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hello everybody and welcome to the Friday debate podcast by android authority discussing topics in android every week I'm of course your host Joshua Vergara what's going on everybody and this week I'm joined by one extra person so now we have a five-panel podcast this time around which might become a regular thing for the fdp in the future but this week in what we thought was going to be Joseph Hindi Zab sins for a while there we brought on nirav gondia to come with us and talk to us about flagships versus mid-range and if it's even worth it to buy flagships now that the mid-range game is getting better and better every year now Joe did eventually get online just in time for him to join in so we have five people on the podcast this time around and you can follow all of the hosts on social media you can find all those links at the Friday debate podcast post at android authority com if you are watching on the YouTube channel that we have up for those of you who aren't on podcast networks you can hit the card over on the top right of the video and you will be able to get to that post as well but one of the best ways of listening to the Friday debate podcast is of course to go to your favorite podcast networks and apps like stitcher and itunes and pocket casts and soon to be soundcloud as well and we will give you information on how to get on soundcloud for those of you who have been wanting the ftp to be on soundcloud without any further ado we have this episode number 13 of the friday debate podcast flagships vs. mid-range devices hope you guys enjoy so how about that money doing what everyone was to take Joe's throne and didn't joke lies it's ridiculous cuz I've only told one joke two of them all I turned I did have to did not i do like two weeks in a row and now I I keep forgetting to do it because I you know for those listening we sort of the podcast super late tonight because of me because I got slightly i watch explain what so I'm me yeah I guess it's the NHL playoffs what you want for me and I bought a new 3ds games are just like I had like my headphones is like watching the game and playing video games and I saw my phone with blinking like crazy just do what she like where the where the hell are you man it's understood podcast I did not think that I was like oh it's 1130 I just chose on the silent do to do to do I have no obligations tonight well one of the auxiliary benefits of Joe being massively late let's not let him live that down is that we actually have a guest with us we started off this podcast as a four-person thing but we always were open to having more people on and one person who's been super super eager to be on the Friday debate podcast is right over there near ave hey guys so um Ravi came on fairly recently and he's a writer with us and if I'm not mistaken you might be doing some videos pretty soon right yep I'm basically trying to get involved on anything and everything nice because you know why not very good um well he's across the pond and by that I mean he's out in the UK so it's really late for a review right now so not if you're mad at anybody be mad at joe yeah joe we gonna have words off oh great everybody wants to talk to me now how are things going on that side of the earth right now in your waiter of it uh if I don't have to hear from another politician on how they're going to promise the world deliver nothing they realize that they haven't got any money to deliver anything I'll be a completely happy man yeah I've been following the news as well there's a lot of that going around but then again we have the presidential race coming up here in the US and everyone is all about how Hillary Clinton ate a burrito a few days ago I don't know if you guys saw that news story at all no but my favorite thing that they've done is a wiki link or WikiLeaks has like a red arrow pointing right in their logo and I guess Hillary Clinton has a red arrow button right in her logo and they're calling it like copyright infringement I do not realize it's a WikiLeaks started complaining about it that there was a copyright on a red arrow pointing right so you learn something new every day you would be surprised just how many were dig lyst things out there are copyrighted like well who was it a Paris Hilton actually coined and trademarked the phrase that's hot really well we're we're super happy to have navi on and you know what with the topic that we have this week and i'll go ahead and have brushy sort of explain how we came to the topic for this week which may be the way we come up with topics most weeks luck coming up we are going to talk about flagship phones and mid-range phones but i'll leave to our sheet to explain exactly what we're going to be talking about right now okay so some of you may have saw that we shared on google plus a pole where we had a few different ideas that we thought of as a team and then we let you guys decide which ones you were most interested in hearing and so basically we just want to talk about which flagship I mean nowadays now that the mid Rangers are getting better and the gap is listening between the two our flagship still worth it for the average consumer basically all right so there are a lot of phones that we take a look at here at Android authority and obviously you got folks like me and lon generally taking a look at the flagship devices but then we have plenty of others on the team that take a look a lot of mid Rangers but that being said any of us who have gone to like say a CES or at mwc will have had time with mid Rangers as well other than that you know we're probably using mid-range phones or flagship phones on our own times I know I know Joe has the m9 now and Ravi wrote a he wrote a piece about the m9 and just before we got on the podcast they were already about to get into a debate about that phone so how about some let's start off with our guests with the Arava here so when it comes to flagship devices I remember you just started looking at the galaxy s6 and now you have the m9 my thoughts so far about this crop flagship devices that we're seeing for 2015 I mean until the s6 they were just more of the same I mean ok so the G flex 2 it looks really nice but it's almost identical to last year's just with a few tweaks the thing about the chief looks too is it's unique take the m9 and it just looks like an m8 at least in my opinion and I know Joe is not going to be happy right now apologies in advance Joe well maybe not the Essex the s6 edge if there's anything about them is that big like the edge especially oh my god it it's so nice because it's so unique there's probably the geek inside me that's going it has to be unique to be different and be worth it but the whole point of a flagship is to show what's possible I don't think the m9 I don't even think unless Sony completely radicalized there's EDD for that's coming up whenever they announce it I don't think the Zed Falls going to be good enough a flagship kind of to justify the price point you need more than just your average oh here's what we did last year and we're going to do a little bit better it's the problem that Apple has is the problem that everyone's had but Samsung is the first to really go okay clearly the galaxy s5 didn't sell in the you know 50 gazillion that we wanted to they only sold 40 so we need to rethink the whole world and the whole world's going to come to an end unless we do this what did they have you have possibly what's the best looking android smartphone ever made no possibly so Joe so give us a recap real quick you're using m9 how long have you had it for now oh just over two weeks okay so how has your experience been with it thus far my experience has been really positive um it comes down to semantics really like how you do fine a word and you know like you know Robbie's you know flagship is what's possible um in my mind's eye that the flagship is just the thing that they do the best foot forward is all it really is it's the phone from which all other phones revolve around and in you know in under that definition HTC One m9 is the flagship phone for HTC and you know I I acknowledges I think was last week at the week before I acknowledge that the HTC One m9 does not have a lot of razzle-dazzle not a lot of unique stuff from prior years but um I also said you know last week week ago that it's okay because HD of the HTC One series is probably still among the best design smartphones it the the problem is that the design is getting old for people because they want something new and something you know different something ridiculous like the s6 edge and that to a lesser extent the G flex 2 and you know that the standard candy bar you know premium but I mean keep Mon this is still an all-metal phone with some really nice have really great bill qualities and ridiculously good you know stereo front-facing speakers it's not like it's not bringing anything to the table it's not like you know a galaxy s5 where it was like you know what is this supposed to be different from you know it's it's it you know I mean yes five was not a great phone this is still a great phone it just doesn't have you know the wow factor and we talked about the wow factor a lot of times especially with Sony because so I mean you know nur obviously something like oh yeah the z4 is gonna be sorry said for I don't know how to say it yeah unless I do something radical like Sony doing something radical with their smartphones is like toilets suddenly flushing differently like it just doesn't you know it's not gonna happen so you know the s6 edge is going to be the winner this year in terms of like wow factor and razzle-dazzle but that doesn't mean that the other smartphones or the other flagships are bad it just means that they're not as unique and you know uniqueness is not a it's certainly you know part of what makes a device good but it's not like the one hundred percent contributing factor whether or not device is gonna be good or not you know yeah perhaps oh I love the analogy with toilets that interesting with it it's like honest basic Saudis mobile divisions going down there anyways oh holy we had a whole freakin podcast where we all agreed to that we really did but then neither the leaks of the z4 or the Zephyr yeah you know and you know they're not they're not going in the toilet per se but I guess they're they're making it clear that with that with a half year release cycle they know that they're not