Shirt Pocket (<-5.4~ screen) Phone Wanted

[Drezha]

Missed your comment on the 4a as well – I’ve got one alongside my iPhone and it performs reasonably well. I have Locus Maps on there, with maps purchased from Thorn Maps.

"Everything looks interesting until you do it. Then you find it’s just another job" - Terry Pratchett

[keith with the teef]

How about TCL phones.

[Ed P]

On my current Android I use OsmAnd+ which for a small fee allows me to have access to always updated UK, European and rest of World OpenStreet maps. The output is very similar to the Cachly map. (thanks for that). IIrc terrain did cost me a little extra, as would coastal water or cycle track data, but at the time I thought it  worth the fee to get offline updated access. (runs into quite a few Gb however!).

What is your iPhone like in the sun? I must confess to always being underwhelmed by most phones in that respect, the Swift being pretty poor as well. From a very limited number of reviews (in 2012!), Samsung performs the best in that respect, however all the reviews use the same test results and only the iPhone4 is tested. In another review the Google Pixel 4a is utter carp except in the shade because for some malign reason Google have disabled the high intensity option and a full root is required to get it back!

[Ed P]

@Drezha, Scrub the question, though I’m always interested in your opinion.

I actually found some objective data on brightness and contrast ratios for a number of phones and the iPhone SE performs pretty well though the Samsung still outperforms. link

[Ed P]

To my surprise my Apple-mad son said its iPhone 12 mini or Pixel 4a. Because he could not justify the price difference he came down on the side of the Pixel 4a. His other choice was the 5.8″  Samsung 10e but said it would have to be an Amazon reject to meet my mid-range price points.

[PlaneMan]

I would recommended the Mi Mix 3 5G but it’s big. Brilliant value though. 

[Wheels-Of-Fire]

If you CAN stretch to the S10e then you won’t be disappointed.

[Drezha]

Mid range, I’d probably go for the SE (2020) rather than the iPhone 12 Mini and save £300.

Apple suggests that the 12 Mini is better screen wise. I haven’t really had issues with the 11 I have (or the Apple Watch, which is also a screen…) The Pixel is reasonable, but I haven’t taken it out in the sun for a while now.

From a benchmark POV, the iPhone trumps the Pixel. And that’s iPhone 11 and Pixel 4a. However, the Pixel is still a cracking phone. Whilst I’m firmly in the Apple ecosystem (cemented over Christmas with the purchase of a Homepod), there are aspects on Android I like, and the Pixel 4a was money well spent (it’s currently being used as my work phone until the replacement iPhone arrives). If I wasn’t in the Apple ecosystem, I’d be happy with the Pixel.

"Everything looks interesting until you do it. Then you find it’s just another job" - Terry Pratchett

[Ed P]

I was playing around with the economics of purchase, and as I do not change phones until they die I came to realise that I should really be looking at phones in terms of purchase price/year. Using that viewpoint the pecking order changes considerably with the iPhone 12 mini, edging out the Pixel 5 which in turn edges out the Pixel 4a. (Pixel 5 starts out one ahead on the Android releases and has bigger battery that should last longer)

All moot at the moment as the Pixel seems to be stocked out in my preferred locations, so that gives me even more time to mull this over.

[Ed P]

After much mulling and pfaffing around it occurred to me that I only buy a phone when the old one is about to die.

My Apple-mad son’s wife exists on his hand-me-downs and her current iPhone is 7+ years old. Using that as a benchmark I should divide the Apple 12 mini’s £700 by 7.5, versus a Google Pixel 4a’s £400 by ~3.5 (A Pixel 5 would give a better cost/year figure but not beat that of the Apple.

In case you want to know, I proxied the battery life by taking the ratio of how many hours one phone charge lasted. (Battery life is directly dependent on the numbers of full charges that are applied.  That is why the Pixel 5 comes out better than the 4a on my reckoning.)

Bottom line I decided to swallow hard join the dark-side and treat myself to a phone that I might with luck only have to renew once! B-)

[Drezha]

Just seen this posted in a Mac forum I frequent – perhaps one to keep in mind if you have a pacemaker (and your shirt pocket storage!)

https://www.heartrhythmjournal.com/article/S1547-5271(20)31227-3/fulltext

That is one perk of the iPhones is that they last a while. The 6S here is still perfectly capable, other than the battery and is on the latest iOS! That’s a 5 year old phone, with the most recent software! I’m not sure an Android from 5 years ago would get that.

"Everything looks interesting until you do it. Then you find it’s just another job" - Terry Pratchett

[Ed P]

Agree on the OS front, that was one of the clinching factors in my divisor, as with an equivalent Google OS plan their battery life potential would have been much better, and I would have gone down the Pixel 5 route.

The other plus with the iPhone is that for reasonable ££s Apple will put in a new battery, and my son assures me that if I take out the AppleCare plan that they will replace the battery if it did not perform to expectations within the warranty period (not sure what that means! :unsure: )

[Ed P]

I

I forgot to add, I used the GSMArena battery ratings to proxy the battery replacement period.

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