A review of the $10 Walmart phone—better than nothing, but not by much

We bought an LG Sunrise for the low, low price of $10. We regret it.

Read the whole story

 

[Bravehamster]

Hmm... I need a cheap touchscreen for a raspberry pi project.

 

[obarthelemy]

If you've only got a 20 to spend on a phone (say for forgot yours for a weekend trip), what else should you get ?

 

[mzlin]

I got one too as a toy and in case a visitor ever needs a phone, in which case i would have tracfone as an option ready to go. The sd card, charger, and cable alone justify the price. I consider the phone free. It's pretty good for free!

 

[harmless]

I like the form factor ...

(Could be a bit thinner.)

 

[Gendou]

I don't know why this article rubs me the wrong way, but it does.

I guess it feels like a Mercedes S-Class owner reviewing a used Honda:
"It has wheels and an engine, I guess it fits the definition of a 'car' LOL."

Not everyone can afford a $600 smartphone.
Not everyone can afford a $60 smartphone.

 

[TruthSeeker57]

Regret it... you mean you can't make a phone call with a $10 phone?

I regularly now spend $12 to $15 dollars for a lunch. All-righty then.

 

[tetrapyloctomy]

This article would have a lot more value if it focused on alternatives for people in the target audience. For better or for worse, it's becoming expected for people to be connected at all times, and a lot of people are scraping by as is. Give them guidance instead of just reiterating that what they can afford is cheap.

 

[mike3775]

Thats something I would give to my kids to use for their first cell phone.

 

[strcat]

The hardware and software seems more than good enough for the $10 price point. The part that isn't okay is selling a product that's known to be insecure. Only Android 5.1.1 and 6.0 get security updates from Google and there's no way that they're doing their own.

 

[kray28]

Gendou[/url]":28ltxu4x]I don't know why this article rubs me the wrong way, but it does.

I guess it feels like a Mercedes S-Class owner reviewing a used Honda:
"It has wheels and an engine, I guess it fits the definition of a 'car' LOL."

Not everyone can afford a $600 smartphone.
Not everyone can afford a $60 smartphone.

This is exactly right.

You paid $10 for this...it is an amazing value for that investment.

 

[macemoneta]

I love these. Cheapest WiFi connected X displays for projects. Less than a third the cost of a Chromecast Audio with the ability to play Google Music, local audio, or streamed from a server / cloud. Cheap bedside ebook reader, using large font and (hands-free) blind scrolling. Google Voice home phone replacement - with no monthly service charge, unlike the cable company's $29/month for the identical functionality.

In short, these cheap Android smartphones are awesome devices. Oh, and they're basic cell phones too.

 

[Trou Macacq]

I like ARS reviews, but this one is pretty pointless. Almost every paragraph begins with two words, "it's awful". Why bother, then? Review a $10 smartphone with $10 expectations, not ones fitting a $1060+tax price point.

Oh the horrific prospect of having to use a crappy screen on a $10 phone to make a basic phone call.

 

[電気人]

I mean, I GUESS the raspberry pi qualifies as a computer. It has a processor and 512 megabytes of RAM, and TECHNICALLY it can run an operating system...

But ho boy, compared to this custom built i7 rig with 32 gigabytes of RAM and two GTX Titan Xs, man is it a piece of shit; 0/10 don't buy!

*edit for grammar

 

[FoxholeAtheist]

So, if I were very poor and wanted basic phone functionality - like, making phone calls, say - how would this work? What would be a better option? Would my kid's school be able to call me in an emergency?

I mean, it's obviously not going to be as good as a flagship phone, but would it work?

 

[semperwifi]

Perfect for Google Voice home phone replacement

 

[baobrain]

Lots of good points on the comment, but I personally loved this article.

The snarky and sarcastic attitude made me giggle a bit, which is better than the typical "heh".

 

[BajaPaul]

"better than nothing, but not by much"...

Unfortunately, that is a true statement for almost any cheap device one buys. I guess you get what you pay for. But most items like this will hit the trash can soon.

Do yourself or family members a favor and spend about twice as much and get something that will be functional for a couple of years....

 

[Astramancer]

FoxholeAtheist[/url]":32jrjdgw]So, if I were very poor and wanted basic phone functionality - like, making phone calls, say - how would this work? What would be a better option? Would my kid's school be able to call me in an emergency?

I mean, it's obviously not going to be as good as a flagship phone, but would it work?

