Dummy's guide to tech shopping

A few years ago when I started writing about technology, I was a hardcore geek. I would spend hours observing the hardware specifications (specs) of tablets and smartphones when I would look to review a product. A former editor once advised me that specs are not that important, the user experience is. In fact, he went on to write an editorial on the subject. Even today, I hold his advice dear to me while reviewing tech products. After years of testing new phones, tablets and computers, here's what I tell friends who are looking to buy something.

Specs are by and large sold as a marketing technique. The core hardware is the carrot that is dangled to the consumer. The key is the user experience. The hardware is merely a means to an end. It is the engine that powers a feature. If the feature itself is not there then the presence of the hardware is a moot point.

Most products come with a octa-core processors, but does a consumer know the benefits or disadvantages of an octa-core chip? Marketing wise, an octa-core processor sounds fancy, but in real world usage, they are often inferior to most dual-core processors. I have spoken to chipset designers in Qualcomm and Intel, who admit that octa-core chips are inefficient on tablets and phones.

For the same reason, even Apple's iPhones to date use only dual-core processors, which are optimised with the operating system. iPhones are considered to be the fastest phones in the market.

In fact, the iPhones even make do with just 1GB of RAM, yet the iPhone is able to deliver a superior user experience than phone boasting octa-core CPUs.

Clearly, there is more to it than the numbers of high-end specs. The following are a few things that people should keep in mind before they buy a product, even if they have not read any reviews:

1. When choosing a phone, a tablet or even a PC one must look beyond the core hardware specifications. This is true especially for processors. Most octa-core processor equipped phones are inferior to their quad-core or dual-core counterparts. Most of the octa-core processors in the market barely match the performance of their quad-core rivals, and also suck more battery life and have a tendency to overheat. It is important to look beyond the number of cores. There are a lot things that matter. It is a combination of the type of processor architecture, and the synergy with the operating system. Take for example, the iPhone. It uses a dual-core processor, which has been custom built for iOS, Apple's mobile operating system. It has a 64-bit architecture which means it can handle advanced PC class applications which most octa-core CPUs in the market cannot handle. The same holds true for Intel's Atom chips which have 64-bit capabilities and use hyper threading technology. Even Qualcomm's Snapdragon quad-core CPUs are superior to most oct-core CPU equipped phones. Mediatek and Samsung make these octa-core CPUs. While Mediatek's solutions target the low-end of the market in phones by vendors like Micromax, Samsung's solution targets some of its high-end devices in India like the Galaxy S5. Qualcomm or Intel powered devices in both cases have are superior. And guess what? None of these CPUs are octa-core CPUs.

2. Higher resolution screens are not always the best. One should look for a 720p screen as a base starting point and then look at things like the brightness levels, the quality of the colours and the viewing angles. 720p screens or HD screens are sharp enough for most people, and beyond a 720p resolution it is difficult for the human eye to discern the difference. The higher the screen resolution the higher the battery drain it will cause. A higher resolution screen will often have adverse effects on the battery life of the phone. This will also hold you in good stead when you are choosing a laptop. For the laptop, a 1600x900 pixels display is recommended as a starting point, but other than that viewing angles, brightness levels and colour quality is more important.

3. The camera resolution is not that important, the sensor size, the quality of lens, stabilisation technique, the aperture size, the image processing (ISP) , pixel size and the camera app interface are. Manufacturers sell their phones by touting the high megapixel count of the camera, but the iPhone is regarded to have the most consistent smartphone camera in the industry and it only has a 8-megapixel resolution. A higher megapixel count only affords larger images and leeway for cropping. If all one wants to do is share photos on social media, then a 5-megapixel resolution is plenty. Heck, it is good enough for also printing photos. Even the Nokia Lumia 1020 which has a 41-megapixel camera shoots photos at 5-megapixels by default. It uses a technique called "Pixel Binning" which combines 7 pixels into one super pixel which, hence increasing the pixel size, which helps in eliminating distortion and creating clear photos. Optical stabilisation helps the phone capture better photos in low-light and adds stability to videos, but in some rare cases, even digital stabilisation (software stabilisation) works well like in the case of the iPhone as its ISP works wonders. The same rule applies to front facing cameras. The iPhone 6 takes awesome selfies, while the HTC One (M8) which has a 5-megapixel front camera takes inferior selfies.

4. Features like 4K video capability is not important as there are hardly any 4k TVs to view 4K videos. Instead, one should look for a phone which has more microphones that can capture better audio on your videos at 1080p and can shoot videos at 60 frames per second.

5. More RAM is always better. This is true for phones, tablets and PCs alike. Extra RAM will provide for better multi-tasking in most cases, but if one looks at the iPhone or even cheaper phones like the Nokia Lumia 630, they make do on only 1GB or 512MB of RAM. This has a lot to do with how the hardware is optimised with the OS. So, specs can be misleading at times.

6. Focus on the graphical processing unit GPU. A device with an average processor and a great graphical processing unit will render realistic games and the user interface animations will also render fluidly.

7. Spend more on internal memory. While many Android phones come with a microSD card slot, there are also many apps preloaded which cannot be removed by the user. Some phones don't allow the user to install their apps on the memory card. This means lesser space for apps, photos and videos, hence it is always prudent to invest a little more and get a little more memory.

8. Fancy features like a fingerprint scanner or a heart rate monitor sound great, but in practice they don't offer much in terms of consumer benefit. Both the heart rate monitor and the fingerprint scanner are grossly unreliable on the Galaxy phones. Yes, the iPhone 5S/6 scanner is reliable but it does not do much apart from unlocking the phone in India. Instead, one should look at features like water resistance and nano coatings which protect the phone and improve its life. Such features can be found on some Sony Xperia phones and Samsung's Galaxy phones.

9. The size of the battery does not matter, but the way it is optimised with the OS, the size and resolution of the screen. A classic example is the Sony Xperia Z3 compact which has a 2,600mAh battery. A 2,600mAh battery is not very big by modern standards yet the phone lasts more than 25 hours on a single charge. Comparatively, the LG G3 does not last more than 20 hours and it has a 3,000mAh battery. In fact, the iPhone 6 outlasts it while having a vastly smaller 1,810mAh battery.

10. LTE support is very important something people buying high-end phones skim or are oblivious to. Make sure your phone supports India's LTE bands. The Sony Xperia Z2 and Xperia Z3 are great examples because both have very similar hardware specs, but the Z2 does not support LTE.