Samsung Galaxy A52 5G: Sub-$600 midranger makes premium phones feel frivolous Samsung's Galaxy A series is the company's midrange workhorse, and although it doesn't generate the same buzz as the Galaxy S series or China's wave of astoundingly well-priced kit, it quietly sells over 100 million units a year – accounting for a decent chunk of all smartphones sold on the planet. The A Series is pitched by …
China's wave of astoundingly well-priced kit,
Why would you astoundingly well price a device that is filled to the brim with sensors, hmm?
Why reviews fail to mention where the subject was made?
If you want to make a privacy conscious and ethical choice you'll spend ages trying to find out whether the device was made responsibly.
I went on the Samsung website about A52 and there is no mention anywhere where they made that phone either.
I am using a Galaxy S8, and it is a perfectly good phone still, apart from being made of glass which is stupid, and the non-removable battery is starting to show its age.
Samsung don't want to support it any more, so I took the time to install Pixel Experience which has given me a more-or-less stock Android and it is so much better than the Samsung Android that I feel a bit silly for not doing it sooner.
It's a toughie. Earlier this year I bought a Galaxy S20 about a month after the S21 came out. Two reasons I did this. Firstly because the S20 had dropped by a good £300 since the release of the S21. Secondly, because the S20 had an SD slot and the S21 didn't (and I had a 128GB card filled with music and videos I wanted to shift over from my previous phone).
Performance of it is fantastic so far given that it's a recently ex-flagship model, but as others have said the one main caveat is that it is likely to lose support sooner, although Samsung's support cycle is a lot better these days.
Still, I managed to extract over 5 years of usage from my previous LG G4. I don't personally mind using a phone that is out of support, but it does force you to be more careful what you download and makes some activities such as online banking much more risky (I always do that on my PC instead anyway).
Well they came out pretty much the same time.
Of course given the A12 gives half the storage, half the ram, slower video, LCD rather then AMOLED screen, at lower resolution and refresh rate, weights more, is bigger, has much lower quality cameras, runs an older version of android, no IP67 water resistance, etc, I would hope it was only half as much. But if none of those differences are things you would use, then half the price is great. In my case I bought the A52 (not 5G) since I like the features, but have no use for 5G and saved some money that way, even though Samsung doesn't even offer the non 5G version in Canada, so I bought it on ebay from the US instead, where it appears it was aimed at the puerto rico market (it defaulted to spanish).
"Genuine question: is it better to buy a superseded top-of-the-range Samsung phone that's now modestly priced, or a new mid-range model like this?"
It depends what you want in a phone. The top range may have better cameras or screens, faster processors, or more memory. However, if it's old enough, those will have become cheaper and the midrange will already have them. The modern midrange will have longer support time and will probably run a later version of Android. The previous top of the range is more likely to have support from replacement ROMs. Basically, decide on your budget and compare the ones available when you're looking to buy, because you can't guarantee what they will have and it all depends on your preferences.
A "new condition" old phone, a "refurbished" old phone, or a "used" old phone?
Nowadays you can't change the battery easily yourself, and it will cost ~100 currency units to replace it, so I wouldn't consider a "used" old phone unless "repairing" was an enjoyable experience for me.
This year I bought a "new condition" old phone - Motorola 2020 g8, which is only old because the 2021 model is already out. A 5000 mAh battery and only 157 currency units.
Actually bought it to use instead of a Garmin cycle computer, the cheapest of which is around 200 to 300 currency units.
I bought a pair of these from Argos, for me and the wife (cashback offer, phone not wife!), and no complaints so far. Apart from the Upday News app - can *anyone* tell me how to disable its newsflash updates? I've tried everything! So yes, Samsungs still have cr*pware pre-loaded, but much less than the bad old days.
Hardware-wise, the phone is excellent. Beautiful, butter-smooth screen, fast and smooth, never skips a beat, and takes good pics with zero effort. It'll beat most 2018/19 flagships for 1/3 of the price. And the software is bang up to date: I got the June 2021 Android security patch update ... in June 2021. Incredible! This device should also be flagged to receive Android 12 early next year.
Also - I've not tried the face recognition, but the in-screen fingerprint doodad works perfectly for me. Very handy, in fact (no pun intended)!
You can get a phone more than good enough for any normal person for £200. Mine is now over 4 years old and is still perfectly good. On what planet does a phone costing three times more than that get classed as "affordable"? It may not be the most expensive phone available, but this is very much an expensive luxury item.
One of the USP's of Huawei is that they do not, by default, cooperate with US security services and courts. I suspect that Samsung is not so good.
(IDGAF if they might let in Chinese ones. They will not sell on my data to US "international" mega-corporations when they find I am not very interesting).
Maybe by default, but if you want to sell a product into a specific marketplace you will have to obey the rules of that jurisdiction. Many USA companies discovered that when selling into China.
My assumption has always been that Huawei refused to include USA Government spyware into their products and that was the major reason why it has been banned there.
All of that is supposition. You assume Samsung installs U.S. spyware. You assume Huawei doesn't install U.S. spyware. You assume that theoretical Chinese spyware wouldn't sell useless information. Do you have proof for any of this?
If we're going to state our assumptions without having any compunctions about proving them, here are mine. I assume neither Huawei nor Samsung install U.S. spyware, nor do they install Chinese spyware. I assume the NSA and CCP have plenty of exploits they'll use to target those devices when they want, but they didn't get manufacturer assistance with that. Have fun disproving that any more than I could disprove what you think.
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