I can weigh in on this, as playing downloaded video files on my phone is a big reason I left iOS.
First things first- site compatibility isn't an issue on Android. I use Megashare/Rapidshare/etc. sites on Opera Mobile all day long in Android. I use Astro to keep track of the files.
Second some clarity- When you say 500mb that can go either way, so let me be blunt- divx or HD content?
Because if it is divx, any 1GHz Android phone can do the job with Rock Player installed. Anything with 512mb of ram can handle the PDFs. That means a HUGE category of phones are available, depending on what carrier you want we could guess a few.
But if you want to play HD content (like mkv files) you might not get away going cheap. My SGS2 can play every mkv (even 1080p) I throw at it thanks to its special Exynos SOC, but I have tried mkv files on MANY other SOCs and so far NOTHING comes close to my SGS2. Bonus points is that my SGS2 can hook up to a TV and play the files in 1080p via HDMI in the STOCK player (every other phone I have to install a player)! Nothing really comes close to this phone, but only three models have the Exynos (At&t's, Sprint's or the International version) and the cheapest they will come out of contract is over $500.
Anything Tegra is a no-go off the bat- it can't handle scene HD files AT ALL. I have been VERY disappointed with Qualcomm decoding-only a few things work on the phones (Evo3D, TBolt) I have tried. TI based hardware from last year fails for me almost every time (like a Droid X). I haven't tried newer TIs yet (like a Bionic) but at that price the SGS2 dominates.
Older SGS1s can handle SOME of the 720p content but not all. Maybe the only cheaper option. I don't know as I am only going off what I have read on about phone as I never seen a SGS1 in person. It used the same decoding guts as current TI models so it might be worth a shot. The only sure bet for HD content is the sequel- my SGS2.
You have to consider that even the fastest phones still have less power than a first-gen netbook, and phones have no way legally to obtain HD content. The only thing driving HD playback is HD on-the-phone recording, which is why even some phones that record 1080p won't playback scene HD well because it is just caring about its own 1080p to playback. Samsung is just extra awesome how they include mkv support out of the box, and they have put together a SOC that can handle REAL high profile x264.
Thanks for this.
Ok so opera mobile can handle one-click file hosts, good to know.
To be honest I hadn't even thought of HD content, I'd be happy with divx. I have been trying to get iOS to do the most basic tasks for so long that just to have a phone that plays low resolution video downloaded from megaupload would make me really, really happy. MKV files -- again, I hadn't dreamed of phones being capable of this. That would also be a nice bonus but I'm not prepared to pay extra just for this. I live in Canada where internet is rationed so even on my home PC I typically choose standard definition rather than HD in order to conserve bandwidth. I would do the same on a tiny smartphone screen. Besides that, I doubt i would really notice the difference between HD and SD on such a small screen. I watch SD on my laptop and am happy with it. And I've watched news broadcasts in SD on my iphone and been happy with it. HD on the laptop is slightly nicer than SD but not worth the extra internet rations... only so much internet allowed per month, you know.
😉
I don't mind converting stuff to MP4 or M4V. If my iphone could play MP4 or M4V from megaupload, I would have been happy.
Didn't know about the 512mb ram requirement to look at a pdf file... good to know (seems absurdly high though -- computers with far less ram display pdf files just fine!). My 128mb ram iphone didn't even come close, yet everyone (not on this forum) was assuring me "oh yeah, I'm sure it'll be great for pdf files".
At this point the only phone I've tried other than my iphone is the Samsung Galaxy S2. Didn't get a chance to test megaupload or video playback, but its handling of "download a graphical pdf from the internet" and "display the pdf I just downloaded" was beautiful. I like that it's not iOS, so that I'm free to use the phone in whatever manner I want. The only thing stopping me from just buying one right now is the $600 price tag. That's just way beyond what I'm ready to pay at the moment. So I may have to wait.
As for carrier, I am with a prepaid service called Telestial. The phone is only used for internet when near wifi, and other times just uses offline functions like viewing video/pdf files, and also offline maps of cities which I will have downloaded. I don't use the phone for phone calls or texts except in emergencies or meeting someone someplace. So I definitely don't need a plan as my current setup works great and costs me around $10-$20
per year in total (I generally talk on it for under 3 minutes per month).
One other thing that's important to me is that I can stick a sim card in it (does that mean GSM?), and that it's quadband.
At first HTC Desire looked like a nice choice, but I'm not sure if it's quad band. (euro version is, but US version isn't? or something like this)
