03:23
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With new Android phones releasing month after month, there can be no definitive way to declare a particular phone to be the best buy for too long. That's why we've made it a monthly habit to keep updating the Best Android phones to buy list, so that potential buyers have one place to seek advice.
Phones under Rs. 10,000
There is a growing number of options in this cost conscious smartphone range, with every manufacturer trying to one-up the other by marginally improving the features. As a rule of the thumb, I'm not even going to consider all those phones with resistive touchscreens, and with good reason. As of now, we declare the newly launched Samsung Galaxy Pop S5570 as the champion of the paisa vasool range. It's an upgrade to the popular Galaxy 5 i5500 model and it brings about some important changes -- the screen size is bumped up from 2.8 inches to 3.2 inches, although it still has the low QVGA (320 x 240 pixel) resolution. But for the price, we can forgive Samsung of this sin.
The camera resolution is upped from the pitiful 2 megapixel to the not-so-pitiful 3.2 megapixel. It still lacks autofocus and an LED flash; don't expect great photo quality from it.
The most important change is that it runs Android 2.2 Froyo from start, unlike the Galaxy 5 which still runs Android 2.1, with no clear update roadmap in sight. It may not be the most recent Gingerbread (2.3) version, but we still appreciate it running a fairly recent version, given how fast Google churns out OS updates every year.
It still has the i5500's 600 MHz processor, and with the same QVGA resolution and the Froyo performance optimizations, you can expect the User Interface to fly swiftly. Apart from this, the Galaxy Pop also adds a proximity sensor and a compass to the package.
Connectivity is sorted with 3.5G (HSDPA), Wi-fi 802.11n and A-GPS support. It sells for Rs. 9,000 -- the same price that its predecessor was sold at when launched. For the price, we think the Galaxy Pop S5570 is a good package for the Android lover who likes to hold back on splurging hard earned money.
We've seen a flood of Android phones so far in 2011. We got our first whiff of the coming deluge in January when we went to the Consumer Electronics Show and saw around a dozen really impressive models on the show floor, all with big displays, 4G radios, beefy processors and promises of epic battery life. Some had interesting add-ons, like big physical keyboards for thumb commandos, or the Motorola Atrix's whacky full-sized laptop dock.
Some of these Android handsets have since arrived, and there are plenty more to come.
This collection represents the best Android phones we've received to test here at Wired over the past few months. So, if you're in the market for an Android phone, start with this short list of our recommended picks.
Of course, there are older phones on the shelves that are still great options, like the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, the HTC EVO 4G and the Samsung Epic 4G. But in these pages, you'll find the newest generation — the head of the class of 2011 so far, and a couple of standouts from the end of 2010.
“The Android platform is gaining rapid adoption in the mobile world and presents a great opportunity to reach more of our members. Because the platform has evolved so rapidly, there are some significant challenges associated with developing a streaming video application for this ecosystem. One of these challenges is the lack of standard streaming playback features that the Netflix application can use to gain broad penetration across all available Android phones. In the absence of standardization, we have to test each individual handset and launch only on those that can support playback. We are aggressively qualifying phones and look forward to expanding the list of phones on which the Netflix app will be supported. We anticipate that many of these technical challenges will be resolved in the coming months and that we will be able to provide a Netflix application that will work on a large majority of Android phones.”
Android fragmentation has been a big issue for developers trying to reach the Android platform, specifically for video applications that need to ensure high-quality playback and content protection. Netflix has been working on developing for Android since at least last fall, but without standardized DRM, it has had to work with individual handset manufacturers to ensure streams are secure.
That said, Netflix hopes to boost the number of supported Android devices soon. De writes: “We expect to quickly add to the number of phones that can download from Android Market as we work with ecosystem partners to expand playback support.”
