The Android Thread

[dangphat]

pixel

[Largi]

Even with the hardware now being nearly a year old as opposed to the one plus being less than a month 

[Dan]

What are you expecting as being the difference between the two? Its not like there has been some marvel of technological breakthrough in that time. 

[Largi]

31 minutes ago, Dan said:

What are you expecting as being the difference between the two? Its not like there has been some marvel of technological breakthrough in that time. 

Processor. The Pizel is on the 821 and the OnePlus on the 835 IIRC
Along with the Ram difference.

I'm just unsure about OxygenOS I guess... because hardwarewise the OnePlus wins...

[Nacey]

We discussed OnePlus and what the current good phones are less than a page ago and nothing has changed since. The OP 3T that was advertised as a "2016 flagship killer" in late 2015 will not even be getting Nougat, the OS released in 2016. The OP5 has a weird wobbly jelly effect on scrolling which may be caused by them having designed the phone with the screen installed upside down (that part seems unclear) and which OP first claimed was working as intended and had been added deliberately and then claimed it was a bug that they would fix, all within 48 hours.

Please stop buying OnePlus phones, they are a garbage company that makes garbage software, releases it slowly, breaks their own products with poorly tested released, as awful customer service, and markets entirely around specs instead of making an actual good device.

If you care strongly about performance and getting updates immediately, get a Pixel. If you just want a decent phone phone that works well and that can replace in a year with the same thing without breaking the bank, get a Moto G5.

It's worth saying that now is not the best time to buy a Pixel considering it's six months old. But there is still no other flagship worth buying.

On 03/05/2017 at 1:30 PM, Nacey said:

If you don't want to spend £600 on a Pixel then just buy a Moto G5. In comparison to those two, every other phone is poor value, outright terrible, or some combination thereof.

Get the Amazon-exclusive model with 3GB RAM as it's worth the extra £15:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01MZCWGYB/

 

[Nacey]

43 minutes ago, Largi said:

Even with the hardware now being nearly a year old as opposed to the one plus being less than a month 

The Pixel is not, and never was, good because of its hardware. The Pixel is good because the software was properly tested and fine-tuned to match the hardware in the phone. When it comes to touch-response and such it is unmatched for this reason, and having a slightly newer CPU to run OxygenOS or Touchwiz or whatever garbage LG shat out this year makes zero difference to that.

As for RAM, this is exactly what OP want you to think. They design and sell phones based on the spec sheet while putting zero effort into the actual device and how it performs. 8GB RAM isn't going to do anything on a phone and it definitely isn't going to somehow make it run faster or better.

Oh, the OP5 also cheats on benchmarks.  Because OnePlus made it so of course it does.

[Largi]

Alright noted. 
Kinda needed that run down. 

Cost wasn't an issue because i'm having to go on contract (but its only like £5 more than my current plan so thats fine) 
And I wish I could wait for the 3 new Pixels but y'know, right now I don't have a phone.

@Nacey - XL or Standard?

Edited July 3, 2017 by Largi

[Nacey]

They are identical except for screen and battery. The XL gets about 10% better battery life but it's nothing significant. DPI on both is high enough to not matter. The XL is certainly better for VR but Daydream is shit so you shouldn't care about that.

Get whichever one is the size you want, basically.

[Fyria]

I still really really want a Pixel but trying to hold off until the Pixel 2. X_X

[Grym]

If you pay cash money the Pixel has £100 off from a few places right now. I'm guessing that's because of the added competition from the OnePlus 5.

As the only decent smaller screen phone right now I'm thinking of going for it.

[Nacey]

At this point I think I'd still say you should wait for this year's version if you can. But if you need a phone right now and the Moto G doesn't do it for you then yeah, with £100 it's a little better value.

Though I will add that the Moto G5 (not the +) is the same screen size as the base Pixel. Note sure how the overall dimensions compare.

[Nacey]

Moto G5 3GB is £135 (normally £180) on Amazon Prime Day Deals:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01MZCWGYB/

Excellent deal if anyone needs a phone!

