HELP! Best/Quickest Cheap 820 Replacement?

g0g

Wife's phone just packed it in - Lumia 820 with badly cracked screen. I'm guessing it can be repaired, but the first quote I got was >€ 110 which sounds mad! She's in the mood for a newer phone anyway provided it's cheap! Needs to be Meteor or SIM free. Defo want Windows Phone.

Is the Meteor online € 49.99 Lumia 530 option the best one? Any other ideas?

Seems like 530 compares ok to 820 but maybe screen not as good and lose wireless charging and maybe less RAM?

All advice appreciated if it's quick as she's like someone who just had their arm chopped off! :pac:

ablelocks

not the 530 - apparently the 520 is still better than it.

(I'll be putting an unlocked 820 on adverts at the weekend - pm me if you're interested.)

g0g

Thanks for the quick reply. Yeah I just did some more research and seems like most people advise avoiding the 530. I wonder would the 635 be better then. Will come back to you about the 820 or even in the meantime drop my a message with rough price and whether it's new or s/h.

Fingleberries

g0g wrote: »

Thanks for the quick reply. Yeah I just did some more research and seems like most people advise avoiding the 530. I wonder would the 635 be better then. Will come back to you about the 820 or even in the meantime drop my a message with rough price and whether it's new or s/h.

Avoid the 530 like the plague, it is an abomination.

How much are you willing to spend? In Argos the 535 is available for 115. It's a surprisingly decent phone, 1GB RAM (better than 635), bigger and better screen than 635.

No 4G, though.

g0g

Fingleberries wrote: »

Avoid the 530 like the plague, it is an abomination.

How much are you willing to spend? In Argos the 535 is available for 115. It's a surprisingly decent phone, 1GB RAM (better than 635), bigger and better screen than 635.

No 4G, though.

Thanks I'd say around € 100 is the upper limit. Was thinking maybe I might pick up an unwanted new 635 on Adverts for around 80-90. But I'd stretch a bit more if I thought 535 was better all round than 635. Does it lack anything?

Davy

Fingleberries wrote: »

Avoid the 530 like the plague, it is an abomination.

Its a cheap phone, but its not that bad.


g0g would she consider changing networks?

The 530 is fine if you want something quick and cheap but its not a match for the 820. If you are interested in the 635 meteor have it new for €99 rather than second hand for €80-90. You can use fatcheese for €10 cashback

Fingleberries

Is the 435 available here yet? That's a better phone than the 535. The 635 is decent, but just 512MB RAM may hurt you in the long term (but works perfectly fine for now)

g0g

Thanks all for the recommendations! I had a look at them all, and TBH none seemed to quite compare with the 820. That said, she wanted something quick yesterday (funny how attached to phones we get!) so I went with the 535 in the end. Thankfully her existing one had been set to backup anyway.

What do you do with a cracked screen phone where repair looks like it'll cost as much as replacing the phone!?

Anyways my comments on the 535:

• A lot bigger than I was expecting
• Little bit plastic-y to hold
• No more wireless charging
• I was surprised when she said it seems a little bit slower when you're typing for characters to appear on screen. I was certain with a couple of years having passed that an entry level phone would out-perform her old phone, but maybe I was wrong...

Otherwise all is grand with it!

wilser

Are you sure it's the screen or just the digitizer ?
I got my wife's digitiser replaced in the Nokia care centre in newbridge a while ago for €70, Would recommend these guys.

g0g

I actually don't know. The crack in the glass is just the slightest bit in the middle at the top. All of the screen is still clearly visible but the touch only responds in about 10-15% of its surface are in the top left corner. If we could fix it I gladly would and sell on the yoke I bought yesterday!

wilser

On the 820 I got repaired there was a crack going right across the middle of the phone, the touch screen worked on one side of the crack but not the other, when I phoned Nokia care the guy was fairly confident it was just the digitizer.

FGR

g0g wrote: »

[*]I was surprised when she said it seems a little bit slower when you're typing for characters to appear on screen. I was certain with a couple of years having passed that an entry level phone would out-perform her old phone, but maybe I was wrong...
[/LIST]
Otherwise all is grand with it!

MS are aware of issues surrounding the screen's sensitivity to typing and are working on an update to fix it.

Source is here.