It’s no secret that now buying a new smartphone can hit the wallet. And if the purchase is inevitable and there is not enough money? You have to make the right choice in the proposed characteristics and abandon the possibly unnecessary in order to save. A smartphone is an integral device and it will not be possible to change individual elements in it, such as a processor, memory or other components. Therefore, choosing a gadget with a limited budget will be a rather difficult choice. Let’s figure out in which cases you can refuse the imposed components, and what to look for in order not to regret your choice in the future.

Processor selection

Each mobile gadget is tied to the processor, as this is its heart. At the moment, two competitors Qualcomm and MediaTek stand out in the mobile electronics market offering their chips, but there are also such exotic ones as Samsung Exynos. It should be borne in mind that the cost of the installed processor will significantly affect the price of the device. And if you are not an advanced mobile gamer, then you should not lay out a large amount for a “stone”. High performance mobile processors of the flagship level have a high power consumption and together with this they generate a huge amount of heat.

If you are not a supporter of mobile games, then you should consider models with installed mid-range processors. This will not only keep the charge level high, but will also reduce the heating temperature, since there is no need to perform volatile tasks. From the recommendations, it can be noted that when choosing a mobile processor, you can pay attention to MediaTek Helio G85 – G96 or Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 level. These processors are not subject to throttling, as they are quite cold and have already proven themselves to be reliable. When checking in multi-level benchmarks, they calmly gain several hundred thousand “parrots” and do not fall into a 100% load.

RAM

Like a mobile processor, RAM is involved in the performance of the device. Therefore, it should be taken into account and calculated by the number of programs used on a smartphone. Gadgets with a minimum amount of memory of 1-2 GB should no longer be considered, since when choosing them, you can get temporary freezes even when running programs that are undemanding to resources.

The RAM of the device cannot be increased, as can be done with permanent memory. Therefore, it is better to make a choice on devices with a minimum size of 4 or 6 GB. This will allow you not to overpay for an unnecessary amount, without visible losses in performance. And given that a modern smartphone is designed for 2-3 years of operation and will require replacement due to battery degradation, then the overpayment for the amount of RAM is not in demand.

From 8 GB or more on board is chosen by users who use a smartphone to play games and run resource-dependent programs.

Screen

Now, perhaps, it is quite difficult to meet mobile gadgets with TFT screens, so we immediately make a choice among IPS or AMOLED matrices. Among these two competitors, AMOLED stands out as a more expensive screen, but also of better color reproduction. AMOLED matrices are installed on top-end smartphones with a fairly large price category, so it is almost impossible to find a state employee with this matrix. Therefore, I propose to consider a screen with an IPS matrix and an increased Full HD + resolution and a frequency of up to 120 Hz. This is already the golden mean, which is equipped with mid-range smartphones.

The higher the resolution and refresh rate of the screen, the more comfortable it is to use them, so it is worth considering screens with a higher frequency. But, personally, I use a smartphone with HD + resolution and a low refresh rate of 60 Hz and do not think that it is worth overpaying for higher parameters. Although the smoothness of the movement of the image will be visible, but it is not worth the extra money. Even despite the low resolution and refresh rate of the screen, the eyes do not get tired during prolonged use.

In addition, using the AMOLED display, some users experienced discomfort, as the eyes are sensitive to screen flicker.

Built-in memory

The more internal memory, the more information you can store on your smartphone. But again, it all depends on the quality of the material being filmed or the content being downloaded. If these are videos in 4K format, then 128 GB will definitely not be enough for you for a long time. Considering a device with a built-in storage capacity of less than 128 GB is not practical in our time, since it will have to be expanded in the near future. Comparing the difference between 128 GB and 256 GB smartphones, you can see a slight price increase of 2-3 thousand rubles, which in some cases is comparable to installing a high-quality memory card, possibly occupying a separate SIM card slot.

Most users do not store their photos or video files on their smartphones, in order to avoid further loss, but place these files on various hosting or personal computers. Thus making a copy of them. Of course, if you are an active user of computer games or use a smartphone to watch video files, then you should pay attention to more capacious smartphones.

Battery

Of course, now you can still find smartphones with a battery of less than 4000 mAh, but these are mostly budget models from niche manufacturers. The limited capacity of the batteries will not allow you to play modern games, run resource-dependent programs, and simply use your smartphone for everything without resorting to recharging. Flagship models are equipped with capacious batteries, as you have to power productive processors, which are resource-intensive devices. Models of the middle line are equipped with batteries with a capacity of 4500-5000 mAh, which allows you to use your smartphone during the day without recharging, or even more.

