Google Nexus 5x and 6P • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#421

Post by r-w » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:23 AM UTC

will_hughes wrote: post #405

zuppy wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody's going to bother to recreate your fingerprint, when it's much easier to beat you with a wrench ( https://xkcd.com/538/ ) until they get access to your phone. It's a huge convenience for you though, to unlock it without doing anything extra, as you're pressing that button anyway to turn the screen on. Much easier than typing passwords.

(I'm not a lawyer, I've just read a bunch of blogposts/discussions on the issue) There's a legal difference in some places between having your phone secured by a fingerprint and a password. If your phone is secured by a password, then in some places you cannot be obliged to provide the password, but a fingerprint you can.

Where are those laws in place?

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#422

Post by simplexion » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:26 AM UTC

munchbunny wrote: post #292

mkozlows wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the thing is, the Nexus 5 was a near-perfect phone (especially considering it was released two years ago), and it's totally reasonable to think it's still doing the job very well -- it is. But that's a fact about the N5, not the N5X/6P. I mean, what would you want from a new phone that would show up on a spec sheet? Faster? Check, both of these are. The 808/810 aren't gigantic generational leaps over the 800, but…

Interestingly my problems with it are exactly three things that aren't addressed in the new models: 1. The wireless charging, while seemingly a small thing, was to me a huge improvement in my experience of using the phone. The fact that I can sit down at my desk, plop the phone down, and it'll just work, and when I get up to leave I can just pull it off my desk. Removing the USB cable interaction made the phone a muc…

Are you saying the battery is hard to replace in the Nexus 5?

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#423

Post by will_hughes » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:30 AM UTC

r-w wrote: post #421

will_hughes wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(I'm not a lawyer, I've just read a bunch of blogposts/discussions on the issue) There's a legal difference in some places between having your phone secured by a fingerprint and a password. If your phone is secured by a password, then in some places you cannot be obliged to provide the password, but a fingerprint you can.

Where are those laws in place?

In the US in particular.

There was a bunch of reporting in the past few days that a Federal District Court in Pennsylvania found that Fifth Amendment rights apply to smartphone passcodes.

Random link: http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/why-the-government-cant-...

That same protection doesn't seem to apply to fingerprints. Random link: http://time.com/3558936/fingerprint-password-fifth-amendment...

Again, I'm not a lawyer, but that seems to be how the law falls out on that issue.

Whether that's an issue for you, personally - no idea. It might be a factor for some.

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#424

Post by deciplex » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:36 AM UTC

shostack wrote: post #364

davidw wrote: post #81

In terms of the software, the Nexus phones are some of the best I've ever had, because they don't mess around with Android to try and 'improve' it, and because they get regular, timely upgrades. My Nexus 4 is still going strong several years after I got it. I'm tempted by the 5x, though I wish it were a bit smaller.

I'm at the point of considering upgrading my N4 to an S6 or this new N5 but really was hoping for a higher-end phone in an N4 form factor. Seems like nobody wants to make a high-end phone for smaller hands these days.

I have pretty large hands and I still consider these things too big. A 4.7-inch screen is enough.

At least they're bothering to release something about like an N5 this year. This is the first Nexus phone in two years.

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#425

Post by zurn » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:37 AM UTC

georgemcbay wrote: post #316

0xFFC wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for reference . Now you have facts . This makes sense , my next phone definitely will not be a nexus (and believe me I was hardcore fan of nexus since the day they begun nexus program). Getting update for only 2 year ? Give me a break . I will be switch to another platform , definitely , I was waiting for ubuntu phone . I will seriously consider them for my next purchase. I am thinking about ditching whole…

Which platform are you going to switch to exactly that has a better official update policy than this one? Not trying to be snarky, but Google's policy is as good or better than most (perhaps all? I haven't heard of a better option, though they may exist) and at least they are completely transparent about it. They also have good policies around keeping the bootloaders unlockable so if they do EOL it and you want to up…

Apple?

Nexus has so far been the one Anroid brand that people considering future updates were buying.

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#426

Post by victorhooi » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:42 AM UTC

rsync wrote: post #225

I am finally in the market for a new mobile phone - my trusty MOTO FONE (F3)[1] finally died after three years. One of my absolute no-compromise feature needs is removable media ... an SD card slot that can accept the new 128 GB cards. This is because my current music collection is 68 GB in size and carrying the entire collection is one of my use-cases. But ... I also want a non-crapware, pure android phone, and the…

Let me ask you a question - how long would it take you to listen to 68 GB or 128 GB of music?

