Forgetting plans and contracts, just picking a device is a royal pain in the behind. I’m looking at a bunch of devices, one of which I’d buy next week in New Orleans (factory unlocked):
Apple iPhone 5
I’ve been using the iPhone 4 for 2.5 years (with a 2 week fling with a Nokia Lumia 820). I fancy … a change. Maybe IOS7 will bring change, and maybe not. I’m not that invested in the platform.
Samsung Galaxy S4
It’s probably the best handset on the market. It’s a pity Samsung put so many cr-apps into the OS that can’t be removed. To make it worse, you can’t move apps to the SD card. Only 16 GB models are available, and only 9 GB of that space is usable. This would be my handset of choice … but this storage space thing is a concern.
HTC One M7 32 GB
This handset has some very good reviews. There’s plenty of capacity. The camera, although low MP, also gets good reviews … but I use a DSLR for those occasions when I want a good photo 
The UI has some issues apparently.
Sony Xperia Z
Some of the guys in the office have and love this one. My concern are the reviews that say the screen doesn’t behave well in bright light or from a slight angle.
Nokia Lumia 920
I can’t get an unlocked 925 or 928, so that leaves the 920. I had an 820 for 2 weeks before giving it to a friend. The battery in the 820 was … poor. The 920 is heavy, but solid. The screen is super. The OS … is WP8. Hmm.
Basically, I am torn. The safe and boring choice is the iPhone 5. The follow-the-crowd choice is to get the S4. The daring choice is a Lumia 920 or the HTC One M7.
Or … do I wait until later in the year when Google releases a Samsung S4 with the base Android OS and no cr-apps?
Well, you could get a Galaxy S4 and stick a custom ROM like Cyanogen Mod on there? That will get rid of the crapps for sure, however, it will also prob invalidate any kind of warranty
Agree the battery on the 820 is as weak as i have seen on a mobile for some time, with the drawback that hardly anyone has a Nokia Lumia charger when you are out and about, but you can always find someone with an iPhone lead..
I was in exactly the same situation, I had an iPhone 4, and was looking at what was next. I looked at the same phones, and came to many of the same conclusions. I ended up buying a Lumia 920. I don’t regret it, but WinPho 8 is definitely a v1 product (since its a new OS essentially) and lacks some very key features it needs badly. Maybe 8.1 will fix it… who knows.
The worst problem for the WinPho 8 stuff is lack of BT support… the Windows BT stack is awful and from the early 2000’s it seems. It works worse than my iPhone 3G from 4 years ago with cars and streaming music. Truly sad MS failed on that one.
Google is releasing the Samsung Galaxy S4 at the Play store with Android 4.2.2 Vanilla on June 26
http://www.itproportal.com/2013/05/15/google-launches-samsung-galaxy-s4-with-vanilla-android-42-jelly-bean-at-io-2013/
Google is releasing the Samsung Galaxy S4 at the Play store with Android 4.2 Vanilla on June 26
http://www.itproportal.com/2013/05/15/google-launches-samsung-galaxy-s4-with-vanilla-android-42-jelly-bean-at-io-2013/
so.. and where is BlackBerry? 😉