• Welcome to TechPowerUp Forums, Guest! Please check out our forum guidelines for info related to our community.

What phone you use as your daily driver? And, a discussion of them.

@mclaren85 ty for this advice:

"mclaren85 said:
in Androd phones, you can specify your custom dns as:

dns.adguard.com

ads are gone."

did this and rebooted my phone and it does work. that is awesome. i assume its still safe to do my banking and stuff on my phone with this setup this way?
 
Space Lynx said:
@mclaren85 ty for this advice:

"mclaren85 said:
in Androd phones, you can specify your custom dns as:

dns.adguard.com

ads are gone."

did this and rebooted my phone and it does work. that is awesome. i assume its still safe to do my banking and stuff on my phone with this setup this way?
Click to expand...
Most certainly yes. DNS is just an address book, it has nothing to do with your connection, unless it directs you a pishing site. But even at that time, the banking app would not communicate with the main server.


Biggest concern for me however, Adguard windows software. It installs its own root certificates in order to decrypt your https and practically sees everything you have done on the internet. But, I don't think they will even attempt to see your moves since it will badly, like very very badly harm their reputation.
 
mclaren85 said:
Most certainly yes. DNS is just an address book, it has nothing to do with your connection, unless it directs you a pishing site. But even at that time, the banking app would not communicate with the main server.


Biggest concern for me however, Adguard windows software. It installs its own root certificates in order to decrypt your https and practically sees everything you have done on the internet. But, I don't think they will even attempt to see your moves since it will badly, like very very badly harm their reputation.
Click to expand...

i use linux, so i don't need to do it anyway for my desktop. just nice to have on my phone is all, thanks a lot. just did it for my dads phone too, he is going to love no ads, lmao
 
mclaren85 said:
Most certainly yes. DNS is just an address book, it has nothing to do with your connection, unless it directs you a pishing site. But even at that time, the banking app would not communicate with the main server.


Biggest concern for me however, Adguard windows software. It installs its own root certificates in order to decrypt your https and practically sees everything you have done on the internet. But, I don't think they will even attempt to see your moves since it will badly, like very very badly harm their reputation.
Click to expand...
I did try it, but I had to change it to "dns.adguard-dns.com"..
 
Space Lynx said:
i use linux, so i don't need to do it anyway for my desktop. just nice to have on my phone is all, thanks a lot. just did it for my dads phone too, he is going to love no ads, lmao
Click to expand...
Yw, for even more ad-free experience you should use Yandex Browser + Adguard Android. Totally eliminates it.

KetoRay said:
I did try it, but I had to change it to "dns.adguard-dns.com"..
Click to expand...
It's all here:

Our server addresses​

If you already know how to set up DNS on your device, use these addresses

​

Default server
AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
https://dns.adguard-dns.com/dns-query
Non-filtering server
AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
https://unfiltered.adguard-dns.com/dns-query
Family protection server
AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content, and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
https://family.adguard-dns.com/dns-query

​

Default server
AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
tls://dns.adguard-dns.com
Non-filtering server
AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
tls://unfiltered.adguard-dns.com
Family protection server
AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content, and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
tls://family.adguard-dns.com

​

Default server
AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
quic://dns.adguard-dns.com
Non-filtering server
AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
quic://unfiltered.adguard-dns.com
Family protection server
AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content, and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
quic://family.adguard-dns.com

​

Default server
AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
sdns://AQMAAAAAAAAAETk0LjE0MC4xNC4xNDo1NDQzINErR_JS3PLCu_iZEIbq95zkSV2LFsigxDIuUso_OQhzIjIuZG5zY3J5cHQuZGVmYXVsdC5uczEuYWRndWFyZC5jb20
Non-filtering server
AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
sdns://AQMAAAAAAAAAEjk0LjE0MC4xNC4xNDA6NTQ0MyC16ETWuDo-PhJo62gfvqcN48X6aNvWiBQdvy7AZrLa-iUyLmRuc2NyeXB0LnVuZmlsdGVyZWQubnMxLmFkZ3VhcmQuY29t
Family protection server
AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content, and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
sdns://AQMAAAAAAAAAETk0LjE0MC4xNC4xNTo1NDQzILgxXdexS27jIKRw3C7Wsao5jMnlhvhdRUXWuMm1AFq6ITIuZG5zY3J5cHQuZmFtaWx5Lm5zMS5hZGd1YXJkLmNvbQ

​

Default servers
AdGuard DNS will block ads and trackers.
IPv4:
94.140.14.14
94.140.15.15
IPv6:
2a10:50c0::ad1:ff
2a10:50c0::ad2:ff
Non-filtering servers
AdGuard DNS will not block ads, trackers, or any other DNS requests.
IPv4:
94.140.14.140
94.140.14.141
IPv6:
2a10:50c0::1:ff
2a10:50c0::2:ff
Family protection servers
AdGuard DNS will block ads, trackers, adult content, and enable Safe Search and Safe Mode, where possible.
IPv4:
94.140.14.15
94.140.15.16
IPv6:
2a10:50c0::bad1:ff
2a10:50c0::bad2:ff
Click to expand...
 
