technology – CatsGamesWhatever

Goal Achieved – New Mobile Phone Acquired!

After a few months saving I finally achieved my goal of obtaining a new mobile phone. I am now the owner of a brand new Google Pixel 6a. I had started out by wanting to acquire a Google Pixel 8a but my goal has changed over the months as I’ve learned more about mobile phones and met with additional circumstances. I realized that it would be impossible to save enough money to buy a Pixel 8a by the time the 3G service would stop being supported by my carrier (end of March 2025). Prices also have just not come down enough for me to be able to save enough for one nor did I want to be left without a functional mobile phone altogether.

I choose to buy the Google Pixel 6a for a couple of reasons:

It will still get OS updates and security support until July 2027 which beat out the support of the other phones in my budget at the time.
Despite coming out in July 2022 it’s still a capable device and can easily replace my Lenovo Tab P10 (which incidentally decided to start having battery issues and is now largely unusable) .
The real world technological differences between the Pixel 6 – 7 – 8 lines are flat. On paper there are differences of course but not to my eyes. I have no use for the AI that they have crammed into the newer lines and all the rest of the changes are marginal at best.
Most importantly I managed to find a brand new in box Google Pixel 6a originally from a Canadian mobile provider from a large tech vendor on Ebay for $150!

Not everything is rosy though. Here are some of the negatives of me buying the phone early:

After I purchased the Google 6a off of eBay 2 weeks later Bestbuy cleared out their Google Pixel 7a’s for $200. If I had waited longer I would have been in a position to take advantage of the sale. Timing is everything as the saying goes and mine was less than perfect.
The lack of 3.5mm jack on the Pixel 6a is annoying because I had to buy a USB-C adapter to accommodate this.
Last week I got an e-mail saying that my mobile carrier was extending their 3G service for an additional 3 months to the end of June 2025. Lovely.

In the end I ended up spending $227.18:

New in box Google Pixel 6a $173.61
Screen protector & case $39.07
USB-C to 3.5mm adapter cable $11.50
USB-C 20watt fast charger power brick $3 (thrift store)

I had already saved more than what everything cost together. Here are some pictures of the items I ordered and the phone itself all set up!

Here is the Pixel 6a in its final form reading my website.

The Google Pixel 6a is certainly a step up from my Nokia 3310 3G. I’m enjoying it so far but maybe my opinion will change over time. I’m just happy to have achieved my goal (even if a bit differently than it originally started).

The Midway Point – Reflections on the Mobile Phone Market

It’s been about three months since I started saving for a new mobile phone so that means I’m halfway through my allotted time to get one. For brevity, I need to be using a new mobile phone by March 31, 2025 since my carrier is sunsetting it’s 3G service in Canada. I only became aware of this discontinuation at the beginning of October 2024 so it’s been a learning experience since then. I knew very little about the mobile space. I got my first mobile phone this summer – a Nokia 3310 (2017) so that should give you some indication as to what knowledge I brought into the situation.

I’ve spent the last three months learning about mobile phones, carriers, contracts, and just the whole mileu around smartphones so I thought I would write about some conclusions I’ve arrived at.

I think the smartphone market has reached it’s mature stage. There is still innovation but nothing currently that I would personally consider technologically impactful. What would I consider impactful? Take for example the switch from CRT resolutions to FHD sets. There you have a very noticeable real world difference between two technologies. Put a common CRT set vs. a common 1080p TV playing the same content and you will see the change. Or a more resonant example when Apple introduced the Iphone in 2007. At the time there was a marked difference between then QWERTY/Split screen phones on the market and the all touch interface of the Iphone.

Right now manufacturers of smartphones are touting AI as the next technologically impactful innovation. And it very well may eventually come to pass but as it currently stands all the uses for AI in smartphones are of no use to me and are what I would consider shoehorned into the phones. If I had to guess I would say that new battery technology is the next innovation in the mobile space. Having a battery that lasts for weeks without having to charge or takes minutes instead of hours to charge (without wearing the longevity of the battery). Batteries that keep their capacity for 10 years. Something along those lines I think is more likely to be the next technological catalyst that propels phones forward over something like AI. Time will tell of course but it’s fun to speculate.

Another thing I noticed is that it’s hard to get good real world information about smartphones. As it stands the market for smartphones reminds me of the fashion industry. You make the new phone, create the demand for it, push it out and move on to the next one. There is a thin veneer of legitimacy over the small army of salesmen because they call themselves Youtubers, Influencers or Celebrities (all really just are manipulators). Once the product is sold it disseminates through social media channels like Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, Twitter and the like. The end buyers then reinforce the sales pitch with their confirmation bias. Sure this new phone I bought it the newest great thing or I wouldn’t have bought it duh!

