Android - what's in your pocket?

The lack of an Aux input is a deal breaker for me.

Lol. Maybe the popular girls will text me too!

Eh, the USB C to charge / audio cables are like $8. Minor annoyance.

Question for Pixel 2 users: one of my co-workers got Pixel 2 on my recommendation and got on Project Fi. It’s his first smart phone, and he’s 55, so I’m teaching him a lot of stuff. One thing that perplexes me is that when he takes photos, unless you’re really careful, you end up taking mini-movies, or moving photos, instead of still photos. Is that something desirable? Is that supposed to happen? Is this part of a new trend to try to make all photos short spurts of moving photos? At first I thought it was his fault for not knowing how to interface properly, but one time I was taking his photo, and I thought I pressed the circle briefly to take a photo, but it turned out to be a moving photo also.

How much is the Apple one?

I’m facing a similar decision, though iPhone X is probably not going to happen as I prefer the flexibility of Android and I don’t want total iOS lock-in on my devices. Here are my current thoughts, though I’m still waiting on full reviews of the S9+ to make the call.

S9+

Pro: Same as you, Bixby is ignorable, and may eventually even be configurable as Google Assistant. Fingerprint sensor seems more sensibly located than last year, though I’m still a bit concerned as I have small hands. Screen is best in class. Camera is great, and the new Samsung features for 2018 all seem genuinely good for me (esp low light, optical zoom and super slow-mo), unlike the stuff everyone has these days like portrait mode and AR crap. Processor should provide a decent bump over previous generation, especially if the Exynos model isn’t crippled by Samsung.

Con: Usual Samsung bloatware and update delays. Long term battery life uncertain (probably mitigated by S9 Active in a few months?) OS is unlikely to be as smooth/clean as stock, especially over time.

Pixel 2XL

Pro: I like almost everything I’ve read about this phone except the screen. Stock Android is a huge plus, both for instant updates and for reducing bloat. Battery life seems good for a flagship, though not as good as I’d like. Camera is best in class in good light conditions.

Con: That screen. Supposedly it’s better now, and there’s some kind of panel lottery that means it can be great if you’re lucky, but chances are it’ll be a disappointment coming from a Samsung. I’ll probably be running Nova Launcher anyway, so I’m not going to be getting the true stock experience. The funky software stuff they did with the camera doesn’t really matter to me - I’m not going to be using portrait mode, and I’d much rather have optical zoom and better low light performance than amazing daylight performance.

Seems like it. Called “live photos” on the Apple side and is on by default. Time for you to go find and hit some buttons to turn it off.

The Pixel 2 XL screen is great, and issues were vastly overblown at launch. They patched the saturated color option in months ago, and colors are as vivid as any other phone now. Off angle viewing is the biggest non-issue since iPhone’s antennagate. It’s plenty bright outside if you crank the brightness meter. If you don’t care about the headphone jack omission, the Pixel 2 XL is fantastic, and the camera and videos are the best around.

I don’t care about (normal) video, and like I say, the things the 2XL camera, um, excels at are less important to me than the things at which the S9 supposedly does.

I’m probably going to end up doing a side to side comparison in a shop to see how the screens compare directly, and if I’m happy with the Pixel I’ll go with that.

Here’s a camera comparison of S9 / Pixel 2 / iPhoneX. Interesting article. Basically depending on the picture I prefer one of the three, so I’d say it’s close to equal. The S9+ with optical zoom and f/1.5 does seem to be a differentiator for low light or more distant photos.

http://richontech.tv/2018/02/smartphones/samsung-s9-vs-iphone-x-vs-pixel-2-camera-samples/

Sounds like motion photos is turned on. I have a Pixel XL (not a 2), so I don’t have direct experience with this, but check the motion photos section in the general Camera Help site.

HTC started it with the “Zoe” feature in the HTC One, and Apple popularized it with “live photos.”

I just purchased this phone.

When I switched from the Apple I got a ZTE Blade Z Max. It is a highly regarded phone. Great battery life, nice screen…but it is also HUGE. I am not a small guy but that thing is like carrying around a tablet. I could not stand it.

The Moto seems like it is much more reasonably sized.

I ended up buying an Essential Phone recently. It’s freaking great. Made the mistake of buying a case that mimicked the ceramic back and it was too slippery for the phone to stay on my magnetic mount in my car. Now I’ve got a nice slim rubber case that should work great.

Feels way faster than the ZTE Axon Pro I was using before. I would have kept using that phone longer if it was supported past Android 6, or had a custom ROM scene at least.

I would have liked microSD or a headphone jack but the standard 128GB of storage makes that not a big issue and I mostly use Bluetooth for music.

Please tell me this came with a Hypercolor sweater for extreme maximumness.

I ordered two of these. At launch saw the blue screen tried to live with it and returned it for a Note 8. After a couple of months, I grew tired of the Note 8 (it is weirdly tall in the hand and heavier than the Pixel) and re-ordered a Pixel 2 XL. I was quickly reminded that the speaker volume is low and for some reason, having it connect to Uconnect in my Dodge and my smartwatch was not possible. And while the screen was improved, still had the blue tint. So I returned, had a brief daliance with Apple, and now back to the Note 8.

I decided to go all in with the Note 8 and you can remap almost everything to use Google Assistant so Bixby is not noticeable on my phone. That was one of the reasons I strayed back to the Pixel is that Bixby is bloat at this point. The other thing is that if you use a smartwatch, the S3 Gear/Note 8 integration is pretty good. Not Apple Watch good, but serviceable. The LG Sport is a huge ugly thing but it did work well with the Pixel when I had it. Tried Huawei Watch 2 and sent it back.

Now I wait for the Note 9.

Hmm. Carphone Warehouse has the 2XL at just £629, which is a full £240 less than the launch price of the S9+. Pretty hard to justify the latter in that case. Strongly leaning toward getting the 2XL now. If I really don’t like the screen, I can always trade in for an S9 Active later in the year, I suppose.

This is slightly worrying, though. I use my phone on speaker all the time (eg to listen to stuff in the shower or while gaming).

Well, my stock Android experience lasted all of an hour. I can’t believe you can’t remove the date indicator on the Pixel launcher. And not being able to resize widgets at will is very frustrating. Yay for Nova Launcher.

“Stock Android” to me is more about the fact that I don’t have ten Samsung apps clogging up my system that I’ll never use and can’t uninstall. I think my Pixel has one single Verizon app, which is acceptable to me.

The launcher is okay but still way behind Nova.

Oh sure, I’m not that fussed about it compared to the bloatware, though I’m curious if running Nova will in practice make things less smooth than with Pixel.

I was gonna get a Pixel 2XL, but at this point I’m thinking the Galaxy 9+ is a better deal, since they seemingly cost the same.

I’m scared of going back to a non nexus device though. I fear the samsung bloat.