My trusty Samsung Galaxy S7 that I bought in 2017 is bricked and now I must buy a new phone. What are the recommendations of the hexbear community for a replacement? I was satisfied with my elderly phone except that there was a lot of junk that came with the phone that I couldn’t delete, and for the last couple years or so I’ve had to delete an app before I could add an app, so that was kind of annoying. But other than that, I was happy with it, so I don’t need the newest coolest thing.
Whichever phone you get, you should go through the trouble of running Universal Android Debloater to remove all the crap that comes pre-installed. This dramatically improves the experience of basically every phone.
Any older flagship phone will be a good choice if you’re on a budget. Newer phones will have the advantage of less wear on the battery.
The specific suggestion I would have is a Galaxy S21 FE, which is what I’m currently using. If you want one with a 3.5mm jack, then I think the Galaxy S10e is an awesome option (although it’s getting pretty old, and so probably won’t have good battery life).
I’ve been buying Xiaomi phones for a while now, historically they’ve been a good value for the hardware in the midrange. On the high end they’ve got all the boondoggles. Outside the US there are Xiaomi stores everywhere. Something that has grown on me is their super fast charging, like they had one with 120 watt charging, mine is 67 watt and I can set it down for 30 minutes and pretty much have most of a charge.
Samsung still produces good phones. The flagships are overpriced but good, you’re probably better off with a mid range one like the Galaxy A54.
If you want a phone with less bloat consider a Google Pixel phone, that way you get just the Google bloat not also random manufacturer bloat.
Thanks, I’ll look at the Galaxy A54. I’m also thinking about a Pixel phone, but I heard the battery life isn’t as good? Or is this just people splitting hairs and the average user wouldn’t actually notice a difference?
The Motorola Edge is like the midrange Pixel with a mid camera and bigass battery. When you set it up it asks you if you want Motorola Bloatware and you just press the “Fuck off” button, unlike Samsung software that’s like 99% bullshit you don’t want or need on your phone. I got one like a month ago and it’s just fine for me, but I’m not like a phone enthusiast.
I’m honestly a fan of apple, their phones tend to just work, and they have a fairly long support period, my iPhone 7 just stopped getting new updates this fall after 7 years. Still works.
Updates for the OS yes, but lots of new software features no. For example, the iPhone 11 never got the software update for making Face ID work with a mask on, despite being the new phone through most of 2020. There’s always a bunch of random software features not released for older phones, but the Face ID mask update being only for the newer phones was fucking criminal.
