Suggestions for a smartphone

FWIW I carry my G4 Play in my left front pocket and it is quite comfortable for me but I tend to like loose fitting shorts and pants.

My sons and myself have the moto g4. DH has the moto g4 play. He used to have the E4 - but it kept running out of memory.

My sister is in the evaluation stage of replacing her cell and is looking at the Moto G5.

The G4 is nice because it is universal (GSM and CDMA) and unlocked... My kids and DH are on the CDMA flavor of Ting, I'm on the GSM flavor of Ting... This worked out great on our summer 3 week road trip - one of us always had coverage...

If you're a Amazon Prime member check their latest offerings. The advertising is very unobtrusive and the prices are great.

My 81 year old MIL got an iPhone 7 after many years of having a flip phone she only used for occasional calls. She absolutely loves it and has discovered a whole new world with it. She now texts photos regularly, uses FaceTime for calls with us, and uses Spotify for music. I'm sure other phones can do similar things but iPhones are quite intuitive and easy to learn to use. She is thrilled with her phone and learns a new thing she can do with it almost every week.

A bit of information for those AT&T subscribers flowers wishing to purchase the Moto E4 Unlocked. On Motorola's web site is a page describing the carrier compatibility of their cell phones. For AT&T and the Moto E4 Unlocked is the following comment:

device is compatible with service provider’s network but some service provider specific features may not be available.

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Motorola couldn't (or wouldn't?) tell me which features those were, as I was advised to contact AT&T. After much hair pulling, AT&T indicated that since the Moto E4 was not on their list of supported cell phones (no idea why), you cannot use the Moto E4 to access the Wi-Fi calling feature within AT&T. Not having a Wi-Fi capable cell phone before, I am not sure how often one would use this feature. But I figured I would report back for those who were browsing this thread.

statsman said:

A bit of information for those AT&T subscribers flowers wishing to purchase the Moto E4 Unlocked. On Motorola's web site is a page describing the carrier compatibility of their cell phones. For AT&T and the Moto E4 Unlocked is the following comment:
Motorola couldn't (or wouldn't?) tell me which features those were, as I was advised to contact AT&T. After much hair pulling, AT&T indicated that since the Moto E4 was not on their list of supported cell phones (no idea why), you cannot use the Moto E4 to access the Wi-Fi calling feature within AT&T. Not having a Wi-Fi capable cell phone before, I am not sure how often one would use this feature. But I figured I would report back for those who were browsing this thread.

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This may impact you deep in a building. My w*rk building has cell repeaters so it isn't a problem for me. Otherwise, it doesn't really come into play. I've never had a problem with call connectivity except for those times I'm out in the desert (wifi won't help) or deep in the bowels of some faraday structure. Most Starbucks (AT&T shops) have wide open access to the cells also.

You also don't get all their other "wonderful" features like crappy apps and mods.

Ian S said:

I have had my Galaxy S5 for two years (TMobile) and have been very happy with it. It's a decent size and is running on Android 6 (Marshmallow). It has several nice features including water resistance, microSD card and a swappable battery that Samsung left off the successor S6. Its blue tooth connectivity is good and it has a nice display. While it was the Samsung flagship and even afterwards, it topped the Consumer Report smartphone reviews. I'll probably eventually get a replacement but have seen nothing compelling recently. I bought a spare battery and charger/holder so I rarely worry about battery life. It takes less than a minute to swap out the battery.

Whatever phone you get - especially an older one - make sure it comes with a recent version of Android or can be updated. I probably wouldn't buy one that didn't already have at least Android 6.

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Quick question about your S5. How is the volume levels? I've read a lot of reviews and buyer comments about the volume levels being low with the S5. Ringtone, caller volume, headphone volume, etc.

Nearly all of the "new" S5s I might find are probably still at Android 4.4.2. I was told I had two options: let AT&T push the upgrade once I had the S5 on their network, or take the S5 to the Samsung counter at a local Best Buy (there are probably 4-5 Best Buys within a 15 minute drive from home). If I did go with the S5, I probably would go with the latter route.

Ian S said:

Whatever phone you get - especially an older one - make sure it comes with a recent version of Android or can be updated. I probably wouldn't buy one that didn't already have at least Android 6.

