The myths of China mobile phones

The popularity of China Smartphones

iPhone 8 and Samsung are taking a beating in China as China Smartphones are gaining a strong foothold in the China market. Many of these manufacturers are adopting Android as the OS for their smartphone with heavy investment into making smartphone more responsive, nice looking and most importantly, bringing values to the market.

Huawei is defining the 5G smartphones, Vivo is focusing on selfie, Xiaomi is packaging as a system provider, Oppo is capturing the hearts of overseas marketing with its fluid experiences, Gionee is positioning to capture the hearts of the businessmen and Meizu is penetrating the value segment.  Other companies like Lenovo, Coolpad, 360, ZTE are also fighting to gain a footage in the competitive market.  Smaller companies are also struggling to survive rolling out phones with features such as weatherproof, bezeless, high battery capacity, 6GB or 8GB ram and dual camera.

In the midst of the competition, there are "traps" for consumers to fall into for a bitter experience.

Myth 1: More memory = Better performance

In the early days, iPhone is known to be lag free as compared to Android.  This is no longer true when Android OS is revamped and improved with 80% of smartphones sold in the market.

The simplest way to sell smartphone is to tout of its high memory as it is a well known fact that more memory (ram) is equivalent to less lag, therefore better performance. Premium smartphones are now sold with 6GB or 8GB ram built in to remove the doubts that there is no memory to run applications.

Ask yourself this: We know that the more rice we eat, the more energy we get.  How many bowls of rice produce more energy: 4 bowls or 40?  Definitely, the answer is 40 bowls.  But can our body digest 40 bowls of rice in one shot?  The diminishing marginal rate of return as our body is saturated after gaining enough energy.  Similarly, the phones cannot utilise the extra memory when there are limited apps.  To make matter worst, the apps cannot fully utilise the bandwidth of the memory thus making it run inefficiently.

So how many is enough? The magic number is 4GB when 6GB costs a bomb now. 

High benchmark does not mean better performance

Antutu is one of the popular benchmarking software and a high benchmark score implies the smartphone is better.  Manufacturers tend to place a premium price tag for high benchmark to justify the high performance.  The truth is high benchmark is achieved at the expense of power consumption and producing more heat.

Real life experience is more important than benchmark

Many are fooled by the promise of fastest cpu and ignore real life experiences.  Some premium phones with more memory and storage can run slower than those with less memory and storage due to different operation system and environment.  For example, Huawei's EUI is much fluid than many China OS who are not optimised.

More cores does not mean better performance

MTK 10 core processor has a fantastic benchmark but when executing instructions on single core, the other 9 processors cannot assist to expedite the process.

So what is the purpose of high benchmark and fastest cpu when most of the applications cannot fully utilize all the cores of the processor.  The processor can also run inefficiently with much heat thereby draining the battery life.

Bigger battery does not mean more standby time

Many China's smaller companies produced many phones with big battery capacity like 4,000 to 10,000 mAh.  However, raw battery life does not guarantee a good battery life.  In some cases, inferior batteries are used with poor setting which resulted in sudden drop of battery life from 30% to instant shutdown.  Effectively, the battery of a 4,000mAh is only operating at 70% or 2,800mAh.  This is disappointing as the promise of a high capacity battery is a fallacy.

Dual camera does not mean better quality. Fake camera

Do you know some dual-camera are fake?  You can try out by taking a picture with or without the second back len by blocking one of the lens completely.  Both photos produce identical image! Be mindful when you are promised with a dual camera in your next purchase.

Higher resolution camera does not mean better pictures

The pursuit of higher resolutions is common in those who are ignorant of the technicalities of a good smartphone camera.  Sensor and focal are more critical when considering a good camera.  High resolutions only produce big photo file size which consume more of the your limited storage space in your phone.

