PCFormat Forum Archive

As of this week, I am due for an upgrade on my Cell C ControlChat top-up contract, and so I ran through the "roll your own" menus on Cell C's website.

I cam up with the following potential upgrades within my price range:

Samsung Galaxy Pocket [R69 p.m. on Straight Up 30]
Samsung Galaxy Y Pro [R88 p.m. on Straight Up 30]
Nokia X2-01 [R76 p.m. on Straight Up 30]
Nokia C3 [R77 p.m. on Straight Up 30]
Nokia Asha 303 [R106 p.m. on Straight Up 30]
LG Optimus L3 [R88 p.m. on Straight Up 30]

Do you, or anyone you know own one of these handsets, and what is your/their opinion of it?

I may be slightly biased here, but personally I'd go for one of the Android options. That rules out the three Nokia phones. (I have a very simple reason for this: there's a far larger and evolved Android ecosystem than there is for Nokia's flavour of the week.)

The LG has inferior hardware compared to both of the Samsung options: in fact, both Samsungs have very similar hardware. I'd go with one of those two, but it's going to be personal preference as to which one you go for; as such, I can't objectively tell you which one. Perhaps your best bet is to go into a store, ask the sales drones to let you play around with both, and see which one you prefer.

My mom has the Galaxy Y Pro. The only glaring problem I have with it is the screen. Both in size and viewing angles. But then, I may just be spoiled with my Nexus. As for the rest of the phone, cant't really fault it, I guess. I'm not a fan of the "blackberry" layout but that is personal preference. Connectivity wise it has no problems, and the software, as far as I can tell, seems stable enough- no issues and no apps crashing.

Can't comment on any of the other phones.

i agree with Ron, IMO i would also take a Samsung android device, but i see there's 2 versions of the Pocket and the Y Pro

As I said - both my younger kids have the pocket and they love it.

Avoid the Samsung Galaxy Y Pro like a plague.

It's a VERY badly designed phone.

So....I went along to the nearest Cell C store on Saturday morning thinking that I would go R9 over budget, and pick up an LG L3.
Unfortunately the only handsets they have in stock currently are the Blackberry Curve 9300 [too expensive] and the Nokia Asha 300 [reasonably priced at R79 a month on Straight Up 30 Top Up....I just didn't know enough about it, and thought I'd do some reading first.

http://www.cellc.co.za/cell-phone-deals/upgrade-deals

http://www.cellc.co.za/cell-phone-deals/featured-deals

http://www.cellc.co.za/99c-build-your-o ... act/top-up

PLease do yourself a favour.

Scrounge up the extra money and rather go for the LG Optimus L5 over the L3.

You don't want a phone with such a low-end screen. I learned the hard way.

The L5 even comes with Ice Cream Sandwich.

Man, CellC doesn't have a very large selection.

But I agree with the L5. Seems like the best option by a margin. You can probably OC it's CPU to 1GHz for a bit of extra zoom.

Rather let them order the phone than take something they have available. It will be worth it!

Why would one want to OC a cellphone?

uhm, for speedier performance?

So that the person you are talking to sounds like Mickey Mouse.

Birdie does not need what you need from a phone. He does not need to OC it - he needs it to be reliable, make and receive calls and add a bit of fun to his life.

Just thought the L5 with an 800MHz CPU might possibly have one or two hiccups running ICS.

ADT wrote:uhm, for speedier performance?

From a phone?

KALSTER wrote:Just thought the L5 with an 800MHz CPU might possibly have one or two hiccups running ICS.

Possibly. I wouldn't know. But talk to SP about "performance issues" and any thoughts with which he might toy regarding getting the L5 will probably fly out the window.

It's not the CPU or anything I'm concerned about.

With the L3's screen, you will be SEVERELY limited to what you can do on it. (If you're going the Android route, that is)

DarkStar wrote:It's not the CPU or anything I'm concerned about.

With the L3's screen, you will be SEVERELY limited to what you can do on it. (If you're going the Android route, that is)

Can it make and receive phone calls and text messages? If so, it will suit SP just fine.

KALSTER wrote:Just thought the L5 with an 800MHz CPU might possibly have one or two hiccups running ICS.

agreed

A birdie told me that he has ordered the L5

Silly of LG to have put ICS on then.

Will rooting the device allow me to downgrade to an oilier version of Android?

Delivery takes 3-7 days. I wonder where it is now? [One has to call them to find out]

Well, I was speculating. Might be fine. You can always turn off the fancy graphical majiggers and just benefit form the rest.

ICS is awesome - you will not be unhappy

KALSTER wrote:Just thought the L5 with an 800MHz CPU might possibly have one or two hiccups running ICS.

Nope, I have one and it runs flawlessly. The large screen(albeit a relatively low res one) is a welcome extra and the battery life is not bad, lasts me 3 days with ease

StarPhoenix wrote:

Silly of LG to have put ICS on then.

Will rooting the device allow me to downgrade to an oilier version of Android?

Delivery takes 3-7 days. I wonder where it is now? [One has to call them to find out]

Why would you want to downgrade? ICS runs perfectly on it. Just watch the data though, if you leave all the snyc and updates nonsense on you will get an exorbitant bill at the end of the month

THE_STIG wrote:

KALSTER wrote:Just thought the L5 with an 800MHz CPU might possibly have one or two hiccups running ICS.

Nope, I have one and it runs flawlessly. The large screen(albeit a relatively low res one) is a welcome extra and the battery life is not bad, lasts me 3 days with ease

Oh that's cool then. My bro will be happy to hear that with his Huawei X5.

My E7 also has the same resolution on a 4" screen and honestly, I don't even notice a lack of resolution. Video's and everything looks great.

That battery life sounds great. Wish I had that.

The reviews make a big fuss over the low res screen, but it really does not matter too much. And lower res screen eats less battery too. It has 512mb ram so that helps performance a bit too

I was surprised by it, I was expecting the usual 1 and a bit days thing but it goes for much longer than that

Wait....one can over clock a cellphone? Isn't the liquid nitrogen unit likely to make it somewhat less portable?

Well, as you probably know, Stig, I would not have opted for an L5 if I had not played with yours at rAge.
Yeah....I got the impression that some reviewers have the same expectations of entry level handsets as they do
of devices costing three times as much.

Like shooting down a sensibly-priced Geforce GT630 because it cannot keep up with executive-salary-level hardware.