There's so much info online about all these Droid phones and they all say the same thing; either the battery life is horrible & don't get it OR this phone is the best phone of them all. None of it seems to be objective or up to date (most the articles are a year or so old).
I'm on the Verizon network and don't want an iPhone, and want to keep the cost at/under $200. From what I've seen the best resolutions are at LEAST 960x540. A physical keyboard isn't a huge selling point for me, I guess over the last 3 years or so the virtual keyboards have gotten better.
So far the Droid Bionic, Droid X2, and Droid 3 seem like the best ones out there... so I wanted other people's two cents. Which of these are the best, or is there another one aside from these 3 that's superior?
I personally am going to be buying the Xperia Play by Sony Ericsson here next month most likely - its 499 without a contract but since your w/ verizon not sure how much that would cost.
I personally am going to be buying the Xperia Play by Sony Ericsson here next month most likely - its 499 without a contract but since your w/ verizon not sure how much that would cost.
That particular phone is free w/ a contract with Verizon. I know it's supposed to be the Sony intro to the phone market (so the gaming phone pretty much) but I don't really have much interest for gaming much on my phone. Also the resolution on it isn't bad but it's not the best around.
Could you guys (who already have their Android phones) report your approx. battery lives? How long you go between charges, how much you use it on a daily basis, etc. Thanks!
Well I just put my phone on charge; I had about 25% left from 8am > 9pm (13 hours) usage.
I was playing on it for about 3 hours today and surfing the net for probably 1 hour total - so If you are going heavy on use it will last about a day.
If you aren't burning it full force then it certainly will last a lot longer.
And just to clarify. The Razr is TECHNICALLY faster than the Nexus and the S2. People just go for those phones as they are popular (it's the Apple Iphone band-wagon thing all over again).
The Razr needs the ICS update agreed; but it is faster than those phones and usually cheaper. I did a lot of research before I bought it - But it's all personal preference.
What kind of data usage do you go through normally? I know that it's tiered when it comes to plans, so I was curious where a few hours of surfing the web would land me. I like to read the news on my phone normally, which shouldn't be taking up too much data usage, though watching stuff on Youtube or IMDB would be likely as well.
Does anyone own a Droid Bionic? I'd really love to hear some feedback if someone does; good & bad things when it comes to their phone.
Leeodin, as far as contract costs go it's like this for Verizon;
300mb - $20
4gb - $30
10gb - $50
20gb - $80
I'm thinking the right plan for me would probably be the 4gb data bundle. 300mb is obviously not very much (and I wouldn't want to go over) but I don't facebook much or twitter at all, so I'm not like some teenager blowin' up the data usage on their phone.
Well, I swung by the Verizon store the other day for a quick second to see the Droid Bionic, Droid X2, and Droid 3 in person. I don't really think I like the Droid 3 after all (not really into the slide-out keyboard) but only took a second to look over the other two. The one thing that stood out was how much larger (height & width) they are than my current LG Voyager, though of course quite a bit thinner. I'm wondering how well these will fit in the average pair of jeans.
So, I happened to have forgot (until today) that I work at a department store with a Verizon vendor in it. Because of that, I can get my phone from there with a 15% discount on top of everything else. Suddenly, I'm torn between the Droid RAZR and the Droid Bionic, though I'm still not settled on the price difference between them. After it's all said and done however, I'll either be spending $181 for the Droid RAZR, or $91 for the Droid Bionic after tax. Is the RAZR really worth 2x as much as the Bionic?
I also got a Razr a few days ago and its great. Battery life is quite short just like any other smart phone. But thats only if you mess around all the time... If its used mostly for calls and texts and just sometimes checking something like a mail, then it can last a whole day... If you go surfing and downloading shit ten taking pictures and playing games,,, 4 hours max.
The Razr is thin but it has a thick section where the camera is which is quite shitty in my opinion. The round edges dont look that good but it has a great fast camera a really good screen (it looks sick on brightest) and ice scream sandwich.
I am pretty sure that the Razr is cheaper than the S2. i dont know anything about the Bionic though.
I dont know why but i wont be 100% honest if i'd told you to buy a Razr. I'd give it a 8/10... Nexus could be a 10/10 imo but yeah its more expensive.
I also got a Razr a few days ago and its great. Battery life is quite short just like any other smart phone. But thats only if you mess around all the time... If its used mostly for calls and texts and just sometimes checking something like a mail, then it can last a whole day... If you go surfing and downloading shit ten taking pictures and playing games,,, 4 hours max.
