What's the point of buying new phones every years?

Other than your carrier give it for free or cheap, I don’t really see the reason why should you buy new phone. I’ve been using Redmi Note 9 for past 3 years and recently got my had on Poco F5. I don’t see the point of my ‘upgrade’. I sold it and come back to my Note 9. Gaming? Most of them are p2w or microtransaction garbage or just gimped version of its PC/Console counterpart. I mean, $400 still get you PS4, TV and Switch if you don’t mind buying used. At least here where I live. Storage? Dude, newer phone wont even let you have SD Card. Features? Well, all I see is newer phones take more features than it adds. Headphone jack, more ads, and repairability are to name a few. Battery? Just replace them. However, my Note 9 still get through day with one 80% charge in the dawn. Which takes 1 hour.

I am genuinely curious why newer phone always selling like hot cakes. Since there’s virtually no difference between 4gb of RAM and 12gb of RAM, or 12mp camera and 100mp camera on phone.

harmonea,
@harmonea@kbin.social avatar

Gaming? Most of them are p2w or microtransaction garbage

And? You may not like them, but there's clearly an audience.

Don't buy a new phone if you don't want one, but why be so mad that other people have reasons you don't?

Freeman,

There are many good games, paid and free but no p2w, as well. They just advertise less.

float,

Galaxy S10e gang checking in. Resoldered the USB port because it was corroded. Everything else is working perfectly fine. No plans to ditch it as of now.

TheAnonymouseJoker,
@TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml avatar

Got any clues on a modern compact device, other than Asus Zenfone 10? Its getting so bad for us compact enjoyers, and all the research makes me end up either on Zenfones, Sonys and budget Oppos/Vivos.

MixedUpMarbles,

There is a HUGE difference in 4 and 12 GB of ram if you’re using 20 different apps at once that are all running background tasks.

The camera raw megapixel are of little significance these days but things like optical zoom or a larger sensor and aperture make a lot of difference.

The main reason to upgrade otherwise is unsupported OS versions. you’ll stop getting security updates leaving your phone vulnerable to attack.

TheAnonymouseJoker,
@TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml avatar

4 GB is not sufficient. Glad to have bought a 6 GB RAM device 4 years ago. 6-8 GB RAM is more than sufficient, 12 is overkill. There is some device now even with 24 GB RAM.

woobie,

The only time I ever “upgrade” is when I break a phone beyond reasonable repair. If batteries were easier / more cost effective to replace, I would keep this Pixel 4a a few more years. The battery is starting to lose capacity now, I’ll have to check on the cost of battery replacement before too long.

Considering a Fairphone next time I do upgrade.

daddyjones,
@daddyjones@lemmy.world avatar

As someone who is currently using a fairphone 3, I cannot recommend it.

The idea is good, but let down by very cheap hardware. The fact is that, when you get the phone brand new, it’s already a very low end phone. Still having it 3 years later just means that it’ll be even worse. The fact that you can repair/replace most of it (but not upgrade) doesn’t change that fact.

I have been so disappointed with the experience on mine and would’ve replaced it ages ago if I could afford to.

Have to say, though, security updates are good.

Yoz,

Same. My next phone will be fairphone.

hydro033,

Batteries are cheap to replace.

amir_s89,
@amir_s89@lemmy.ml avatar

An important change is happening in many industries/ markets. To make devices easy to repair & enable OS updates many more years for long term use.

ghostwolf,
@ghostwolf@lemmy.fakeplastictrees.ee avatar

I spoke about this with a person, who wanted to get a new phone and replace their 3yo model. Ultimately, they just wanted a new thing, because it’d make them happier. That’s irrational.

DJDarren,

It’s not irrational when almost every piece of media we see is somehow designed to make us want The New Things. Companies spend a lot of money working out how to convince us that we’re dissatisfied with what we have.

Also, it’s kind of sensible to upgrade after three years, when the device you have is still feasibly worth something on the second hand market.

Pssk,
@Pssk@lemmy.ml avatar

I have been using my poco f1 for more than 4 years now, the only problem i have had is the battery. It has an sdcard slot, headphone jack, 6gb of ram which has been more than enough and latest lineageos is supported. see fsfe.org/activities/…/index.en.html

Blaze,
@Blaze@iusearchlinux.fyi avatar

Sorry for hijacking this thread, how do you like the Poco F5? It’s currently on my radar

El_Rocha,

I switched to the Poco F5 from my Mi Mix 2S. Overall I think it’s probably the best bang for buck in the category. If you know your way around MIUI’s shennanigans, it should be pretty great. The only complaint I have (it’s really small) is that I was used to tap the power button for shortcuts, but now that becomes weird because it always unlocks the phone.

Blaze,
@Blaze@iusearchlinux.fyi avatar

Thank you!