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I found a Galaxy S5 Active for $158. A corporate buy back, it looks like the phone has been sitting in its original retail box unused. Got the SIM card replaced and the smartphone activated today. Appears to have come with Android 6.0.1 (AT&T lists this as the latest OS). The S5 and S5 Active cannot be upgraded to Android 7+ (well, not without a hack). I don't plan to use this phone to access any financial account we have. That was going to be the case regardless of the smartphone we purchased.

This smartphone is overkill for my needs, but at the cost, it was worth the investment to try. The display is stunning for a 3+ year old model, and I have a tempered screen protector already installed. It's a bit larger than I planned, but it's almost the exact same size as the Moto E4, albeit slightly heavier (170g vs 150g).

Thank you to everyone who responded to this thread with suggestions for a smartphone.

statsman said:

I found a Galaxy S5 Active for $158. A corporate buy back, it looks like the phone has been sitting in its original retail box unused. Got the SIM card replaced and the smartphone activated today. Appears to have come with Android 6.0.1 (AT&T lists this as the latest OS). The S5 and S5 Active cannot be upgraded to Android 7+ (well, not without a hack). I don't plan to use this phone to access any financial account we have. That was going to be the case regardless of the smartphone we purchased.

This smartphone is overkill for my needs, but at the cost, it was worth the investment to try. The display is stunning for a 3+ year old model, and I have a tempered screen protector already installed. It's a bit larger than I planned, but it's almost the exact same size as the Moto E4, albeit slightly heavier (170g vs 150g).

Thank you to everyone who responded to this thread with suggestions for a smartphone.

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Sorry I didn't get back to you but I've been traveling and had limited time to check on forums. I'm sure you'll be happy with the S5 active - not sure of the differences from the plain S5. I would have said that the volume on my S5 seems adequate to me. I have looked at other smartphones but just haven't seen one that makes me want to upgrade. Android 6.0.1 will be supported for sometime to come IMHO. I've had Android phones since 1.7 was the latest and greatest and feel that there were bigger changes from version to version in those days than there are today. Good luck! Sounds like you got a good deal on that phone. I'd recommend you get a second battery and charger and swap back and forth on occasion to extend the life. Often I find that batteries start to fail long before the phone and by the time they do it may be hard to find a good quality replacement.

Ian S said:

Sorry I didn't get back to you but I've been traveling and had limited time to check on forums. I'm sure you'll be happy with the S5 active - not sure of the differences from the plain S5. I would have said that the volume on my S5 seems adequate to me. I have looked at other smartphones but just haven't seen one that makes me want to upgrade. Android 6.0.1 will be supported for sometime to come IMHO. I've had Android phones since 1.7 was the latest and greatest and feel that there were bigger changes from version to version in those days than there are today. Good luck! Sounds like you got a good deal on that phone. I'd recommend you get a second battery and charger and swap back and forth on occasion to extend the life. Often I find that batteries start to fail long before the phone and by the time they do it may be hard to find a good quality replacement.

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The S5 Active has a sturdier case that is slightly larger and heavier than the S5. I am not sure it is any more water resistant, but it appears to be a bit more dust/dirt resistant. The back waterproof speaker is almost twice as large as on the S5, improving volume levels compared to the S5.

Some trade-offs of the S5 Active are: no fingerprint scanner, USB 2.0 instead of USB 3.0, and no ability to add a wireless charging module internal to the back cover.

I've seen the suggestion to purchase a spare battery and standalone charger for the S5, which I think applies to the S5 Active. I am not a heavy user, and even with a lot of tinkering with the phone for the first two days, I still had 19% battery life left.

But this does point to my one worry with the S5 Active, which also applied to the S5: having the USB port malfunction or fail. I've seen the videos on replacing the USB port, and it looks like a nightmare of a task. Fingers crossed this one doesn't fail on me.

statsman said:

The S5 Active has a sturdier case that is slightly larger and heavier than the S5. I am not sure it is any more water resistant, but it appears to be a bit more dust/dirt resistant. The back waterproof speaker is almost twice as large as on the S5, improving volume levels compared to the S5.

Some trade-offs of the S5 Active are: no fingerprint scanner, USB 2.0 instead of USB 3.0, and no ability to add a wireless charging module internal to the back cover.