The Razr is thin but it has a thick section where the camera is which is quite shitty in my opinion. The round edges dont look that good but it has a great fast camera a really good screen (it looks sick on brightest) and ice scream sandwich.
I am pretty sure that the Razr is cheaper than the S2. i dont know anything about the Bionic though.
I dont know why but i wont be 100% honest if i'd told you to buy a Razr. I'd give it a 8/10... Nexus could be a 10/10 imo but yeah its more expensive.
Good luck.
Actually the RAZR and the Galaxy Nexus are both $299 with a contract (the same price as the RAZR) before discounts and stuff.
I also got a Razr a few days ago and its great. Battery life is quite short just like any other smart phone. But thats only if you mess around all the time... If its used mostly for calls and texts and just sometimes checking something like a mail, then it can last a whole day... If you go surfing and downloading shit ten taking pictures and playing games,,, 4 hours max.
The Razr is thin but it has a thick section where the camera is which is quite shitty in my opinion. The round edges dont look that good but it has a great fast camera a really good screen (it looks sick on brightest) and ice scream sandwich.
I am pretty sure that the Razr is cheaper than the S2. i dont know anything about the Bionic though.
I dont know why but i wont be 100% honest if i'd told you to buy a Razr. I'd give it a 8/10... Nexus could be a 10/10 imo but yeah its more expensive.
Good luck.
It depends what you want from a phone I think?
Personally I don't think you can rate a phone on looks as it is such a subjective thing. I really like how it looks and the slight bump at the top gives it some much needed weight (as it is very light).
I also can't rate the Nexus as they re new out; all I know is that in benchmarks the Razr matches / out performs the Nexus EXCEPT that it does not come with ICS pre-installed.
So as I said earlier, if you are a tech-head; the Razr is currently the one capable of the highest performance; it has a unique look that seems to be a love/hate. I personally love it.
The battery life; I work from 6am > 2pm and then didnt charge it until 10pm and with moderate use (as in not constant but certainly not idle in my pocket) it held up for the day with about 20% left; rating it higher than the Nexus for battery at the moment.
Personally I'd say it was a 9/10. The faults for me are not the look but:
- No ICS intially
- Motorola and not the popular choice or poster child. (this is only if you care about that though)
Everything else I find to be perfect.
But a phone is a personal thing; go play with the Razr for a bit before you commit to buy
The last line is probably the best one, but it's so awkward standing in a Verizon store playing with their phones with no immediate commitment to buy. I'd like to play with em for a lil' and then go home and think about it.
Overall, at the moment, I'm more feeling the RAZR than anything else, maybe because it's got a unique look to it as opposed to the normal-looking rectangle that is the Nexus. That and it's got great performance specs all across the board. I'll have to go down there and play with each for a few mins at least, get a feel for 'em and whatnot.
First of all - don't buy from Verizon. At Christmas time, I was looking into an Incredible 2 from various sources for my wife. It seemed to be a good combination of cost and performance from an HTC phone. I've got an Incredible 1 myself, so I knew the Inc 2 would be great as well.
I checked VZW - $100. Some sort of rebate was available, but I've never gotten ANY of my rebates back from them ($150 worth over the last few years).
Next, I went for Amazon Wireless. Theirs was $30, but I was nervous about doing it online and accidentally changing the plan to the new "all your money are belong to us" plans.
Later, I went to Best Buy and Radio Shack. Both of them had insane deals - $0 (yes, free) for the Inc 2. Even better, the Thunderbolt, which was way more at VZW, was only $50. We ended up buying a phone at Best Buy. VZW doesn't have 4g specific plans, so we opted for the faster network you get with the Thunderbolt. As a bonus, at that time you got double the data for the same price if you upgraded to 4g smartphones. It took them a little while to get the phone added because of the old Alltel plan she has, but it was totally worth it.
So, moral of the story, don't buy through VZW.
-----------------
As for the phone, I've fallen in love with HTC. Any HTC phone should be a good bet, but I suggest the Thunderbolt for sure. I thought I wouldn't like the larger screen as compared to my Inc, but it's actually really awesome. Not to mention, it's quite fast and the 4g network does a great job. It does not have the hardware keyboard, just the touch keyboard.
I never fell in love with the Motorola Droids, some people love em, others don't. If you go Moto, I really have no idea what's good and what's not, but I can definitely recommend HTC. The Rezound is the newest and most expensive of the lot, so if you're looking to max out that budget, I imagine that is a great choice as well.
