{"id":6267,"date":"2016-12-31T13:53:40","date_gmt":"2016-12-31T12:53:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.walkingrandomly.com\/?p=6267"},"modified":"2016-12-31T13:53:40","modified_gmt":"2016-12-31T12:53:40","slug":"android-phone-musings-and-my-switch-to-the-oneplus-3t","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/walkingrandomly.com\/?p=6267","title":{"rendered":"Android phone musings and my switch to the OnePlus 3T"},"content":{"rendered":"

A personal Android history<\/strong><\/p>\n

My first Android phone was the HTC Hero which I wrote about all the way back in 2009<\/a>. It\u00a0was very different to anything I’d had before and I liked it a lot. I even compared it to 1980s supercomputers in an article<\/a> that subsequently got slashdotted<\/a>. Android has changed a lot since then and I’ve kept up with most of the changes although I quickly switched to Samsung after the Hero. I started off with the Galaxy S1 but upgraded to the Galaxy S2 relatively quickly when the S1 died. \u00a0The S2 was a nice phone. I remember I liked that one a lot.<\/p>\n

I then switched to the Galaxy Note series of phones and was regularly mocked by my friends for owning such a HUGE phone; If I had a pound for every time someone referenced a particular Trigger Happy TV sketch<\/a> I’d be a rich man! \u00a0The large screen was perfect for keeping me entertained on the regular train commute between Sheffield and Manchester that I endured at the time. The Note 1 gave way to the Note 2 followed by the \u00a0Note 3 — I upgraded fairly regularly back then.<\/p>\n

Things are different now<\/strong><\/p>\n

For the first time since starting out with Android, I didn’t feel compelled to upgrade when the next version of my phone came out. The Note 4 passed me by and the next time I noticed a phone in the series was when my boss got the ill-fated Note 7<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Perhaps I’m just getting old but the truth is that my phone usage has stabilised around a few core applications — none of which require anything too fancy. Although I use my phone heavily, I don’t do anything that pushes its capabilities. Reading (Kindle<\/a>, Guardian<\/a>, Browser<\/a>), Video (iPlayer<\/a>, Netflix<\/a>, YouTube<\/a>), Audio (Music,\u00a0DoggCatcher<\/a>, Audible<\/a>) and social media (Gmail<\/a> and Twitter<\/a>) are probably my most used apps. Other than that, it’s predominantly utility-type stuff such as\u00a0Calendar<\/a>, Camera, Maps, Coursera, Calculator and so on. \u00a0A slew of things I fire up occasionally such as\u00a0Fitbit and Shazam and that’s pretty much it.<\/p>\n

In the early days of Android, I used to play a lot of games but no longer do so. This is primarily due to a lack of time but also because most mobile games simply aren’t fun anymore. The industry switch to the Fremium model<\/a> has changed game dynamics in a way that I don’t find palatable.<\/p>\n

The Note 3 wasn’t just good enough for my usage pattern, it was better than I needed it to be<\/strong>! I’m perfectly happy with the HD screen resolution of my 32inch TV so having the same resolution on a 5(ish) inch phone feels like decadent luxury. There’s an awesome stylus I never use, more CPU horse power than I need<\/a>\u00a0and a ton of sensors that I don’t have time to play with<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I don’t need to upgrade my phone anymore<\/strong><\/p>\n

As a Research Software Engineer I find that whatever computer I have is not quite good enough. I could always do with more cores, a faster clock speed, better GPU or more memory (No burning desire for dongles<\/a> or a touch bar<\/a> though!). \u00a0Phones are different. They got good enough for me years ago.<\/p>\n

Breaking out of the phone upgrade treadmill is great: I can reduce my contract down to almost nothing and put the money saved from handset upgrades to something more important like financial independence<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So, when I lost my Note 3 and found myself back in the mobile phone market earlier this year, I was gutted!<\/p>\n

My Big Android Mistake – The Samsung Galaxy S5 Neo<\/strong><\/p>\n

The logic went like this:<\/p>\n