If you're only worried about making phone calls, then getting a dumb phone would be a better bet. Last time I got one (years and years ago), the phone cost a bit less than the amount of call time with tracfone that it actually came with -- the phone was just a loss leader, literally less than free. (I don't recall exactly how much, but it was something like it came with $20 worth of call time, but cost $15 for the phone and the call time)

 

[ramuman]

The cynicism in the article has actually made me want to take a look at the phone the next time I'm at Walmart.

The camera seems perfectly fine. Put in a larger SD card, and you have a great audio solution for your car, as mentioned a Pi screen.

I could also see other uses - when I goto the gym or run out for a quick lunch, I can leave my cell phone at home and have this in my car, always charged to use if needed for whatever reason.

If it runs Skype, then it seems like a simple dedicated VoIP home phone. If you have younger children, seems perfect for them as an emergency phone.

I can think of a lot of uses for this - that apparently the author can't.

 

[NetworkElf]

Honestly, how much time and effort can you spend critiquing a $10 phone? Maybe, just possibly, have you considered that your expectations are just a tad unreasonable?

 

[aruisdante]

Gendou[/url]":2kdlfdcx]I don't know why this article rubs me the wrong way, but it does.

I guess it feels like a Mercedes S-Class owner reviewing a used Honda:
"It has wheels and an engine, I guess it fits the definition of a 'car' LOL."

Not everyone can afford a $600 smartphone.
Not everyone can afford a $60 smartphone.

This sentiment has come up every time Ars has attempted to do a budget, well, really anything but especially phones, review (and not just Ars really, most of the major tech sites/blogs). The problem is that none of them seem to have anyone on staff that isn't coming into these reviews with the prospective of having come from something worse, because none of them have ever been in the target audience for something like this. And that's somewhat to be expected given the requirements that tend to come with getting a job writing for a technology site on the internet. But it always makes coverage of things like this seem lacking at best, and downright mocking at worst, of people for whom this might really be their only option.

I'm somewhat surprised that they haven't done something about it, but I'm not really sure how you solve the problem without being exploitive while still maintaining the writing standards expected of the site.

 

[saanaito]

I'm feeling a bit torn between agreeing with some of the comments here about expectations, and the author's review.

I mean, yeah, for $10 one can't expect much more than the basics, and the Sunrise certainly seems to meet those. It sure sounds plenty serviceable as long as you're patient and avoid comparing it to a modern flagship.

On the other hand, I imagine that a lot of less-fortunate people who want to move up from a feature phone pick these super-cheap smartphones as an upgrade (heck, I know two people who went that route). The least the manufacturers could do is make sure that the phone doesn't provide so awful an experience that the owner all but begs to go back to their feature phone and, say, swears off smartphones for life.

 

[plympton]

Frys had the Verizon Moto e on sale for $10. A much nicer experience I'd wager for the $. Still don't understand why/how they go that low unless there's a warehouse full of them, or if even 30% use the service regularly they will make a profit on the sale eventually.

Either way, the cost delta between "it works good enough" and "flagship" is getting bigger and bigger on the Android side to where it will be hard to justify spending $600 on a phone soon.

The successful holdout, of course, is Apple. With ecosystem lock, single provider hardware, and first mover advantage on new self-developed technology they have a district market advantage.

One, I wish at times, I wasn't captive in.

 

[Statistical]

This article would have a lot more value if it focused on alternatives for people in the target audience. For better or for worse, it's becoming expected for people to be connected at all times, and a lot of people are scraping by as is. Give them guidance instead of just reiterating that what they can afford is cheap.

Ars I would like to see something like that. I mean we get a $10 phone is going to be a piece of junk. Honestly it looks like the only thing they cheaped out on was the screen. So how much more than $10 do you need to go up to get a smartphone with a decent (once again nobody expects good) screen. If it is $20 then yeah this is a bad product if it is $120 then well $10 vs $130 maybe the bad screen can be excused.

Just taken in a vacuum the article doesn't really provide any context.

 

[salamanderjuice]

Astramancer[/url]":2344fyil]

FoxholeAtheist[/url]":2344fyil]So, if I were very poor and wanted basic phone functionality - like, making phone calls, say - how would this work? What would be a better option? Would my kid's school be able to call me in an emergency?

I mean, it's obviously not going to be as good as a flagship phone, but would it work?