going to necessarily keep up with the latest and greatest that's out there um I would stop short of saying that they are in the toilet um I just thought it was I just thought it was funny that you know you could get a new model toilet and then the could the company's saying stuff that's new about it when there really isn't look at some bday now it's not like kind of like exactly it's like the s6 edge is like the toilet with the seat warmer whereas the HTC one and nine is the toilet that flushes it's like at the end of the day they are both freaking toilets they both freaking flush and it you know after five minutes of sitting on one like you're gonna notice the seat warmer anyway so chillin just not a lot about this apparently I have not so we're worse so we're essentially establishing what a what a flagship is especially since we have some of the phones that have come out already krushi and feisty uh have you guys had any time with the with the flagships that are out now I know grocery you had some time with the G flex 2 when we were out at sea yes but what the Essex and the m9 have you guys spent any time with those phones yet I have yeah ok well which ones all of them now Oh yep so would you when your thoughts on how the flagship game is working it because where i want to go from here is we're establishing what a flagship is but then the much more loaded question coming after that is what exactly establishes a mid-range products and that's something we're going to get into in a sec to me um I i agree with navi i'm not impressed by the m9 i mean it's not that's a bad phone it's not a bad phone per se it's just not what i would expect from a flagship to me it feels more like a mid-ranger honestly um it just I guess I kind of think that you know flagship is they're throwing everything with possibly can especially now that which we can we'll talk about later but now that the gap has lessons and you're seeing you know you're seeing quad cores and even you know you're starting to even see 1080p resolutions in the mid-range and now that you're seeing all of this the gap has listened so much that the flagships need to raise up the bar and I think Samsung did a great job with that but HTC the spec said it brings to the table we're seeing from some adventures other than maybe the Snapdragon you know 810 you know and so I guess I just feel like the m9 hasn't done enough to raise that bar and I'm not for sure I have the Z forward rumors claim that it's going to have an all-metal body we weren't confident enough on that rumor to post about it on our site but that is the the going rumor and supposedly it could have a which I don't know this would make even sense but supposedly will have a fingerprint scanner in the power button I don't know how that would work but that's what supposedly they're do is gonna be a humongous power button I know that's what i was thinking it's like I don't know how the heck they would even pull that off but it was a semi credible leaker so I'm not gonna get into a whole lot but so there's that and then the LG g4 I'm excited about it but I'm not for sure if I personally like the leather look I mean I think it's teach their own I'm not necessarily impressed by the look but I know there are people who enjoy that um but I don't know I guess the point is that I feel that a flagships definition is something that goes above and beyond and they need to set themselves apart whether that's design whether that's you know hardware is harder to set yourself apart from any more is the thing is I just don't think hardware's where it is it has to pretty much be design or software at this stage you know hmm alright how about you feisty have you spent time with the the new flagships thus far I've touched the m9 but but that's it so far the guy at the local frys store he you know he had an m9 out was willing to let me play with it however when I asked about the the galaxy s6 and the edge he's like you can have it for zero down on a two-year contract carrier that you really don't want to use I'm like yeah great thanks yeah I just want to see it alone alright so um so we've been pretty effective with the new and this is coming from HTC Samsung LG obviously the g4 is coming up in a couple weeks and I'll be out there getting all of that stuff ready for the masses to see what that supposedly leather backing even though that was a pretty substantial league is going to be like well LG has confirmed it now by the way oh they have enough okay yeah they did this morning well I can't wait to see what that means yeah this is a very interesting move if there's a guy who signed out it's more dead cow on the back of my phone can't wait for that I just don't have the bothers me about it is anyone i think that the stitching is odd i just don't like the stitching in the middle wall doesn't look good it looks like all it that's what bothers me about it it's not leather it's not leather that bothers me it's the the placement of the stitching i think is what i don't like about it or even at least it's not fake stitching like the gutter like yeah like the Galaxy Note 3 with the poor bad yeah it definitely lastic molding stitching on the side of it to make it look authentic even though there was no actual leather or stitches on the pink at all it's they yeah they officially said if like what they called it like veggie edged I mean aged leather or something so yeah it's it is officially leather it's not it's not a pleather or anything you know it is actually legit veggie veggie what I don't know it was like veggie aged or it's the way that it was done was with I don't know that's what it said on the thing they beat the counter death with a stalk of corn not for sure I'm not a leather experts I'm never sure what that means to say yeah they said a vegetable tanned there we go vegetable tanned to heathers cover I'm not exactly sure what that means but I'm looking at all the little connoisseur uh it sounded for a second better take a wild guess that the acidity from the vegetables it just stains yeah probably so I don't know well then that is a thing but it will tell ya I'm not an expert on my first it sounded for a second owner of you wanted to chime in on the g4 say yeah i mean the g4i the g3 was probably one of my favorite devices i liked it apart from little bits and bobs but is something about that leaked design that just kind of I mean the leathers just an accessory it's one option but I think that just the fact that they put that leather leak out there always leaked out there and I've got very kind of my views are that companies the pretty much everything themselves whether they like to admit it or not the fact that they've put that leather out there from what I saw it's already put a lot of people off it even though it's just about cover yeah exactly it's uh I really don't know what to expect from it because it's it I do applaud them though I mean they haven't confirmed it but if you look at the early leaked images there appears to be at least three models that still have a plastic back so if you don't like the leather at least you have an option you know well then the LG is why why why was that the leak then that's what i was asking but also the is it is it almost as if LG is trying to go moto maker in a way or something like that like ours is there gonna be a wooden back or something like that well i found it yeah i found it interesting that the word choices i mean granted yes it is technically a cover but they didn't say in their official confirmation they said as a leather cover they didn't you know and I you could interpret that as maybe it comes with plastic but you have the options of buying let you know the way that they they worded it it's hard to say if it actually comes with it or not I can you know I can just already imagine having a leather-bound phone in my pocket and there's going to be just that if I'm wearing like a pair of tight jeans that that one section on my thigh is gonna be sweaty as hell like I can't I'm not looking forward to that at all but okay we have so we have established what flagship basically means to us but we're going to get back to Russia's point that the m9 might not necessarily feel flagship we might feel closer to mid-range but I wanted to go back to our guests here in our ave on what constitutes a mid-range device to you and if you're able to give some actual device examples I'll be great to see this is probably the topic that you could talk for 10 hours on because everyone's gonna have different views but my opinion is that a mid-range is determined by price to kind of give it some context because you get mid-range devices that you make classified mid-range such as I don't know just take one of the minis as an exam I think s5 mini or an s4 mini sorry that that launched and it was like it is only 50 quid cheaper than the normal one but the specs were stuff you'd might find donor under a 50-pound phone so I can't look to classify mid-range devices by price and if I was going to talk about what classifies like the best mid-range is the ones that bring flagship experiences it doesn't need to be flagship specs it just needs to be a flagship experience if you take like the Xperia z3 compact and you took the experience at 320 a compact bought the exact same experience but to a lower price point and it was the mid-ranger a lot of people preferred it to the actual was dead 3 itself but it wasn't as an example the other kind of mid-range I probably think about our like though honor phones or while I even like the likes of one plus one I would always consider that as flagship device based on the specs but because of where their pricing it to kind of who they're targeting if they're made the ideal mid-range is one that kind of brings the flagship specs to a mid-range price point but is targeted the main consumers the ones who can't afford to spend 500 pounds on the phone or in dollars 800 pounds I've conte under dollars off contract on the phone the ones you can only spend 3 400 or they want maybe fifty dollars down on a phone that kind of that's how you classify what two mid-range and if you kind of look where everyone's going it's but seeing the flagship that are the be all and end all but then everyone seems to be kind of toying with trying to release this release a flagship or flagship like device in the mid-range just like Google and deeper the Nexus until they made the Nexus 6 and ruined everything well that's a good point i was thinking