Google unveils new Nexus phones, Chromecasts, Pixel C tablet & more

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Comments

  • Reply 81 of 158
    jetz wrote: »
    I don't get the complaints about the Fingerprint sensor on the back.

    It serves two purposes:

    1) Maximizes screen real estate in the front.
    2) Allows for easy unlock with the sensor in a natural position for the index finger.

    That's why it's on the back.


    It's a different design philosophy from Apple, which has the fingerprint sensor on the front because Apple might as well make use of the real estate taken up by the home button.

    Some have raised the issue about the phone sitting on the desk.  That's what Smart Lock is for...avoid having to lock based on location.

    These are simply trade-offs.  You can have a hardware button on the front with multiple features and a smaller screen or the sensor on the back and a larger screen.  Apple chooses to keep the home button and accepts a smaller screen.  Google prefers to give consumers a larger screen and relocate the sensor to the back.
    your 1) is irrelevant. Look at the front bezels of these Nexus, they're big enough for 3 buttons with the size of that ImPrint. 2) the it's limited to index finger on the hand holding the phone which is a bad implementation. I can unclock my iPhone with left/right thumb, left/right index and any right finger with one touch when it lays on a surface. With these Nexus, how can you unlock when it's on a surface? Face down,lol? Even with face dow, how do you know if the finger reading is good? I don't need to name more issues with it. Bottom line: rear button for fingerprint sensor is a bad implementation just like the way Google design the phone.
  • Reply 82 of 158
    rogifan wrote: »
    I wasn't aware the Nexus 5X cost $649.

    if the issue is usability, then it doesn't fucking matter what the price is. your complaint has never been that it's too much for the BOM, but that it wasn't useable.

    the iPhone cost more than a google phone because it's the market leader.
  • Reply 83 of 158
    slurpyslurpy Posts: 5,382member

    All these devices are hideous. 

     

    And I love how Google believes it has the cachet to price their devices so high. An android tablet for $500 with a $150 KB? Sorry, but who is this for? Everyone knows Android tablet are terrible, and don't have many tablet optimized apps. At least the Nexus line made SOME sense, as their differentiator was "dirt cheap". Who would buy this over an iPad, apart from hardcore Android enthusiasts? 

     

    As for the phones, they're incredibly boring, offering 2nd rate duplication of features Apple has perfected. Android phones used to have a litany of hardwrae features unavailable on iPhones (even though implementation was shit). Now, there's literally nothing really new or special. An iPhone wannabe, without all the advantages of Apple's ecosystem, support system, industrial design, hardware quality, privacy, security, or anything else. They've gone and ripped off iOS's privacy and security concept- finally. Oh, and a finger print sensor on the back. Brilliant. 

  • Reply 84 of 158
    I think it will be easier to unlock a phone one-handed while pulling it out of your pocket with these Nexus phones than with an iPhone, while starting off with the phone in a single-hand usage orientation in your hand. I'm not convinced the back is better than the front home button, but it does have some advantages.

    not a chance. if you'd used a 6s you'd know this -- by the time it's pulled out of a front pocket it's already unlocked, no effort required at all. the new Touch ID is that fast and capable. it's crazy good.
  • Reply 85 of 158

    Not digging the designs at all.  Fingerprint sensor in the back, you can put as many "dimples" as you want, still a pain in the ass to find it.  Chromecast, more like Hockey puckcast.  And another attempt at the tablet market, whats this their 15th attempt?  Google is the McDonalds of tech, they keep doing too many god damn things, when they should be like In-N-Out, just make one thing really good and stick with that.  Maybe if they fixed their search engine to work, like it did back 7 years ago to have more profound information.  

  • Reply 86 of 158
    koop wrote: »
    I can't believe everyone here thinks the iPhone 6 is actually good looking. It's the ugliest iPhone ever made. The 6 Plus is god awful looking, and not ergonomic in the least. Every Android flagship is more interesting looking, even if their actual design isn't up to snuff. The Nexus 6P in videos (pictures are misleading with the camera hump) and hands on looks really unique and interesting. Early impressions have been positive. It's also lighter than than the 6 Plus despite having the larger display.
    Dude... I'm not even an iPhone guy, at all, and I'll admit that the 6 is a nice looking phone, and definitely better looking than any of the previous iPhones.

    Also, these new Nexi are pretty ugly TBH. Google should have stuck with Motorola; the only thing these new ones have on last year's Nexus 6, really, is the fingerprint scanner.
    Smart Lock and extended similar features through Tasker are also an easy way to avoid using a fingerprint sensor because the phone doesn't lock where you don't need that feature. Any place where I leave my phone on a table is a place where it's unlocked.
    Have you actually gotten that to work properly? if so, how'd you do it? Trusted Places hardly ever seems to work for me; stays locked even when I'm at home.
  • Reply 87 of 158
    croprcropr Posts: 1,122member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by coolfactor View Post

     

    I'm just surprised that suddenly all of these iPhone competitors are getting fingerprint sensors with very little discussion around how secure they are? Apple made a big deal about how secure their scanner was, so why has it been so easy for the rest of the industry to suddenly embrace this? Have there been some compromises in reliability and security?