If you're only worried about making phone calls, then getting a dumb phone would be a better bet. Last time I got one (years and years ago), the phone cost a bit less than the amount of call time with tracfone that it actually came with -- the phone was just a loss leader, literally less than free. (I don't recall exactly how much, but it was something like it came with $20 worth of call time, but cost $15 for the phone and the call time)

As a person who's owned many cheap phones, I second this. Bad android phones can be bad even as phones. My cheapo HTC One V started out okay but after a few months use it would take 1-2 minutes to load messaging or contacts. I didn't even have that many contacts or receive that many text messages(less than 150 a month). My also cheap Nokia Lumia 610 was a bit better as phone as long as you kept to MS built in apps. My BlackBerry Q5 has been fine and was around the same price as the phones mentioned above although that's 15x the price of the phone reviewed here.

 

[SparkyM]

NetworkElf[/url]":3mj37zte]Honestly, how much time and effort can you spend critiquing a $10 phone? Maybe, just possibly, have you considered that your expectations are just a tad unreasonable?

Exactly. This is the dumbest article I've seen on Ars ever. You know why you buy a $10 phone? TO MAKE PHONE CALLS! Obviously anyone buying this as a "smart" phone with a billion needless apps and gadgets is in for a letdown aren't they? Then again they're not paying $600 are they? My cell is just over 4 years old at this point and I don't care. I'll keep it until it dies. You know why BECAUSE I USE MY PHONE FOR PHONE CALLS AND NOTHING ELSE. Jesus!

 

[Statistical]

The camera makes me feel old. It is noticeably superior to my first digital camera (yeah back when people bought single function devices) and it is only part of a $10 phone vs $300? (probably more) that I spent.

 

[randomer19]

This review feels far too negative. I've had a similar experience with my own cheap phone, a Huawei Y-330. I bought it for £10 about a year ago (on sale via a pay as you go (i.e. prepaid) "upgrade") and while it's not a very good phone, I think the price more than makes up for it. Yes, it's not a very good smartphone, its run a very old version of Android (4.2.2) and performance can be quite bad at times but you really can't beat it's price, particularly for someone who needs a backup or just a phone, or as a cheap device for a child.

I can also say it is remarkably durable. It's made of plastic, including the screen, so I can drop it as many times as I like (and I have) without it breaking. Whether that's the case with the Walmart phone I can't say, but I'd imagine it is since it's also made of plastic.

 

[fenncruz]

Just today i found out my i had set things up properly for using my phone abroad and couldn't make any call. Thus a $10 phone would of been pretty usefull to be able to make a phone call even if it is a bad phone.

I'm amazed they can make a phone for $10.

 

[Aelinsaar]

Hate to say, but I have to agree with people saying this is just a wasted review. It's like going to the knackers yard and complaining that all of the horses look old and sick. What exactly did you expect? Be realistic within the range that you're reviewing, and as others have said offer alternatives. The entertainment value of "Wahahaha cheap phone!" wears off very quickly, and then you're left having actually learned nothing.

 

[NienorGT]

" We bought an LG Sunrise for the low, low price of $10. We regret it."
"The specs look like something out of 2007"

Please Ars, next time you make Ron test a very budget phone, force him to use an HTC Dream/G1 and maybe pay him a vacation to rural Africa so he can sound less like a spoiled brat laughing at a device that someone from 2007 couldn't even dream of or someone in the need can't even afford to pay.

I was hoping to read a review telling how much we evolved in the last few years or how much stuff can be done with a $10 phone. =/

 

[SirBedwyr]

I don't think the article's all that bad. It's for larfs and that's fine as far as it goes. However I think it'll only stand if Ars does, as suggested, a comparison of true budget phones for people that can't afford the usual smartphone. There's a worthy purpose to it! A lot of poor people need to be able to communicate, have a handheld computer, and not bust a budget. I'm firmly in the camp that mobile phone + internet access of some kind is an absolute necessity just as, depending on where you live, a car is an absolute necessity.

 

[ethd]

I bought one of these and activated it on Straight Talk while my G3 was getting its screen repaired (a small hairline crack that made it impossible to actually use the screen, yay).

My impressions were similar: they cheaped out on a few things that would make the device almost unusable for me. The screen would have done better with nothing more than better viewing angles; the resolution and dithering were weird but not something I couldn't get used to, but the viewing angles are almost impossible to nail and the inversion of the colors gives me a headache.