about price also and when you were saying that price would make a mid-range i was thinking like so what is a 1 plus then is that like the mid-range killer like it but it really isn't but um so yeah it's a mixture of the two feisty where do you where do you land on this this this defining of a mid yeah well yeah I'd like to think of it as more than just a price tag but it kind of is just the price tag determines what a mid-range your phone is mom I think there's more blur in between budget and mid-range than there is between mid range and and flagship at this point and certainly that's changing as the the flagship sorry as the midranges get more and more powerful the oneplus one for example I mean price wise we like you guys just said we considered a kind of a mid-range but it certainly flagship material in the spec sheet so yeah you look at those specifications and nope it was like pisces tablet is causing some problems yep nope that goes there goes feisty feisty what by the way back momentarily focus these after these brief messages all right so um yeah the Friday debate podcast brought to you by fly grip on the so grouchy how about how about you going to chime in there um so feisty i think is just about coming back on it are you back there feisty oops i'm back yes oh my goodness man go 45 sorry i know it keeps dropping where did I where did you lose me um somewhere in oh we're numb the the line between mid range and flagship was starting to blur yeah oh wow we're at the beginning i rambled on for two minutes you guys just ignored oh no skype now you're talking about like the what I was I mid-range was getting more powerful like the one plus one yeah and that's about where you cut out also it was just me and I was ignoring a nice job over there host yes so yeah I mean really what I'm saying there is uh yeah really just agreeing with navi and joshua so far it the price is ultimate definer for a mid-range ray everybody's out you know if you're not running the latest and best processor and maybe down to just the one or two gigabytes of ram not running the most amount that's currently available for flagships then you know the simple definition it's not a flagship its mid-range but certainly I mean there's some budget phones that look really great as well if you want to consider like the Moto G range you know performance wise never mind the spec sheet performance wise there that's kind of a mid-range phone in my books but we'll stay at a budget for today we're talking flexi i guess i would i would personally consider the Moto G more of a mid-range ER because of its experience even if its pricing is even lower yeah I was about to bring that up the Moto G the middle I think it's about an example for sure yeah yeah so the Moto e obviously being the budget phone but then they're always going to be those people out there um this is just me sort of pontificating here the the they're always going to be people out there who look at a phone that is about maybe sub four hundred and still say that that's too much in terms of price you know so two people like that I suppose they would say something like oh the Moto e is the real mid-ranger it still provides a decent experience and then they realize they use the word decent and then um so it's uh yeah price does have a lot to do with it but specifications and experience so brushy you were saying that moto g would can be considered more your mid-range let's say a line would it be yeah I mean I find it interesting in a way that I guess in my phone at this point you have flagships you have mid-range let me have you shouldn't buy you know I guess you know I don't even consider budget a category I figure at this point you know to me midrange is isn't really it is price to an extent I guess anything but that price can can be wildly you know anywhere from 180 to like you know 400 bucks maybe you know um to me at mid-range the only major difference in more between a mid-range in a flat I think you know I thought was interesting face was saying the blur between bit but between budget and mid-range I think there's a blur between all of it at this point you know the budget mid-range high-end you know there's the like I said you're sitting octa cores and you're seeing 1080p even and you know lower-priced phones at this point you're starting to and so uh you know I guess I i feel like i would consider Moto G a mid-range phone I wouldn't yes as a budget price but I wouldn't consider it a I guess to me when I think budget i kind of think derogatory you know it's garbage you know you did it it can barely run you know it has you know you could have like one app open at the time hail or else it will crash well yeah well which which begs the the the I was about to say secondary but really the third question here which is you know who exactly who exactly is who actually is the person defining what is a flagship or a mid-range because we're talking people in the West right now it's all of us right now true hey you know and we look at flagship oh that's the phone that we want everyone's gonna want that then mid-range oh you know that's a good choice to have in the end of the budget but two people two people let's say in like developing countries it's a whole different scale which is what really intrigued me about this topic is you-know-who so who exactly is asking because we have a very diverse audience in android authority and there are plenty of people who only dream of having flagships and oh yeah i think of you asked a lot of these people what they consider budget I think they'd probably say sub-100 at this point you know exactly they're like low and ruin yeah exactly i think that would be budget I guess I just feel like Moto G Moto e maybe budget you know ty end but you know it's a higher end of the budget spectrum to me you know I guess I feel like once you get above you know about a hundred and you know $175 let's say once you get close to 200 bucks I'd say you're mid-range you know yeah exactly and even though the blur and pricing I'm sorry Feist none of those NAR everything Oh was it Navi yeah that was me I'm so where does this then kind of put the likes the Chinese manufacturers who are basic where would you put show me everything I would say I've used a few of theirs and I've saved but some are there I think I can't remember which one I used it was ridiculously cheap but it would offer the Moto G style experience or just not a smooth but it was well under it was like under a hundred pound sterling layered uh so it was about one hundred and twenty dollars there you go maybe I thank you for that rabbit it's a good point yeah it's definitely you know there is there like I said there's just such a blurring of the lines anymore it you know it's that's why I guess I felt like you know flagships need to stand out because it's just you don't need to spend a lot of money to get a good phone anymore you know bottom line you know I mean my wife has a moto G and it's would I use it as my daily driver / probably not it's close there's just a few things that keep me from considering it you know worthwhile for me but would I recommend it to someone who isn't necessarily doesn't need a massive screen doesn't need you know wasn't gonna be watching videos on it much sure it's a great phone I mean she's had no issue with it whatsoever and it does everything that my neck you know I use the nexus 5 primarily now getting ready to replace it but anyway it does everything that my phone can do and it just doesn't do it quite as well and so like I said it's yeah there's definitely it's all you know it just it makes you appreciate how far we've come though cuz there definitely was a major difference between budget mid-range and flagship like three years ago yeah yeah I remember the galaxy ace yeah the galaxy ace bone that phone was awesome first ball that phone had one of the most dedicated aftermarket developing communities that I have ever witnessed in my lifetime I used to work a lot I pretty much everybody knows this point before I worked in android authority used to work at XDA as a writer and I was writing about weird ridiculous crap that they were doing with the galaxy ace right up until i left XDA and that was 2013 the problem is you could do all sorts for the galaxy ace says you went to turn it on ago sorry got enough no memory yeah i'm not saying i wanted to have problem just I was just remarking on on that they're after market development is really really truly impressive I think like maybe the gala cs3 the HTC hd2 and maybe the HTC evo 4g on sprint were the only other phones that had like just such a huge community of people that were trying to make the phone not suck and it was really impressed me all right well I'm tuner obvious point actually uh you talk about the Chinese manufacturers you know that's that's that goes back to what I was saying earlier about how different markets have different ways of scoping these things because obviously we're not we think in terms of moto G because we don't even have our hands on Xiaomi around here you know you have to buy that via other channels like you know going eBay or something like that and even though even then you're ever in the UK you guys have Huawei's and we don't here in the US which I wouldn't apart from the PA we have huawei and we don't because it's kind of let's put this where the mate seven was six months ago and it's still more available mmm i allus creates going to be available here before the mate seven is and when then when huawei announcer mate 7 vodafone UK were listed as one of their partner networks it's been seven months we're still waiting oh yeah is that Huawei its new budget fonts coming to the US though we're trying to snap to hmm it's a hundred and eighty dollars snapdragon for it's basically a moto g no it is it's basically my review at te everything's a moto g and yeah but it's called a yeah well yeah ok budget mid-range i gets to me there i don't know there's a lot of blurring ok i'm sorry there mid range I it's like exactly I know it's a it is identical to the Moto G spec-wise except for I believe LTE is about the only major difference I think it's displays not as good as the same resolution but it's it's like a TFT you know so it's not quite as good of a display hmm so really what I'm going from this is there's really no industry standard and each manufacturer is kind of setting their own idea of budget midden flagship yeah and yeah that was actually something up I wanted