android buttons (Back, Home, AppsList) are non standard. Home is still in the middle, but back is the right button and the left button is Settings. To get the AppsList it's a long click on home.
5: It has android 5.1 installed. No idea when (if) Marshmallow is coming.

If I was upgrading, I'd have no problem looking at the higher end Cubots if this cheap model is anything to go by.

Hi, How this phone going for your parents.... I'm thinking of getting one for mine too....any updates

mickoneill31

gazzaman22 wrote: »

Hi, How this phone going for your parents.... I'm thinking of getting one for mine too....any updates

It didn't suit my dad. But this was more issues with Android than with the hardware. He's not very patient with new technology so he's a bit hard to support too.
He also is quite outdoorsy and a 5" phone was too big for him.
I put him back on his old phone (an old Windows phone that he's familiar with)

For my mam, it took her some getting used to but this was Android rather than an issue with the phone. I set her up with Viber & Whatsapp and when I'd send her a pic using Viber I'd get a reply back by SMS
And when I'd send a pic sometimes I'd get a call back asking where it went.
But she's gotten used to it and loves it.

One issue I had was with phone covers. I bought two flip over covers from Amazon. They looked great and they fit great but when you take a photo with the flash the flash reflected off the hole over the camera and caused blurry pictures.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B018RV7QT6/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I replaced the cover with a gel cover and it's perfect.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01EWMVCYY/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I installed the paid version of Nova Launchers and made the icons as big as possible for them and locked the icons so I didn't get the "my phone icon has disappeared".

For me, still very happy with the phones. They look like phones that cost €400 or €500 rather than the €125 I paid.

Mr E

Just in case anyone finds this thread in a search:

My mother wants calls and text, but not much more than that.

She got a Doro phone from Vodafone and loves it.
Absolutely no frills (no android, viber, whatsapp etc.) but it's compact and has nice big buttons.

http://shop.vodafone.ie/shop/phones/doro-phone-easy-632-pay-as-you-go-black