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  • Are Budget Phones & Tablets Worth It?

    Kaustubh Katdare

    Kaustubh Katdare

    @thebigk
    Updated: Oct 26, 2024
    Views: 1.4K
    Indian markets are flooded with budget phones and tablets. Every new day, I see a new company offering their phones - with almost the same hardware and software and a different brand name. All these phones are imported from China and are sold under Indian brand name. I had checked a Micromax phone a few months ago and wasn't impressed by what it offered. Keeping in tune with the price, the phone offered cheaper plastic, difficult to use touchscreen and not so responsive screen & keyboard.

    But I'm not blaming Micromax. I think the company has improved a lot and many of their latest phones are at par with the competition from global giants. But the fact that there are several companies that have copy-pasted hardware and software and are available for less than Rs. 5000 in markets.

    My main question is - are these phones worth the money? I'm looking for some first-hand experiences.
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  • Kaustubh Katdare

    Administrator • Mar 11, 2013

    I'll tag #-Link-Snipped-#, #-Link-Snipped-#, #-Link-Snipped-#, #-Link-Snipped-# - to participate in this thread 😀
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  • babumoshaaye

    Member • Mar 12, 2013

    I personally own a Micromax A110. This phone costs around 10k currently. It was launched with the ICS Android version but now I have modded it with Jellybean.

    I agree that the build quality and hardware ain't good, the benchmarks speak it all. Though they have specs similar to expensive phones, they have used cheaper hardware, that don't match up to the performance.

    But when the doubt arises in a tight budget, these budget phones give you more than you can expect. I have rooted and modified my phone a lot to increase its performance and have been successful, since this device got a lot of support among developers in XDA.
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  • Kaustubh Katdare

    Administrator • Mar 12, 2013

    #-Link-Snipped-# - thank you for replying. I'd not expect performance from budget phone as long as it delivers what it promises. I'd not put those phone through benchmark tests because they won't compete.

    I'm more curious to know the value for money these phones offer and what is the long term ownership benefit one can expect. I'm also interested in knowing what are the downsides of owning a budget phone besides not getting the desired performance.
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  • ABCD ABCD

    Member • Mar 12, 2013

    Very nice topic to debate on. It would be nice to hear the opinions from those who bought Android from progressive/new manufacturers.

    Just some weeks ago, a friend of mine had bought a new tablet. He said he had some issues with it. But, it was later resolved. The point i need to say here is that these budget tablets sometimes wont work proper. Many of these tablets might use a same operating system like Android, but the UI is different. And that's what makes me feel that buying a smartphone from a better manufacturing company is better.

    Another thing, what I've seen is some stores including those online sell (china made) phone with very competitive prices. These are prone to risks. From what i have analysed, they can cause fire accidents and thus cause injuries to the user. Moreover, many of these so called china models don't have a standard OS, which makes it difficult to use high-end apps on it.
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  • Abhishek Rawal

    Member • Mar 12, 2013

    I never prefer Budget Phones or Tablets.I would rather opt for Entry level Phone.
    Budget Phones will give you what it says, but I have noticed too many problems in hardware & most of it is related to touch screen & processor(freezing),those are the parts that should be responsive & stable respectively.
    Quality over Quantity, Period !

    mreccentric
    Many of these tablets might use a same operating system like Android, but the UI is different. And that's what makes me feel that buying a smartphone from a better manufacturing company is better.
    The Legit "Android OS" UI is seen only in some of the high-end phones.
    Take some Samsung's Galaxy phones, the OS is Android but the UI (most probably icons & launcher) is customized by the company.Samsung uses "Touchwiz".

    Now, that's pretty common thing in Opensource softwares, you know.
    Develop your own launcher & port it with Android OS & sell the product !
    Almost every Android phones manufacturing companies do so to stand-out unique in the market.You can check UI of HTC,Sony & Samsung.
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  • babumoshaaye

    Member • Mar 13, 2013

    Owning a budget phone isn't bad after all. The problem would be the user experience of handling the phone. Due to poor build quality, the case may crack up, some times there may be hardware failures where the motherboard burns up. Another problem with budget phones are that they have poor service after sales. Repairing or replacing a broken phone may take up to a month.

    Talking about the OS, all the budget phones come with the Stock Android UI, the same seen in Nexus devices, since these companies don't have developers to design their own UI over the Android Open Source Project.

    Budget phones are really great for new users to Android who cannot afford their expensive counterparts. Through these phones, the consumer market is getting more acquainted with Android.
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