to talk about for a second yeah I mean let you guys talk about you know like lot of what you guys are saying is like really existential like you know like oh is the experience of the one m9 makes it feel like a you know a mid-range phone but then you know the experience that you know what I look at something like that the question I always ask is what are the corners that they're cutting and the thing is that you know you can add that up in almost every instance and see like literally where the price goes like doesn't the Moto G have like a Snapdragon s4 Snapdragon 400 or for 10 or something like s4 pro what does s4 pro was on what it was back in the day yes go pro in the first one yeah yeah s4 pro than a 400 guys we're in the email address that you know it was a Snapdragon 400 in both moto g's yeah so the I mean you know you have it when was the last time Snapdragon 400 was the flagship cpu right was it like two years ago maybe longer no she was never a flagship yeah oh yeah you're right but you know you look back you know like at the s600 are the Snapdragon 600 was in the 1m yeah the other one m7 and the galaxy s4 and then you know the Moto G has the 400 so you can see you know where they cut that corner and then you know how much I have one gig you know in today's flagships they all have three gigs of ram so they like and you know the camera is probably you know 8 megapixel from 2013 also and is it's you know when you look at these kinds of things that you can see where they cut the corners to lower the price and I think what the real difference is from a couple of years ago is they found better corners to cut to you know to where they don't have to you know drop down into that you know because you know mid-range back in the day was like you know a year pray and something else I guess I'm kind of going in circles I'm sorry about this guy's but you know you got to think about that the differences in processing power from one year to the next for a good long time I mean we went from single cord a dual core 2 quad core like what three years yeah so you know so you look back you like all right so we released a mid-range flagship with last year's flagship specs that was going from a dual core to a single core and then going from a quad core to a dual core and like obviously it's going to be a whole lot worse but now you know it's all it's all quad cores now and we're getting into octa-core is now in the quad core still great device I mean my note 3 still runs lollipop pretty much flawlessly and it's a Snapdragon 800 you know quad core processor and that's a mid-range phone today you know based on how much you can buy it for so I think that you know that you have all touched on it like just like little tiny bits here and there but at the end of the day it's really is where do they cut the corners any and you know with what and it may not even be specs in the phone it could also be something like you know um this is gonna sound really terrible i'm not gonna listen examples but like you know quality assurance you know maybe quality assurance gets a little bit of a you know takes a little bit of a back seat to keep those costs down a little bitter they hire a smaller staffer there you can't ramp up production is like a the oneplus one well i was gonna say one plus one yeah they had some quality assurance issues and they've had production issues because their team is very very small and that's how they keep their costs down and I you know so I when I think of a flagship I think of something that doesn't cut any corners and you look at the galaxy s6 in the s6 edge the One m9 the LG g4 up maybe hopefully the Sony Xperia z4 and you look at you know three gigs of ram the most recent processing package the best screens available today well the HTC One was a calculated risk but they got the bigger batteries you know they're not cutting slack on the batteries they're not cutting slack on the camera sensors now in HD sees you know against HTC here they really screwed up their software but that you know the hardware is still good like what I'm holding in my phone are in my hand right now is a 650 dollar phone there's no ifs ands or buts about it it is aluminum it's got a huge battery in it the three gigs they ate the octa-core 64bit cpu from snapdragon you know it's got everything that a flagship should have it has the best that's available today and that's the way that I look at flagships versus mid-range you know you look at the you know the one plus one it had a what was in it a Snapdragon 800 bird 801 which phone again the one plus 100 8a the 800 now right so that was you know the 80 ones in the 80 fives were already out then they were using the last year's processor so they I cut a little bit of cost there and you know that's I think there is still a very good very solid line that you can draw between flagship and mid-range and I think it's just once you ask the question where do they cut the corners okay now so that's what the rifle one plus one was a etowah now that i think about it wasn't it was a doing well it was still almost positive is a no one okay where they releasing the 805 time it was announced it was announced when it was first announced they said 800 and then they change their mind right before release yeah I'm almost positive that okay yeah yeah I do what's that like eight and a half nine months between houseman really hyperbole hyperbole for comedy guys I'm not actually it was nine months I was expecting to hear Mike drop after joke said all that stuff think it's like as I SAT here and listened you guys talked for like ten minutes about it and I'm like you know you guys are all saying the exact same thing just in different words and you're not pushing it out as much because he like I think feisty said it at some point and then like russia says I'm like all you guys have said it at some point I'm just kind of summing up what everybody's saying cuz i agree with it you know it's you know you're not gonna get you know the galaxy s6 edge camera on a mid-range device so obviously there is a big huge line there and yellow mesh or on a One m9 m what Dylan of it so okay Joe I completely get you there but hold up didn't HTC cut corners with the one m9 display you said it was a calculated risk there's a calculated risk because of the battery not because of the price it's still a I mean it's only fifty dollars or hundreds less expensive than it is a hundred dollars that's expensive than the galaxy s6 I just looked on amazon it's 750 bucks for factory unlocked galaxy s6 650 bucks for factory unlocked HTC One m9 so it's a hundred dollars cheaper but I mean it's a calculated decision based on the battery because 1440p sucks up a lot of battery it wasn't like something they're like oh we're trying to cut costs and cut game to get it out at a lower price because it you know I mean at least over here in the States everything is zero dollars down everywhere right now so okay on all right unbusy talking about where you cut corners let's take something like and the Huawei honor 6 plus the specs list on that is flagship it's got a very very good display it's completely solid it's got break it's got great but I think it's a quad-core karen 925 or an optical karen 925 one of the two it's got two or three gig ram where are they cut corners for that because what some chickweed what was fun is a tee on a 6 plus the honor our six all right I'm gonna go look this up really quick keep talking promise i promise i'm listening I just haven't seen this phone I think I look I think out of all of us only i have only actually no ave and i have messed with the honor 6 plus i agree with you is Erin Ivie there or it has managed to be a phone that is pretty affordable for a lot of people and yet it has the same specifications as a lot of the flagships out there and if you're comparing it to the m9 yeah on paper it does definitely sound like it's kind of keeping up with the m9 which is considered a flagship high-end let's say expensive device well I you think I'm looking at here what the hell is hisilicon Karen okay 25 ok so hisilicon karen is josh you on da game hisilicon karen processor is basically to huawei what XE nose is too samsung it's their in-house made processing system processing package i should say and to that point it works it's gold wonderful it's so good and adds I've been impressed by it with him 87 the mate 7th floor I mean if you I've been playing with the p8 and wow the kirin knowing 30 stocks man 35 depending on the version is outstanding to the point where although while a kind of mu mu i is probably slightly heavier and clunkier than senses the PA it's a lot faster than my m9 i can see where joe i can see we're just coming from though because we have so many snapdragons in America that when you see anything different like MediaTek rhinos media tackle a well I don't know it's a thing no I know what media tech is an egg's knows I know what all of them are I've just never heard of the high silicon it's all today yeah it's Huawei's that's probably the one of you don't have to outsource their chips you know to another company they so they get to cut prices a little bit that way that you know there's also that thing you guys remember that the nexus devices were sold under cost in order to gain market share right you guys remember that or they were trying to promote the Play Store or something like that they're trying to make the nexus devices super cheap to encourage other people to sell cheap and I remember there was a big it was a big thing about it the the the nexus 4 was sold under cost so that people would buy it well you could say the same thing about the oneplus one also they they they sold it but like way below what you would expect that phone to be just so they can get you know recognition and yeah like you said it's probably they're probably other taking a hit to it or you know they were taking advantage of the fact that all the stuff was done in-house I mean you don't have to outsource and stuff you know distributions a little bit easier you know getting all the parts together um you know it is and another thing you know first of all I don't think anyone should be having any software discussions of any kind until Android fixes the memory bug absolutely none I will not hear it okay no offense I'm not saying anybody stupid or anyone's needed or anything I just simply refuse to talk about any software optoma optimizations and he's how software acts or anything