I've seen the suggestion to purchase a spare battery and standalone charger for the S5, which I think applies to the S5 Active. I am not a heavy user, and even with a lot of tinkering with the phone for the first two days, I still had 19% battery life left.

But this does point to my one worry with the S5 Active, which also applied to the S5: having the USB port malfunction or fail. I've seen the videos on replacing the USB port, and it looks like a nightmare of a task. Fingers crossed this one doesn't fail on me.

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The USB port seems quite sturdy especially considering my obsessiveness regarding always sticking it on the charger even if it's only down 20%. The tiny plastic cover on the S5's usb port can break off when handled with excessive roughness but it's an easy fix with plenty of suppliers of the part on Amazon. Not sure if same applies to the active S5. Upon further thought, I've not had a usb port fail on any phone I've had so it's not something I worry about.

I would recommend an Apple iPhone SE. They are about $200 and far better than the cheapie Android phones.

Ian S said:

The USB port seems quite sturdy especially considering my obsessiveness regarding always sticking it on the charger even if it's only down 20%. The tiny plastic cover on the S5's usb port can break off when handled with excessive roughness but it's an easy fix with plenty of suppliers of the part on Amazon. Not sure if same applies to the active S5. Upon further thought, I've not had a usb port fail on any phone I've had so it's not something I worry about.

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The USB port cover on the S5 Active seems more sturdy than with the S5. But I read about owners breaking off the USB covers on most phones, so who knows.

After having my S5 Active for a couple of weeks, my wife decided she wanted the same smartphone. She's wanted a smartphone for quite some time but could never justify the $700-800 cost for one. Both of us are quite pleased with the S5 Active, especially for the cost of what were essentially new, unused phones.

Only complaint I have, which also applies to most Samsung smartphones running Android 5 and 6 (don't know about 7) is the Message app. If you are in the Message app and have open a specific message thread, the app does not notify you via sound/vibrate if that person sends you a message.

Samsung claims this is a "feature", believing if a message thread is open, you are looking at it (although this wasn't the case for Android 4.4). Sometimes, I have a message thread open but put my phone into screen lock because I am waiting for a message from someone. If I exit to the list of message threads or exit the Message app completely, I do receive sound notification for a new message. Not a huge issue, just something I am not used to.

My life is not this complicated. I have a basic cell phone. If it rings while im driving, they wait till my trip is done. I cant yap on the phone and concentrate on driving. Blue tooth or not i find it very distracting.

If you're wanting to go cheap just pick out an android go phone at ATT. Should be under $50. That's what I do when a kid looses one and needs a replacement. They still have all the features but the camera might not be the highest resolution

Ian S said:

The USB port seems quite sturdy especially considering my obsessiveness regarding always sticking it on the charger even if it's only down 20%. The tiny plastic cover on the S5's usb port can break off when handled with excessive roughness but it's an easy fix with plenty of suppliers of the part on Amazon. Not sure if same applies to the active S5. Upon further thought, I've not had a usb port fail on any phone I've had so it's not something I worry about.

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I have an S7 but still have the S5 I used previously. I always keep the previous phone as insurance in case there is a problem with the new one. When I replace the S7 down the road, I'll keep it for backup and sell or give the S5 to a friend or family member.

I use whatever phone my wife does not want any more. Currently, I have an S5, my wife has an S7 (Her S6 was lost when we were on vacation in Cancun). She has been looking to buy an S8. Her "reason" is to give me a better phone.

Bir48die said:

Samsung's are like having a mini pad. I would need a murse to hold it. I had an IPhone 5 forever until I got frustrated with the battery. Just got a IPhone 6s and very pleased. I am not all that keen on Android handhelds.

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DW got an iPhone 5 from a friend who had got a 6. Battery never worked. Got it replaced for $40 in 20 minutes. Now it works great.

Whatever phone you get, remember that your monthly carrier costs over the life of the phone will far exceed the cost of even the most expensive phones.

Music Lover said:

I have an S7 but still have the S5 I used previously. I always keep the previous phone as insurance in case there is a problem with the new one. When I replace the S7 down the road, I'll keep it for backup and sell or give the S5 to a friend or family member.

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I do the same except my backup phone is an S2.