[Nacey]

In case anyone is still considering buying a OnePlus phone:

http://www.androidpolice.com/2017/07/18/some-oneplus-5-owners-report-phone-reboots-call-911/

[dangphat]

Broke my nexus 5x screen and the cost to replace the screen was more than my insurance excess. Insurance company are sending me a Samsun Galaxy S6 32gb as a replacement, does this seem appropriate?

[Dan]

That depends why you wanted a Nexus to start with.

[Nacey]

I would say it fits the definition of a like-for-like replacement. It's a 2015 flagship phone which is six months older than the 5X but was more expensive at release so it's be hard to argue that it's not a reasonable replacement without getting into some very technical arguments about update schedules.

From a user-perspective I would sell it and buy a Moto G5 though I'm not sure what you'd get for a two-year old Samsung. I suspect they may hold their value better than is actually justified.

Edit: If possible, avoid taking it out of the box if you want to sell it, then you can sell it as new.

[NATO]

I thought this might cause amusement.

[Fyria]

xD

[Nacey]

32GB Pixel is £400 at CPW (£500 for 128GB, no sign of the XL) which is a pretty good deal. New Pixel due around October of course.

[Grym]

The more leaks I read about the Pixel 2 the more disappointed I get and the less I feel like waiting. Getting a Pixel for £400 is starting to look pretty good.

The designs of the new Pixel phones seem barely updated, foregoing a number of design changes that have come to the latest flagships whilst taking a number of backward steps like removing the headphone jack and having the camera stick out from the body of the phone. Given that the price is likely going to go up with the new model it just doesn't seem to me to be worth £250+ for a year's updates, a new processor, and a worse design. Am I missing something?

[Dan]

You say backwards steps, but those changes sound great. As a person that keeps phones forever, those are two things that always become unusable earlier than other things - the amount of crap you get in the camera that can't be cleaned out of the tiny corners without scratching the lens, and things clogging the headphones port is a little silly... and I'm only talking pocket fluff!

Get bluetooth\wifi headphones\earphones, wires are awful.

Consider that for a lot of people the consideration isn't +250 for those changes, its +650 to go from the crap phone they had to the top one so they can keep it for ages Pixel doesn't really feel like its aimed at those people who change their phone yearly, unless you have oodles of money, at which point you don't care about the price difference. When I was looking into it, Pixel was only available with a specific EE contract, so its never an upgrade option unless you literally go and talk to EE about it specifically (my experience is that people generally sit on a contract and take is upgrade options, rather than getting SIM Only and a seperate phone).

[Brynneth]

Some of us like to use good quality headphones so need a jack. Definitely not getting a new Pixel then. Might get a Pixel 1 when I get a new job if they're down at £400. 

[Dan]

You can certainly get good quality headphones that don't, they're just expensive and not what you've already purchased.

[Lagrosh]

You're not the target audience. Same was iPhone. The iPhone7 (soon 8) don't have a headphone port but rather a converter.

The pixel is a device for the top end so usually those users buy the top end headphones without wires as well.

[Brynneth]

The problem is that there are only very very few audiophile quality headphones that are wireless. Partly because very few devices actually can stream lossless audio over Bluetooth - Sony have a proprietary codec which is currently only available on Xperia phones but might get generic support in Android O, there are a couple of others which aren't supported on most phones. I don't understand why this "top end" target audience excludes people with top-end audio hardware. If, say, I've spent £400 on a set of Beyerdynamic cans, why can't my top of the line phone use them?

Just realised that Google are still disdaining the SD Card slot as a thing, so I'd need to splash out £100 extra for the larger model to fit any decent amount of hi-res audio on it. Might stick with Motorola for the moment, though have just discovered that the Moto G5 doesn't have NFC so can't use Android Pay - though the G5+ and the G5S/+ coming out this month seem to have it. Looks like the release price on the G5S is probably going to be £220, with a few incremental changes over the G5 - .2" larger screen (though same resolution so lower PPI),  200mAh larger battery, 16MP camera rather than 13, same processor but 3GB RAM and 32GB storage basic. No reviews in yet, but reckon it'd be worth that?