like that until my system stops taking up 1.1 gigabytes of RAM for no frickin reason and that is Android and google's fault not the one m9 not any other device not any manufacturer that is androids problem so until Android fixes androids problem I don't really want to hear about well you know the software runs better because you know it's it's a matter of if the system if Android is taking up so much RAM that the stuff that's already installed on the device can't run then it's not really that stuff's fault you know that's why the that's why Samsung started putting three gigs of ram in their Galaxy Note devices because s-pen took up extra ram it wasn't for performance it was because they had extra software extra bloat that needed to run and in this case I mean Android these days is heavier than TouchWiz so I mean you know if if the if the wall way you know thing is using up less ram than senses then yeah it's going to be a little bit more study on the one m9 it's just gonna happen I've noticed it too mmm so this is what i mean so this is what Joe's like after midnight after watch after getting riled up by a hockey game really yeah you've been on a brother that's he has been so much so much so much of our conversations are so philosophical like how does the device feel and you know how well does it work in your day-to-day activities you know depending on whether you watch videos or play video game you know the fact of the matter is if software were absolutely perfect you know you'd probably not see too much of a difference and the software isn't perfect and for once it's not the fault of the OEMs and that's something that really gets on my nerves because like four years you know for years and years and years OEM skins were given the worst rap and you know that they've all been you know streamlining their stuff you know this year's TouchWiz is like what the best touch switch of that TouchWiz of all time right yes the best touch wedgie you know and no sense no sense d bloated a few years ago and all that jazz like OEM skits are getting smaller and smaller and smaller and better and better and better but now Android screwed up royal and it's just like the idea life hearing something like you know well HTC Sense is you know bloaty and bad no it's not no it is not HTC Sense is not blody and bad at all it's Android screwing up the works this time well I agree with you about sense not being bloody I've got agrees well because as much as it sounds like I hate dm9 and would like to throw it off a bridge I love sense yeah I think it's still by far probably one of the best Android interfaces hell I've been using sense since the HTC hd2 windows mobile hmm that's how back I that's how much I like HTC's interface and it gets better and better every single year yeah i wanna i completely agree that sense is kind of like up there with the best interfaces on any device whatsoever yeah i'm not saying anyone doesn't like it or anything like that it's just it's frustrating to hear you know like you know oh you know this device lags this device stutters like you know mmm i can't think of a different way to phrase this but um it's it would just be a it's impossible it is impossible to comment on the experience of any device running Android 5.0 or 5.1 right now it is impossible because Android is broken currently it is broken and there is no denying that the memory bug is right there you can google search it right now and find evidence of its existence in both versions until five point two or five point one point one comes out and that memory bug is fixed and these flagships are updated to that so that the memory management is actually functional I think it's really unfair to compare experiences because right now in KitKat has the superior experience right now guys hey that's the log I mean I can't if I could run KitKat on my 1am 9 I'd be freaking running KitKat on my one at nine cuz I I mean I hate lollipop on this phone right now and I think that that I think that's part of the thing that makes it cuz ain't I agree it feels like a mid-range phone sometimes but that's why is because the software is so unwise dright now that it's it's causing little blips in like my applications and it's just it's frustrating it really is let me tell you what happen to be here the other day with this moto G he's got 5.5 o to install death would and you know it doesn't stutter very much talking about that experience but I tried to make a phone call yeah I couldn't get through it just kept crashing the phone I these are phones first right not yours first could not make a phone call so it's sounding to me Joe that okay so so back to our question yeah yeah we've talked yeah we've danced around that we haven't even been I wanted to make sure we covered all of our bases and Joe definitely make sure that which is which is great I'm just I'm just I'm just drinking the chain over there brother so uh Joe on the question of our flagship still worth it if the mid-range game is getting a lot better it's sounding to me so just since you are an owner of an m9 and despite your gripes about the m9 experience at the moment would it be safe to say that you would still prefer the flagship lines because of what the mid-range may or may not be able to offer we have reached the point where the answer that question is exactly the same as it is in the laptop market do you need a two-thousand-dollar alienware laptop no then don't get one you know it's same thing with flagship phones these days if you don't need something you know with the eight cores in the three gigs if you need something just search facebook and you know calls people well don't get a moto G or you'll end up like feisty but um I know can't make a call goodness but you know you know you know we're getting to that point we don't need it anymore I mean you know I can render videos and do my job on a six-hundred-dollar 700 laptop these days I don't need the $1,500 two-thousand-dollar razor aces raag flagship you know alienware laptops and it's the same thing with smartphones I'm not so high up you know on my HTC One m9 love that I say that people absolutely need to buy these things they you know you can totally get away with getting a mid-range phone and have a totally great experience but just realize that something you know a corner was cut to get to that price point and it's exactly the same thing with laptops you get a seven hundred dollar laptop you get up you know a gtx 660m with probably an Ivy Bridge I seven process I'm an integrated graphics that's what you're gonna get that's good not necessarily but especially for though but you know if you're playing league of legends or world of warcraft like you're ever gonna frickin notice you just have to turn the graphics down the medium you'll never know you can still render videos on a 660m i used to do it all the time but you know the people who benefit from something as powerful as a flagship phone or a flagship you know laptop or power users are the people who are going to be pushing this phone all day and night doing all kinds of different stuff and I mean let's face facts you know the way things are I mean people just don't need that that much anymore well how about where you were going earlier about build quality in the aluminum slabs sitting in your hand right now it would would be would it be safe would it be what did suffice to say that people who really want that particular aspect but they don't need the rest would that justify someone going for a flagship over a mid-range because are there any mid-range devices that are offering that kind of design feel I'm thinking about that right now and I'm sure that there are like I'm sure that there are some of the Xperia z3 compact right yeah I've gotten my hands on that but I me that that the build quality on that is fantastic mm-hmm um I mean the glass back i don't like glass backs you know because I'm i drop things on carpeted floor in my my nexus 4 shattered being dropped on carpet the back did so I don't like last backs anymore but uh you know I mean there are mid-range flagships that have decent build quality I just don't think you're gonna get I'm gonna sound like such a shill right now but ACC not the only that does this you know a phone that's been especially shaved out of a single block of aluminum you know you know you don't get the same phrase like she seemed paying you by the iphones the same ways isn't the iphone machine out of a single block of aluminum it's just all buzzwords honestly like still I mean it's not like um you know I mean the galaxy s is six you know it's the same thing isn't like it's the whole the frame is entirely aluminum with like a piece of glass shoved in the back of it um you know I mean these are you know this required some effort to build whereas you know you look at like a nexus 5 Nexus 5 was a slab of plastic you know I'm holding one in my hand it's a slab of plastic with a spray rubber coating on the back of it essentially you know this phone was did not take a lot of effort to make and you can feel it when you pick it up like it feels like a hollow little phone you know and you can hope I don't I remember you did you do a drop test on a nexus 5 and it broke so bad you could see the circuit board we don't talk about that cuz i did it in front i did it in front of the android statues in san francisco oh yeah that's nice my remembering is like you drop your phone and it's like I really one was like sacrilegious is sacrilege yeah you can see that you could see the yellow circuit board on the back and like it's like that's obviously where they cut the corner that and the camera and the battery yeah oh well you know we're really lucky that we're using skype for this call because with the many things we've said about Google and lollipop and the fact that I dropped the nexus 5 the days after i came out at the Google headquarters if we were using a house it boo we good thing you will have been cut off like right then in there well yeah you were you were saying Joe but no is it that you can have a great experience you just you know I'm not saying you can't have a great experience I'm just saying that there were corners cut to get it down that low and as long as you understand that and you understand you can cut you can get different corners cut depending on who you go with you get the Xperia z3 compact you're not compromising build quality you're probably compromising something else but you know but it display a gardener of