📱What's my phone?

Reviewing the history of the smartphones that I have used and what I am currently using now.

Shot on Canon 600D

My smartphone line-up

Uhmm, where do I start? So, anything that is tech excites me. Right from trimmers to high-end graphic cards. Henceforth, I was very cautious about buying my first phone. It was during my college days and every tom, dick and harry was having a fancy phone in my college and I had this feeling of FOMO and I realised that I badly need a phone. And at that time, the money that I got from my side gigs wasn't enough to afford a good phone. So I had to depend on my parents to partially fund my phone and I finally got a Moto G 2nd Gen 😬

I knew it was not the flagship though but I really loved how simple it was and oh my gaawd what great sensors on the back. The camera was slick and it was super amazing for a first phone.

Two years later, I changed to Redmi Note 3 (not that great). Fortunately or unfortunately I dropped it and it broke into pieces. So I had to buy Mi A2 this time. Uh, Mi A2, Why again with MI? Because I really loved Google's Android One. I was using it till my first 6 months of work.

The 1st Flagship phone

Even though A2 was satisfactory, I had this super urge of getting a high-end flagship phone. I know I am a very materialistic guy. But I love tech. Love to play with tech. Explore new tech. So, I decided to buy one of my favourite brands - OnePlus.

I was also cautious that I can't be spending my entire salary on that. Thus, I started looking for side gigs and part-time. Fortunately, I got one exactly a few weeks later. The client paid me well and I saved them like a beggar.

Finally, on 28th May 2022, on the day of launch, I booked the OnePlus 8 Pro the Glacial Green version 🥳

Here starts the problem...

I was excited to try it out and moreover, I was able to buy it entirely with my own money. The Oxygen OS was highly customizable, super easy to use and very fluid. The cameras were 48MP and the photos turned out really great. I really felt that I had a DSLR in my hand.

First few pics taken with the Sony sensor.

Unfortunately, I seriously have no clue what happened to OnePlus or maybe it is just my bad luck after I bought the phone, OnePlus lost its trademark. You know the story - 'The Oppofication of OnePlus' 😩

A new take on other smartphones

Okay, let's try to understand what's with the other smartphones. While Samsung was trying to copy what Apple was doing, Microsoft had their own ground and its own players. The very 1st thing that one would notice from a windows phone back then was just how responsive it was. Windows mobile OS has the best animation with parallax effects to date I have ever seen. It was slick. It was fast and fluid. The UI was picture-perfect and the dynamic tiles were totally efficient and practical. There was a lot of depth to the UI and the dynamic tiles were my favourite part since they were very efficient but very practical. You can make it as complicated as you want or very simplistic just the way I like it. The keyboard was very tactile and the best that I have used so far. And there was thought behind every UX design. All the essential stuff was near the bottom of the screen so that can be easily accessed making it easy for one-handed use. Overall, everything felt 5 years ahead of the design and this was a solid start for Microsoft with their windows phone.

But developing OS isn’t sufficient to launch a mobile phone. You need partnerships. And Microsoft had that too. Large companies in 2010 from Samsung to HTC were there but there was one brand that looked like a perfect partner for Microsoft - The Nokia.

They launched the Lumia with awestruck marketing campaigns. (Check out Lumia’s Don't fight ad👇)

So everything was nice with Lumia. But what lead to the downhill of this great phone?

It should be very bizarre to look at a phone with no apps, right? Since most of the app developers were already on hands with Android and iOS, they made zero efforts to make apps for a very minimal user base. To give you a picture, Instagram and Youtube took 3 years to launch on the windows OS. And there ends the story of a great smartphone. In 2017, Microsoft has let its curtains down and the production of Lumia was stopped thereafter.

Anyways, keeping aside all the fuss, I am planning to change to my phone again😉. Keep your suggestions pouring in the comments section below.