Worst purchase ever was buying an LG G4 cell phone. Although I do have a love for the machine. The design was clean and nice with user replaceable battery to boot. Plus it could act like a IR remote control since my actual remove controls with membrane buttons have failed more than their share. The device was brilliant when it worked.
First problem was a known issue with this generation of phones. An infinite boot loop bug. And that barely started before warrantee expired. LG still tried to get me to pay $400+ for fixing it though. I told them no and send the phone back. Then capitulated and fixed in anyways. That whole experience felt a bit slimy to me though. Ick.
Second problem happened more recently. The battery ballooned. There are replacement batteries still to be had on Amazon but it doesn’t seem you can original OEM batteries anymore though. So I got the best reviewed battery replacement.
Third problem was that the new battery seemed to take a dog’s age to charge. I don’t recall the OEM battery taking that long to recharge. However it held the charge and worked so I didn’t think much of it.
Forth problem just happened a few days ago. I was using this phone as a back up for when I’m in the US. I guess the battery got depleted and now the phone won’t turn on or recharge the battery. So I don’t know what happened here or what is wrong with the phone. I took it to a repair shop and they said they won’t fix it because they wouldn’t be able to get parts for it anymore. In other words I’m SOL.
So, this has been by far the worst cell phone experience I’ve had. Not that I’ve had many but I’ve had an ACER Liquid, Nokia something or other (Denise’s), Google Nexus 4, Google Pixel (first one), Samsung S9 or 10 (Denise’s), and my new phone Samsung A52. Acer and Nokia had issues, mainly they were slow and locked to a network. Which reminds me, the LG was locked to Wind when I bought it but I managed to unlock it. However after the bootloop, the repair center locked it to Wind again and I couldn’t get it unlocked for some reason after that. I ended up using the Pixel which was initially intended to be used by Denise but I ended up with it. The Nexus 4 was good when until the battery started to not hold a charge for a day. The Pixel is still a good phone but the battery is also on the way out, and getting that replaced was also met with, “It’s cheaper and safer to buy a new phone with the risk breaking the screen to take the stupid think apart to replace the battery” sort of deal. These new phones are throwaway devices. Even the newer S10 and A52 phones we currently have aren’t really repairable.
Now I’m looking for a cheap replacement backup for the LG G4. I probably should have bought a dual sim phone but I didn’t know I was going to be spending so much time in the US when I bought the thing. Doing research now but it’s rather depressing seeing all the reviews and potential problems with the ‘cheap’ phones. Which one to buy? So annoying. I’d like to stick to good name brands though but they are naturally more expensive. I might have to give up on that but the lesser know Chinese brands don’t instill any confidence with the apparent build quality and issues. I was hoping for something around the $100 mark or less but that might be a pipe dream.