it it was sorry i was just saying on this entry compact will be just a despite uh 727s early so they played literally like one penny for that because after just trying to get them out of the warehouses at this point but he not you so you sacrifice little bit of screen do you get a better batter you get a better battery and better build quality or you can have the up-to-date specs and maybe have a lesser battery-less your screen or bless your camera you know like you just have to know what you're getting yourself into and you can have you know i don't use a camera on a smartphone hardly ever so this that the camera issues on every phone i've ever owned doesn't apply to me i don't care say I'm glad you brought that up now as I I'll go ahead and answer the question right now is I don't think that like especially with the new crop of flagship star coming out now I do think that there's a distance again between the flagships in the mid ranges primarily because I am that kind of user I need a great camera I want to Seattle for a few days this past weekend and i'm sure people people have seen in the camera shoot out for the essex that I put out and I brought both of my production cameras with me My gah for my gx7 I brought both of them with me expecting to take pictures everywhere and on that first night my my buddy who we were staying with Broadus thoughts a pike place market and I didn't have any time to grab my cameras they were so in my luggage I just had my s6 edge on me and I just started using that it was on that day that I realized I don't need to bring my cameras with me everywhere all the time anymore and that is just simply an experience that even in the in the flagship game I can only get on an S six because lord knows what what's going on with the m9 software upgrades whatever its camera just doesn't do it for me same thing with the G flex 2 the g3 and the g3 they they're kind of their there they're not too far away that it's laser guided autofocus is auction is actually really great but in terms of quality i I need my s6 edge now and you just won't be able to get anything like that in the mid-range market I do think that especially if you look at it lens no pun intended it's going to have that that discrepancy and that that that gap is is widening I don't I love the mid-range game don't get me wrong i but but I I understand the mid-range game in terms of other people I'm very empathetic to the people who need to spend less on the phone but for for the flagship game oh man like where we're kind of at a crossroads now there's this there's this evolution that I feel like it's happening this year and I can't wait to see what the g4 does despite its weird looking leatherback that looks like a crotch I'm just gonna sign but yeah and then this is it for but I was going to go over to Navi anyway so the what were you gonna say how would you answer this question arriving oh yeah I was actually just trying to come in and answer this because i was i was going to talk about first he on your point of cameras is kind of off topic but i did warn you in advance that i rambled for it england pretty much um probably the note for is when smartphone cameras finally became good enough to use anyway angry and then the s6 has kind of taken it cuz I've I probably only ever taken a hundred pictures across in four years on a DSLR like out and about I'm one of these people who shoots on this photo know me on this phone because you know why the hell not it's the best camera is the one you have on you and that's obviously what smartphones Allah for answering this question going back to one of the 109 obviously they haven't done a mini version this year but in previous years you could have got the HTC One mini which brought the same design but completely tanked on the specs I think was it the first one mini that had a cute like qhd not quad HD but quarter HD display yeah I think it was something 60 quid cheaper than the original yeah I remember that was the one m7 mini of another second in in in their defense that was back before OEMs understood how to do that yeah you know because it was a point with a from the Moto X 2013 on forward OEM finally figured out how to do a mini mid-range kind of phone without screwing everything up so everything before that I kind of give it a wash you no just like all right that was a learning experience you guys did it wrong you would nobody you're totally right that but balls like I'm not saying it didn't if it was freakin garbage but she's you know I was selling phones back in that day and I remember selling about five and four of them didn't work before they even left the shop oh no oh my goodness so that means you technically so online basic basically yeah and then a couple more came back as well okay so did you have morn arriving uh oh no sorry I was just that was me alright so let's go road if I see then how would you answer this question on on flagships and midranges because you're well you just give us a story about the Moto G not really doing it for you so where would you stand then on the mid-range / flagship battle yeah there's two kind of ways of looking at this I absolutely believe in budget / mid-range devices but you guys already know I've got a six basically budget phone sitting here on the desk but the reason that I have them the reason that I want them i almost said need them it is for specific reasons i mean one of them is purely being used as an mp3 player which i mean i bought it for twenty dollars an mp3 players twenty dollars you know it doesn't make much of a difference so and if you have those sorts of needs or you can split up your devices for single purposes really or you know just a few purposes / you know maybe you have one that's dedicated to the doc in your car you know it's a dash cam kind of thing or music player mp3 is obviously you know or just one phone specifically that maybe it's waterproof and you take it swimming you know it in these particular cases a mid-range and even the budget ranges I think are priceless but exactly what you said all I've got is these mid and budget rage phones I tried to do something with it something legitimate with it and it completely failed me so I really I mean I'm shopping for a flagship level phone right now at the m9 I'm not sold on it that the g6 is as well I just so I'm really hoping I don't know about the LG but I think I'm waiting to see what the Sony's got the Zed 4z for and I think that you know right now i'm holding out to see what they bring to the table did you say GG 6 earlier just trying yet that's why i was gonna like cs6 i'm sorry it's not as late here but I'm Pisces been holding out on us tonight he's got the g six already yeah or mumbling through I apologize one day we're gonna do a podcast like early in the morning and you know what it might actually help Navi in particular if you'll be able to do a podcast in the afternoon rather than what is it now almost six o'clock for you it's called just six but yeah sure guys listen if you want to do one early in the morning for you guys I am super happy for sure hey you know what meet meet meet you guys it's approaching last call here's what is interesting because uh whenever we did the scheduling I mean we're up to wide episode 12 13 now like we always we always just a faltar going at night here in the US winning I'm totally okay with it okay um alright so safe ramble on for 17 minutes at a time sorry about that about all the pot I think about how much lollipops sucks and I'm fed up with it now I guess imagine fed up with lollipop just imagine Joe going doing something very random during his day and you cease like a lollipop on a table just smashes it it's like damn you lucky all right so now we have brushy brushy where do you stand on the flagship and mid-range so actually you know I agree with you that the I think 2015 exciting year period for all of the sides of it i mean i've seen some really exciting you know mid-range devices too and i'm really interested to see we're seeing a lot of growth of devices that don't quite fit the mid-range definition but don't quite fit the flagship definition either you know the one plus you know I'm 1 + 2 i'm sure will be along that line le TV you know having their new phone super phones as they call them and those look really impressive Snapdragon 810 yeah they call me super ten Snapdragon 810 you know you know all the high-end specs you would expect from a flagship but they're going to come into the u.s. supposedly and they're aiming for like a what four hundred five hundred dollar price tag um you know and you're seeing the zenfone 4 I mean up for I'm sorry zenfone 2 zenfone 2 you know and that's an impressive phone right there I've I haven't had the opportunity to mess with it yet but just watching lawns review and just doing my research on it um i actually have considered buying one as one of my main phones yeah you know just because I support I want to support growth in the mid-range because I think it's uh I think it's important that more people be able to afford smartphones and be able to you know I think it's I want to be able to you what that sorry bruh she going no it's alright what's up Robbie I was going to say do you think we're at a stage where it's no longer just your budget mid-range a flagship do we need a level in between budget and mid-range and another level between mid range and flagship I think I think we kind of do it's just it's hard to uh it's hard to find the line I think we already do I mean cuz like i said i consider the Moto G a mid-range but then the zenfone 2 is a mid-range yet the difference in specs is slowly substantial yes you know why don't we just move over to like how we do it in taxes in the US we have upper class upper middle class middle class middle lower class lower class someone salty about paying taxes the other day or poor homeless and then Joe handy so hey guys look at it you bring up the yeah you bring up the zenfone 2 which I thought was a good I have been thinking about the whole time we were doing this like a sous is an interesting company where it seems as if the phones now not really counting the PadFone and the zenfone zoom which could be conserved fringe products but their mid their actual like real top like their their their flagship phone let's differentiate between flagship and high-end at this point yeah it's the zenfone 2 is considered their flagship it's not what we would consider a flagship but it's close I mean