Seriously, what is the difference between a $100 and a $1000 Android phone?
Android Price Differences
GOFYS on 24/07/2015 - 08:30
Comments
$900
One that works and one that dosen't.
OP's next post…"how long is a piece of string".
They all work, some work better than others.
If you only need phone,text, music,camera and GPS which I do, its pointless buying a phone much more than $50When I do need more than that I use a REAL computer or my 8 inch+ tablet as screen real estate is everything
Better hardware
- CPU/GPU- speed and power efficiency
- RAM- reliability, speed and capacity,
- storage- reliability, speed and capacity,
- screen- resolution, brightness, colour accuracy
- build quality- better solder, better buttons (last longer), higher quality materialsBetter Software
- Security- more up-to date and likely to be maintained into the future
- Features- can do more stuffBetter Support
- Warranty (chinese phones essentially come with none)Having said all that, Chinese phones have never been better. Especially with manufacturers like Ulefone talking about using Open Source projects like Cyanogenmod. Which essentially eliminates the "better software" argument.
What's the difference between a $800 iPhone and a $1200 iPhone?
32GB.
Usually screen, RAM and camera are compromised on the cheaper phones.
Oh yeah, camera I totally forgot about in my above list..
The "13mp" cameras you see on cheap phones are rubbish.But the canon ixus I got for $50 takes great photos so it doesnt matter and I have $1000 in my pocket
Thanks for the list, Scubacoles, but why do people need it, and possibly, like most buyers, I have no idea of what it means in phone terms? I know there's lots of apps out there, but have never seen the need for one. Do they require all the extra features? And thanks for the update about Cyanogenmod, gotta love open source. I'll be on it in a heartbeat.
Davros summed up my expectations, I don't need to take photos of myself or food, need a gps maybe once a month, and Facebook from a computer.
But I still can't imagine why anyone would spend $1000 on the "better" features.
Because better is better.. Plus "all my friends will laugh at me"..
The last one isn't just a teenager issue apparently - I bought my Father in Law a $99 THL4000 cause he wanted a cheap phone with good battery life to replace his flip phone. His ~50 year old friends give him crap about his cheap phone, despite the fact it is perfect for him and does everything their phones do (except run out of battery before the end of the day).
I would hope he was man enough to not give a rats instead of having a tanty and crying in the corner like a spoiled child.
He is, (he loves the phone, can't believe it was so cheap, yet so good and loves that the battery lasts him all week) but it surprised me that 50 year olds knew it was a cheapie let alone cared!
Which makes me think, maybe the 50 year olds didn't know it was a cheapie until he bragged about it to them.
Huh, I thought you were like those people who go android sucks so why buy something expensive. My apologies.
Anyways that'd depend on person, for me, it's more of software support/features and how long I will hold onto it. Many phones that have a lot of xda 'support' are flagships or phones that are nexus related. I also like to not feel like the device is old (minimum requirements for major updates have been increasing). So I tend to grab a flagship that has become slightly outdated. I will probably hold onto the phones I have for a long time.
Lumia 925 is going to be still around the midrange spec next gen for Windows phone. Galaxy s4 active probably won't be, but it'd last me long enough, I reckon.
Next question:
What's the difference between a $1k car and a $100k car?
Spec sheets of multiple phones/OS are freely available in order that one may make a determination. And yes, to an open question, much wastage goes to depreciation & obsolescence, flagship cycles. I am more satisfied by the nexus/Oneplus concepts.
There's definitely real difference between a $100 and a $1000 phone, but what about a $500 phone and a $1000 phone eg Nexus 5/OnePlus 1 vs a Galaxy S4/5? Sure the camera on the S4/5 is better, but is it twice as good? And there are valid arguments the cheaper N5 is a better phone due to stock Android.
So my question is why do people spend $800 and upwards on an Android phone when there are just as good (and some would argue better alternatives) at half the price?
I guess that's why Samsung profits have plunged — people are wising up to the fact that a premium Android phone is basically an oxymoron.
Hmmm, whether N5 is a better phone depends on your perspective. While I don't deny that stock Android is faster (at least, so I've heard) than TouchWiz or any of the manufacturer modification of the Android, they do come with more functions as well (though yes, I wish Samsung stops putting more, but I don't deny that I use the Multi-Window, SoundAlive etc etc). Not to mention, N5 is not the objectively best phone (As you've mentioned, camera is lacklustre).
Not everything increase in the same increments as the increment of the price increase but people choose to spend up to certain point because they are willing to pay that much. Not everything is about bang for the buck. Everyone has that point where they are content with what they have and it's different for everyone. While I don't understand why people would spend over $400~500 on a phone as well , I know that they offer things that lower price phones don't offer. That said, the gap has become smaller than before. I see little reasons to upgrade from a flagship from 2013, the only time that I will upgrade, is when the current phone I own breaks down beyond repair (or if the repair costs more than $200).
What I do think is true is that phone market in general has stopped expanding at the rate it used to expand. Many people now have a phone that works fine for them and they don't have to replace them. It's just that like the CPUs on PC, TV industry, the phone hardware is at that point where the increase in performance from next gen hardware has slowed down. Snapdragon 800 still is a fairly decent processor and that's from 2 years ago. We have less and less reasons to buy next gen unit because the differentiating factor has become smaller and smaller.
Most people never pay outright anyway.. They have a $60/month plan and just renew every 2 years and a new flagship phone is included in the price.
For most people it's just laziness, pure and simple.
They either have no idea that they can get the same plan value at a far lower pricepoint, or their gadget lust is so great that they don't care.
Obvious troll is obvious?
If you want really want an answer, depends. Most of the times, better hardware and better software support.