Absolutely loving my Pixel 9a, I really like that they made it a thick phone with no camera bump/extra battery, it's just so easy to hold and grip without a case being on it. Very lightweight too since it is all plastic mainly. Very happy with this phone, I love how clean it is vs the samsung bloat. I'm glad this phone will be getting 7 years of updates, it also has a feature where when battery saver 80% charge limit is turned on, if it is plugged in, the battery is bypassed entirely. I'm not sure if all modern phones have this feature, but it says specifically this one does. I am kind of old fashioned in that I think we should not be chained to our phones, I use Garmin for my GPS driving, and I work remote anyway so I rarely if ever leave the house, so my phone rarely gets unplugged. So, I enabled the 80% battery and leave it plugged in.

Hopefully this means even 4 years from now the battery will be in good shape still, since it won't be going through many charge cycles.
 
Space Lynx said:
I'm glad this phone will be getting 7 years of updates, it also has a feature where when battery saver 80% charge limit is turned on, if it is plugged in, the battery is bypassed entirely. I'm not sure if all modern phones have this feature, but it says specifically this one does.
Click to expand...

I think it started out as a Pixel 9 feature then rolled it back as far as the 6a. My 7a has it too. It's definitely a good feature I use as I bluetooth stream white noise (rain) to a speaker while I sleep so it's great that it's not trickle murdering the battery every night.
 
I had a Samsung S10 for like 5y and after I started repairing Apple products for a living I got a free iPhone 12 to get a better understanding about how to use them
 
Update on my ROG Phone 6:
It's been fine
Idk why people say "Oh it fries itself"
Never had anything remotely close to being that kind of issue unless you count the one time it randomly restarted.
 
Moto Edge 50 Fusion
Camera is amazing, even in low light.
Performance is good for general use, i don't play games.
Battery life is decent especially with power save mode, can last few days on low usage.
Sharp Display, minimal bloat except some motorola apps.
I kinda dislike stock android though, not my cup of tea. (prefer realme ui, even xiaomi miui and hyperos is alot better).

overall a very good phone but i rarely use it because i am mostly on my pc and phones are not my cup of tea.
 
Here I am, it's 5/31/25 and I finally got a new phone.

Moved on from my Samsung Galaxy S8 that I picked up around the end of October in 2017. The S8 was still doing well for me, battery life was okay and I believe it took better pictures than my wife's S21 (until you zoomed in too much, then the S21 was the winner), but sadly I was getting pop-up messages on a few apps I use saying that Android 9 was being phased out and soon I wouldn't be able to use the apps. So I finally gave in and picked up a S25.

Got a Unicorn Beetle case on the way and should see it by midweek next week. Hopefully this case for the S25 is as good as the case for the S8 was; it did hold up pretty well for about 7 years until the side buttons on the case started to wear out and fall off (had to use a touch of super glue to hold them back in place).

Here's hoping I get a good many years out of this phone, like I did my S8.
 
neatfeatguy said:
Here I am, it's 5/31/25 and I finally got a new phone.

Moved on from my Samsung Galaxy S8 that I picked up around the end of October in 2017. The S8 was still doing well for me, battery life was okay and I believe it took better pictures than my wife's S21 (until you zoomed in too much, then the S21 was the winner), but sadly I was getting pop-up messages on a few apps I use saying that Android 9 was being phased out and soon I wouldn't be able to use the apps. So I finally gave in and picked up a S25.

Got a Unicorn Beetle case on the way and should see it by midweek next week. Hopefully this case for the S25 is as good as the case for the S8 was; it did hold up pretty well for about 7 years until the side buttons on the case started to wear out and fall off (had to use a touch of super glue to hold them back in place).

Here's hoping I get a good many years out of this phone, like I did my S8.
Click to expand...
Nothing wrong with the S8 imo. I still use it as my backup phone
 
KetoRay said:
Nothing wrong with the S8 imo. I still use it as my backup phone
Click to expand...
Great phone it was. Only issue was the Bixby button - thankfully there was a way to disable it. I hate Bixby, in fact I hate all the "assistance" programs on these devices. Until I found how to disable the Bixby button, every time it was accidentally pressed you'd get some intrusive shit trying to tell you how to do things or what you do. I'm so glad there is no Bixby button on my S25 and that I can simply opt out of using it while setting things up.

I just finished making sure all my data and apps were transferred to my new phone and factory reset my S8. Time to move on.
 
neatfeatguy said:
Great phone it was. Only issue was the Bixby button - thankfully there was a way to disable it. I hate Bixby, in fact I hate all the "assistance" programs on these devices. Until I found how to disable the Bixby button, every time it was accidentally pressed you'd get some intrusive shit trying to tell you how to do things or what you do. I'm so glad there is no Bixby button on my S25 and that I can simply opt out of using it while setting things up.

