Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Hi everyone,
My iPhone is nearly dead & I'm seeking a more frugal alternative that can do the same stuff. I found my iPhone difficult to repair or even replace a battery & saw that the HTC might be relatively easy to fix/maintain. I'm looking closely at the HTC One M9. Does this seem like a good frugal choice? Any thoughts? I saw some alarming reviews on amazon in terms of hardware & software issues.

Check out this phone: BLU R1 HD. Login with an Amazon Prime and get the one with ads. It's only $60. I bought one a couple months ago and I like it a lot. The hardware is probably every bit as good as you need on a phone. I had an iPhone 6 before. I wouldn't pay over $120 for ANY phone on earth right now when I can get one of these for $60.

I had a $50 LG before. It's hardware wasn't as good and the phone regularly annoyed me. The BLU never annoys me.

Hi C40,
Thanks for your response. I took a quick peek at the phone. I'm concerned it has insufficient storage & RAM. Can you or someone else recommend a phone that is easy to DIY fix, permits DIY memory upgrades, & would let me run memory-intensive apps?

brute would be surprised if any modern HTC was easy to DIY fix. the M9 is also quite old, isn't it? wouldn't that make it slow as well?

brookline wrote: Hi C40,
Thanks for your response. I took a quick peek at the phone. I'm concerned it has insufficient storage & RAM.

The storage is expandable with a micro SD. Up to 64gb I believe. Do you need more than that? I've found the RAM plenty enough for anything I think is reasonable on a phone, plus some games on top of that. What apps do you use that are really memory intensive?

brookline wrote: Can you or someone else recommend a phone that is easy to DIY fix, permits DIY memory upgrades, & would let me run memory-intensive apps?

No. I don't think phones are generally designed to be upgraded or even maintained much. AFAIK, Batteries are about the only thing expected to be replaced.

I've had the M9 for the past 12 months so I feel I could speak to this.

It gets warm if in use for an extended period of time. I use the SD slot for 64 gb card that holds all my music. The camera is decent but nothing to write home about. Overall I'm happy with it. I bought mine used on Kijiji (Canadian Craigslist). I'm not sure how old the model is but I haven't noticed a decrease in performance in the time I've owned it.

Android is my preferred operating system so if you are coming from an iPhone I think you will be happy.

I use the Nova Launcher which is an app that changes the layout of the phone. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND. You will notice a significant speed up in the phone and a longer lasting battery as it removes a lot of the annoying default settings.

distracted_at_work wrote:I've had the M9 for the past 12 months so I feel I could speak to this.
It gets warm if in use for an extended period of time. I use the SD slot for 64 gb card that holds all my music. The camera is decent but nothing to write home about. Overall I'm happy with it. I bought mine used on Kijiji (Canadian Craigslist). I'm not sure how old the model is but I haven't noticed a decrease in performance in the time I've owned it.
Android is my preferred operating system so if you are coming from an iPhone I think you will be happy.
I use the Nova Launcher which is an app that changes the layout of the phone. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND. You will notice a significant speed up in the phone and a longer lasting battery as it removes a lot of the annoying default settings.

Hi Distracted,
Thanks very much. This is really helpful! I appreciate your recommendation about the Nova Launcher app. That sounds really valuable.