-----------------
Wide, sweeping generalizations typically aren't good things, but in this case, I believe this to be true - all smartphone batteries suck. What we're doing with these phones is ridiculous - they can do a million and one things with their surprisingly powerful processors, decent wireless Internet connections, WiFi, GPS, voice recognition, applications, etc, not to mention talking and texting. Battery technology simply cannot keep up with the demand the phones are putting on them.
Now, there are things you can do to make it work. First, an extended battery. For my Inc, it was a must. With moderate to heavy use throughout the day, I get about 18-24 hours out of the extended battery (whereas with the standard battery, I got about 6-8 hours with light to moderate use). For the Thunderbolt, it's not absolutely necessary. My wife gets probably 12-18 hours out of her battery with moderate use, although she still intends to buy an extended battery soon.
The single biggest battery drain is your screen. Yesterday, I had my screen on for a total of 5 minutes and after 18hrs on battery, I had 90% remaining. I had text messages come through all day from Google Voice (which I answered on my computer), I had WiFi on 100% of the time, I received and ignored one call, and there are always background processes doing whatever they do. Thus proper brightness management is a must. Have it at the very bare minimum possible for your current lighting conditions. Any ROM will have a power widget - use it. Turn the screen down, turn off WiFi if you're not using it, etc. There is contention over whether using a task killer is good or bad for your battery, but I do use one. I have mine kill tasks every hour. This gets rid of unnecessary processes that might be wasting CPU time. I use a custom Android ROM called CyanogenMod 7 (CM7). That has also definitely improved my battery consumption. It's probably not for the feint of heart, but totally worth it if you are savvy.
----------------
As for data packages, the 300mb plan isn't even offered for smartphones, that's just for standard phones. While on holiday visiting my family, I was tethering to my computer for maybe 1-2 hours a day to browse the web for about a week; I stream my music via Google Music over 3g daily, sometimes less; I'll occasionally stream YouTube; I browse my RSS feeds (MMO-C, Diablo Fans, some comics, sometimes Lifehacker, etc) daily; I've probably updated 15 applications via 3g this month; I use my data package to send text messages via Google Voice, 30+ a day; and of course I browse the web or app store daily as well. All of this, and I use about 1-1.5gb a month. So, start with the 2gb plan and keep an eye on usage - if you're getting close, you can jump up to the next stage if you need to.
I've spent way too much effort on this post already, but I'll post again if I think of anything else. =)
First of all - don't buy from Verizon. At Christmas time, I was looking into an Incredible 2 from various sources for my wife. It seemed to be a good combination of cost and performance from an HTC phone. I've got an Incredible 1 myself, so I knew the Inc 2 would be great as well.
I checked VZW - $100. Some sort of rebate was available, but I've never gotten ANY of my rebates back from them ($150 worth over the last few years).
Next, I went for Amazon Wireless. Theirs was $30, but I was nervous about doing it online and accidentally changing the plan to the new "all your money are belong to us" plans.
Later, I went to Best Buy and Radio Shack. Both of them had insane deals - $0 (yes, free) for the Inc 2. Even better, the Thunderbolt, which was way more at VZW, was only $50. We ended up buying a phone at Best Buy. VZW doesn't have 4g specific plans, so we opted for the faster network you get with the Thunderbolt. As a bonus, at that time you got double the data for the same price if you upgraded to 4g smartphones. It took them a little while to get the phone added because of the old Alltel plan she has, but it was totally worth it.
So, moral of the story, don't buy through VZW.
-----------------
As for the phone, I've fallen in love with HTC. Any HTC phone should be a good bet, but I suggest the Thunderbolt for sure. I thought I wouldn't like the larger screen as compared to my Inc, but it's actually really awesome. Not to mention, it's quite fast and the 4g network does a great job. It does not have the hardware keyboard, just the touch keyboard.
I never fell in love with the Motorola Droids, some people love em, others don't. If you go Moto, I really have no idea what's good and what's not, but I can definitely recommend HTC. The Rezound is the newest and most expensive of the lot, so if you're looking to max out that budget, I imagine that is a great choice as well.
-----------------
Wide, sweeping generalizations typically aren't good things, but in this case, I believe this to be true - all smartphone batteries suck. What we're doing with these phones is ridiculous - they can do a million and one things with their surprisingly powerful processors, decent wireless Internet connections, WiFi, GPS, voice recognition, applications, etc, not to mention talking and texting. Battery technology simply cannot keep up with the demand the phones are putting on them.