Typically, the battery life does not exceed more than 2 years, and after this period is reached, visible degradation begins with a decrease in operating time. And this becomes noticeable even when running ordinary applications that do not require special costs. Indeed, you can see that after 1.5 – 2 years of operation, the smartphone begins to actively eat up the charge level and then you have to either change the battery to a new one or replace the smartphone. Modern smartphones are equipped with non-removable batteries and to replace them you will have to contact a service center, and the replacement cost will be comparable to half the cost of a new gadget.

Camera

A smartphone is a universal gadget and I want to get a device that allows you to get good photos that do not differ from the entry-level DSLR. Now it is no longer possible to surprise the user with matrices installed in a smartphone of 64 megapixels or more. But chasing megapixels is not worth it, because in some cases it may not be required. And high-quality photos in the daytime can be obtained on matrices of 48 megapixels.

In fact, the number of megapixels is not so important and they do not greatly affect the result obtained during the acquisition of a high-quality image. With a high-quality matrix, you can get much better results with excellent detail and with fewer megapixels. At the same time, the cost of a sensor with a smaller number of megapixels may be higher than that of an interpolated matrix of 64 or more megapixels.

A modern smartphone uses several cameras at once (wide, macro or portrait) with a separate matrix for each eye on the back side. And if in flagship models these are really worthy options for obtaining high-quality images, then in more budget models you should not pay attention to this, since the image quality will be above average, but not what you want to get.

Optical zoom in budget options is practically absent and is replaced by digital. It reduces image quality without increasing the cost of the gadget.

Related options

In addition to the above, you can slightly reduce the cost of the gadget by abandoning the more advanced 5G. Well, firstly, it is not so widespread in our country, and secondly, not all tariffs are designed for these speeds. Therefore, 4G remains the most relevant, at which the speed is enough for viewing bulk video content and for downloading files and games.

The NFC module at first glance may seem like a panacea during wireless payment. But as practice shows, a small number of users use wireless payment. Therefore, the NFC module may not be in demand. Therefore, you can also pay attention to this when choosing a smartphone. Although, the difference in the price of gadgets with and without a module is now quite insignificant.

Dual speakers for stereo sound. How often do you use your smartphone to listen to music, even at high volume. For these purposes, a wireless speaker with several larger speakers and a capacious battery is more suitable. In this case, I consider stereo speakers to be “pampering” and in fact they can be neglected, making a choice for more responsible smartphone parameters.

Nowadays, most smartphones are charged by wire, but more and more gadgets with wireless chargers or fast wired chargers are appearing. When using these technologies, the cost increases slightly, and for example, the use of wireless charging is not always justified. Yes, and the speed of such work is quite slow. What can not be said about wired charging using fast protocols. Such gadgets can be charged with an output power of 20 watts or more, which reduces the time to half an hour or less. Again, reducing the charge time can negatively affect the heating of the device itself and the battery life.

findings

Powerful processors for everyday tasks are quite redundant and I believe that they are not needed. A productive processor, which is quite hot, consumes a lot of energy and, due to flaws in the software, can fall into trolling. Whether you need this, and whether you want to overpay for short-term games, is up to you. But by choosing a previous processor model, you can significantly reduce the price, without a visible loss in performance during normal use.

I myself use 4GB of RAM and have no problems running programs or games. The performance of these functions runs smoothly and without freezes. Perhaps in the future I will choose a mobile gadget with 6 GB of RAM, but at the moment I think this is redundant.

The IPS panel will be a great alternative to the more expensive AMOLED options, but you can’t really hope for high refresh rates. Usually these are resolutions no more than Full HD + and a frequency of no more than 120 Hz.

I think it’s redundant to choose smartphones with built-in memory of more than 128 GB, since it is quite difficult to fill it, and at any time you can expand the storage by installing a memory card. And an overpayment for 250 GB or more, I think is not the best option.

It is better to immediately think about the upcoming energy consumption and choose a device with a battery capacity of more than 4500 mAh and possibly with support for fast charging, unless of course it hits your pocket hard.

When choosing a smartphone, you should pay attention to gadgets with 48 megapixel matrices or other voluminous options. It’s not worth chasing options with 64 megapixels or higher, since 48 megapixels is enough in the daytime, and increasing the matrix will not greatly improve the image quality at night and increase the image volume.