If one turns off the wifi, bluetooth, and sometimes the GPS even a few days are usually not an issue.[quote=“ccmpl, post:20, topic:14502”]
provision for carrying a spare battery
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The non-swappable internal batteries are a fashion statement. It is the only way to make them slim and trim. The ‘spare battery’ is now the powerbank product.
This is FAR beyond my price tag for a phone and almost getting ridiculous. I know a phone today is more than a phone…but for me this becoming a joke to pay that sort of money. I guess I am getting beyond it.
I love I.T and new gadgets should I say I LOVED . But today given the waste that is generated with all those items that we buy and disregard, I will stick to my Iphone 5S for the time being and when that dies I’ll think about it…
This is a good point, but it’s worth remembering that not every network (Optus, Telstra, Vodafone are the only three) uses all of the same bands (this goes for both 3G and 4G, although calls are only carried on 3G). For example, Telstra and Vodafone both use the 850MHz band among others, whereas Optus does not.
So, if you are looking at Telstra’s Blue Tick, it’s only 100% useful to consider mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs, eg ALDI, Amaysim, Moose, etc) that sell access to the Telstra network, and not those that sell Optus access. A Blue Ticked phone may work really well on the Optus network, but you’d have no “guarantee”.
About bands: Australian Phone Networks and Frequencies Explained | WhistleOut
I agree and thank you for clarifying my poor explanation of the point I was trying to make.
In my post I made reference to both major carriers that have some sort of indication if a phone has better fringe reception, I don’t think Vodaphone has a similar rating system. But my post was unclear in pointing out the usage based on bands used eg Optus’s “Top Picks for our Regional areas” apply to the phones that are supported on their network and the bands they use.
So if choosing for Telstra or Vodaphone based networks (such as ALDI & Woolworths for Telstra and Kogan, Lebara and TPG for Vodaphone) the Telstra “Blue Tick” should indicate the phone will be a better option for fringe areas. The Optus rating should be a similar outcome for all providers based on Optus’s network such as Amaysim, Dodo, Exetel & Moose.
In neither of these rating systems for fringe areas do iPhones appear to be well represented and the same can be said for many other brands out there.
Indeed it’s been many phones since I bought one on a plan. Nowadays there are so many good prepaid options out there - just buy the phone outright (if it doesn’t cost as much as a cheap car 
)
A clunky great power pack compensates for a design being turned out as a “fashion statement”? This is nuts!
Some [emergency] power packs are key chain size and many are smaller or about the same size as a mobile. If you only focus on the bigger ones that are meant to charge laptops and tablets, they are indeed ‘clunky great’ things in the context of a phone.
Remember that while many of us keep phones for many years and they keep working, the manufacturers consider they have a 2-year product life, and the original batteries usually provide good service for that period. Whether it be planned obsolescence or the march of technology is in the eye of the beholder.
I’ve just upgraded to a Google Pixel phone. With modest usage, the battery is depleted by around 15~25% per day. This would give me way more than 36 hours usage on a single charge.
I used to charge my previous phone, a Nexus 5X, every day. Now, I’m confident to go a few days at a time without charging.
The battery is not user-replaceable.
I would probably just buy the iphone 8s. Why do you need to spend that much on a phone? This is when a phone is really trying to become a status symbol but not quite making it. Apple has kind of dried up since Jobs died and its lost its mojo a little bit. There is more competition than ever and realistically a lot of the stuff they have developed has come out by other phone companies before them. Their big rival was going to be the Samsung note 8 so this is their plan. A status phone that fails when they show it off. Woops. The note 8 is virtually a mini computer in your hand. I don’t need a new phone but seriously apple needs to get itself together because Samsung managed to recover from its fall from grace but if apple keeps annoying its customers I predict its only got about another 5 years left. They need to figure out what their target audience actually want and can they deliver and listen to them.
All of the better smart phones have more computing power than a supercomputer of not many decades ago. Supercomputer power did applications such as weather forecasting and modelling with their power. Now it is for scrolling, emulating cameras, music, games, pretty videos/graphics, and so on. Such is the ‘democratisation of computing’ where most of the CPU cycles make ‘computing’ available to those who do not, do not want to, and probably do not need to, understand the complexities.
I like the design & features but the premium price is an issue.
I’m not a big fan of big phones though, it’s only slightly smaller than the 8 plus.
Oh, who am I kidding, I’d love one.
New technology is my drug!
I can never get past the inflated price tags for the things. I currently own a second hand iPhone 5S which does what I need it to do. It sends and receives phone calls and text messages. It takes photos and videos. It gives me access to Facebook. It shows the time and date. It has an alarm clock function. It doubles as a calculator and it gives me access to my emails. While it actually does do quite a lot of things, including being a device that I can also make phone calls with, there’s no way on this planet that I’ll ever fork out more than a couple of hundred dollars for the thing. The only reason I have an iPhone is because I was disappointed with Android and Windows base phones. Would I pay more for a phone than I’d spend on a half decent laptop? Not a chance.
It’s interesting how people find different implementations more or less intuitive/etc - but they do, and thats ok. I’ve always used Android for religious reasons 
but to be fair I find my Nexus 5X which set me back about $370 does more than I need - including my OBD engine diagnostics, digital speedometer and a handy ballistics calculator 
… and I specifically DONT have ‘faceplant’ installed on my phone. If I’m out and about, I like interfacing to the real world …
Someone here posted that Apple iPhone is a premium brand and therefore it is as much a status symbol as it is a very functional and reliable phone.
Style and cachet is very important for many you only have to witness the sales of various euro-brand (allegedly) luxury cars to the aussie middle class to witness how perceived style and cachet takes precedence over necessity and reliability.
IMO Apple will always seek to occupy the luxury segment and other than the short-lived 5C plastic model iPhones, they will not provide a budget model, they will likely never again lead the everyday smartphone market but they continue to work to dominate the luxury smartphone market.
Fortunately for apple users they get a very durable & reliable device that works seamlessly with most other devices whether they be apple or windows, and they get a relatively safe OS that is supported for the life of the phone the software access to is regulated only by Apple which reduces instances of malware.
Also if you use android, google is watching you to make their advertising highly tailored to you and if you buy Chinese brands like Huawei some of these brands are very close to the Chinese central government and you may well be sharing info with it.
I don’t know if Apple does but it is unlikely given their strong position on user privacy this even extended to their unwillingness last year to even assist the US government and the FBI crack the sacramento terrorist iPhone’s encryption.
Google certainly does track users and it is part of their business model well documented so much that the European union has been investigating them for doing exactly this and some countries are considering passing laws about their meta-data snooping.
and the Chinese who knows what they are doing as they are totally opaque.
… lucky the iPhone is entirely manufactured in Cupertino !! 
Great informative reply Brendan, thanks
Ahhh Ohhh… Not just for the new iPhone 8 & X, but relevant.