Full screen is not really full screen

The latest craze is the bezel-less phone which promises full screen effect.  Just like the fad and hype of 2.5D screen which not only serves as a beautiful vase but has no tangible feature in real life.  A true full screen has many compromises which tests greatly on the designer on antenna and circuit routing and bypasses.  You can only choose 2 out of the following 3 options - real full screen, good signal/GPS strength and good price.

Conclusions

There are many cracks in the selection of good China smartphones which has no standard by itself.  Some manufacturers even has spywares pre-installed to collect the surfing profile and information of the end-users.  The only consolation is consumers are getting smarter and by collective intelligence, inferior manufacturers will be eliminated by boycotting their new products.  We believe tomorrow will always be better than today.

How to choose your postpaid Singtel Combo Plan?

Singtel Postpaid Combo Plan

Singtel Postpaid Combo Plan is the traditional and standard plan in every telco with a catchy 24 months plan to lock in customers. It is the prime and main plan offered by Singtel to attract customers since day 1 so it should be the first thing potential customers will see. Over the years, it is the cash cow of Singtel so it should offer the best plans to fight against competition. So are you getting the best deal if you are currently in this plan?

What is the current Combo Plan?

Ref: https://www.singtelshop.com/shop/plans-add-ons.jsf#/tab-combo

This table is wordy and appears confusing. A better table can be found below.

From the table, it is obvious that the last 3 plans are for those who wanted unlimited minutes and sms.  Combo 12 plan is designed for frequent travellers who wanted to change phone every year (IMO, a silly act to choose flagship phones).  Combo 6 is targeting those who are simply frequent travellers while Combo 3 are those who are not frequent travellers.

So where is the catch? or should I say the "trap"?

First Trap: Buying flagship phones with the most expensive plan

I consider it silly to buy flagship products as discussed in my previous blog.  There are thousands of phones in the market and by sticking to the latest model of a specific company, you are restricting your choice to only 1 model.  This is an ideal scenario of paying diamonds to buy water in a dessert. Singtel capitalised on your hunger and setup the perfect trap to lock you up for 24 months with a heavy penalty if you break the bond. 

Combo 6 and Combo 12 are the perfect trap with free throw-ins such as roaming vouchers (which you may never use) and high value vouchers (S$500) for your next model to trap you for another 24 months.  It is a nice trick to let you voluntarily fall into the same trap every 2 years.

Second Trap: Never consider add-ons

Many customers select their plans based on their monthly consuming minutes, sms and data.  This strategy works in the past but it no longer valid now due to the increasing use of data and the declining use of sms.  With social apps like whatsapp, wechat and skype, we have options to choose data calls instead of conventional calls thereby reducing the needs for calling minutes and sms.  One can dramatically choose a better plan than just based his/her choice on minutes and sms now.

Singtel offers add-on plans (Data X 2, Data X 3 and Data X Infinity) to boost more or unlimited data plan for higher end plans.  With this add-on, it is a game changer after stripping off the gimmicks such as S$20 or S$35 roaming charges and the S$500 yearly voucher.

Net 24 is the total costs of the plan (with or without add-on) after deducting the full roaming charges and the S$500 yearly voucher.  Now, let's discover the "traps".

Plans to consider:

• Unlimited Minutes Plan - Combo 3
• Unlimited SMS Plan - Combo 3
• Unlimited Data Plan - Combo 3 + Data X Infinity

Plans to avoid:

• Combo 6 (Choose Combo 3 + Data X2 instead)
• Combo 6 + Data X Infinity
• Combo 12
• Combo 12 + Data X2
• Combo 12 + Data X3
• Combo 12 + Data X Infinity

Third Trap: Stick to combo plan for data plan

If you are a high data user, Combo 3 + Data X Infinity is the Singtel plan for you.  But you have neglected the trend of more and more people signing up SIM-ONLY plan because they already have a working mobile phone and do not need a new one.

This exposed the weakness of the lower segment of COMBO plan as they are totally unattractive as compared to the SIM-ONLY plan as shown in table below.

