Welcome to 2019 - no need for hard drive, you can get 256GB brand name card for around 30$. Storage is really cheap nowdays, well except for iphone users.
Not sure if it is a good budget smart phone but I got for my wife a free Samsung Galaxy A5 2017 brand new.. Seems to be pretty decent after I removed all the bloatware, turned off mobile data, turned off all notifications except for incoming calls etc. The only thing I don't like is that the phone is the Canadian version and they disabled the FM tuner. Would have been nice to have it working without using any data. Searched around and not convinced installing a new global rom would fix it as I have read never ending issues with this phone trying to do that.
I.m.o. a decent 2nd hand Samsung S5 is perhaps the best deal.
Make sure to do a factory reset BEFORE you start using it.
Lord knows what mess is on there when you buy a used one.
A micro SD card is a good idea too. For me 32 GB is more than enough.
The only draw back is the age and wear of the battery, but you can get a new one if necessary.
[quote]
Secret Back Door in Some U.S. Phones Sent Data to China …
Nov 16, 2016 The Chinese company that wrote the software, Shanghai Adups Technology Company, says its code runs on more than 700 million phones, cars and other smart devices….
How to Stay Safe from Adups Spyware on Budget Android Phones …
Aug 1, 2017Chinese Android software transmitted personal data including text messages, call details, and contacts from tens of thousands of phones.,
Yes, i’ve heard similar things… Laptops, even military equipment…
Reminds me of what happened to me a couple of days ago.
I was petting the (my mom’s) dog, saying “hey, doggie”.
And her phone was close by, and the phone said: “He’s a good boy.” and played a dog barking….
My mom thought it was hilarious,
i was a little freaked out by it…
I guess it must have been some stupid app that caused this, but who knows?
Since then i turn off the Wifi on my phone (and of course the data transmission via the cellphone network) when i don’t need it.
But guess what happens when i turn it on?
It’s busy transmitting a bunch of data back an forth, making it next to impossible to do anything else until it’s finished.
Recently purchased a 1 year old 64 gb Samsung Galaxy S8 on Craigslist for $60 with a cracked screen. Had the screen replaced at $75 and added a 128 gb micro SD card.
Looks like Samsung will not issue any updates to the S8 but I think $125 for a S8 seems to be a good deal.
I purchased a used Samsung S10E 128GB for $130. It has almost nothing visually wrong with it, and I decided to get one for mom. I forgot how much bloat Samsung devices have after using Moto for a number of years. But it’s big improvement in performance over my last phone. Hoping to have it a good number of years.
Whatever the current iPhone that has the lowest cost, such as an iPhone 7, iPhone SE 2, or iPhone XR depending on vendor. For Android why not Nokia or Alcatel?
My kids got new Samsung tablets at xmas so I could finally have my own tablet computer (phone and PC is usually enough for me but some android games are nicer on the big screen).
So I used this guide and this list to clean the rubbish. Took me one hour around midnight to reinstall the keyboard thoudg, so DON’T remove or disable anything with keyboard or honeyboard in its name.
If I was to de-bloat an S10E (my wife owns one, maybe I’d inherit it soon if my Sony XZ1c would die someday) I’d check this post.
Cheers.
The best new brand budget phone in cca 200Eur range is Xiaomi Poco X4 Pro but soon new version will be released (Poco X5), and of corse Redmi Note Series 11 and 12.