[GUIDE] Things To Consider When Buying A Smartphone Offline In 2017
Smartphones are probably the most popular piece of tech right now & they can be found both Online & Offline. The online market is great with Great Spcs, Low Prices, Free Home Delivery & more. But, when it comes to the offline market the story changes completely & specially if you live in a country like India. You may find a ton of smartphones in the offline market with features like a 20MP selfie camera, Very thin bezels & 2.5D glass. If you’re not some random geek & you went to a store for buying a new smartphone, you’ll probably go crazy after seeing one of those super attractive phones & think hey let’s take it home. Then you’ll pay a ton of money for it & after using for a couple of days you’ll find that the device didn’t meet your expectations at all. This is the theory behind this article & you can consider the following pointers before buying a new smartphone from the offline market.
The Processor:
This is the most important thing you should check before you make your decision. No matter what your budget is, processor is important. In budget segment phones ( Mostly under 20000 INR / 300 USD ) many of the brands mention something like “Quad-core processor”, “Octa-core processor” & don’t tell actually what processor they are using. So, if you find something like that written on the box, ask the retailer about the processor or consider checking for the specifications online.
One thing to remember though is that, Snapdragon processors come with best value for money. So try to pick a Snapdragon over a Madiatek or Exynos. But, in case you have to pick a Mediatek as that’s the only choice, try not to pick anything below the MT6750. Anything less powerful than it will definitely not stand on your expectations. If you can get a Snapdragon though, try to pick at least a Snapdragon 430. In 2017, anything below a 430 will be quite underpowered.
If you have higher budget though, try getting Snapdragon 625, 652, 653, 820 or 821 dpending on your max budget.
RAM & Internal Memory:
Buying a smartphone with RAM capacity below 2GB & Internal Memory capacity below 16GB is no more recommended in 2017. No matter how low your budget is, don’t buy anything that has less RAM & Storage than this. Remember, you can easily get many options with 3GB RAM & 32 GB internal Memory within 10000-15000 INR(~150-225USD).
At higher budget, there are a ton of devices available with 4GB & even wiyh 6GB RAM. The Internal Storage options are avaiable from 32-128GB for high budget smartphones.
Features:
In 2017 a phone with good features is no longer super expensive. Within 10000 INR, you can get a Big Battery, a Fingerprint Scanner, a 1080P Display, a Good Camera etc. So if you’re on a budget, pick as many of these as you can.
If you have higher budget though, look for a Metal Body, Good Processor & Decent RAM, a Great Camera, a High Resolution screen, Gyroscope, NFC etc.
After Sales Support:
Before buying a Smartphone, make sure how good is the After Sales Support of that brand. Check if you have at least one Service Center nearby & how is the experience of other people with the Service Centers of the same brand. Bad, after sales support can be a real deal breaker for you. So, first be sure & then consider a Smartphone from a perticular brand.
Brands & Their Pricing:
If you’re on a budget anywhere below 30000 INR (~450USD), avoid phones from Samsung,LG, HTC etc. I have seen many people buying under 30K phones from these brands & specially from Samsung. Their user experience however was horrible in most cases. A Galaxy J7 was lagging from the next day of purchase, a near 30K Galaxy A8 was giving very ordinary user experience along with having a yellowish screen & many more cases like this were reported to me.
I recommend you to buy phones from brands like Motorola, ASUS, Lenovo etc. when you’re spending anywhere from 15K-30K. Oppo & Vivo often offer good looking phones with high resolution selfie cameras but, most of the time they sacrifice a lot in the Hardware segment & that makes them unworthy for your money. And avoid phones from brands like Micromax, Intex etc. . They are really bad.
If you have higher budget (More than 30K) though, you can cosider Samsung & LG along with ASUS, Motorola etc.
Don’t Believe Everything The Retailer Says:
I have seen many people getting fooled by retailers. They often sell worthless phones at a very high price to those who are not well aware of the smartphone market. They’ll convince you that, they are giving you the best phone on that price point & after using it for a couple of days you’ll find that you actually bought a piece of trash at a very high price point. so read all the points I mentioned above & then make the decision yourself. If you’re trusting a retailer, that’s probably a big mistake.
If you still can't decide what to buy, wait for some more time. Within a week I'll post a complete Smartphone Buyers Guide with the complete info on the Best Smartphones for Every Price Segment. So keep checking back geeksnipper.com if you want to check that article.