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General Discussion & Feedback => Just Chat! => Topic started by: Petrochemicals on 05/09/2024 20:05:57

Title: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: Petrochemicals on 05/09/2024 20:05:57
The 3G network is being switched off in the coming few years and any mobile you buy now will need to be at least a 4G type. Having looked at the phones on the market at present they all look largely the same, massive screen, camera on the back. There are a few exeptions such as the folding phones, but generally the same.

 The prices though are extrodinarily different. I can buy a phone for 70 pounds that pretty much looks the same as one that costs 1000+.  Whilst I understand some have a better camera or the folding phones are new and fancy, what precisely does the extra money buy you?
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: alancalverd on 05/09/2024 20:15:17
Peer status. Like the Motorola Brick and the Blackberry of years gone by.

Dunno why they call them phones nowadays - folk use them for just about everything except talking to humans.   
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: paul cotter on 06/09/2024 16:02:09
If there were not customers willing to buy the latest fad, there would not be those outrageously expensive models.
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: Bored chemist on 06/09/2024 17:55:08
A 'phone is not expansive; the latest 'phone is expensive.
Much the same with a lot of other things.
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: alancalverd on 06/09/2024 18:56:46
  A 'phone is not expansive

 But
the folding phones are new and fancy

So some of them are "expansive"! But why?
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: Petrochemicals on 06/09/2024 23:34:58
Appears im probably asking the wrong group of people, i shall source myself some children.
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: paul cotter on 07/09/2024 10:11:53
I am at a loss to understand your comment, Petro. The answers given cover the subject quite well, imho. There is a cohort of people with more money than sense who are quite willing to purchase vanity and the manufacturers know this and price their products accordingly. I am fairly sure that these expensive models are only marginally more expensive to manufacture. A similar phenomenon can be found with watches where absolutely astronomic prices can apply to certain brands, regardless of their mechanism and precious metal content.
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: Petrochemicals on 10/09/2024 16:03:03
I think youbare half right paul, the folding phones are obviously new technology and i can see how it can be justified, remeber the price of flatscreen tvs when first out. The flat phones do not seem to do much more than each other, I guess because the gimicks are getting old, the budget phones seem to have pretty much caught up with the premium phones. I remember when Apple where accused of making peacemeal improvements to allow for further new models in future.

Worst thing about all of this technology is that it is all rubbish.
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: alancalverd on 10/09/2024 19:11:01
Please explain the justification for a folding phone! I remember compact "flip" phones with proper push buttons, but putting a crease in a touch screen simply makes a defective product (touch screens are prone to error and waste time - car manufacturers are now getting rid of them, and entering data on a touch screen in a small plane is positively dangerous) liable to failure.

And why is it impossible for anyone to write a screenplay nowadays without invoking mobile phones? Same old tedious cliches: "I've got to take this call"  "Get the lab to unlock his phone" "Message from unknown caller", destroy the SIM, no battery.....
Title: Re: Why are some mobile phones so expensive?
Post by: Petrochemicals on 10/09/2024 20:07:43
Buttons Alan, I really miss buttons, wonderful nearly infallible buttons.