TheAnonymouseJoker,
@TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml avatar

Huawei P30 Lite. 4 years. More or less 1:1 size of S10e, compact enjoyer with big hands. Got battery replaced for a whopping $20, officially. No security problems, keep my Firefox with uBO updated, solid firewalling and app permissions in check.

I have a whopping total of 5 closed source apps (including Whatsapp and Discord sandboxed in work profile) with internet connection, all of which are fully safe as far as security goes, if not privacy. One of the other apps is safe for privacy as well. All of my apps that are not these 5, are installed from F-Droid.

I will upgrade though, because the camera on this at night is no longer competent enough, and there are camera sensors far superior than 1/2.8" on main and 1/4.0" on ultrawide. (1/1.0" main and 1/1.5" ultrawide are peak hardware these days, amounting to atleast 2x better photos and videos which is significant and worth it.)

DJDarren,

Because the megacorps who make the phones like money and that’s how they get it.

From an individual perspective, unless you can afford it and like having the new phones, there’s basically no point in upgrading every year.

solrize,

I have Android 7 and Jerboa {the official Lemmy app) requires Android 8 or higher. So people told me to upgrade but I wasn’t having that. It turns out there is a fork with Android 6 and 7 support that might get merged into mainline, so my phone will be cool for a while longer. But the upgrade pressure is out there.

godofpainTR,

Android 7 is quite old though, isn’t there any custom ROM development for your phone? I know there are downsides but it’s usually been fine for me

solrize, (edited )

I am not sure of the custom rom situation but I use this phone every day so I don’t want to mess with it. I can consider it if I get a new phone while the old one still works.

001100010010,
@001100010010@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

You can use the web version and hold on to your phone even longer 😉

solrize,

I had trouble with the web version but it works now so I’m using it. I’ll try Jerboa again sometime. I had to uninstall the 0.17 fork I was using after lemmy.world upgraded it’s backend.

I_Miss_Daniel,
@I_Miss_Daniel@kbin.social avatar

For me it's either when I find the included RAM is too small (as apps grow over time) or when the flash memory degrades to a noticeable degree, or when the camera loading takes too long.

Kolanaki,
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

I only get a new phone when my current phone just dies. The hardware for even the best phones out there really doesn’t change much even in 5 year spans. It’s actually kind of annoying. The biggest difference between the phone I have now and the first smart phone I ever had is a few hundred cycles faster CPU and it has 4 cameras instead of just 2.

I wish these things were like a desktop PC and I could just buy parts and build it myself so I could have the raw power I want.

No difference between 4GB of RAM and 12GB

You… You’re serious? I guess if you’re a super casual user, it won’t matter. But if you want to do more at once, you need more RAM. Shit, even if you don’t more RAM does make a difference when the apps start consuming more and more as time goes on.

nihilomaster,

I wish these things were like a desktop PC and I could just buy parts and build it myself so I could have the raw power I want.

So when my last phone was nearing death i finally made the decision to get myself a Fairphone. Plan is to save money in the long run by just replacing parts as they break not the whole device. Plus it’s one of the only phones out there with a replaceable battery. The modular design makes it quite bulky but I actually like that as well.

godofpainTR,

My old phone with 3GB ram was hell (granted it had a weak SoC too). Now that I have 8GB (on a midrange phone too), it’s become much more enjoyable to use my phone. Everything is snappy, nothing ever freezes

FiftyShadesOfMyCow,

The Megapixel “argument” is also laughable. Like you said, casuals can’t know the difference.

sagrotan,
@sagrotan@lemmy.world avatar

My mother in law died after long sickness and she kinda connected phones, not the best, not the most expensive, but now I’m stuck with 8 phones, all ok for me, this one has that, and that one has this, I’m very confused what I should do, but on principle I’ll never to buy a phones for 1300 € plus, that’s about what a decent one would cost me these days, nope, never. Now I’m up to rooting My collection of Chinese spying apparati, yeah! I WILL SURVIVE THIS! Cheaply!

Shurimal,

I upgrade when the opsys gets hopelessly outdated (as in apps no longer supporting it) or the device physically breaks. My last phone (Huawei Ascend P7) lasted for 7 years, but the Android 4.4 got just a bit too old, plus I cracked the screen a month after removing the battered to hell glass screen protector...

I don't care much about the phone not getting OS updates since I don't keep anything important on a phone in the first place and I don't care much about CPU/GPU performance since I don't run intensive apps on my phone—that's what my desktop and server are for. My current phone I bought last year will last probably for 5 more years.

Thorny_Thicket,

I had to wait 6 years untill someone released a device that’s atleast in some aspects better than the one I already had. If I were forced to switch every year I’d hate most of them.

Switched from LG V20 to Galaxy XCover 6Pro

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