Board 8 > What's a good cheap phone that's compatible with t-mobile and uses a nano sim

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09/21/17 1:44:49 AM
#1:


I messed up the screen on my Sony Xperia Z3 today. I'm going to try to fix it by replacing the screen myself, but I'd like to get a cheap stopgap phone in the meantime since the touch screen is totally shot and it's completely unusable right now.

Anyone got any recommendations. Obviously needs to be unlocked too as the plan is to just plunk the sim card from my dead phone in it for a bit.

Alternatively an upgrade for the Sony Xperia Z3 would be okay I suppose, assuming I can get as good or better specs at a reasonable (<= $200) budget.

@Wanglicious plz
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09/21/17 2:14:30 AM
#2:


http://www.gsmarena.com/lg_k3-8269.php

Looking at this one since I can pick up an unlocked one in Best Buy for around $80. A bit pricy as a stopgap but I feel like I can keep it around as a backup too which could be useful for situations like this. Yes? No? Seems to have all the needed bands.
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Shaduln
09/21/17 2:33:00 AM
#3:


So I bought a Blu something or other at Walmart unlocked for $25 for this exact purpose (Shadwife broke her screen on her Galaxy S8).

It's an android phone, but I guess I wouldn't say it's "good". It will only do 3G. It technically does mini sim, but if you go to a t-mobile store, they'll likely give you an adapter.

It worked for the week that we needed it for and now it's a good backup.
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09/21/17 2:43:29 AM
#4:


Kinda want 4G on the backup, if I get one, as I may use the fact that I have it to try and convince my mom to get T-Mobile for her phone + internet instead of landline + cable as I think she'd save a lot of money that way and frankly be more happy with that, since you can actually stream quite a good amount with just the $30 plan I've found. Also if I can't convince, having a fully functional backup seems more desirable than not.

That phone was the cheapest model I could find glancing around that had it though, so if I want 4G + unlocked + t-mobile compatibility it seems like I'm gonna have to pay a decent sum for it, unfortunately. Might consider the BLU option-- can't beat $25!
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Wanglicious
09/21/17 10:55:54 AM
#5:


Blu, Motorola, ZTE, and Huawei all typical brands you can do for this, though Blu's the lowest quality. LG also has some decent low budget options sometimes too. generally the lowest budget ones are phones with a Snapdragon 210 or 410 inside. alternatively you go for used phones that are 3+ years old on ebay or Swappa. in terms of the ones that are on sale right now somewhere.... would need to look into that. but those are usually the weak ones (210/410) if it's <$50.
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09/21/17 4:17:20 PM
#6:


Thinking I might just upgrade

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lg-g5-4g-lte-with-32gb-memory-cell-phone-unlocked-titan/5199400.p?skuId=5199400

Considering getting that. $50 cheaper than my Xperia Z3 and slightly better specs, and I can pick one up today to minimize downtime. Then try and resell my replaced screen Xperia at a discounted rate to recoup some of the losses.
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Wanglicious
09/21/17 6:08:46 PM
#7:


that could work. personally i've cracked part of my phone (Nexus 6) but it's still fully usable so i'm just gonna keep holding out on upgrading until November as that should be when the craziest deals happen. but i'm also gunning for phones with the latest chip in it so different strokes there!

there's some sales here and there but if you're going for "I need it now," there isn't much you're gonna find better than a decent local deal.
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Lopen
09/21/17 6:13:14 PM
#8:


Yeah I don't really care about top end. Decent mid end is good for me-- big difference with this one is I save the "placeholder" money which basically makes the phone discounted. That combined with screen replace + maybe selling used for like $150 would further cushion it to a reasonable fee.

And yeah Xperia Z3's screen is kinda weird like that. Basically if you crack it at all the entire screen becomes non-functional due to how the pieces are laid together-- digitizer is too close to the glass I guess. Probably would've gotten a different phone had I known as the cracking isn't so bad that the phone should be unusable imo, but whatever.
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09/21/17 10:49:14 PM
#9:


Ended up going with the LG G5. Hopefully it's a pretty good phone-- G4 had some strange issues to it-- weird lag spikes, that ultimately caused me to return the thing and jump to the Xperia, but I almost think I got a lemon when I did it as it seemed a generally positively reviewed phone.

Went pretty hardcore with the case this time. Not risking that again.
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Wanglicious
09/22/17 3:54:25 AM
#10:


G5 is a pretty great phone, though you may see a lot of reviews mixed on it. LG was trying some gimmicky stuff with it by saying it's a modular phone and that didn't fare well. but it does let you swap out the battery, has a lot of neat little features, and has fairly strong construction. camera's great too.

the main problem it had was being called a flagship when it wasn't a very good "flagship" type device, it's a good alternative to one. fortunately its price now reflects that a lot more but it still has the crazy good flagship specs that's at the top of last gen's hardware (Snapdragon 820, technically there's the 821 but that's a minor bump). and i mean the generation split there, the current chips changed in size to be smaller.
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