I'm not even sure I understand what high specs matter on a phone anymore. I sort of have new phone envy, but would choose the G over the X Style even if they were the same price just b/c I don't want a 5.7 inch phone.

ya i was factoring in the price and just the complete package that was ideal for me

the things i like:
phablet size 5.7", great screen-to-body ratio, 1440p, camera specs, big upgrade in battery (3000mA vs 2300mA), large RAM 3GB, SD card slot, water resistant

I do use tap-to-pay every once in a while, but most of my use from NFC is to quickly pair my phone with my camera to transfer a picture or two over or use the phone as a remote shutter.

Also, in Lollipop, when setting up a new phone you can use NFC to pair your new phone with the old one to transfer apps, settings, etc. I just used this yesterday when I got a replacement phone after the microphone stopped working on mine.

So yes, limited use, but undeniably helpful in a few cases. NFC takes up almost no volume inside the phone and it's quite cheap.

Received an email that groupon is selling factory refurb HTC One M7s fully unlocked for $230.

For the price, is it worth it to get this as a back up? I have the One+ one as my main phone and an N5 as back up but the N5 is 1st gen and already had problems with the power button sticking several times and the last time it took some effort to get it unstuck. I also use the N5 as my main phone when I travel outside of the country.

Is $230 worth it on a factory refurb M7?

I've got two m7's. I think that $230 is borderline of a deal.

The strongest feature of the m7 is it's speakers. They're unbelievably good.

The camera is it's weak spot (purple fringe). But HTC will repair the camera issue for free even long outside the warranty period.

Anyone else have an m9

I'm really digging it going to this from the g3

anyone able to help me?
i have a samsung galaxy S5 my problem?

im having a group text with 4 other friends with occasional pictures thrown in making fun of each other etc, when all of the sudden i quit getting A LOT of the messages from the people instead i get a text message from "Unknown address" then the actual text will say "message not found" what proceeds to happen then is i dont see whats going on in the group text and then everyone proceeds to tell me my phone sucks get a new one yada yada yada. anyone able to help me out? or do i need to just go down to my local tmobile and be like this **** blows can you fix my phone?

This is not true, at least for Sprint. They don't advertise it, but you can still do a normal subsidized purchase you're used to if you ask. At least this was the case in late Feb when I last upgraded.

It's highly unlikely that it's an S5 problem, probably either carrier or app. FYI, I have t-mobile too and they're kind of notorious now for having ****ty texting service, but it's generally fine for me.

Get Textra and turn on the "use mms for groups" setting. That's your best bet. If that doesn't work, it's the carrier.

I hope texting truly dies at some point soon. The data apps are there and great, but people need to use them. It's unfeasible to have to talk to some people on sms, some on hangouts, some on FB, some on telegram, etc. Reminds me of when I wished everyone would switch from aim to yahoo messenger back in the day. Hangouts is crap (compared to most) and Google clearly doesn't care about it, meanwhile people are switching to Apple because iMessage is goat.

@ people in Europe who all use WhatsApp: you're doing it right.

for those that like sub 5" phones, the Alcatel Onetouch Idol 3 4.7, competing w Moto G:
http://mashable.com/2015/08/10/alcat...ch-idol-3-4-7/

There is now nobody under the age of 40 in the U.S. without a smartphone, as my wife and I finally got one. Sort of like "I don't even own a TV," having a "dumb phone" was kind of a badge of honor (plus, since I didn't need one, I couldn't justify the price), but a deal Metro PCS was offering made it basically risk free:

2 lines for $50, all fees and taxes included. Unlimited talk and text, 1 GB 4g LTE data, but still unlimited data after that, just throttled. Extra $50 discount on each phone for porting our numbers made them free. No contract.

Now for a story followed by a question:

We signed up on Saturday and there was a problem with the number porting (my fault - gave them the wrong Verizon PIN), so we had some screwy text messaging over the weekend. Voice and data worked, though. Got the port issue solved today, so now texts work, too.

Voice quality has been fine EXCEPT for when my wife and I talk to each other using our new Metro PCS phones. We've tested it when both in the house, when I was in the front yard, when she was at work and I was out and about, and when she was at home and I was out. Talking to other home phones and cell phones from our cells sounds fine. When our two phones connect, though, it's incredibly tinny-sounding. Really distracting.