Now, there are things you can do to make it work. First, an extended battery. For my Inc, it was a must. With moderate to heavy use throughout the day, I get about 18-24 hours out of the extended battery (whereas with the standard battery, I got about 6-8 hours with light to moderate use). For the Thunderbolt, it's not absolutely necessary. My wife gets probably 12-18 hours out of her battery with moderate use, although she still intends to buy an extended battery soon.
The single biggest battery drain is your screen. Yesterday, I had my screen on for a total of 5 minutes and after 18hrs on battery, I had 90% remaining. I had text messages come through all day from Google Voice (which I answered on my computer), I had WiFi on 100% of the time, I received and ignored one call, and there are always background processes doing whatever they do. Thus proper brightness management is a must. Have it at the very bare minimum possible for your current lighting conditions. Any ROM will have a power widget - use it. Turn the screen down, turn off WiFi if you're not using it, etc. There is contention over whether using a task killer is good or bad for your battery, but I do use one. I have mine kill tasks every hour. This gets rid of unnecessary processes that might be wasting CPU time. I use a custom Android ROM called CyanogenMod 7 (CM7). That has also definitely improved my battery consumption. It's probably not for the feint of heart, but totally worth it if you are savvy.
----------------
As for data packages, the 300mb plan isn't even offered for smartphones, that's just for standard phones. While on holiday visiting my family, I was tethering to my computer for maybe 1-2 hours a day to browse the web for about a week; I stream my music via Google Music over 3g daily, sometimes less; I'll occasionally stream YouTube; I browse my RSS feeds (MMO-C, Diablo Fans, some comics, sometimes Lifehacker, etc) daily; I've probably updated 15 applications via 3g this month; I use my data package to send text messages via Google Voice, 30+ a day; and of course I browse the web or app store daily as well. All of this, and I use about 1-1.5gb a month. So, start with the 2gb plan and keep an eye on usage - if you're getting close, you can jump up to the next stage if you need to.
I've spent way too much effort on this post already, but I'll post again if I think of anything else. =)
I don't know how you don't buy a phone from Verizon.... my carrier is Verizon, is there something I'm missing?
Secondly, where I live I'm pretty sure I can't even get 4G reception, unless I drive like 30 mins. I'm not positive, just pretty sure. I'll have to look into it.
3rd, the RAZR doesn't have a removable battery btw, it's built in like an iPhone.
Buying a new smartphone is a big decision (for me) so I just wanna make sure I make the right choice!
Edit: Forgot to mention, thanks for the info about how much data you use, that's something I was unsure of but it's good to hear it's right about where I thought the amounts would be for average use.
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That particular phone is free w/ a contract with Verizon. I know it's supposed to be the Sony intro to the phone market (so the gaming phone pretty much) but I don't really have much interest for gaming much on my phone. Also the resolution on it isn't bad but it's not the best around.
It's smooth, has great customization and is a blast to use.
from verizon > best
That's $300, I'm trying to do $200 or under.
Verizon doesn't carry the S2, though I'm guessing it's over $200 anyways.
What kind of data usage do you go through normally? I know that it's tiered when it comes to plans, so I was curious where a few hours of surfing the web would land me. I like to read the news on my phone normally, which shouldn't be taking up too much data usage, though watching stuff on Youtube or IMDB would be likely as well.
Leeodin, as far as contract costs go it's like this for Verizon;
Yeah, not an option, out of my price range ($200 or less w/ contract).
That's so lame...
The Razr is thin but it has a thick section where the camera is which is quite shitty in my opinion. The round edges dont look that good but it has a great fast camera a really good screen (it looks sick on brightest) and ice scream sandwich.
I am pretty sure that the Razr is cheaper than the S2. i dont know anything about the Bionic though.
I dont know why but i wont be 100% honest if i'd told you to buy a Razr. I'd give it a 8/10... Nexus could be a 10/10 imo but yeah its more expensive.
Good luck.
Actually the RAZR and the Galaxy Nexus are both $299 with a contract (the same price as the RAZR) before discounts and stuff.
The last line is probably the best one, but it's so awkward standing in a Verizon store playing with their phones with no immediate commitment to buy. I'd like to play with em for a lil' and then go home and think about it.
Overall, at the moment, I'm more feeling the RAZR than anything else, maybe because it's got a unique look to it as opposed to the normal-looking rectangle that is the Nexus. That and it's got great performance specs all across the board. I'll have to go down there and play with each for a few mins at least, get a feel for 'em and whatnot.