By far, the biggest frustration was the 512MB of RAM. The Snapdragon 200 is a surprisingly solid performer, but when browsing Ars occasionally the entire page would have to reload while I was scrolling down because there wasn't enough RAM to display the whole thing at once.

The camera was actually way better than I was expecting. Under the right conditions, you can actually get a pretty good shot.

Battery life is awesome, at least in comparison to my G3, which only gets a few hours of screen on time. The Sunrise has a 1540ish mAh battery, which is small by today's standards, but since everything else is pretty low-powered spec-wise it all adds up to me never getting less than 6 hours SOT and being surprised by how much battery life I have at the end of the day.

That all said, I came from an LG G3 with a QHD screen without a single bad viewing angle, a Snapdragon 801, and 3GB RAM. My mother-in-law I gave it to, on the other hand, came from a Samsung Galaxy Centura, a phone that retailed at $100 from Straight Talk and had similar specs. Its battery life had gone down to about 1 hour of SOT despite having the same amount of RAM and storage, a significantly weaker processor, Android 4.0, and a smaller screen of the same resolution. My mother-in-law is utterly floored by how well this phone performs in comparison.

You just have to go in with the right expectations. If you're going for something that performs pretty well, you'll want to pay a bit more and get a 2nd-gen Moto E or a lot more and get something like the Moto G, OnePlus X or the LG G3. (Or even more and get something like the Galaxy S6, LG V10, Moto X, OnePlus One, Nexus 5X/6P, etc.) But if you're content with something that's "good enough," then the Sunrise should be fine. It's never going to be great, but it's fine, and that's all you can hope for when you have a price point this low.

EDIT: put some spacing between the lines so as to not create a wall of text.

 

[PhantomPhoton]

Someone on Ars mentioned this exact phone a few weeks ago, and there was a question as to whether it could double as a cheap WiFi webcam for security and whatnot. So, on a recent trip to Walmart I picked one up. It is indeed a crappy phone but it can pull duty as a wifi camera as well as function as a cheap remote for my zwave device website.

The biggest problem I've had with the purchase is that my girlfriend now thinks I have a "burner" phone and after consulting with her brother, they both think it's sketchy. This article couldn't have come at a better time for some justification and damage control. I, for one, thank you.

 

[ColdWetDog]

plympton[/url]":34a05550]Frys had the Verizon Moto e on sale for $10. A much nicer experience I'd wager for the $. Still don't understand why/how they go that low unless there's a warehouse full of them, or if even 30% use the service regularly they will make a profit on the sale eventually.

Either way, the cost delta between "it works good enough" and "flagship" is getting bigger and bigger on the Android side to where it will be hard to justify spending $600 on a phone soon.

The successful holdout, of course, is Apple. With ecosystem lock, single provider hardware, and first mover advantage on new self-developed technology they have a district market advantage.

One, I wish at times, I wasn't captive in.

When my wife's 4S died, we got a replacement at AT&T for $20. Really can't beat that, although it's the subsidized price and Amazon wants $215 for a new one. If you want good and cheap, a used mainline phone seems to be the way to go.

An Apple 4S will be a decent smartphone for a very time....

 

[RufousTreepie]

Ars readership extends to countries where many people use phones worse than this. I get it if you don't want to review this phone, but if you decide to do so, please compare it to others in its price category. May be something like a lynx A100? For God's sake Nokia 1100 sells on amazon.com for 96.99$ new!!
http://www.amazon.com/Nokia-Unlocked-1100/dp/B000FJ1XWA

 

[RicheTheBuddha]

The reviewer left out a a few very important aspects:

How well did the phone functionality work? Could a user hear calls on it OK? Could the person on the other end of the call hear OK? Was it around average or worse when it comes to dropped calls?

Did the texting function work OK or was the weak screen a hindrance in typing SMS messages?

How tough was the phone? Could it easily survive most drops onto a tile floor undamaged?

Finally, would most users be better off with this smartphone with a bad screen or should they go with a "dumb" call/text/camera phone with a clearer display?

And as for the camera on the Sunrise, while far from "great" I sure wouldn't call it "awful," at least in conditions with good lighting.

 

[orangpelupa]

Does it have GPS? If it does, then it also can be used as super cheap always connected GPS tracker.

For car, for luggage, etc.

Heck, even of it don't have GPS, it is also nice to be used for lots of other stuff. Making phone call, first smartphone for little kids, home automation, voice command for home entertainment, etc