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Pixel 8 Pro

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Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#351

Post by brokencode »

kimbernator wrote: post #178

It's starting to feel silly, having a yearly release cycle for smartphones. So much of this product page is focused on new software functions that may have some vague relationship with the slightly upgraded hardware, but that could mostly be released to existing phones. Every new iPhone, Pixel, or Samsung phone basically claims the camera is marginally better and hey, look at these software features that have very li…

A lot of these new software features are enabled by better hardware. Especially AI features, which can require quite specialized and powerful processors. On-device LLMs are the next frontier in personal assistant software, and that can only be enabled by better hardware.

Even the image processing for high resolution images can benefit from better hardware. Modern smartphones are heavily dependent on image processing to improve camera quality. Without the right hardware, performance and energy efficiency could be unacceptable.

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#352

Post by vel0city »

chimeracoder wrote: post #346
vel0city wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much of that is the software demands increasing and the flash storage itself wearing out over time. As flash storage wears it'll often go slower and slower as the error correction needs to process more to actually get you the uncorrupted bits. This is why a lot of cheap devices tend to just become unbearably slow after a while, their storage just gets to be way too slow. Flash storage doesn't last foreve…

> I wonder how much of that is the software demands increasing and the flash storage itself wearing out over time. As flash storage wears it'll often go slower and slower as the error correction needs to process more to actually get you the uncorrupted bits. This is why a lot of cheap devices tend to just become unbearably slow after a while, their storage just gets to be way too slow. Too bad no flagship phones have…

If we're looking at older phones with removable storage, it usually limited what could be put on the SD card. And in the end the OS and system libraries were still on the on-board storage which would wear out over the years.

And there's good reason for the OS not being on a microSD card. Run a Raspberry Pi without locking the storage and see how fast it'll corrupt itself. Most SD cards have pretty miserable reliability compared to the storage on-board. Imagine if you had to re-image your device every few weeks after your storage device corrupted itself again. Not really a great experience.

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#353

Post by kimbernator »

kaba0 wrote: post #294
kimbernator wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is technically true. However, I do find that a lot of people I know tend to get new phones well before they actually have a need for them. I don't entirely blame peoples' consumerism; As somebody who once worked in cell phone sales, the mere act of visiting a carrier store is likely to land you in front of a salesperson who is incentivized to sell new phones and lines indiscriminately. Not to mention the incredi…

> lot of people I know tend to get new phones well before they actually have a need for them It might just be your “bubble”, but even if not, is it really that bad of a deal? If you resell your previous phone at 2/3 the original price each year, you can use the latest phone for like 200 bucks for a year, or $17 monthly. For a device that is with you 0-24, and is probably the most often used item a typical person owns…

I feel qualified to say it's not just my bubble, having worked in cell phone sales. The business hinges on the fact that people don't run out the useful life of their devices.

Incentives exist on the part of the person who, being human, definitely want the new shiny thing, regardless of the logic behind it.

They exist for the salesperson, who will get a commission for selling the new shiny thing, regardless of whether this makes the customer's life any better or worse.

They exist for the carrier because the customer is on the hook for 2-3 years of service when they buy the shiny thing.

Finally, they exist for the company that made the phone because they make a profit on the sale price of the shiny thing.

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#354

Post by synergy20 »

still using pixel3, except they stopped upgrading the software a while ago, still it's usable though some apps refuse to be upgraded, sigh

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#355

Post by kkielhofner »

mpalmer wrote: post #300
Lutzb wrote: post #283

The depreciation between Pixels and iPhones is staggering. Trade-in in Germany on Google Store page: - Pixel 6 Pro 256gb ($999 on release) - 235€ - iPhone 13 Pro 256gb ($1099 on release) - 730€ While I am partial to Googles line of phones (had pretty much every Google phone since the nexus one), the loss of value is something I cannot really ignore any more when deciding to buy a phone.

Maybe it's just worth more to Google to convert an iPhone owner? Trade in value is not a very pure measurement of depreciation.

A search of completed/sold listings on eBay shows roughly 2x resale pricing for the iPhone 13 Pro 256gb vs the Pixel 6 Pro 256gb.