Metro PCS customer service said it could have to do with the porting problem (the sound issue was happening both before and after the port fix) - that the process still needs to be fully completed or something - and that to call them if it's still bad after 72 hours (from this afternoon).

Does it make sense that it could be related to the porting completion being delayed? Is there some other issue that could be causing it that I could fix myself? Since voice quality is good to other people/phones, it seems like it wouldn't be a network or bad phone issue. The phones are Samsung Galaxy Core Prime, which is a low-end, but decent, smartphone. It gets solid reviews and I haven't read any complaints about voice quality.

In the meantime, I'll wait until Thursday and see if it's still happening.

The latter is why the former is not happening any time soon. If I have someone's number I can sms them, the end. I don't have/want to figure out what other messaging platform they're on. IMO all the sms alternatives were invented because a) people used to not have unlimited texts (now most people do) and b) it was for kids so mom and dad wouldn't see who and how often they were texting on the bill.

I don't know what protocol whatsapp is considered but I just started using that with a few friends and it's incredible. So much better than texting (except no gifs). Whatsapp is based on your phone number.

hard to believe, but WhatsApp is already bigger than global SMS:
http://ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2...saging-go-next

Yea I understand that; I'm saying an agreement on the latter is what is needed. We're almost there with WA.

I think even with unlimited texts and no mom/dad, you're going to be hard pressed to find anyone who thinks the SMS protocol is objectively better than the data-based messaging services. They simply work better, have more features, and more interactive, and provide way more options for future development.

There doesn't even necessarily need to be agreement on any single app - there just needs to be a communications standard that any app can implement (this almost happened btw).

The day imessage is on Android is likely the say SMS all but dies in the west. Apple could corner messaging if this is part of why they hired a bunch of Android devs recently. Then again it's one of the few USPs they have so who knows what makes most sense to them.

In Asia SMS has been all but killed already by viber, WhatsApp and wechat (all with different messaging models), but that's mainly due to different consumer use cases.

Any iPhone user I've talked to that's had to use whatsapp abroad says it kicks the **** out of imessage. Apple is gonna get left in the dust because of their closed off ecosystem.

To me, there are several major advantages of Hangouts over most other options that make it my preferred method of communication:

-Completely cross-platform, including PC. It's so convenient to be able to respond on my computer. Easier typing, don't have to pull phone out, etc.
-Searchable. You can search through your entire chat history with everyone. If you don't like that, you can also tell Google to not save chats with specific people or on an as-needed basis
-Related to the previous item, if I switch phones, the chat history moves with me. I lose all my old SMS and (the last time I tried, anyway) Whatsapp messages
-Works over both cell and wifi - so if you're somewhere with no reception but have wifi, you can still message people, unlike SMS
-Mute specific conversations (like group messages) if they get too crazy
-Doesn't require unlimited texting (which some people, including myself, still don't have)

I know some of the other services have some or even most of the above options, but off the top of my head I don't know any that have all of them. I'd be open to using Whatsapp if my friends used it, but afaik their PC client is not very good? Right now I do use GroupMe with one specific group of friends since one guy is on Windows Phone...

The big downside to Hangouts, of course, is that it requires a Google account. Not a problem for most of my friends, but this is a barrier to making everyone get on it.

The big problem DM is your last 5 words: "making everyone get on it." The problem is getting everyone you want to talk to on hangouts to use hangouts. You're in a lucky situation that your friends either agree with you about hangouts's awesomeness or are willing to go on in order to talk to you. What happens when you run into a friend who talks to everyone on either SMS or FB and says "nah that sucks I don't wanna manage a 3rd app, just text me."?

The problem isn't lack of good app (whether you like hangouts or not) - the problem is social and technological standards.

agreed, thats y email is so ubiquitous today because of POP/IMAP/SMTP

Hangouts handles and integrates sms only contacts fine, no?

^ yes, but that's like... 1% of the problem we're discussing here...

I absolutely agree.
It does, but it just serves as a standard texting client with those contacts/conversations. It doesn't do any of the stuff I talked about in my previous post (or at least didn't the last time I tried using Hangouts for SMS), like working when you only have wifi, being archivable/searchable, able to text from computer, or transferring over between devices.

Am thinking about getting an android box and cancelling cable. Anyone have one of these?

I have a Fire TV stick and sideloaded Kodi, which is pretty sweet.