Android Oem’s: Which Company Has a Phone You Would Like?

There are Dozens upon dozens of Android Phone makers to choose from. Only a select few rather create phones for most markets. The average Phone maker often restricts sales to domestic countries. So you’re interested in a phone but don’t know which one to trust? Often with most countries, phones are bough unsubsidized(AKA without contract) and thus are a much more expensive investment. I’m going to try and cover at least 4 of these more commonly known manufacturers that are well known and I have had the experience of trying.

HTC

HTC is sometimes seen as the developer poster-child of the Android Ecosystem. Their phones are developer friendly and often have little restrictions associated with them. The Build Quality of HTC phones are fairly consistent and often feel very premium in the hand. HTC often uses beautiful LCD screen tech and features aluminum and other sturdy metals in their construct making the phone feel durable. HTC’s often partners up with Qualcomm know for their quality cellular radios, making sure that many HTC phones can pull through for cell phone signal if needed. For QWERTY keyboard phones, HTC is passable. Their built in QWERTY’s are fine, but the slide out keyboard models often incorporate plastics, feel cheep and often have Hinge Problems. HTC however are known for cutting down on Battery life. Most HTC phones last for about 5 or so hours. Overall, HTC phones look nice, get good signal, and often sport gorgeous screens. HTC’s cameras are also of top quality. If Battery is a must however, learn to use the phone more casually to get better life, or look for another phone.

Updates: HTC is one of the fastest Android makers to get updates out. If you don’t know how to root, and are worried, HTC often more than not can get you a system update.

Samsung

Samsung is the consumer poster boy of Android. Their Galaxy S series of phones are the best single selling phones on the market, only outperformed by the Iphone. Samsung like HTC is developer friendly if tinkering is your thing. Build Quality on their phones however seems to range. Samsung is a fan of Corning’s “Gorilla Glass” and often makes use of it making it’s screens very durable. Samsungs phones however may feel cheap in the hand. Samsung often makes use of plastics in their build with very few metals of any kind, often making you afraid to carry your phone in the first place! Samsung’s Radios are decent to well performing. They’ll get you through most of the time, but tend to have weird fluctuations in capacity. At times they’ll be fine, and at others they just don’t wanna pick up. Samsung’s QWERTY followings also tend to go a plastic route, but their sliding keyboards don’t have many problems. Most Samsung phones have passable battery. You can easily get 8-10 hours on most of their phones, with a few, such as the old Droid Charge lasting a few days! Samsung’s cameras are fairly decent to good. If you can get past the Build quality on most of their phones, you’ll find Samsung to be a very comfortable fit.

Updates: Samsung contrary is one of the slower roll outs if any at all. Samsung often just makes a phone, sends a few changes, and moves on to the next.

LG

LG…where do I begin. LG’s phones are of fairly decent construct. They won’t go out of their way to impress you, but they do a fine job with what they have. Their cell radios are fine and get the job done well as Samsung does. The new Nova screens they are rolling out are beautiful. Their Software however is awful. LG phone’s Android skin often bloats the phone, causing simple actions such as opening an app or swiping, to be laggy and slow. Even if they had decent support for tinkerers, their software just can’t cut it. Although a smartphone’s first use should still be to call people, paying premium price for a phone should also yield at least some decent software performance. I’ve never played with an LG QWERTY, so I can’t speak much on that end of the spectrum. LG’s cameras can be well done and often do see good use. LG just hasn’t really come up to bat like some of the other’s have.

Updates: I’ve never heard of an LG phone receiving a system update. Truthfully speaking.

Motorola Mobility

Ah yes, the progenitor of Android. Motorola was the first Phone maker to really kick android off with it’s “Droid” Smartphone and introduce the world to what android could do. Although struggling in the recent years with finances, and being purchased by Head honcho Google itself, Motorola typically never failed to impress. Like HTC, Motorola is almost fairly consistent in using metals to build their phones. Hell, the Razr and Razr Maxx sport Kevlar backs! They spare no expense in creating their phones. Motorola cell radios are top notch, always making sure to pull signals from whatever towers may be around. Their QWERTY’s often still sport a metallic feel and have little to no problems at all with hinges. Motorola’s screens are nice, but sometimes tend to dip in quality(though they’ve started tor really take a turn for the better). Motorola’s cameras are not the best in the business, and they often use the amount of megapixles as a marketing technique. Compared to cameras both above and below, optics is something Motorola needs to work on. They aren’t too tinker friendly either if you can root your phone, as they still lockdown bootloaders. With recent Launches Motorola has been setting the standard for battery life in Android phones, with the Razr Maxx going from 2-3 days of use on 4G connections! Motorola is stubborn but has a special place for a purchase if your really looking for something solid.

Updates: While rarely issuing them, Motorola HAS give system updates to some of it’s phones. Very Few, but they have.