Which new smartphone should it be?

1.) Buy an iPhone
Whoever knows me should know, that I am not at all a fan of Apple. It is not because the hardware would be rubbish or something like that... hardware wise they produce some of the most solid devices, which are slightly (sometimes not onl slightly but highly, but that is a different story) too expensive, but nevertheless not bad devices. But what makes them unusable for me is the software limitations they put on them by purpose and because of philosophy of the company. As long as you are just going exactly the ways Apple wants you to go everything is fine, but try to do something Apple can't make money with and you are screwed...

Additional to that here are the hardware disadvantages:
- No changeable battery
- No expandable drivespace by SD card
- Alu & Glas case (what? Isn't that great? No... for me it is not... see below for more info why...)

Conclusion: This is a no-go for me.

2.) Buy a Nexus device
This is a device on which is a unchanged Android operation system installed. This would get rid of the update problem, because you can download the updates of the operation system directly when Google would bring them out. But there are two things which would be bad about that: The latest Nexus devices aren't rated very well and are expensive enough (especially in comparision with the once before) and I would use everything from Google directly, since they install all the Google stuff on them. (for instance, everything mail connected is done by GMail, etc. which means: Google gets all the information in there)

And if you follow me here, I am not a fan of the superiority of Google nowadays... if you want to see why and what this is all about, have a look at my other blog entry here.

And again:
- No exchangeable battery
- No expandable drivespace by SD card

3.) Install CyanogenMod on my smartphone.
This is actually a good option... use a Android phone an install this mod of Android on it. You can install a very new version of Android on close to any smartphone available, especially since my phone is actually still quite fast.
But here are the disadvantages: You loose the garanty and it is a makeshift solution (in the bad way). So there will be bugs, which I have to get rid of myself and it can get quite ugly there...

4.) Buy a Windows Phone / Windows Mobile / Surface Phone
... and now everybody is looking strange again. But yes: Windows Phones are updated as long as the hardware can take it by Microsoft to the newest OS version. This is the same as with iPhone and with Nexus phones.

Additional to that: The system is tidy and fast. Even if a newwer device of windows wouldn't technically be as fast as a Android device, (but just to mention it: The 950XL is at the same level.) it would still be very fast, because of the OS. I think the reason for that is, that the system is programm by a company, who is creating operation systems for a very long time. Apple shows us that... they create a good operation system (if you can live with the limits of iOS): They are fast and often less jerky than Androids, because the operation system is simply smooth and less resource hungry.

I tested this with a smartphone of a friend of mine, which I played around with for several days. It was a Lumia 630. It has less RAM and a much slower processor than my Note 2 but started Apps quite much faster and was less jerky in terms of scrolling and stuff like that.
That is especially astounishing if you compare prices... even today a Note 2 ist more than twice as expensive and it really is old!

What about Windows Mobile? Yes it is different but not bad... it was tidy and when I started to wrap my head around it, it really was very logical and well designed. And that was Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 seems to be more practical from what I have heard.

So what about the hardware of for instance the Lumia 950XL?
- Yes, the battery is changeable!
- Yes, you can expand hd-space by SD cards!
- It is build from polycarbonate.

The biggest draw back is the app diversity. This was a problem for me, but than I thought about my habbits app-wise and I came to the conclusion... that is not a problem at all... lets do a small test:
1.) When have you downloaded your last app, which really was worse it and which you are really using?
2.) How many apps are on your device?
3.) Which app is really uncommon?

> I answered it like this:
I do not use any uncommon apps and I use quite a small amount of apps anyway because of drive space problems and just because I do not need them anyway. I downloaded most of my apps I am constantly using in the first 4 weeks.

On the schoolyard this would be a problem, because I am not the coolest kid if I would not have the latest fart-joke-app, but I am not in scool for quite a while now... this is no longer necessary for me.

So if I do look at that, the Windows Phone is the best choice...

Additional to that, if I for instance get one of the flagship Lumia devices (likt the 950 and the 950xl), I get one of the best cameras all around especially in low light situations with a ZEISS-opjective one of the fastes or even the fastest CPU available, 3 GB of RAM (which is quite much), can push the local storage to at least 220 GB (32 GB internal - operation system + 200 GB SD-card (or even higher in future) and I can even use Continium (the abillity to use you Smartphone very similar to a computer, run Office programs on it (like Word or Powerpoint) and connect it to a beamer or any kind of display with the dock, which is given to earlier buyers for no additional fees). Additional to that, it has a large battery (it is not clear till now, if that is just needed or result in a very long battery life, but we will see that).

But as always: I will have a look at the devices in the store before I buy it. (it is available now) and if there is nothing that really bothers me about it, I will be a Lumia owner in future. I will very likely tell you about it here in future.