I realized this as I tried to process the differences in smartphone generations as I evaluate what to buy. I don’t have any preference or brand loyalty so I was just looking to find performance differences in real world application. You can find hundreds of reviews on the New Pixel 9 Pro but only a handful comparing a Pixel 6 Pro with a Pixel 9 Pro. Not hardware benchtest videos where performance is translated into a score and compared to another. I mean real world tests like how much time it takes to open an app, how responsive it is, how the screen looks streaming media, how the different pictures look taken from their cameras, etc. Of course if you’re trying to run the latest games or hardware intensive programs to edit photos or process videos you’ll notice a difference. But for the majority of end users? They will not notice a remarkable difference.

What I ended up finding is that there just isn’t a huge difference between phone generations anymore. Phones in the Samsung S20 line or Pixel 6 line still work fine today in 2024. Even a newly released $150 phone like the Motorola G (2024) does about 90% of the things flagship releases like the $1800 S24 Ultra or a $1400 Pixel 9 Pro do. It might not look as nice or be as fast but the technological gap between devices has been all but bridged. The gap certainty is not worth the price difference being charged between devices at least for me.

Feature Phone Review – Nokia 3310 3G (2017)

Specifications: https://www.gsmarena.com/nokia_3310_(2017)-8597.php

The Nokia 3310 3G is a feature phone that was released by HTC in 2017. It’s a re-imagining of the famous Nokia 3310 from the early 2000’s that was iconic for it’s durability and staying power. I’ve been using it full time since June but before that my mom had been using it for years so I have second hand experience with it that way as well. Consider this a long term review because of that.

Pros:

It’s a basic mobile phone that does basic mobile phone things like calls and SMS messaging competently. I’ve had no dropped calls while using it over the last months in various areas of my city.
Battery life is good. It has a 1200 mAh battery that is removable. The original battery had swollen but I replaced it with a aftermarket battery that is nearly identical in performance. You can charge it from empty to full in about 2 hours and from low to full in about 1 hour. My experience was having to charge it every 4-5 days for an hour with light use. The battery is easily replaceable and can be accessed by just popping off the back of the phone.
It makes a good digital music player (MP3 player) with its 3.5 MM jack, expandable storage (it takes up to 32 GB SDHC cards) and battery life. Transferring music files is as easy as plugging it into a computer and moving them with drag/drop into a folder (when plugged into a computer the Nokia 3310 will show up as a USB device under windows 10/11). It will not support advanced codecs like .FLAC, .ACC or Vorbis for example though.
One of the most underrated aspects of using a feature phone like the Nokia 3310 3G is the peace of mind you have owning one. It’s a functional tool. Nobody is going to mug you for this phone. You don’t have to treat it like you’re handling a piece of jewelry or a newborn babe. You throw it in your pocket and it’s there if you need it.
It’s small. It’s a little less than 5 inches long x 2 inches wide and half an inch thick and It will not bulge out of your pants pockets.

Cons:

It’s a basic phone so it can’t do any of the things you would expect from a modern smartphone like going on the internet and having common APPs because no software developer supports it.
It has bluetooth but it is terrible suffering from re-pairing/dropping almost every time you use it.
The build quality is plastic. Not cheap plastic mind you but still plastic. It doesn’t have the same brick like durability of its namesake either. As you can see from the photos above it picks up scuffs and scratches but I’ve never used a phone protector or screen protector on it either so it stands up reasonably well.
It is 2/3G only device. No LTE or 5G possible. This is a big problem for the phone functionality at least here in Canada since the last 3G carrier (Rogers) is sunsetting their service by March 31, 2025.
Video is not worth mentioning. 240p @ 8 FPS yuck.
The 2 MP camera sucks. Even under ideal lighting conditions photos were blurry and overexposed.

Conclusion

If i had to grade the phone on a 10 point scale I would give it a 5/10. If you know what you’re getting into with a feature phone it’s fine. You get used to it and there’s perks of not caring about a mobile device in your pocket. There are some definite limitations however but as long as you can get it cheap it’s a suitable product that will meet basic phone needs.

Goal: New Mobile Phone

As I wrote in my previous post I need to acquire a new mobile phone by the end of March 2025. I have known about this problem since early October so have been saving what I can since then.

The problem is that I’m broke. What money is not going to just living is going towards my debt. First servicing the interest on the debt each month and then using whatever money that is left over to pay down the principal (if any!). There is simply no money left to save for a phone at the end of the month.

I would get another job but it’s not feasible given the constraints of my life. Since that is not an option I have had to get creative with my finances.

I’ve resorted to the domain of so called “Beer Money”. Doing menial tasks for bits of money with the time I have spare. Programs like Microsoft Rewards, Swagbucks, Cash back sites etc. It’s often pennies but it adds up. I’m not stupid so I know my time is worth more in theory but in practice this does not translate to real world results for me. When you’re poor pride can be a dangerous thing to cling on to if you expect something to change.