My hypothesis is, you don't actually need 68 GB of music around with you. In fact, it doesn't confer any meaningful advnatages.

Using http://www.richardfarrar.com/song-capacity-calculator-for-mp..., I can see that 64 GB of music at 256 KBps is around 559 hours of music - I really doubt you'd listen to any meaningful portion of that in a month.

See, I used to have a 64 GB MicroSD card, and keep music with me. But then I just ended up using Google Music, and streaming everything. I can pick anything I want, and just listen to it on demand.

Let's be honest, most people can't tell the different quality wise anyhow, so the quality argument is moot.

And it's not like streaming music chews up that much bandwidth.

Doing it this way means I can listen to my music on any device - my desktop, my laptop, my phone, tablet - etc., my playlists are synced, my most recently played lists etc. And I don't need to worry about having to backup my music (I used to do it on my NAS), or worry about syncing up new files.

It's *incredibly convenient - and I can't see any meaningful disadvantages.

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#427

Post by patrickaljord » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:42 AM UTC

julbaxter wrote: post #17

patrickaljord wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because most people don't need that much, especially with the new auto-delete of photos that have been copied to the cloud in Google Photo, love this feature.

Where can I turn on this feature?

Slide to the assistant, if your phones is full, it will suggest deleting photos that have been copied to the cloud already.

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#428

Post by rjbwork » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 1:48 AM UTC

ihsw wrote: post #271

kozukumi wrote: post #259

Honest question: why would I get a 5X over a Moto X Play which is cheaper or Moto X Style which is only £20 more (in the UK at least) and has better specs?

You shouldn't -- they intentionally gimped the 5X in order to make the 6P more appealing. And it's working, I wouldn't be surprised if first-day 6P purchases outnumber 5X first-day purchases by a magnitude.

I'll tell my reason for going 6P: I loved my N5, but the lacking battery life was annoying, and a total bricking after a full discharge (not eligible for another repair, since it was already fixed from being dropped in a puddle a few months earlier...) brought it's life to an end.

I've been scraping by on a Nokia Lumia 530 for about 3-4 months now. Great little phone for 40 dollars, but I'm getting tired of the subpar GMail, HipChat, SubSonic, etc clients that come with having a Windows phone. I figure that as long as the 6P is as good as the original N5, with a better battery life, I should be satisfied for a good long while. I didn't go with the 5X because I am genuinely worried about the subpar battery life again.

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#429

Post by DataWorker » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:03 AM UTC

zuppy wrote: post #327

chrsstrm wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Plus the fingerprint thing is probably a bigger deal than you think Am I the only person on the planet who doesn't want a fingerprint reader on my phone? I don't want to secure anything of importance with my fingerprint - fingerprints are usernames, not passwords. This just feels like the equivalent of writing your password on a Post-It and sticking it to your monitor.

Nobody's going to bother to recreate your fingerprint, when it's much easier to beat you with a wrench ( https://xkcd.com/538/ ) until they get access to your phone. It's a huge convenience for you though, to unlock it without doing anything extra, as you're pressing that button anyway to turn the screen on. Much easier than typing passwords.

I think the OPM data breach recently put about 10 million fingerprints and a ton of associated personally identifying information into the hands of people who have clear motivation to hack the cell phones of many of the people impacted.

Re: Google Nexus 5x and 6P

#430

Post by knappe » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:11 AM UTC

As someone who purchased a Galaxy S4, I'll _never_ purchase another Google phone. The entire reason I purchased a google phone was to avoid the lack of updates, like I had when I was at the whim of Motorola with my Droid2. I was stuck on 2.3 and never saw an upgrade in the time I owned the phone. I figured that Google would be a better actor and actual push updates, but boy was I in for a wild ride.

When I saw that 5.0 had been pushed, I upgraded, thinking that Google had vetted the release. Instead what I had was wifi that never stayed connected and seg faults ALL over the place in virtually every app that I used on a regular basis, including apps developed by Google (hangouts, photos [which were trapped on the phone unless I wanted to connect external and download them], my SMS app, WeChat, Strava, Kindle ect). They broke my phone, no way around it. It was miserable and I stuck with it, because I paid for a premium device and wasn't about to go blow another $650 on another device. Three weeks ago I got the 5.1 upgrade, just shy of a year after it was released. I'm now a firm believer of the shit phone. https://medium.com/matter/shitphone-a-love-story-a44e6643480...

Buyer beware.