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Which iPhone Smartphone Offers the Best Value?

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Which iPhone Offers the Best Value?

With so many smartphones and iPhones to choose, deciding which iPhone offers the best value isn’t always easy. Apart from specifications and features, you should also consider the iPhone’s age, price, and re-sell value to find the best value iPhone. To help you out, we have selected three iPhones that tower above the rest in terms of the value for money they provide.

Best Value iPhone: iPhone 8 Plus

Out of the three new iPhones Apple released in 2017, the iPhone 8 Plus offers the best value iPhone. Even though it’s $200 less expensive than the iPhone X, the two smartphones share basically the same internal components. We found them on Amazon starting from $915.

But the iPhone 8 Plus has the same design?

Yes, the iPhone 8 Plus still sports the same tired design as the iPhone 7 Plus, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. For example, if you currently own the iPhone 7 Plus, all your current accessories should work just fine with the iPhone 8 Plus, including cases and car mounts. Some people may even prefer to stick with the familiar design instead of learning the several new gestures that are required for navigating the iPhone X.

Thanks to the A11 Bionic chipset, the iPhone 8 Plus is considerably faster than all older iPhones, so you can rest assured knowing that your smartphone is going to remain breezy for a long time. The iPhone 8 Plus also features basically the same rear dual-lens camera module that is present in the iPhone X. This means that you can take 12 MP wide-angle pictures with one lens and then capture 12 MP closeups with the telephoto lens. You can also record 4K video at 60 frames per second or Full HD video at 240 frames per second.

What about screen quality on the iPhone 8 Plus?

The only major thing that the iPhone 8 Plus sacrifices in the name of value when compared to the iPhone X is screen quality. The iPhone X has a beautiful, edge-to-edge OLED screen with 2436 x 1125 pixels and support for HDR. The iPhone 8 Plus, on the other hand, has the same Full HD 5.5-inch IPS LCD as the iPhone 7 Plus.

But because there’s no real reason to go beyond the Full HD resolution on a 5.5-inch screen, apart from virtual reality, we stand behind our opinion that the iPhone 8 Plus offers the best value for people who want an all-around excellent iPhone and can live without the latest and greatest design.

Best Value Iphone Alternative: iPhone 7

Since the release of the iPhone 8, 8 Plus, and X, the second-hand market with the iPhone 7 has exploded. For a very attractive price, you can get this one generation old performer, which looks almost identical to the iPhone 8, but lacks some of the bells and whistles of its younger brother.

Most notably, the iPhone 7 has the A10 Fusion chipset, which is not nearly as impressive now as it was when it was first released. While the chipset still has more than enough power for just about anything that you can find in the App Store, you may notice that it occasionally has trouble keeping up with heavy multi-tasking or bloated web pages.

As such, you shouldn’t buy the iPhone 7 brand-new from Apple. The smartphone only really makes sense if you don’t intend to use it for more than two years—but ideally just one. A refurbished version is available on Amazon for a fraction of the price.

The iPhone 7 also lacks wireless charging support, only has up to 128 GB of storage capacity, and has a lesser camera than newer iPhones. That said, we don’t think that the lack of support for wireless charging is something to worry about unless you now own a smartphone that has this feature and don’t remember the last time you’ve charged it with a cable.

Photography with the iPhone 7

The camera is then perhaps the biggest weakness of the iPhone 7 because it doesn’t support the special portrait mode nor any other newer features, such as Face ID. But make no mistake, the iPhone 7 still takes stunning pictures. It’s just that flagship smartphones have evolved since 2016, but the iPhone 7 stayed the same.

Apart from its reliable performance and attractive price, the iPhone 7 also offers very manageable size as well as nearly all of the strengths of the iPhone 7 Plus. If you don’t feel like splurging a large sum of money on a brand-new iPhone 8, and you don’t like larger smartphones, you should definitely consider getting a second-hand iPhone 7.

Best Value Older Iphone: the iPhone SE

Released in March 2016, the iPhone SE is old. But despite its advanced age, this wonderful little ode to the short-lived era of 4-inch smartphones still has plenty to offer to people who need a smartphone only for the most basic tasks, including taking pictures and making video calls.

The price of the iPhone SE is the winner here.

Perhaps the best thing about the iPhone SE, apart from its adorable size, is its very attractive price of just $349. That’s right, $349 for a new iPhone straight from Apple. It’s true that you can find newer iPhones, such as the aforementioned iPhone 7, for better prices on sites like eBay and Craigslist, but you need to be willing to get a second-hand iPhone to begin with, and not everyone is. Personally id check out Apple on amazon for a great deal (see here)

We think that it’s perfectly reasonable to spend $349 on a new iPhone SE, knowing that it doesn’t come with the latest bells and whistles and doesn’t have as much processing power to spare as newer iPhones do.

