phone reviews – introduction and benchmark plans

before graduating in elementary i had my first mobile phone. it was just a basic mobile phone, or some people call it dumb phone, lately. but some phones were equipped with other features back then. so i thought that in the future, more features will be put into such small device.

fast forward, many improvements were present to mobile phones and the market went mostly to smartphones – which means it is now stuffed with sensors and software to do “smart” stuff.

main purpose of this blog and the succeeding ones about phones is to provide feedback to phones i owned. mostly, these are subjective, meaning, how i see it and how it fits to my usage and preferences. one particular aspect where i can provide a, somehow, objective feedback is on battery charging and discharging or usage. despite of pointing out that i also have a preference with charging time and usage, i would still show data objectively and present it in a way that it is easy to compare a phone against another phone. as for that personal preference, my ideal charging time is about three hours or so and on usage, i am fine with an entire day of casual use. screen on time, six hours is already great. i can top up some juice just within the day anyway.

and as somebody who is quite interested to mobile phones, i made a plan to collect a number of phones based on my age. though not all phones are usable and accessible (i am not sure where few of my phones are), i consider everything i owned as part of the collection.

initially, you can see here the battery charge and discharge test i made last year. i used original charger, charging them from 0% to 100%. for now, i will be hiding the identity of the phone. i will reveal each one after each ones’ review.

ranking 2020	phone	duration of charging (hh:mm)
1	phone 18 - sony xperia z1 compact (b)	00:15
2	phone 17 - sony xperia z1 compact (a)	01:08
3	phone 5 - lenovo e156	01:49
4	phone 26 - sony xperia 1 ii	01:54
5	phone 8 - nokia n8 (a)	01:57
6	phone 7 - nokia asha 202	01:58
7	phone 9 - htc desire 200	01:59
8	phone 24 - nokia n8 (b)	02:04
9	phone 25 - sony xperia xz2 compact	02:11
10	phone 4 - nokia n70 (a)	02:13
11	phone 22 - sony xperia z5 premium dual	02:22
12	phone 13 - nokia n9	02:29
13	phone 15 - nokia lumia 1020	02:31
14	phone 21 - lg g4	02:56
15	phone 12 - asus fonepad note fhd6	03:01
16	phone 16 - sony xperia z3 dual	03:24
17	phone 27 - lg v50s thinq 5g	03:45
18	phone 6 - sony xperia miro	04:17
19	phone 10 - htc windows phone 8x	04:29
20	phone 23 - nokia n70 (b)	not tested
21	phone 20 - firefly mobile aurii secret 4g	not tested
22	phone 19 - cloudfone thrill plus	not tested
23	phone 14 - nokia x2 dual sim	not tested
24	phone 11 - asus zenfone 5	not tested
25	phone 3 - nokia 1600	not tested
26	phone 2 - alcatel ot c552	not tested
27	phone 1 - nokia 1100	not tested

 

i would also like to show you my preference ranking. i have two main criteria in ranking – usability and uniqueness. again, this is among my collection. so that means, uniqueness and usability among my collections.

ranking 2020	phone	rating
1	phone 15 - nokia lumia 1020	excellent
2	phone 25 - sony xperia xz2 compact	excellent
3	phone 26 - sony xperia 1 ii	excellent
4	phone 7 - nokia asha 202	very satisfactory
5	phone 18 - sony xperia z1 compact (b)	very satisfactory
6	phone 27 - lg v50s thinq 5g	satisfactory
7	phone 22 - sony xperia z5 premium dual	satisfactory
8	phone 4 - nokia n70 (a)	satisfactory
9	phone 16 sony xperia z3 dual	satisfactory
10	phone 24 - nokia n8 (b)	satisfactory
11	phone 21 - lg g4	satisfactory
12	phone 12 - asus fonepad note fhd6	good
13	phone 17 - sony xperia z1 compact (a)	good
14	phone 10 - htc windows phone 8x	good
15	phone 6 - sony xperia miro	good
16	phone 5 - lenovo e156	good
17	phone 9 - htc desire 200	good
18	phone 13 - nokia n9	good
19	phone 8 - nokia n8 (a)	good
20	phone 23 - nokia n70 (b)	good
21	phone 1 - nokia 1100	good
22	phone 2 - alcatel ot c552	good
23	phone 3 - nokia 1600	good
24	phone 14 - nokia x2 dual sim	poor
25	phone 19 - cloudfone thrill plus	poor
26	phone 11 - asus zenfone 5	poor
27	phone 20 - firefly aurii secret 4g	poor

 

as battery degrades and also the phones might perform differently this year, both of these rankings will change.

so here is the set up i made this year.

for charging i am still going to use the included charging brick and cable unless it appears damaged. i will charge them from 0% to 100%. some of the phones boot when enough charge is present and i will let them charged, turned on. as for others, i will not boot them up. meaning, i will charged them “naturally” – whether they boot or not. for some other cases, it will be mentioned on respective phone review.

the discharging has the following plan

tasks*	minutes
music play	20
web browsing	10
gaming	10
photo shoots	5
video shoots	5
video play	10
* in the absence of a task, other task will be used

 

daily testing	24 hours
active use	5 hours
inactive use (still switched on)	19 hours

 

that is it. again, this will be updated as i review each phone.

will this be relevant to you?

i really do not know…