[X Style (Pure) General] acejavelin:
Honestly... I will give you my opinion but you might not like it.

Last year I started out playing the waiting game with a Moto G5 Plus, because I couldn't live with the battery life of the MXPE anymore and I just couldn't see any device out there compelling enough to invest $400+ on... the benefits just are not there in my opinion. And after having this device for a year, I just don't see the advantages of a "high-end" device at all anymore unless something changes in the future.

I have also lost all interest in root and custom ROMs, the benefits just are not there anymore in my opinion because Android has gotten much better than it used to be, so why bother? A simple custom launcher and a few apps with permissions granted via adb are good enough, and I don't have to worry about all the issues that come with rooting. If you read into rooting on devices that ship with Nougat or Oreo, it can be a nightmare... I'll let you dig into it.

My son just broke his phone, and we replaced it with a Nokia 6.1... it is literally a fantastic device for just over $250. I would recommend it anyone in heartbeat... Solid aluminum construction, top headphone jack, good screen, fantastic battery life (6+ hours SOT), and it includes everything you would need in a device.

I have a Moto G5 Plus that is pushing a year old... still gets 5 hours of SOT in normal use and easily gets 7+ sometimes, and it hasn't been wiped in a year. It's just worked flawlessly.

What I am getting at is my "go to" devices right now are mid-rangers... the Nokia 6.1, the Huawei Mate SE (the Honor 7x is our backup phone, the Mate SE is essentially the same device but with 4GB ram and 64GB storage), and the Moto G5S or G6 if you require CDMA.

But why take this "step down"? The answer is that isn't really a step down, not in my opinion... The SD808 in the Moto X Pure was not good, and very inefficient, not only do the current SD625~635 series SOC's match it's performance, in normal use they seem faster, cooler, and are battery friendly. The display of the MXPE was BEAUTIFUL, no doubt, but to get any advantage from it you had to turn the brightness up above 20% and that decimated the battery life... Everyone hyped up the camera on the MXPE, but honestly I never thought it was that great and the mid-rangers take acceptable pictures. And don't get me started on the battery life, 2-2.5 hours and charging 2-3 times a day? Never again... this was my primary gripe with that device. I don't know how I ever lived with battery life like that, especially after getting something that I could use all day and still have 30% left when I put it on the charger at night almost every day.

The best part is you can buy it for $200-$300, use it for a 9-15 months and buy a new device, then sell the previous one and still get more than 50% of it's value... Almost a year ago I bought my Moto G5+ 4/64GB model for $225 at Best Buy on sale, the average sale price in used, excellent condition on swappa.com right now is still $180-$190, meaning locally I could probably unload it for $160 easy to bypass the headache of selling online. So I can get a new phone every year for under $100 total investment.

Don't get me wrong, if I had $600 to blow I would probably be using a OnePlus 6 right now... but I just can't justify the $$$ for what it gives me, which is what in reality?

As far as those "older" devices like the Essential Phone or OnePlus 3T, I wouldn't bother... why buy a 2 year old device? No matter how you look at it, it's 2 years old and already past, or at least on the edge of, it's real world life span. And after you use it for a year or two, where will you be with it?

Now, if something drastically changes in the technology... I might change my mind, but for now I don't see any advantage of paying more than $300 for a cell phone.

You asked my opinion... it was a slow morning at work... so you got the whole enchilada. :)

Oh, and as far as "high-end" devices go... Not impressed there either. We had a friend in town from St Paul this weekend with an SGS9, we headed for the capital grounds to spend the day playing Pokemon Go. After about 3 hours of constant use he was less than 25% battery and uncomfortably warm to the touch, but our Nokia and Moto were still at 50%+ in battery life, and warm but not uncomfortably so. We all started out at 100% when left the house. :)