So with the death of my iPod (that I was only using to browse the net / youtube / reading manga... no music for a while since my library hadn't been updated) and the fact that I'm using a borrowed phone that cost less than £40, I'm now looking to upgrade to the 21st century. I'm basically looking for a no contract smartphone in the region of £300 (can go slightly more, but would be pushing it). I've checked out the Nexus 4 and quite like it, but the easy crackability of the case is a putoff. Anyone have any suggestions for me? As said, will mostly be used for browsing/youtube, with little in the way of actual phone usage
New nexus 4 is due out very shortly, I'd hang about for that. Although you can now get the original Nexus 4 for a massively reduced price for which it's a bargain (around 160 8GB or 199 16gb)
Samsung s3 can be had relatively cheaply now. £285 brand new sim free from Asda. (Would be less 2nd hand) Decent sized screen with a quad core.
Just go with the nexus 4. Hard to argue with it on price and all phones are rather fragile. You could buy two of them for the price of a comparable spec and marginally tougher alternative. I doubt the successor will be worth the £100~ or so more for your use and chances are it'll will have huge stock issues until some time until 2014 assuming the price is competitive.
Question - how much did you by yourself in in the Apple ecosystem ? That is, how many paid apps you have for your iPod Touch and would you feel bad about losing access to them ? That could stop you from moving platforms.
@Minimal_fuss, Mucgoo: Yeah, strongly leaning to the Nexus 4... might wait a few days/weeks to see what the next one is like 1st. @Faugusztin: Zip, Zilch Nada. Only used free apps, but the files/data I'd downloaded/written I had saved on it was a big loss (mostly because of Apple's ****ing limit on different PC's you could sync to, which I'd reached years ago due to new PC's or OS reinstalls). Biggest hits were to my book collection and to all the notes and partial chapters of a novel I'd started planning out and was slowly updating. Thankfully I have some backups of the books or hard copies, and most of my notes were transferred to paper copies. A lot of reference material was lost, some of them obscure enough that I don't remember what they were, but hopefully will be able to recognise them if I get hints/see them again.
I bought a 2nd hand Galaxy Note a while back. Cost me less than £200 in pretty much 'new' condition. I wanted the bigger screen so it could serve as my all-in-one bridging device between phone, e-reader, and tablet. I'm very happy with my decision.
The N4 is an epic phone. So many features for such good value. The main problems include, as you say, the fragility of the case (mine cracked within a few months of using it, but it isn't really a problem), and the fact that during prolonged use it becomes rather warm. I clocked mine at 52 degrees, although that was on a hot day while playing Ingress (a GPU intensive app) constantly for a few hours prior. Under normal use it is fine.
Id say nexus 4 and a decent hard case. Im using a hard case at the moment. Its slim but tough. Though no screen protection. Oddly a friend busted the gorilla glass in his phone recently. New Nexus will be my phone of choice once im out of contract.
You can under settings reset our account so its linked to no pcs again then just pop your password in again on your current pc
That's exactly what put me off the Nexus 4 when I was looking. I'm careful with phones but even then I've managed to drop my S4 twice in 5 months. It survived both times unscathed - I'm not convinced a N4 would have done...
With the amount of times I've dropped my iPod (mostly from leaving the headphones in when I get up from my desk), I'm surprised it hadn't broken before now. That's why I don't really want a fragile phone like the N4, even though it looks good
That was literally the only thing that put me off. I went for the S4 in the end but don't know what they cost sim free as I'm on a contract.
Going to be controversial and suggest a Lumia... mine's been tough as old boots. Your budget would get you a 920, which has a 4.5" screen, or a 625 which has a 4.7" screen but slower processor. Worth considering!
