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Google Pixel 9 Pro

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Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#231

I'm an iPhone guy, but - there _are_ other designs for phones, right? The squircle corners, the shiny metal band surrounding the matte back, the aqua-pill-shaped buttons, the colors - Google is a $2T company, there's gotta be an industrial designer somewhere in the building or some process for phone design that doesn't take place in Cupertino, right?

Profitable products attract copycat designs. Samsung copied no removable battery and the metal used. The first Google phone was a Blackberry style layout until Apple popularized the all touchscreen design.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#232
post #211

It blows me away that people will spend $1k for a phone when there are good options for $500 or less. I will grant that Google's phone is probably the best. But in my experience the difference in quality does not correlate to the difference in price. Apple has a monopoly and they set price expectations. Also, I think buyers think if you have a cheaper phone strangers may think you are poor. Personally I want people t…

I don’t like spending $1k on a phone, but my iPhone 11 Pro lasted 4 years and the only reason I upgraded was because the 15 has USB-C. It would have needed a battery upgrade otherwise but modern phones do have much better longevity.

You'll get the same mileage out of a €300-€400 Samsung.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#233
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My Pixel 5 is an amazing device, but it's slowly falling apart, software-wise. Bugs bugs and more bugs! It's also no longer getting software updates, and its successors have a laundry list of issues. The alternative is Samsung, the company that doesn't understand privacy nor consent, or Apple, whose phones lack uBlock support.

If uBlock is the only thing holding you back from an iPhone, you can use the Orion browser, which can install many Chrome extensions (including uBlock Origin)

how do we know the orion browser isn't somehow spying on you? I want an opensource browser, that's where I do so much financial and other transactions (as well as like bank company apps).

That browser should be something like a fully opensource de-googled chrome browser, but it doesn't seem to exist on mobile.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#234
I may switch this time since they're finally offering trade-in offers here in Ireland. I like my Pixel 6, but wanted a better camera for a while (to be clear, the Pixel 6 camera is really good, especially considering the price the phone was, but I still miss things like e.g. better optical zoom), so I may get a Pixel 9 Pro.

BTW, for those talking about issues: I bought my Pixel 6 at release, and yes, I had some strange Bluetooth issues during a few months. Not anymore, and for a while the phone is solid.

Also, this is probably the first phone that I have that I don't feel the battery got worse after 2+ years of usage, maybe thanks to the Adaptive Battery. My wife iPhone 12 (that she bought around at the same time as me) already had a ok-ish battery when she bought, but nowadays the battery is just plain sucks (battery health is 87%, that doesn't explain the whole story), one of the reason that she may switch to a Pixel too. Another thing I like from my Pixel is after those 2 years, the phone still feels snappy. I know people like to say that Tensor CPUs are bad, but I never had any issues with them.

I don't like the fact that Google increased the prices though: Pixel 6 was an amazing value for EUR649, but at EUR919 the Pro looks a more interesting choice since the gap reduced between the two. I think the reason is because the Pixel a series is such an amazing value that nobody care about the normal Pixel anymore, but if anything this is Google's fault.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#235

It blows me away that people will spend $1k for a phone when there are good options for $500 or less. I will grant that Google's phone is probably the best. But in my experience the difference in quality does not correlate to the difference in price. Apple has a monopoly and they set price expectations. Also, I think buyers think if you have a cheaper phone strangers may think you are poor. Personally I want people t…

[deleted]

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#236
Looks great. Really nicely designed except that camera bump is intense. I like having nice cameras on my phone, but I wish we could go back to the flush camera design. I guess they know you will put a case on it anyway.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#238

I'm an iPhone guy, but - there _are_ other designs for phones, right? The squircle corners, the shiny metal band surrounding the matte back, the aqua-pill-shaped buttons, the colors - Google is a $2T company, there's gotta be an industrial designer somewhere in the building or some process for phone design that doesn't take place in Cupertino, right?

Mobile phone design peaked with the Nokia 3110 and the Motorola MicroTAC, and it's been downhill ever since.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#239

It blows me away that people will spend $1k for a phone when there are good options for $500 or less. I will grant that Google's phone is probably the best. But in my experience the difference in quality does not correlate to the difference in price. Apple has a monopoly and they set price expectations. Also, I think buyers think if you have a cheaper phone strangers may think you are poor. Personally I want people t…

For most people the amortized cost of a phone over its life is pretty small. If you spend $1000 on a phone and it lasts you 3 years, that's ~$28 a month. A lot of people spend that on coffee each month. The value they get out of their smart phone dwarfs most other big expenses.
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