[lproven]

Seconded (& I recommended them to the author of the piece, who didn't listen. :-D )

I have an Umidigi F2, with a 38MP camera, 6GB RAM, 128GB flash, big retina screen -- I neither know nor care the rez -- and a huge battery. It lasted 3 days of intensive use when new, it has a headphone socket and both dual SIM + µSD card slots, and it was an astonishing €125 new.

And a totally vanilla Android 10 install that even says it's a Pixel in a couple of places.

I'd rather have a ~£150 phone I can replace every 2 years than a ~£300 phone that has to last ~4 years, but others' mileage varies, of course. Including David's.

This is my 3rd cheapo Chinese phone and I've been very happy with all of them.

The 2nd was a PPTV King 7, AFAIK never sold outside of China, so even when set to English the ROM was partly in Chinese. This one I reflashed with CyanogenMod and it worked well. My camera no longer focused but that was about it. For its time it was _stunning_ and it's still in use by a friend of mine about 5Y after I bought it second-hand.

[davidgerard]

Umidigi was a line I strongly considered - they have some very nice gadgets - but the 108mp camera smelt too much like tasty, tasty crack.