    The fact that you mention it just proves that Apple has a great marketing. A fingerprint scanner as such is not secure of insecure, it just reads the fingerprint data and makes it available to the underlying OS.  If the authentication based on a fingerprint scan is secure or not depends on how Android or iOS handle the scan.  Up to now I have not seen any evidence that Andorid performs different than iOS .

  • Reply 88 of 158

    Yay!  Another Android tablet.  Another Google's version of an iPad, pretending to be marketed towards competing with the Surface line.

    Awfully overpriced for a tablet.  I see no reason to buy this when the Surface 3 is superior in pretty much every way.

  • Reply 89 of 158
    nairbnairb Posts: 253member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Michael Scrip View Post





    Exactly.



    I have my iPhone sitting next to me on my desk. I can unlock my phone by simply pressing on the home button and letting TouchID do its thing.



    How would you unlock the Nexus phone if the fingerprint sensor is on the back of the phone... facing down on the desk?

    You wouldn't. The phone will know you are at your desk and will not need to be unlocked with print unless you request this. 

     

    When out an about and carrying the phone a sensor on the back makes much more sense.  Very easy to access and many people hold it here all the time. In ergonomics terminology it is called an "internal precision grip" and it makes the phone much more comfortable to hold.

  • Reply 90 of 158
    nairb wrote: »
    You wouldn't. The phone will know you are at your desk and will not need to be unlocked with print unless you request this. 

    When out an about and carrying the phone a sensor on the back makes much more sense.  Very easy to access and many people hold it here all the time. In ergonomics terminology it is called an "internal precision grip" and it makes the phone much more comfortable to hold.

    Gotcha.

    Although I've never considered the iPhone and/or its front-mounted TouchID sensor to be "uncomfortable"
  • Reply 91 of 158
    rogifanrogifan Posts: 10,669member
    nolamacguy wrote: »
    if the issue is usability, then it doesn't fucking matter what the price is. your complaint has never been that it's too much for the BOM, but that it wasn't useable.

    the iPhone cost more than a google phone because it's the market leader.

    No my complaint absolutely has been $649 for 16GB is too expensive. But knowing that price isn't going to change I've argued Apple should increase the storage to 32GB. Yes I also think 16GB is ridiculous in this day but it's not quite as bad when the phone is a lot cheaper.
  • Reply 92 of 158
    rob55rob55 Posts: 1,291member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by rselover View Post



    1. Does Chromecast Audio allow multi-room setups (i.e. a cheap version of the Ridiculously $$$ Sonos Platform)?



    2. Hopefully it does and Apple will copy it.



    Um, it's call an Airport Express. Apple has been making them for years. 

  • Reply 93 of 158
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by punkndrublic View Post

     

    Not digging the designs at all.  Fingerprint sensor in the back, you can put as many "dimples" as you want, still a pain in the ass to find it.  Chromecast, more like Hockey puckcast.  And another attempt at the tablet market, whats this their 15th attempt?  Google is the McDonalds of tech, they keep doing too many god damn things, when they should be like In-N-Out, just make one thing really good and stick with that.  Maybe if they fixed their search engine to work, like it did back 7 years ago to have more profound information.  


     

    This is Google's first in-house tablet design. Nexus in the past has been more of a statement against bloatware abandoned update schedules. Nexus is also largely intended as a reference design and a development tool. The Pixel C is the first time Google has designed a tablet.

     

    In-N-Out does one thing very mediocre. Whataburger kicks their ass in the fast food realm. They offer spicy ketchup and gravy, so your argument is invalid.

     

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Durandal1707 View Post



    Have you actually gotten that to work properly? if so, how'd you do it? Trusted Places hardly ever seems to work for me; stays locked even when I'm at home.

     

    Mine does work.

     

    Before Lolipop I had a Tasker profile using the Secure Settings app, and that worked well. It recognized router SSIDs in trusted places and disabled the screen lock. Once that router was out of range, it would go through Secure Settings to re-enter my pin and re-establish the screen lock.

     

    Quote:


    Originally Posted by JamesandBennie View Post

     

    I see no reason to buy this when the Surface 3 is superior in pretty much every way.


     

    We don't have specs on the Pixel C, so how do you know? The surface 3 is heavy, has a fan, generates a lot of heat, and the battery lasts less than 8 hours, which sets a pretty low bar for the Pixel C to hop over. 

  • Reply 94 of 158
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by fallenjt View Post





    your 1) is irrelevant. Look at the front bezels of these Nexus, they're big enough for 3 buttons with the size of that ImPrint. 2) the it's limited to index finger on the hand holding the phone which is a bad implementation. I can unclock my iPhone with left/right thumb, left/right index and any right finger with one touch when it lays on a surface. With these Nexus, how can you unlock when it's on a surface? Face down,lol? Even with face dow, how do you know if the finger reading is good? I don't need to name more issues with it. Bottom line: rear button for fingerprint sensor is a bad implementation just like the way Google design the phone.