Clearly, there are 8 plans better than Combo 1.  Even the cheapest SimOnly (5G + 12 mths) cost lower than Combo 1 and offer 50 more calling minutes, 2.9GB more data and unlimited Singtel Wifi.  The S$100+ difference is the subsidy for a new mobile phone. Why should you pay S$100 for a limited selection of 10 instead of buying from the market of thousands?

Similarly, Combo 2 is also a joke when you compare with SimOnly plan.  If you are interested to have more comparison of Sim-Only vs Combo plan, leave a comment below on what is your range of monthly budget and I will forward the range to your valid email address. Note: Your budget range difference should not exceed S$50 (example: from S$40 to S$90).

Conclusion

Is Combo plan obsoleted in the data dominant era?  If you ask me, it is a definite YES.  Postpaid plan is only good for people with no mobile phone.  Are you one of them?

Top 10 reasons why you should not buy flagship phone in Singapore

Why chasing after flagship phones?

Many are chasing the latest iPhone X or Pixel 2 XL which will be launching soon in end 2017. The local telcos are also rushing to come out with phone plans using the old models to lock their loyal customers for another 1-2 years. Little do the customers know that this old business model is silly and no longer apply to this new world of technology.

Reason 1: Warranty of Phone is only 12 months but contract is 24 months

The warranty of most of the phones are 12 months but the contract is 24 months.  This implies that the high-end phone has no warranty on the 13th month onwards.  Most of the electronic parts seldom break down in the first 12 months and that's why manufacturer are committed to service their phone within the first 12 months.  Why should you sign a 24-month contract to buy a 12-month warranty phone?

Reason 2: Premium phone is sold at a premium during launch

All phones are sold at the highest point to capture the trend setters who buy the story of the manufacturer. After 3-6 months, discounts will be available for the phone and prices will gradually decrease over time.  Why should you buy the phone at the highest point? To support the manufacturer and show off to your friends?

Reason 3: There is no room for discount for a low monthly plan

If you are paying below S$45/month for your phone bill, there is no benefit of getting a high-end phone. The maximum subsidy you enjoy is only S$200 but you must fork out over S$1000 up front. The lowest tier does not enjoy any benefits and are always the last group of customers that the telco serviced.

Reason 4: Use up monthly data in less than 2 seconds!

For high-end phone, they are capable of delivery bullet speed data.  Pixel 2 XL is a CAT 11 4G LTE beast capable of transferring 500Mbps across Singapore.  Given 100MB of data per month under Singtel COMBO 1 plan, you can use up your monthly allocated data in 1.6 seconds. Even if you are having the COMBO 12 plan (S$239.90/month), you only take up 192 seconds or 3.2 minutes to consume your 12GB monthly quota. This sucks!

Reason 5: Features you seldom use

New phones come with many features like NFC, 4k video recording, Face ID, iBeacon micro location, 2.5D, iWatch app and many others which you seldom use. Why pay so much more for something you use once in a while?

Reason 6: Small battery size

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Reason 7: High repair costs

Many of the new phones have double sided glass for premium aesthetic look and feel. They are easily contaminated with fingerprints and once it is cracked, the costs of repair can cost up to S$500 since you need to replace glasses on both sides of the phone.

Reason 8: Electronic parts have lifetime

Smartphones are electronic products which are made up with active and passive components. Active and passive products have a lifetime and once their lifetime is up, they will no longer function as required. The design of the phone is also important in determining its product lifetime.  It is a miracle for these designs to last more than 10 years. So it is unwise to buy a high end phone.

Reason 9: Battery cannot last more than 5 years

Most batteries depreciate after extensive use and the lifetime of battery cannot last more than 5 years.  If the design of the battery compartment is small with no allowance for expansion due to heat or pressure, explosion incidents may happen similar to Samsung Note 7.

Reason 10: The next flagship product will be launched tomorrow

There is no end in chasing flagship product.  The moment you buy the current flagship, it will depreciate 10% to 20% on the same day and the next flagship product will be launched tomorrow. Remember: Technology travels fast.