Looking For a "Small phone"

[petecal]

I searched the forums and the most recent thread related to this topic is from 2014 so I assume things are different.
I just cracked the screen on my FirePhone. It looks like replacing it is tough and I am pretty ticked at Amazon so I am looking for a replacement.
I like the smaller screen size. 4.7 inch or smaller.
Other specs. should be "typical" for a "today" phone.
I don't do gaming
I would be very partial to a phone that used just a micro USB, not a special cable.

Thanks in Advance
Pete

 

[The_Chief]

Your best bet is to go to your carrier and find the best phone for you, based on the reasons you use a phone. If you ask 20 people what phone you should get, you will probably get 20 different answers... none of which may work for you. Figure out what you NEED your phone to do, then what you WANT it to do. Determine your budget and filter the available devices to just the ones that will do what you need your phone to do. Look at the consumer reviews for each, and pick the best of them.

 

[mikedt]

Try here, you should be able to narrow things down a bit based on what you're looking for, like maximum screen size of 4.7in...
https://www.gsmarena.com/search.php3?
I assume you're in UK or US, since you're using an Amazon Fire Phone.

Don't know what you mean "special cable" though, you mean proprietary? Because just about all Android used micro-USB Although many new devices are now USB-C, and probably eventually all will be USB-C.

BTW I think Amazon doomed the Fire Phone themselves, with it been exclusive and locked to a single carrier and a mandatory stiff two year contract.

 

[Hadron]

Yeah, in a few years all will be usb-c, and my guess is that most new phones will be already. No point fighting that. I've been using it for a few months now, and find it no inconvenience - I bought a couple of decent usb-a to usb-c cables, and have a usb-c otg adapter, and don't notice any difference in use except that I don't have to work out which way up the cable is.

 

[petecal]

MikeDT, thanks for the link. I used it to home in on the Galaxy A3. But that was just the start of the search. It seems that the only versions I can find are "No warranty". I guess they are for use outside the US. I have to make up my mind if I want to go without the warranty, get a third party warranty, or keep searching for a US version.
It has a USB-C and I don't have a problem with that. My daughter-in-law bought a phone a few weeks ago and she warned about a "special cable" but couldn't tell me more. I bet it is a USB-C also.

The Fire phone was good for me. When Amazon was dumping them I got one for $120 or $130 with a year of Prime. I also was able to load it with the Google Play app so I wasn't locked into the Amazon store. There was also a process that let me use it with the provider H2O.
Then Amazon stopped supporting the voice-2-text function so I raised hell and they gave me a $30 credit.

I contacted them about the screen. They don't support it so they offered me 15% off the "already low priced" "Prime Exclusive Phones". But those seem to have adds and lots of bloat. I could pay more to remove adds but all the phones are too large for me.

Thanks to all.
Pete

 

[Fox Mulder]

Be very careful about the international/non-US version phones. Aside from the lack of warranty they may also lack the proper frequency bands to operate properly in the US.
There really aren't many current or recent phones with that small screen size that I know of. If you're willing to go up just a bit to 5 or 5'1" there may be more choices. I'd suggest taking a look at what's available on Swappa.com as you should be able to find a good selection of last-generation phones at good prices and all the phones and sellers there are verified so it's a safe place to buy.

 

[petecal]

Fox Mulder,
You have unleashed my monster. Note that normally I am the kind of person that researches the crap out of anything before I purchase. In this case I was hoping to skip that by "sliding" into a phone that was close to a FirePhone. Well, you convinced me I couldn't do that and should loosen my requirements.
I now know more about frequencies, bands, etc then I ever wanted to know and it still isn't enough to help me find what I want.
I did look at alternatives and sort of picked a Samsung Galaxy S7. When I tried to find a place to purchase one, I discovered there must be 10 or 20 different "S7"s. With widely varying specs. Even to the extent that some S7s have quad CPUs. and some have octa CPUs. And trying the Samsung or AT&T sites gets these gigantic images that exhaust my "scroll down" finger and blast out jargon but little in the way of facts.

Swappa doesn't seem to have one.
Amazon seems quite evasive about the lower priced models. And the filters are real crap. I ask for "high to low price" and Amazon still gives me $8.97 cases for a S7.

I continue to search.
Thanks to all for the great advice and assistance.
If I ever settle on something I'll post here.

 

[Unforgiven]

FWIW, it appears H2O is an AT&T MVNO, so you when looking for a phone, almost any "unlocked" phone will be supported. When you looks at the S7's the model SM-G930UZKAXAA is the unlocked version and should work with any GSM / LTE carrier which AT&T is.

