Solved! In terms of future proofing, is it better to have greater software support or better hardware?

the_bears

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Dec 6, 2013
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I'm planning on buying a new phone and the most important thing that I'm looking for is longevity, that is, to get a phone that will last as much as possible before I need to replace it, something like 4+ years.

The two phones that are within my price range and that I think will fulfil this criteria are: Poco F3 and Samsung Galaxy A52s

Now, I'm in a bit of a dilemma of deciding which of these two phones I should take, and the only thing that remains is to decide which of the features of these phones provide better future-proofing.

Poco F3 for example, comes with amazing specs for it's price range (SD870 CPU, Adreno 650 GPU, 8GB (DDR5) RAM, UFS 3.1 Storage speed) which seem to be flagship grade, and it does have IP53 rating. However, from what I've read, it does come with a weaker / sluggish software, that is, it's operating system MIUI, and less update support.

A52s on the other hand comes with weaker specs that are mostly aimed towards midrange phones (SD778 CPU, Adreno 642L GPU, 6GB (DDR4) RAM, UFS 2.1 Storage speed), but it does come with a bit more stable OS, more software support, and IP67 rating.

Both phones have specs that are overkill for my minimal use cases. I don't do a lot on my phone other than browse the net and watch YouTube videos, and I try to avoid dropping my phone on the ground and water so I'm not sure how much the IP ratings are relevant here. The only remaining factor in deciding which of these two phones I should get is whether or not taking a phone with better hardware (F3) has an advantage of taking a phone with better software support (A52s)?

On the one hand, if I take F3, I'll have better hardware, but less updates to push that hardware to it's maximum efficiency, and due to my use cases, I wonder if I should even bother with stronger specs, whereas if I take the A52s, I'm worried about the opposite, if it's midrange CPU (SD778) will be enough for those years ahead to push things through smoothly and without stutter, and if all these software updates will eat up more and more (of it's limited 6GB) memory.

I know that I'm probably overthinking this, but seeing how the prices are quite similar (with A52s being around ~30$ cheaper), in your opinion, which of these two would you take if you wish for a that will last you as long as possible?
 
Solution
You need both really, hardware that won't run what you need is no good, neither is software that won't run what you need.
I would not worry much about it though, cheap devices are cheap to replace, higher end devices are faster and have better software support.

Unless you are getting the phone for gaming on, where speeds matter most, just get what is decent now and don't worry how it will be in 3-5 years. If it's bad, it's bad, if it's good then, yay.
Application support does not often end when the OS is outdated with Android, yes some programs need some newer versions but that usually takes a while to get to and it's not worth worrying about the future unless you are spending like $500 for a phone. And at that price point, the...
You need both really, hardware that won't run what you need is no good, neither is software that won't run what you need.
I would not worry much about it though, cheap devices are cheap to replace, higher end devices are faster and have better software support.

Unless you are getting the phone for gaming on, where speeds matter most, just get what is decent now and don't worry how it will be in 3-5 years. If it's bad, it's bad, if it's good then, yay.
Application support does not often end when the OS is outdated with Android, yes some programs need some newer versions but that usually takes a while to get to and it's not worth worrying about the future unless you are spending like $500 for a phone. And at that price point, the updates should be done for years on it.
 
Solution