I just finished making sure all my data and apps were transferred to my new phone and factory reset my S8. Time to move on.
Click to expand...
The assistant features wouldn't be so bad if it didn't require wifi or mobile data to be turned on all the time
 
Sony Xperia 5ii. Love the small design and processor's great. Snapdragon 865 can certainly keep up with daily use and light gaming. Never experienced stutters. It's also got a pretty high resolution OLED with 120hz refresh rate, great camera quality and a pretty long battery life considering the size. I've heard that the screen often craps up and displays lines, though. Seems like a common problem with the Xperia lineup. No problems yet but I better watch out. I recently switched to an iPhone 16, but after a few weeks I switched back. Can't get used to how large the iPhone 16 is.
 
Has Xiaomi just stopped rolling new updates out for the Poco F6 Pro ?
Its latest security patch is April 2025, but OS is 15 AQ3A.240912.001, kernel is 5.15.148-android13-8-00004-ge488687c12ef-ab11838684.
They skipped May 2025 and June 2025 updates :eek::twitch::banghead:

Very unhappy with this phone - its battery life is extremely poor, when working on the phone, it loses like 1% of battery per minute ! :eek::twitch::banghead:


Err:

Honor 400 Pro - Full phone specifications

www.gsmarena.com www.gsmarena.com

1751104685883.png


Xiaomi 15S Pro - Full phone specifications

www.gsmarena.com www.gsmarena.com

1751104718504.png
 
Not sure if I left an update, but a few months ago I upgraded from an iPhone 11 Pro Max 512GB to a iPhone 16 Pro Max 512GB. All in all, I'm pretty happy with it. Transfering over 128GB took about an hour and all of my stuff came for the ride per the usual. The camera is a nice upgrade. I've taken some shots that rival my mirrorless camera for things like portraits. My daughter wrecked her phone, so I gave her my old one instead of rewarding her with a new phone. Got my wife an iPhone 16 128Gb because her XS was on the fritz as well. Needless to say, it was an expensive day at the Apple store, which is every day at the Apple store. :laugh:

If you really must know, I choose Apple because the entire family is familiar with it. Things like family management, calendar integration, device management, AirDrop, and being on a *nix platform (I prefer to dev in *nix and can't stand windows,) makes it, hands down, the best platform for my purposes, so I'm capable and willing to pay the Apple tax for their devices. I know it's not everyone's jam, but it works well for me.
 
  • Haha
Reactions: ARF
ARF said:
Has Xiaomi just stopped rolling new updates out for the Poco F6 Pro ?
Its latest security patch is April 2025, but OS is 15 AQ3A.240912.001, kernel is 5.15.148-android13-8-00004-ge488687c12ef-ab11838684.
They skipped May 2025 and June 2025 updates :eek::twitch::banghead:

Very unhappy with this phone - its battery life is extremely poor, when working on the phone, it loses like 1% of battery per minute ! :eek::twitch::banghead:


Err:

Honor 400 Pro - Full phone specifications

www.gsmarena.com www.gsmarena.com

View attachment 405715

Xiaomi 15S Pro - Full phone specifications

www.gsmarena.com www.gsmarena.com

View attachment 405716
Click to expand...

GSMarena is not always update to date, same with my Vivo iQoo Neo9s Pro Plus it only shows Origin4 based on Android 14, but I am officially on Origin5 based on Android 15 and I get security patch update every month.

If I remember correct my phone is set to between like 3 or 4 yeaars og major android update which is nice.

My phone: https://www.gsmarena.com/vivo_iqoo_neo9s_pro+-13187.php
 
Shou Miko said:
GSMarena is not always update to date, same with my Vivo iQoo Neo9s Pro Plus it only shows Origin4 based on Android 14, but I am officially on Origin5 based on Android 15 and I get security patch update every month.
Click to expand...

Tip them at https://www.gsmarena.com/tipus.php3
They should add that your phone is upgradeable to the quoted version.

How is your battery? 5500 mAh but does it last or does it deplete very fast?
 
Space Lynx said:
did this and rebooted my phone and it does work. that is awesome. i assume its still safe to do my banking and stuff on my phone with this setup this way?
Click to expand...

unwind-protect said:
I am pessimistic about that. After the fall the screen was on, but once shut down it refused to turn back on. Probably a lot more damage than just the glass.

View attachment 399169
Click to expand...

Just to follow up on this, a glass replacement did fix the entire phone, it turns on again.

youbreakifix charged me $350, though.
 
Motorola Edge 30 Neo
Simple phone with small size. But some nice nifty features on it, like a short shake and the flash-light turns on.
 
I'm waiting for the new Nothing Phone 3.
To be honest I don't care about phone in general, but I found the Nothing line well designed.
 
ARF said:
Tip them at https://www.gsmarena.com/tipus.php3
They should add that your phone is upgradeable to the quoted version.

How is your battery? 5500 mAh but does it last or does it deplete very fast?
Click to expand...

About 24hours for the use I do.

I am not a gamer but i do use browsing, social media a lot on it.

I only use a 66W PD charger not the original 120W charger I feel the 66W is more than fine for me.

I might do so, I just have to read up on the promised major android updates from Vivo for my phone so I can attach a source and also get GSM to actually add Android 15 for the phone.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top