iPhone X

[MagisterCultuum]

$20 phone?

I am interested. Where'd you get it?

My first smart phone cost me $5. I bought it from Kroger in December 2015. It would have cost $20 normally, but was on sale for those with a Kroger card. It was an prepaid TracFone with the Android 4.4 Kitkat operating system. It had a 3.5 inch screen, 3g WiFi, and no GPS. It had a mediocre front facing camera. (Initially that was good enough for depositing checks with mobile banking apps, but not after those apps got some updates.) It had only 2gb internal storage, to which I added an 32 gb SD card, but most apps can't be moved to the SD card so I couldn't run very many.

(I bought 3 of these phones at this price. Originally I planned on one being for me and one being a Christmas present for my mom and sister respectively. My mom is too much of a Luddite to upgrade to a smartphone though. My sister ended up losing the one I gave her, switching to the other, and later losing that one too. I still have mine, but after spilling water on it the USB connector no longer works for either data transfer or charging. Before my sister lost her second smart phone, I would swap out the battery after charging it in hers.)

In February of this year I upgraded to another prepaid TracFone from Kroger, which was $50 with my Kroger card and would have been $100 without. It is a Samsung Galaxy Luna, with Android 6.0.1 Marshmellow, with 8 gb internal memory to which I added a 128 gb SD card. (The Adoptable storage feature was the main attraction of Android 6 to me, but unfortunately Samsung disabled that and TracFone went out of its way to try making it impossible to root or jailbreak so I am still limited on how many apps I can use.) It has a 4.5 inch Super AMOLED screen, 4g LTE WiFi, a good GPS, an ok front and back facing camera, etc.

 

[Synobun]

My first smart phone cost me $5. I bought it from Kroger in December 2015. It would have cost $20 normally, but was on sale for those with a Kroger card. It was an prepaid TracFone with the Android 4.4 Kitkat operating system. It had a 3.5 inch screen, 3g WiFi, and no GPS. It had a mediocre front facing camera. (Initially that was good enough for depositing checks with mobile banking apps, but not after those apps got some updates.) It had only 2gb internal storage, to which I added an 32 gb SD card, but most apps can't be moved to the SD card so I couldn't run very many.

(Bought 3 of these phones at this price. Originally I planned on one being for me and one being a Christmas present for my mom and sister respectively. My mom is too much of a Luddite to upgrade to a smartphone though. My sister ended up losing the one I gave her, switching to the other, and later losing that one too. I still have mine, but after spilling water on it the USB connector no longer works for either data transfer or charging. Before my sister lost her second smart phone, I would swap out the battery after charging it in hers.)

In February of this year I upgraded to another prepaid TracFone from Kroger, which was $50 with my Kroger card and would have been $100 without. It is a Samsung Galaxy Luna, with Android 6.0.1 Marshmellow, with 8 gb internal memory to which I added a 128 gb SD card. (The Adoptable storage feature was the main attraction of Android 6 to me, but unfortunately Samsung disabled that and TracFone went out of its way to try making it impossible to root or jailbreak so I am still limited on how many apps I can use.) It has a 4 inch Super AMOLED screen, 4g LTE WiFi, a good GPS, an ok front and back facing camera, etc.

The cheapest smartphone I can get here is about $80.

Flip-phones are slightly more reasonable at $40.

I knew a modern phone for $20 was too good to be true.

The horrible WiFi in my apartment is making it tough to rely on an app for calls, and it also means no calls of any kind while out of the house. Finding cheap solutions that allow calls + reading + Netflix has been a trial.

... as you can tell, the woes of a $1300 phone don't mean much to me.

 

[Zelig]

One of the things I find most disappointing about the phone industry is that asides from iPhone/Pixel ~$1k devices, everything else in the marketplace is trash, by virtue of the software not being supported appropriately. (And Windows, Firefox, Ubuntu, BB, who had comparable update models to Apple, but with lower-cost device options, all exiting, or already having exited the market.)

Hopefully the Treble effort on Android makes stable, quickly-patched versions of LineageOS feasible on sub-$1k devices.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

The cheapest smartphone I can get here is about $80.

Flip-phones are slightly more reasonable at $40.

I knew a modern phone for $20 was too good to be true.