Related content from GigaOM Pro (subscription req’d):
Connected Consumer Q1: The Over-the-Top vs. Pay TV Battle Heats Up
Mobile Q1: All Eyes on Tablets, T-Mobile and AT&T
A Media Tablet Forecast, 2011 – 2015
Phones under Rs. 10,000
There is a growing number of options in this cost conscious smartphone range, with every manufacturer trying to one-up the other by marginally improving the features. As a rule of the thumb, I'm not even going to consider all those phones with resistive touchscreens, and with good reason. As of now, we declare the newly launched Samsung Galaxy Pop S5570 as the champion of the paisa vasool range. It's an upgrade to the popular Galaxy 5 i5500 model and it brings about some important changes -- the screen size is bumped up from 2.8 inches to 3.2 inches, although it still has the low QVGA (320 x 240 pixel) resolution. But for the price, we can forgive Samsung of this sin.
The camera resolution is upped from the pitiful 2 megapixel to the not-so-pitiful 3.2 megapixel. It still lacks autofocus and an LED flash; don't expect great photo quality from it.
The most important change is that it runs Android 2.2 Froyo from start, unlike the Galaxy 5 which still runs Android 2.1, with no clear update roadmap in sight. It may not be the most recent Gingerbread (2.3) version, but we still appreciate it running a fairly recent version, given how fast Google churns out OS updates every year.
It still has the i5500's 600 MHz processor, and with the same QVGA resolution and the Froyo performance optimizations, you can expect the User Interface to fly swiftly. Apart from this, the Galaxy Pop also adds a proximity sensor and a compass to the package.
Connectivity is sorted with 3.5G (HSDPA), Wi-fi 802.11n and A-GPS support. It sells for Rs. 9,000 -- the same price that its predecessor was sold at when launched. For the price, we think the Galaxy Pop S5570 is a good package for the Android lover who likes to hold back on splurging hard earned money.
We've seen a flood of Android phones so far in 2011. We got our first whiff of the coming deluge in January when we went to the Consumer Electronics Show and saw around a dozen really impressive models on the show floor, all with big displays, 4G radios, beefy processors and promises of epic battery life. Some had interesting add-ons, like big physical keyboards for thumb commandos, or the Motorola Atrix's whacky full-sized laptop dock.
Some of these Android handsets have since arrived, and there are plenty more to come.
This collection represents the best Android phones we've received to test here at Wired over the past few months. So, if you're in the market for an Android phone, start with this short list of our recommended picks.
Of course, there are older phones on the shelves that are still great options, like the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, the HTC EVO 4G and the Samsung Epic 4G. But in these pages, you'll find the newest generation — the head of the class of 2011 so far, and a couple of standouts from the end of 2010.
“The Android platform is gaining rapid adoption in the mobile world and presents a great opportunity to reach more of our members. Because the platform has evolved so rapidly, there are some significant challenges associated with developing a streaming video application for this ecosystem. One of these challenges is the lack of standard streaming playback features that the Netflix application can use to gain broad penetration across all available Android phones. In the absence of standardization, we have to test each individual handset and launch only on those that can support playback. We are aggressively qualifying phones and look forward to expanding the list of phones on which the Netflix app will be supported. We anticipate that many of these technical challenges will be resolved in the coming months and that we will be able to provide a Netflix application that will work on a large majority of Android phones.”
Android fragmentation has been a big issue for developers trying to reach the Android platform, specifically for video applications that need to ensure high-quality playback and content protection. Netflix has been working on developing for Android since at least last fall, but without standardized DRM, it has had to work with individual handset manufacturers to ensure streams are secure.
That said, Netflix hopes to boost the number of supported Android devices soon. De writes: “We expect to quickly add to the number of phones that can download from Android Market as we work with ecosystem partners to expand playback support.”
Related content from GigaOM Pro (subscription req’d):
Connected Consumer Q1: The Over-the-Top vs. Pay TV Battle Heats Up
Mobile Q1: All Eyes on Tablets, T-Mobile and AT&T
A Media Tablet Forecast, 2011 – 2015
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