What it does have is a sharp 4.0-inch IPS LCD with 640 x 1136 pixels, the A9 chipset, up to 128 GB of storage space, 2 GB of RAM, 12 MP rear camera that can record 2160p video at 30 frames per second or 720p video at up to 240 frames per second, 1.2 MP front-facing camera with face detection and FaceTime support, and front-mounted fingerprint reader with Touch ID support.

Mac

Best Apple Mac for Students? What MacBook is good for College?

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Best Apple Mac for Students

Whats the best Mac for Students, which is good for College? Even though it’s entirely possible to get through college without a laptop, college students and professors alike know how helpful a good laptop can be. From taking notes to research to communication with other students to writing papers and completing various assignments—no other item in college student’s backpack is as versatile and often as indispensable as a laptop.

Apple Macs have always been a favorite for students

Visit just about any lecture hall, and you’ll immediately notice the overwhelming presence of Macs. Yes, it’s true that some college students are attracted to Mac computers simply because of their popularity, but most choose a Mac because they want a reliable machine they can depend on and which can get them through a long day without a charger.

Some college departments have specific software requirements their students should be able to meet, and Macs are the only computers that can run macOS, Windows, and Linux without a hitch thanks to Apple’s Boot Camp.

But the fact remains that Macs are not cheap. When buying one for a student, you want to pick the right model, one that can last for several years and still offer satisfactory performance and battery life. To help you out, we’ve narrowed down Apple’s current line-up to just three models, which we consider to be the best Mac computers for students.

Best Mac for Liberal Arts Students: 12-Inch MacBook

Most liberal arts students use their laptops predominantly for writing—lots and lots of writing. Because inspiration likes to come unannounced, and often far away from the nearest electrical outlet, it makes sense for liberal arts students to choose a laptop with a long battery life, small size, and fast Wi-Fi connectivity.

The 12-inch MacBook is the smallest and lightest laptop in Apple’s line-up, weighing just 2 pounds, and it also offers an excellent battery life of up to 10 hours and the latest 802.11ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.2 wireless technologies.

Instead of traditional scissor switches, the 12-inch MacBook features a comfortable keyboard with Apple’s second-generation butterfly switches, providing superior responsiveness and crispness when typing. Below the keyboard is a large trackpad with support for Force Touch, which allows it to detect slight differences in pressure.

What Mac features are best for students?

The 12-inch MacBook has an edge-to-edge Retina display with 2304 × 1440 pixels, energy-efficient backlighting, and wide viewing angles. The fine resolution makes text very easy on the eyes, and its IPS display technology guarantees professional-grade color accuracy.

You can get the 12-inch MacBook either with a 1.2 GHz dual-core Intel Core m3 for $1,299 or with a 1.3 GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 for $1,599. Both versions start with 8 GB of RAM and Intel HD Graphics 615, but the more expensive version has a 512 GB PCIe-based onboard SSD, instead of just a 256 GB PCIe-based onboard SSD.

Unless you need as much processing power as you can get, we recommend the less expensive version of the 12-inch MacBook. Intel Core m3 processors are so energy-efficient that they don’t require any cooling whatsoever, yet they are fast enough for just about anything apart from professional software applications such as Adobe After Effects or AutoCAD.

Best Mac for STEM Students: 13-Inch MacBook Pro

It’s only natural for STEM students to require more processing power than students of liberal arts do. A laptop is suitable for a STEM student only if it can run computationally expensive software simulations, compile software, and handle applications such as Photoshop, Dreamweaver, or Microsoft Visual Studio, just to name a few.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro offers a 2.3 GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 with Turbo Boost up to 3.6 GHz even in its most basic configuration, which costs just $1,299. The laptop is also available with Touch Bar for either $1,799 or $1,999, depending on the amount of storage space, but you should stay away from these versions because Touch Bar isn’t really all that useful.

Instead, get the 256 GB version without Touch Bar, which costs $1,499 and is configurable up to 1 TB SSD. The basic version only comes with 128 GB of storage space, and that’s just not enough for anything beyond basic tasks. The 256 GB version additionally has Intel Iris Plus Graphics 640 onboard graphics card, 8 GB of 2133MHz LPDDR3 onboard memory, and a beautiful 13.3-inch Retina display with 2560 × 1600 pixels, wide viewing angles, and up to 500 nits brightness for comfortable outside use.

Another Apple Mac option for Students

We should also mention that there’s a 15-inch MacBook Pro. While not exactly huge, the 15-inch MacBook Pro is slightly too bulky and heavy for hauling around campus, but, above all, it’s just way too expensive for most college students, starting at $2,399 for a version with a 2.8 GHz quad-core Intel Core i7.