    1) I see a speaker in the center of each bezel. Where would you squeeze in a fingerprint sensor?

    2) Instead of simply making it easier to unlock the phone when it's lying face up, why not try to remove the need to repeatedly unlock your phone? If I'm already at my desk, I'd rather mirror the notifications to my main computer and deal with them there instead of juggling multiple devices. 

  • Reply 95 of 158
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by waterrockets View Post

     

    We don't have specs on the Pixel C, so how do you know? The surface 3 is heavy, has a fan, generates a lot of heat, and the battery lasts less than 8 hours, which sets a pretty low bar for the Pixel C to hop over. 


    The Pixel C uses nVidia's Tegra X1 with 3 GB LPDDR4. It's quite powerful.

     

    The Surface 3 (not to be confused with the Surface Pro 3) is not heavy, it's fanless and has a battery close to 10 hours.

     

  • Reply 96 of 158
    gumbigumbi Posts: 148member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by waterrockets View Post

     

     

    Quote:

     

    We don't have specs on the Pixel C, so how do you know? The surface 3 is heavy, has a fan, generates a lot of heat, and the battery lasts less than 8 hours, which sets a pretty low bar for the Pixel C to hop over. 


     

    Surface 3 does not have a fan and the battery lasts longer than 8 hours in normal use.  The Surface Pro 3 has a fan and is heavier, but still has better than 8 hours battery life in normal use.

     

    Surface 3 is better than the Pixel C in most ways.  For instance, for the $499 base price of the surface 3 you get twice the local storage and one year of Office 365 - that gives you at least 1TB of OneDrive cloud storage.  Also, you get a full size usb port, a mini display port, and an microSD allowing you to expand local storage. 

     

    Surface 3 has a digitizer built in, and has full stylus support.  The stylus for a Surface 3 is an additional $49.  The stylus comes with the Surface Pro 3.

     

    Surface 3 runs Windows 10 and can run most desktop applications - you can even run android apps using blue stacks or another android emulator.

     

    The keyboard is cheaper on the Surface 3 ($130 vs $149).

     

    The Pixel C is an over-priced android tablet that runs only crappy android tablet apps.  Why would I want that over a Surface 3 which is a bit cheaper and much more capable?

  • Reply 97 of 158
    jungmarkjungmark Posts: 6,926member
    koop wrote: »
    The fingerprint reader placement has to do with Google not having a home button or capacitive keys at all. As such they are limiting bezel by throwing it on the back. For those worrying about checking things while on a desk, use smartlock, use the backup pin, use the Google search built to the homescreen.

    That's not convenient. Why bother having a sensor if you force people to use a pin.

    nairb wrote: »
    You wouldn't. The phone will know you are at your desk and will not need to be unlocked with print unless you request this. 

    Did geotagging get that precise to tell that I'm at my desk on the 3rd floor and not on the lounge directly below my desk on the first floor? Or if a person in the neighbor cube swiped it and have it at their desk?
  • Reply 98 of 158
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by RobertC View Post

     

    The Pixel C uses nVidia's Tegra X1 with 3 GB LPDDR4. It's quite powerful.

     

    The Surface 3 (not to be confused with the Surface Pro 3) is not heavy, it's fanless and has a battery close to 10 hours.

     


     

    Ah, yeah, I mixed up the Surface 3 and the Surface Pro 3. I was thinking it was a more apples and oranges comparison. Battery life does not appear to be over 8 hours in practice though: http://www.anandtech.com/show/9219/the-surface-3-review/8

     

    I have used Surface Pro 3s for work, and they are great for a small PC, but I didn't consider it to be a tablet experience -- just a really small PC with a nice display. It certainly has its place, but didn't make sense to compare it to the Pixel C.

     

    The MS Surface 3 does look pretty nice, but I haven't used one. We still have some specs missing on the Pixel C for a real comparison.

  • Reply 99 of 158

    You can make these things all day long Google but all the time it runs Android, it's a failure. It's like Ferrari selling car with a 1 litre engine.

    It's a detestable OS that needs all the extra power and memory to make it run yet it's still not as smooth or as fast as iOS that runs faster and better on slower processors.

     

    Android needs to be scrapped and replaced with a purpose built OS, not one designed for a 2007 phone with physical buttons that hastily had layers coded to it to make it work with a touch screen.

  • Reply 100 of 158
    sog35 wrote: »
    but,but,but,but,but,but, no one should make 16GB phones anymore.....

    keep smoking crack losers.

    there obviously is still a market for 16GB users.  Hell, I have a 64GB 6+ and I'm using less than 8GB of storage.  I could easily fit everything on a 16GB phone.  Fact is people are streaming most content - movies, TV shows, music.  And photos and videos go to the cloud and my Mac. 

    There is a market for 16GB phones, just not at $649.

    Pass me the crack pipe. You've had enough.
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