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#356

Post by maxerickson »

libertine wrote: post #328
Lutzb wrote: post #283

The depreciation between Pixels and iPhones is staggering. Trade-in in Germany on Google Store page: - Pixel 6 Pro 256gb ($999 on release) - 235€ - iPhone 13 Pro 256gb ($1099 on release) - 730€ While I am partial to Googles line of phones (had pretty much every Google phone since the nexus one), the loss of value is something I cannot really ignore any more when deciding to buy a phone.

What I don't get are these price tags. My last flagship phone was a Google Nexus 6P where the base model was $499. Amazing phone, too bad after 3 years it had a battery issue but the manufacturer gave me a new one. But the thing is: it was $499. That was the greatest thing about the Nexus lines - good hardware (maybe not the latest SOC) with regular updates and a good OS experience. I miss those phones. Google with t…

I payed $550 for my Pixel 6, ~1 year after the release. Has good hardware, regular updates and a good OS experience.

Comparable to ~$450 a year after the release of the 6P.

I guess the 6P might be relatively higher end?

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#357

Post by pie420 »

libertine wrote: post #328
Lutzb wrote: post #283

The depreciation between Pixels and iPhones is staggering. Trade-in in Germany on Google Store page: - Pixel 6 Pro 256gb ($999 on release) - 235€ - iPhone 13 Pro 256gb ($1099 on release) - 730€ While I am partial to Googles line of phones (had pretty much every Google phone since the nexus one), the loss of value is something I cannot really ignore any more when deciding to buy a phone.

What I don't get are these price tags. My last flagship phone was a Google Nexus 6P where the base model was $499. Amazing phone, too bad after 3 years it had a battery issue but the manufacturer gave me a new one. But the thing is: it was $499. That was the greatest thing about the Nexus lines - good hardware (maybe not the latest SOC) with regular updates and a good OS experience. I miss those phones. Google with t…

"That was the greatest thing about the Nexus lines - good hardware"

Yet every nexus phone had major hardware issues. that's not good hardware. It wasn't premium, it wasn't supported long, and it wasn't high quality. I LOVED the nexus line, as a broke college student that prioritized bang for the buck and customization, and speed, and android was getting great new features every year, but things have gotten so bad at google.

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#358

Post by kxrm »

antod wrote: post #214
grepLeigh wrote: post #173

This is a meta comment, but I think it's extraordinary that we're only 15ish years from the first smartphone release and we've already reached the "boring" incremental improvement phase for these tiny pocket supercomputers. Consider how long it took PCs to reach the same stage (with a fraction of the adoption). It was like 20 years from Kenbak-1 to the 90s PC era.

I really don't think the iPhone (or even Android) was the equivalent of the Kenbak-1 in terms of smartphones. There were "smartphones" before the iPhone. IMO the iPhone was the 90s PC era where these things got a lot better and more ubiquitous and less fragmented. And (also in my opinion) coincidentally 90s led into an the era where overly dominant OS vendor(s) were crushing the fun and freedom out of computing. Phon…

Yep, I too remember Windows CE 5 on my Audiovox slide out keyboard phone which in 2006 was blowing people's minds. I got it purely so while on-call I wouldn't have to head home to handle incidents.

It was a great mobile computing experience but terrible at being a phone.

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#359

Post by partiallypro »

Lutzb wrote: post #283

The depreciation between Pixels and iPhones is staggering. Trade-in in Germany on Google Store page: - Pixel 6 Pro 256gb ($999 on release) - 235€ - iPhone 13 Pro 256gb ($1099 on release) - 730€ While I am partial to Googles line of phones (had pretty much every Google phone since the nexus one), the loss of value is something I cannot really ignore any more when deciding to buy a phone.

My trade in for the 7 Pro was $420 to get the new 8.

Re: Pixel 8 Pro

#360

Post by [deleted] »

kimbernator wrote: post #178

It's starting to feel silly, having a yearly release cycle for smartphones. So much of this product page is focused on new software functions that may have some vague relationship with the slightly upgraded hardware, but that could mostly be released to existing phones. Every new iPhone, Pixel, or Samsung phone basically claims the camera is marginally better and hey, look at these software features that have very li…

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