Honorable Mention: 13-Inch MacBook Air

Despite its advanced age, the MacBook Air is still an excellent choice for all students who have other things to spend money on besides a laptop. Starting at just $999, the MacBook Air is by far the least expensive Mac on this list, yet it has the longest battery life (up to 12 hours between charges), and some even swear by its keyboard, which has much longer vertical space below each key compared to the 12-inch MacBook (1 mm versus 0.5 mm).

The MacBook Air is also the only Mac on this list with regular USB 3.0 ports. While it seems that virtually all Mac users will have to eventually embrace the dongle life, the owners of the MacBook Air should be able to get by without adapters for a few more years.

When it comes to the downsides of the MacBook Air, the outdated CPU and display are probably the two biggest ones. Yes, the laptop is still fine for writing documents, chatting with friends, or browsing the web, but things do slow down noticeably if throw too many tasks at the laptop at once.

What’s worse, the 13.3-inch display of the MacBook Air is so behind modern laptops that Apple even doesn’t mention it in the laptop’s overview on the official website. It has only 1440 × 900 pixels and covers just 66 percent of the sRGB color gamut.

iPod

What is the best iPod for kids?

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One of the most popular electronic devices among children is the Apple iPod. Which leaves parents asking the popular question – What is the best iPod for kids?

Lets face it… kids today are better at operating electronic devices than some adults. Children are always adapting quickly to modern technology and new devices. So its natural for a parent to second guess themselves when buying electronics for children.

Currently you have three options when purchasing a kids iPod – the iPod touch, iPod nano or iPod shuffle. Lets review each and find the best iPod for kids.

iPod touch

Most expensive
Largest Screen (4″)
Only iPod with Camera
Wireless/Bluetooth Capable
iOS Software

If you were to take the Apple iPhone and remove the phone capabilities you would in fact have an iPod touch. Though because it has wireless capability you can send iMessages and make calls via FaceTime as long as you have a wireless connection. The iPod touch is the flagship iPod, the top of the line, the best. If money is no issue this is the iPod for you.

It comes with the latest iOS software built-in just like the iPad or iPhone. So if your child is already familiar with those product they will have no issues. Additionally iOS allows you to download apps to your iPod, for children this means mostly games and educational apps. The iPod touch allows for parental controls so you can limit what your child has access to, a big plus for parents of younger children.

The iPod touch takes beautiful photos and video and is the only iPod to do so. The iPod touch price range is between $199-$399 depending on the amount of storage 16GB-128GB. Given that, the iPod touch is the best iPod for kids who are crazy about music, video, photos, games and apps but are not yet old enough to be given an iPhone.

iPod nano

Mid-Range Price
Smaller Screen (2.5″)
No Camera
Bluetooth Capable
Generic Built-in Software

The iPod nano closely resembles the iPod Classic (now discontinued) in that its main objective is to play music. Theres nothing too fancy about this iPod however it does have some unique features.

The bluetooth connection allows you to connect to other devices say your car radio or home entertainment system. So if your child is begging you to play their music in your car, the iPod nano has no problem allowing you both to sing along. Speaking of radio it comes with FM radio built in. It also comes with Nike+ support so you can get your child interested in fitness early and teach them to track their fitness goals.

Your child will be able to store images and watch videos but the iPod nano does not have a camera to take videos or photos. The main objective of the iPod nano is to allow kids to store and play music and even podcasts. If your child has no desire to play games and download apps but wants to be a DJ, then the iPod nano is for you. Reasonably priced at around $149 the iPod nano is the best iPod for kids who love music.

iPod shuffle

Lowest Price
Smallest iPod
No Screen
No Camera
No Wireless/Bluetooth
No Built-in Software

The main feature of the iPod shuffle is its size, about 1″ square. If your children are active and play sports the iPod shuffle includes a clip which will allow them to keep playing to their favorite songs. This is about as simple as a modern device can get.

The iPod shuffle plays music in two ways either by “shuffling” or playing yours in order, thats it. If you or your kids are good with iTunes you can sync playlists so that songs go in the order you prefer. Additionally, you can turn the volume up and down or move to the next/previous track that is about it. It’s only standout feature is the VoiceOver button which lets you hear the names of the songs. At $49 the iPod shuffle is the best iPod for kids and parents on a budget.

Bottom Line

Simply put we recommend buying the iPod touch. The iPod touch has the most features and benefits and generally is the best iPod for kids. Additionally the iPod touch has the most accessories available. If you are on a budget and looking for a children’s iPod the nano and shuffle are great low cost options.

Thinking about an iPad or Tablet? Check out our article about the best iPad or Tablet for kids here.