performance wise I mean four gigabytes of RAM it's kind of hard to beat I no no yeah personally I would love to see what that zenfone zoom is like and I'm still I I hope one day I'll be able to pick up that panasonic lumix phone yeah I know you were hardest phone to come here you have it there we have it here 799 pound sterling sana I know one part I know two people have bought it that mean they're both the same person and the bottom twice within about an hour have you heard any like real world reactions to like how it works in them in daily usage or what um not really I think the common consensus is the camera is incredible the rest isn't no I was kind of expecting that to be honest yeah to that point I mean there's another whole different market that we could talk about it different podcasters you know that the fringe products the the Maxis of the world or the zooms or the lumix camera phones of the world but yeah brushy you were did I didn't catch it if you finished your point on on our question here um well basically uh something up actually a lot of what's been said there are a lot of great phones out there um like I said I've actually i'm at the point where i'm ready to buy a new phone and i haven't decided I've actually not for sure if I'm gonna stay with the flagship I've like the zenfone 2 impresses me and I I may end up granted i think that the four gigabyte model still gonna be four hundred dollars or so so it's not it's like it's not quite mid-range and it's not quite flagship in the pricing cuz i mean if you look at like LG their their pricing for their flagships this point are only around 500 or so so you know i don't know about the g4 who knows that could go more expensive but i doubt it i have a feeling that g4 will be around 500 to 600 dollars somewhere in there and so do people need you know down to the actual question do people need flagships anymore it comes down to you know what Joe said in a way I mean do you mind those cut corners I mean and it's true they're all having cut corners i mean the the zenfone 2 uh it has an intel processor which I don't mind intel processors but I know a lot of people consider that right there a deal breaker you know in the mobile world and it's also the design i mean it's it's an attractive-looking mid-ranger but it's I don't know if I would call it unique either it's you know basically they took the LG you know G design from the g2 g3 and then they put the power button on top which is a weird placement and so basically they kind of just bastardized different elements from other you know you know one which is usually what the what the you know what companies do in the mid-range or in china too for that matter which this is an attorney's phone but you know my point is basically you're not gonna get a you not gonna get a high-end design you're gonna be missing out on a few small specks but if you're willing to if you're okay to live with that then yeah there's no point in getting a flagship a lot of the reason to get flagship at this point is for the status of it to be honest I mean you know to your nerd cred basically you know that's a big reason to do it at this point I mean yeah there are other reasons I actually agree with you Josh that if you're into camera experience on your phone yeah you're not gonna get it on a mid-ranger that's just a fact to me that that's what that that's the line really you need to be though coming from a nexus 5 anything I can go to a mid-range and I've like this camera is awesome you know so cuz I have a nexus 5 which has a nice sure you go back to a flip phone and yeah I just can't resolve and I'll be like oh brushy oh you just don't know but you know um so yeah I mean but I do think that tub the answer this question there is no cut you know there is no a you know the answer is very personal depending on who you ask and I would say it's very regional to you know well for us you know for a lot of people in markets were you know merging markets etc we aware that you know for the u.s. let's be honest I mean the difference for us to raise you know three hundred dollars as opposed to us raising six hundred probably isn't a big deal to us a three four hundred dollar price difference to someone in a developing country or an emerging market over will you want to call it um that's a huge deal you know yeah that's always where I'm gonna go when it comes to questions like this is I'm always gonna think about like my relatives and the Philippines and I've said this a couple of times on the podcast before but like you know my dad goes back to Philippines and brings back phones that we don't use anymore just for the people that he knows back there so when I think about mid-range devices in that sense like oh yeah mid-range devices are really closing the gap that's amazing you know and I can't wait to see you know all of my friends and relatives back in the Philippines actually using these phones you know and having the kinds of experiences that I can have on a flagship maybe just a little bit lesser you know but but still you know they'll be don't have their foot in the door and that's all that they need really but yeah if you don't have a lot of money you know whether you live in a country where you just don't make as much sure you just don't make as much wherever you live uh is it worth it when you you don't know it's not in my opinion if you have money to burn sure yeah there's there's benefits i mean there's obvious benefits design you know there's specs that there's obvious benefits but if money's tight no save your money you know we're also i look at it anyway you know yeah you know i have i have two kids and i have a lot of commits so to me I that's the reason of Nexus 5 is I got a flagship like I mean it was a flagship device but I got a flagship like experience but it wasn't expensive and you know yes I could afford a flagship device but I would rather spend that money on you know things for my kids or vacation or you know so just depends on what your priorities are bottom line you know grisha's humble bragging right now I just saying it might ask one question when you guys are ready yeah sure it kind of back tracks a little bit here in the topic of you know what is mid-range what is flagship how much weight do you guys put on benchmarks like n22 benchmarks and stuff myself personally it's an afterthought yeah but what do you guys think I I feel the same way especially in the flagship game there's really little that like if we were to put into our reviews listen listen listen Shing personally I don't think that the common consumer which is who we mostly cater to would look at that and say that this number is higher than this number i'm going to go for the higher number when there's so much more to a phone that matters um i think that it has to do with the numbers themselves i don't think it matters because the numbers are always so close anyway I mean it's like oh and just like I don't know how to to scoring works pacifico this phone has a 35,000 and this phone has a 35,000 and to this phone has a 30 4098 clearly it's lagging behind the competition guys so um like I think that if it's like a huge gigantic number of like once it you know getting the 35,000 and then another one's getting like you know 15,000 I think that matters I think that's what I think that's worth looking at but if it's you know like you know it's really close to it no it doesn't matter at all well on the problem with benchmarking is correct me if I'm wrong because I'm not I don't put a lot of weight into benchmarking but I mean I know it's a very it's an inconsistent thing I mean you can run a benchmark multiple times and get different results within a certain variants right oh yeah well you you should be doing the edible tests on the same boy yeah I suppose you'll come up with an average but I'm saying it's just I guess to me it's just I just don't think it's worth putting weight in you know that that's why I said there has to be that huge gigantic gap there like if it's you know a couple even if it's like 30,000 a 35,000 nah don't worry about it but you know again like you know if it's something so gigantic sigh half the score like one third the score one quarter the score then I'd probably look into that other device and see why it scored so low you know maybe they cut corners on the on the GPU in the CPU you know the SOC you know is you know there's something going on there that's preventing that phone from doing anything you know well I know Rob pretty much by our time this is totally off topic but I kind of got thinking about it just watching a lot of the reviews recently that you know that we've been putting out and stuff and maybe it's always been this way but it seems like recently we're seeing a lot of phones that in you know Josh you'll be able to comment on this for sure we're seeing a lot of phones that we get a repartee you know they automatically they set a reputation and the thought of a certain way and we've even seen this with smart watches and then all of a sudden it's a few updates later and they're they're way better it seems like we're seeing more devices that are optimized out of the box no of court no definitely has that always been the case or is it just more recently now it just seems like I've been noticing it more recently it's been no more recently now because Android is messed up no jobs like Josh to you I mean I think that's been up at always issue to be honest or I mean it's been it's been okay in the past it was more the case with some manufacturers than others but it does yeah it does seem like that that is because it seems like every phone that's coming out I'll like you'll see some posts about oh this updates now fix the battery issue or this updates now fix this well this is what this is the thing that I always think of when I when I see those is just how much can you really fix with a firmware update and you know what what the thing that bothers me most about it it doesn't bother me too much that the firmware updates have to happen after the launch but what bothers me is that they just kind of assumed that they can fix so many things in a device that's already completely packed together no injustice outlets you know and they promised a lot but this is the thing that pisses me off most about it is um if I'm doing a review and you know maybe maybe we have some representatives from the companies in our ear you know and and you know they're they're looking for this or that and