I checked VZW - $100. Some sort of rebate was available, but I've never gotten ANY of my rebates back from them ($150 worth over the last few years).
Next, I went for Amazon Wireless. Theirs was $30, but I was nervous about doing it online and accidentally changing the plan to the new "all your money are belong to us" plans.
Later, I went to Best Buy and Radio Shack. Both of them had insane deals - $0 (yes, free) for the Inc 2. Even better, the Thunderbolt, which was way more at VZW, was only $50. We ended up buying a phone at Best Buy. VZW doesn't have 4g specific plans, so we opted for the faster network you get with the Thunderbolt. As a bonus, at that time you got double the data for the same price if you upgraded to 4g smartphones. It took them a little while to get the phone added because of the old Alltel plan she has, but it was totally worth it.
So, moral of the story, don't buy through VZW.
-----------------
As for the phone, I've fallen in love with HTC. Any HTC phone should be a good bet, but I suggest the Thunderbolt for sure. I thought I wouldn't like the larger screen as compared to my Inc, but it's actually really awesome. Not to mention, it's quite fast and the 4g network does a great job. It does not have the hardware keyboard, just the touch keyboard.
I never fell in love with the Motorola Droids, some people love em, others don't. If you go Moto, I really have no idea what's good and what's not, but I can definitely recommend HTC. The Rezound is the newest and most expensive of the lot, so if you're looking to max out that budget, I imagine that is a great choice as well.
-----------------
Wide, sweeping generalizations typically aren't good things, but in this case, I believe this to be true - all smartphone batteries suck. What we're doing with these phones is ridiculous - they can do a million and one things with their surprisingly powerful processors, decent wireless Internet connections, WiFi, GPS, voice recognition, applications, etc, not to mention talking and texting. Battery technology simply cannot keep up with the demand the phones are putting on them.
Now, there are things you can do to make it work. First, an extended battery. For my Inc, it was a must. With moderate to heavy use throughout the day, I get about 18-24 hours out of the extended battery (whereas with the standard battery, I got about 6-8 hours with light to moderate use). For the Thunderbolt, it's not absolutely necessary. My wife gets probably 12-18 hours out of her battery with moderate use, although she still intends to buy an extended battery soon.
The single biggest battery drain is your screen. Yesterday, I had my screen on for a total of 5 minutes and after 18hrs on battery, I had 90% remaining. I had text messages come through all day from Google Voice (which I answered on my computer), I had WiFi on 100% of the time, I received and ignored one call, and there are always background processes doing whatever they do. Thus proper brightness management is a must. Have it at the very bare minimum possible for your current lighting conditions. Any ROM will have a power widget - use it. Turn the screen down, turn off WiFi if you're not using it, etc. There is contention over whether using a task killer is good or bad for your battery, but I do use one. I have mine kill tasks every hour. This gets rid of unnecessary processes that might be wasting CPU time. I use a custom Android ROM called CyanogenMod 7 (CM7). That has also definitely improved my battery consumption. It's probably not for the feint of heart, but totally worth it if you are savvy.
----------------
As for data packages, the 300mb plan isn't even offered for smartphones, that's just for standard phones. While on holiday visiting my family, I was tethering to my computer for maybe 1-2 hours a day to browse the web for about a week; I stream my music via Google Music over 3g daily, sometimes less; I'll occasionally stream YouTube; I browse my RSS feeds (MMO-C, Diablo Fans, some comics, sometimes Lifehacker, etc) daily; I've probably updated 15 applications via 3g this month; I use my data package to send text messages via Google Voice, 30+ a day; and of course I browse the web or app store daily as well. All of this, and I use about 1-1.5gb a month. So, start with the 2gb plan and keep an eye on usage - if you're getting close, you can jump up to the next stage if you need to.
I've spent way too much effort on this post already, but I'll post again if I think of anything else. =)
I don't know how you don't buy a phone from Verizon.... my carrier is Verizon, is there something I'm missing?
Secondly, where I live I'm pretty sure I can't even get 4G reception, unless I drive like 30 mins. I'm not positive, just pretty sure. I'll have to look into it.
3rd, the RAZR doesn't have a removable battery btw, it's built in like an iPhone.
Buying a new smartphone is a big decision (for me) so I just wanna make sure I make the right choice!
Edit: Forgot to mention, thanks for the info about how much data you use, that's something I was unsure of but it's good to hear it's right about where I thought the amounts would be for average use.