Now for the specifics:
Goal: New mobile Phone ($400 saved)
Start Date: October 01, 2024
End Date: March 31, 2025

Best Case Scenario:

A phone with 4-5 years of support in regards to security and Android updates so I can use it a long time without having to replace it.
A phone powerful enough to replace my aged Lenovo Smart Tab P10 that is reaching it’s end of life.
A phone with a good enough camera to replace my point and shoot Fujifilm Finepix AX600 that I’ve been using for Ebay ($15 thrift store find FTW).
5G capability so it’s futureproof and I don’t have to do this whole scenario again so quickly.

With this criteria in mind I was thinking of targeting models like the Google Pixel 8 or Samsung A35/S24. Ideally it would be a new phone as I’ve seen how some people treat their phones over the years but I’m not totally against buying refurbished as long as it has a warranty attached to it.

Worst Case Scenario

A phone with 5G capability

I would have to settle for an inexpensive model like the Motorola G play 2024. Unfortunately if this does occur I will still be left with the problems of an aging Tablet/Camera that need replacing. Not to mention a cheaper model phone will not get extended support with new versions of android or basic security support beyond say 2025. As far as I know no manufacturers besides Apple, Samsung or Google have committed to 5-7 years of Long Term support.

As an end note I suppose I should discuss the option of leasing a phone. Before October of this year I thought leasing was for cars or office computers. Apparently leasing is a very common practice in the mobile space that I’ve been completely ignorant of.

Basically leasing boils down to paying for a more expensive contact per month over a certain period of time (2 years is the most common). The mobile carrier will subsidize the cost of the phone. You either pay a fee in addition to your plan cost each month, pay nothing each month or pay a fee/prepayment combined with either of these options. At the end of the contract you either return the phone, pay a “Bring It Back” fee to keep the phone or in some cases just keep the phone outright paying taxes on the original retail price of it.

Unsurprisingly it has been complicated for someone like me who is unfamiliar with the process. I’ve slowly been learning the terminology and what these contacts usually entail. I read online that it is common for people to do this practice to have the latest phones trading them in every 1-2 years for updated models. In some cases some people can wind up with very favorable transactions coupled with promotions like Black Friday or carrier loyalty offers than substantially lower their cost per month below what would otherwise be offered to the general public.

In my case a BYOD (Bring your own device) plan will cost between $20-25 a month in addition to the upfront cost of the phone for what I need. That will be the basis I use to evaluate buying outright vs. leasing. Overall I’m skeptical I’ll go the leasing route however as there are pitfalls you can fall into and from looking I’ve not found anything cheaper than what I’m saving for anyway.

I need a new mobile phone

New mobile phones are awesome little machines. It has been surreal seeing them transform from portable landline to handheld computers that have shaped our world. The problem is that I’m poor so I’ve resisted buying one since they are so expensive to obtain but more importantly maintain.

My poverty has not changed for the better over the years but I did break down in July of this year (2024) and got one. The breaking point came for me when everything required having 2 factor authentication and that requires receiving a SMS text message (something a traditional landline is unable to do). I found myself unable to function normally and realized it was hurting me not having a mobile phone.

These concerns were voiced with my mom and she graciously gave me her disused and dust covered Nokia 3310 (2017). The battery was bloated and dead but an aftermarket one for $17 on Amazon gave it life anew. I coupled that with the cheapest prepaid/pay as you go plan I could find and thought I was finally done catching up to the modern world.

And as it turns out the Nokia 3310 (2017) is what is now referred to as a “Feature Phone”. My mom and I had been jokingly referring to it as a dumb phone for years but feature phone sounds much better to my pride. Feature phones for those that are unaware are phones considered basic or bare necessities. They can’t do any of the things that modern devices can but are simply there to receive phone calls and text messages. It turns out that all the features available to us today with modern smart phones can make people addicted or feel overwhelmed. As such a market has developed for simple devices that these people can use to help them conquer these problems. I think the Nokia 3310 (2017) is a fine phone in this regard and I plan on giving it a more thorough review later on.

The problem is that a Nokia 3310 (2017) is a 3G only device. Of course I had absolutely no idea what that meant at the time but there are apparently wireless bands that telecommunication companies use to provide service to their customers. 3G is considered the old standard whereas 5G is the one being used in Canada now (a newer and better standard apparently). Unbeknownst and unfortunately for me my carrier is sunsetting their 3G service in March of 2025 and will no longer be supporting devices in the 3G band by the end of that month. Nor will any other Canadian carriers be supporting it either.

That means in essence that in a few months time my new phone will basically be a brick. Wonderful.