Here is a search on Best Buy that meets your criteria. I see the Blu phone on there which is the same as Amazon Exclusive but without the ads.
https://www.bestbuy.com/site/search...peratingsystem_facet=Operating System~Android

 

[Fox Mulder]

Looks like there are a bunch of unlocked S7's and s7+'s on Swappa.

 

[svim]

One thing to keep in mind when buying any used smartphone is if it has a replaceable battery. If the previous owner wasn't too kind to it (i.e. habitually used the phone until the battery level was in the single digits before charging), that will shorten the battery's usable life.
Good luck in your search.

 

[petecal]

Fox Mulder. The Swappa phones most likely won't have a factory warranty. I inquired about a third party warranty but have not heard back.

I looked on Amazon and every S7 has many 1-star reviews. "Not new", "Scratched". "Locked", "Quit in short time, can't return". This is like the wild west out there.

There is a rumor that there will be a S9 MINI. I may go for a cheapie POS to hold me over hoping for the MINI. But I spent so much time "tailoring" mine to the way I like it I shudder to think about doing that to the POS then having to do it over if the MINI comes along.

 

[Fox Mulder]

No of course they won't have a warranty since they are older devices and mostly sold used or sometimes new-old-stock. If new with a warranty is a requirement for you that will significantly limit your choices.
Although I can understand reluctance to purchase something other than new-in-the-box from an authorized dealer, if you're willing to consider the alternatives Swappa is probably the safest marketplace for such devices since they verify their sellers and what they are selling. Not totally perfect or foolproof but a far sight better than Ebay, Alibaba etc.

 

[petecal]

Fox Mulder, good point. I am a little queasy about putting out $400 and risking a dead duck in a few weeks.
I have found out that I can "borrow" an older Galaxy to use temperately until I see if Samsung will come out with a S9 MINI. It is expected in March but I bet that will slip.
Thanks and thanks to all.
Pete

 

[Milo Willamson]

Read as "Small pill size phone" topic hahaaa

 

[Hadron]

Since the S5 Mini was the last mini model Samsung released I'd take those rumours with a fairly large pinch of salt...

 

[Steve Perez]

The smallest cell phone I ever had was a Samsung. But I'm not sure if it was called the prevail.
The model number was SPH-M820
Pretty tiny and fast. I think they are actually still around. But I'm not sure.

 

[dontpanicbobby]

Buy one on Japan.

 

[mikedt]

The smallest cell phone I ever had was a Samsung. But I'm not sure if it was called the prevail.
The model number was SPH-M820
Pretty tiny and fast. I think they are actually still around. But I'm not sure.

It was Samsung Galaxy Prevail. introduced in 2011, and it was a budget, very low specced phone then.

 

[Steve Perez]

I did a search on the Samsung Prevail and surprisingly enough, they are still around and more than I thought they were! Some I saw, have been updated quite a bit. Makes a good back up phone.

 

[mikedt]

I did a search on the Samsung Prevail and surprisingly enough, they are still around and more than I thought they were! Some I saw, have been updated quite a bit. Makes a good back up phone.

Be aware that is a CDMA/EVDO only phone, so that will severely limit your choice of carriers. Also it's got less than 1GB of internal storage, and Froyo 2.2, so basically don't expect to be using it as a true smart-phone and go installing apps on it.

I believe it's counterpart here in China and Asia was called the Galaxy Young, which was dual-SIM and GSM/HSDPA

 

[dontpanicbobby]

Small phones are cool Steve. Good pictures on a small screen. Less battery use but. Hard to post.

I wish I was in Japan with a Touch Screen, Flip Phone.

That's a thing there.

 

[mikedt]

Small phones are cool Steve. Good pictures on a small screen. Less battery use but. Hard to post.

I wish I was in Japan with a Touch Screen, Flip Phone.

That's a thing there.

It was, back in the heady days of NTT DoCoMo. AFAIK many Japanese now are toting Apple iPhones, Samsung Galaxys, etc, just like the rest of the world. I think it's really only Samsung that makes one or two Android flip-phones now, and are really only available in Korea and China mainly

 

[dontpanicbobby]

So then Communist China?
There are factories there.

 

[mikedt]

So then Communist China?
There are factories there.

Judging by the number posts here on AF I think a lot of people, especially Stateside seem to like importing exotic phones from "communist" China. And sometimes find they can't use the things at all...
https://androidforums.com/threads/does-my-phone-need-rooted.1237567/
I purchased a Homtom S9 from GearBest. It said it was compatible with the Verizon network, but I took it to Verizon and they said it was not compatible.

Nope...not going to happen...and that phone will not work in the US at all.

Of course being in China, I'm absolutely spoiled for choice with phones.

 

[dontpanicbobby]

Damn, @mikedt

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