It's more modern than the rotary dial phones we used to have. The one I still used back in '09 (the upstairs phone that wasn't the same as the downstairs one, which was the $10 one I mentioned) was the oldest of our rotary dial phones. That thing was heavy - the sort you could use to knock somebody out like they used to do in TV murder mysteries.


I'll probably have to get one of these new things at some point. It's getting to the point where some things are designed only for people with smartphones, and it's really annoying. London Drugs can send me all the coupons they want; they'll all go unused, since I don't have any way of scanning them, uploading them, or whatever else I'm supposed to do with them.

 

[Zelig]

I opt for just shopping at stores that don't accept coupons, and purchasing items that don't get coupons issued (e.g. you never see coupons for bulk beans). That way I'm always paying lowest prices without wasting my time.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I opt for just shopping at stores that don't accept coupons, and purchasing items that don't get coupons issued (e.g. you never see coupons for bulk beans). That way I'm always paying lowest prices without wasting my time.

How nice, if you have the luxury of being that picky about where you shop.

I have to stick with the places I can afford AND that will deliver in a timely and not-insanely-pricey way.

Example: London Drugs is the store that keeps emailing me coupons I can't use because they're designed for people with smart phones. However, London Drugs is where I bought my new microwave. It was delivered last week via Canada Post and the driver brought it right to my suite, rather than some able-bodied courier whining that he was only obligated to bring it to the door of the building, and he was even doing me a huuuge favor by coming into the parking lot at all.

I'm opted in to the loyalty program of one of the pizza places here. They email me coupon codes pretty much every day (not that I eat pizza that often!), but in that case I don't need a phone to use them - just use the code when placing an online order. Once or twice a month I might use the code for 50% off my order, which makes a very noticeable difference.

 

[Zelig]

I can't imagine there are many people who would describe the luxury of being able to buy beans in bulk as "picky".

 

[Birdjaguar]

For those of you in North America on a tight smart phone budget, Ting.com has a non contract service that ties pricing to volume each month. You can bring your own phone to the program or buy one of their many choices of both new and refurbished. When you call them, a person answers too!

 

[Hygro]

not in canada last I heard (march?), but they sponsor starcraft tournaments so that's rad

 

[Birdjaguar]

not in canada last I heard (march?), but they sponsor starcraft tournaments so that's rad

Damn. Sorry. I was sure that they covered Canada. I apologize.

 

[Synobun]

Damn. Sorry. I was sure that they covered Canada. I apologize.

Our telecommunications industry is... lacking. Oligarchies rule!

 

[Zelig]

I dunno, we've got definite conglomerate and anti-consumer problems, but the CRTC has been doing a pretty good job of regulation since Harper got them in gear, and we have access to world-class service at fairly reasonable prices.

I pay CAD 48/m for 6 GB of data and unlimited nationwide talk/text on a world-class (Telus) network, and we're getting LTE service for Apple Watch significantly cheaper than the US. (4 vs 10 USD per month)

If I lived in America, I'd doubt I'd be able to justify any service other than Project Fi. Mildly surprising Apple doesn't have anything similar - they could crush the carriers with an equivalent service.

 

[warpus]

I pay $38 for 3GB of data a month and when people hear about my deal their jaws drop. Most people here pay $100 a month+ for something like that. Maybe things are different out west but here in Ontario cell phone plan prices are crap

 

[Zelig]

I mean, the ARPU is in the 60/m range, you can see it in the carriers' quarterly results.

 

[warpus]

It's utter crap compared to what Europeans and Asians pay for similar services. Canada's mobile industry is a joke

 

[Zelig]

It's really not, we've got some of the best speeds and coverage in the world, over one of the largest areas, with the fewest people.

Napkin math shows that if you shut down all the retail stores, end any dividend payments, and cut margins to 0%, you're able to drop the average monthly bill by about $10/m. You can work it out yourself from their financial statements if you think you can do any better.

 

[warpus]

I don't know what you're smoking, honestly

 

[civvver]

American prices aren't bad if you bundle 3-4 phones together. A single phone though jeeze, unlimited plans are like $80-100.

I get like 6gbs for $60 including all fees on att.

 

[Thorgalaeg]

I cant figure what a $1350 iphone can do that my $200 Xiaomi mi Max cant, at least to justify such brutal overprice.

 

[Zelig]

I cant figure what a $1350 iphone can do that my $200 Xiaomi mi Max cant, at least to justify such brutal overprice.

Roughly double the speed, much more secure, much better screen.