you know they're helping tests and stuff like that especially when it comes to our first looks and stuff like that when they keep telling us that we shouldn't show this or that or they would like it for us not to because there's going to be a software update anyway and this is all in terms of like embargo stuff usually would be mad about it is if this is the production unit just because you're going to update something later doesn't excuse how it performs now and that's the problem always gets me when it comes to stuff like that this is something I've commented on before I don't think it was in the podcast but I think I've written pieces about it before um android is an extreme as it has an extremely Spartan release cycle um you know you look at like everything else like everything else in technology how often do things get refreshed every sing year you know like we're not getting a PS five in this year we didn't get one last year you know I'm rocketing one next the year after this one you know it's it's going to be several years before the xbox two in the PS five come out and you know like you know televisions are the same way I think my i bought my television ATP television like five or six years ago and 1080p televisions have made very little strides since then and you know so the way I look at it you know think the reason why you no cell phones and you know the android the OS and everything is just everything so Spartan you know that they have the next version of android is going to be out in freakin six months and they haven't even fixed the one that's out yet you know and a she sent us back to law is not bashing yeah well it's a little part of a larger point crushy I do that Samsung's already working on the s7 HTC is already working on the m10 LG's already LG probably has it it was probably already working on the what is it they're releasing for this year right yes they're probably already working on the five like the the the time frame to get these things right is so slim that you know it's inevitable that eventually you know the shells gonna crack and you're gonna have these phones that have issues out of the box and it takes the manufacturers a little while to fix them like everybody's behind schedule and i hope i have long touted that Android and OEMs should like take a year off he's like next year no flagships make us deal with it screw us the consumer bed get your stuff together you know you know fix the fragmentation a little bit fix android a little bit makes you know get these phones working and prepared and then you know next year it's so fast and it's constant I mean Samsung is not only working on the s7 they're working on the note 5 and probably on the note 6 right now and it's like obviously these phones are gonna have issues when they come out because I mean they don't have the time anymore to do anything about it everybody wants it right now immediately it has to up refresh every year and that's also part of the reason why I don't care that that m9 like the m8 the m7 who cares it's it's still a good looking phone it's just not new and exciting you know like they didn't have time to come up with a new design so be it you know it happens hello it sounds like I'm an apologist and I kind of am i guess but you know I'm siding with OEMs and on Google with this one like you know it you have to fix this now it has to be perfect right on release day and then you know it's gonna take him three or four months to fix all the issues with the phones are out now and then you look at that they got eight months to polish and you know finish everything up entirely so yeah you know it's just it's so Spartan in it so I keep saying that word it's just it's just march forward march forward march forward march forward and you know no one wants to just stick around and fix what's wrong now it's always got to be what's next and i think that's a lot of the reason why the culture of android as a whole is I mean everything now is irrelevant in eight months anyway so what do they care if the camera software is a little messed up you know well on that I do i do believe that we have very thoroughly answered the question so those of you who have been on the pole which was our first poll for the friday debate podcast hopefully you guys were able to get a lot out of this and i'm pretty sure you were able to we were able to go in a lot of different places not only in terms of this question but also in terms of joe's feelings on lollipop yes so thank you for all of you that did not vote for us to talk about lollipop because that was an option some people in the comments or something was that that was number three I think in the poll oh yea though some people in the comments were saying like I want this one this one and this one so technically to kind of got with the ones I think we did it well it was all over the place what we did it that said before i get into the OH what was it to these we didn't talk about what were the other two which one topics you mean which does did we not discuss uh gaming and like play store stuff yours yours the stuff that's your domain all right great they both suck congratulations we had all five we didn't talk about tablets if they're worth owning and they suck to all six my steez out now I disagree tablets are awesome no there they are tablet my droids have like I use my tattling four hours a day now they're freaking awesome now I'm playing shadowrun so much on my shield right now so with all these budget phones i have to have the good no whole new angle do this we didn't think about haha it's big enough so we can cuddle it in his sleep yeah I love you flagship tablet go screw yourself budget phones and Turner it like you stand the crier why steal of us it's too late for you guys who would you stop well with all that said we will continue be doing these poles there will be some weeks where we have topics that are like really set in stone especially in a couple weeks from now for example or to talk about our reactions to the g4 probably but even then we will have these ongoing polls so make sure you go to our Google+ page and the links will be available at our android authority compost for the Friday debate podcast but you can find us everywhere on the internets I will have navi on our andhra thority friday debate post a post friday babe podcast post on android re calm so you can follow him on social media just like you can the rest of us I want to extend another thank you dinner I've a man it is half six o'clock a.m. for you know dude man I know you are a Jew now I've noticed I've been a bit quiet I last 20 minutes if it if it provides any insight i woke up at about ten past eight yesterday morning dear oh wow so what are you gonna do i would say like if you're able to get like a some some rest dude i would really recommend it but I was in the my sister ways just waiting till we finish up alright well the rav a thank God thank God for you coming on man we're gonna we're gonna we're going to have you on definitely up again pretty soon hopefully and if anything will have will make this a five-person podcast most weeks I think that'd be pretty fun too but uh huh Asner ave gets ready for his nap and then when you wakes up a few hours from now and grab some cost of coffee I want to go ahead and say thank you guys very much for listening to the Friday to be a podcast by andrew authority discussing topics and android every single week as always we have our hosts here i'm josh you have andrew grush Jonathan Feist Joe Hindy and nor ave here as well how do you pronounce your last name by the way I forget um it my last name is gone the India but I figured now at the end of this podcast you know an hour and 20 minutes in its nirav and not their hobby hahahaha oh josh is like all Josh's fault because I heard he said because I quite job over there hose in my defense i've been calling him that ever since the day I met him and he's never told me I thought it was her off but then when you see her obey I just figured you were right to be completely fair there was a was talking to one of the people my PR contacts for days ago she's been calling me in their RV for about two and half years exactly because not all my fault okay no but honestly there is no either of them works who used to both we spent days together with about in China and I think I called you never know you never told I know what your life is more fun if I just an out on the reading this the whole time yay yo Josh vajura you really need to start doing yeah it doesn't Heidi I'm Joseph Hyndman and engineering that literally my entire life that's how I know it's a telemarketer hello is this Joseph Heidi go screw yourself clay guess you can't mess up Jonathan Feist I mean it's pretty it's pretty straightforward taste hey I ed spiezio please yeah I got feast a lot growing up yet dude I wish no way she was pronounced feast we call you feasty beastie or something like that alright alright I it's time to it is time it is breath all together it is late for all of us and I hope you guys have thoroughly enjoyed this edition of the Friday debate podcast talking about flagships and midranges whether or not they make sense with one kind of closing the gap on the other without all being said make sure you stay tuned for next week's episode as well and we have the poll if we're gonna have to pull up this week rush yeah wobble poll ok stay tuned for the pole and make sure you let us know what topic you want is to talk about next we're probably going to recycle whatever wasn't picked this week and then put them in for next week and just see what comes up next is that is that what we're gonna do um what we'll talk about but yeah we'll definitely have a pullout I have a possible idea will but we'll have something fun for you guys alright cool well you have your voting buttons ready for the next upcoming week for the Friday to be a podcast by android authority of course your source for all things everybody together android android android man how long have we known each other and we've been saving your name roms food to be completely honest i did not even realize to about halfway through the pool hahaha wait is he talking to me like that I just can't imagine what that realization was like just sitting there like I think calling me naraba that's wrong oh no it's fine you know honestly listen I will one day share with you some of the names I've been called at which point you'll realize why new Ravi is absolutely fine