29 June 1997. That was the day the first iPhone launched, changing the nature of the smartphone industry forever. The phone, among other specs, came with a RAM of 128 MB and storage options ranging from 4 to 16 GB. In 10 short years, the industry as it is today is absolutely unrecognisable, more so after the announcement from OnePlus about the impending launch of OnePlus 6 and its specs.
At a promised 256 GB of storage, and 8GB RAM, the One Plus 6 is the best demonstrator of how far the smartphone has come. Bringing us to the most important question. Are these really the changes users want? Read on to hear some of the views we collected after extensive calls, face to face meetings and feedback from our own users.
For Sameer Seth, a college student in his final year at Mumbai, currently on a well used Motorola X, the extra storage is a boon. ” If I can buy the phone, I will definitely find it useful to store more media, be it films, songs, or shows. 256 GB is huge, and I would imagine getting into any free wifi zone with a fast connection would be really worthwhile now”.
Ankita, an executive with a fintech firm has a much more practical view of things. This Vivo 9 user says ” I doubt I will buy the phone just for the extra memory, plus with constant upgrades, I am not a fan ofphones above Rs 30k. I am pretty sure that phones in my budget will also upgrade, and like dual cameras, a phone at 20K should be offering 64GB easily, besides better cameras”. The extra memory will be useful for keeping a few more apps, and the pics and other media from my chats on the phone, as I don’t like to back them up, and prefer deleting them every now and then”.
Tanmay, a mid-level executive working in Bhopal is also circumspect. “I am not too sure about what I will do with the extra memory, as I have just about got used to using the cloud well for my storage requirements. Of course, this number (256) is even higher than what Gmail offers at 15 GB or 30GB for corporate mail. Plus, end of the day, keeping a lot of important stuff on the phone does not make sense to me as it is a piece of hardware at the end of the day, and I will need to worry about a back up in any case. Of course, I think this will be very useful for people who like taking, making videos a lot”. Bingo.
Our View: 256 GB is an awesome way to stand out, and will place One Plus 6 right up there in the consideration set for high-end users. It will be fantastic for intense video users, as videos are one media that can still be a pain when streamed for the cloud for later viewing, or for showing to someone. Having it all on the phone should be a great help.