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Google Pixel 9 Pro

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Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#881

Post by truculent »

j_timberlake wrote: post #827
peapod91 wrote: post #786

The dominance of the negativity in these comments is noteworthy. Personally, I thought it was a exciting update with major hardware improvements, some compelling AI demos and use cases at a similar price point as the past. Top tech reviewers e.g. MKBHD has similar impressions. Mostly just curious as to why there are ~0 positive comments here. I suspect could be: 1) anti-google HN bias - perhaps deserved? 2) it's simp…

I'm very bullish on genAI, and I bought the new phone, but I really don't think the features shown are that exciting yet. It feels like they're laying the groundwork for more powerful AI to be ready to do things in your phone apps, and the current features are just paving the way. The killer-app (that isn't porn) is going to be asking your phone to order food and it guesses correctly what you want while cross-checkin…

> The killer-app (that isn't porn) is going to be asking your phone to order food and it guesses correctly what you want while cross-checking availability, pricing, and discounts. Then a Waymo or Wing Drone delivers it.

If this were a "killer-app", then Amazon would still be selling those quick-buy Amazon Dash[1] buttons, and Alexa would be making a profit[2]

[1]: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-47416440

[2]: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/07/alexa-had-no-profit-...

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#882

Post by maximus-decimus »

maipen wrote: post #855
izacus wrote: post #848

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really think there's bias, it's just that HN these days predominately attracts negative ranting comments. It's not really Google specific either - if you look at any other topic, even Linux or OSS related, there's going to be bunch of highly upvoted people ranting and raving. That pushes out any kind of positive discussion and normal people leave.

I think the internet has become much more toxic these last few years. I see a lot of resentment and projection in people’s comments. And most of the time the ,comments are useless and don’t represent the general consumer/citizen opinion. This is specially true for anonymous profiles

I've been wondering if Reddit has always been this cesspool or if I just got older. When I'm logged in it's not too bad because I curated the subreddits, but the default subs it shows me when I'm logged out feel like half the content is angry people complaining about politics and immigrants.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#883

Post by thefz »

chc4 wrote: post #707

I have negative desire to get a phone billing itself around AI and LLM features. I turn off every AI assistant feature on my existing devices, I actively don't want a phone that ties Gemini and AI photoshop even tighter into it. If Google wanted to actually improve their phones they would add basic software functionality they're still missing instead like, say, a per-app volume mixer that half the 3rd party Android p…

AI integration in Pixel phones is bland, and all in areas where it can be day to day useful.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#884

Post by maximus-decimus »

taeric wrote: post #183

I'm kind of sad that the world seems to have given up on the smaller phones. The marketing of the masculine hand holding the larger phone is amusing to me, and I can understand wanting to have a larger screen. I do not like the amount of space these things take in my pocket, though.

I discovered about the Unihertz Jelly Star the other day which is allegedly the smallest android phone with a 3 inch display. People over /r/dumbphone seem to like it as a mean to make doom scrolling less appealing to them while the phone can still be used to do all you need like use Uber (although android auto on this must be horrible).

At 309 CAD on Amazon, I'm tempted to give it a try.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#885

Post by maximus-decimus »

paxys wrote: post #449
taeric wrote: post #183

I'm kind of sad that the world seems to have given up on the smaller phones. The marketing of the masculine hand holding the larger phone is amusing to me, and I can understand wanting to have a larger screen. I do not like the amount of space these things take in my pocket, though.

From what I have seen women tend to prefer the larger phone sizes more than men, because they keep it in their handbags and use it two-handed.

I have pretty average man hands (although my fingers might be a bit long) and I use a Note 8 one handed without really any problem. Honestly, I like it even if just for the fact I tended to drop smaller phones a lot more.

Based on that, I would expect half the men to be able to use even the biggest non-fold phones one handed without any problem.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#886

Post by winternewt »

dagmx wrote: post #800
peapod91 wrote: post #786

The dominance of the negativity in these comments is noteworthy. Personally, I thought it was a exciting update with major hardware improvements, some compelling AI demos and use cases at a similar price point as the past. Top tech reviewers e.g. MKBHD has similar impressions. Mostly just curious as to why there are ~0 positive comments here. I suspect could be: 1) anti-google HN bias - perhaps deserved? 2) it's simp…

Out of (genuine) curiosity, what major hardware improvements are you referring to? On paper, it’s largely the same as prior years for the SoC at least. I think the fold has the most obvious upgrade but nothing I’d consider really major. Other than that, it seems like mostly a camera bump year?

> On paper, it’s largely the same as prior years.

Not even the same. The 9P screen has lower PPI than my 7P, the camera has worse field of view and the battery has lower capacity.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#887

Post by saberience »

collin128 wrote: post #820
saberience wrote: post #815

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What qualifies someone as a “top tech reviewer”? It’s a phone for gods sake and some random YouTubers opinion isn’t anymore valid than a random Hackernews commentators opinion. If we were getting opinions on the latest PhD paper on attention mechanisms than I’d trust someone with a PhD versus a random person, but for getting opinions on the new Google phone? Think for yourself.

Agree with you re: think for yourselves. Two things: 1. He's held / seen the phone live, I buy online so won't get a chance to before I decide. 2. He's also held hundreds (thousands?) of phones which I haven't. While he does have preferences that differ from mine, his perspective is still interesting. >what qualifies them? 19.3m subscribers on yt

Joe Rogan has a lot more subscribers and listeners than this guy, does it mean I should listen to his opinions?

Valuing someone by reach makes no sense at all. Most professors at MIT have no social media reach at all, I still value their opinions extremely highly.

In fact, valuing someone's opinion purely based on the size of their megaphone is partly why we're the world is in such a bad state politically (and in other ways) these days. E.g. people listening to social media influencers opinions on vaccines.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#888

Post by DrBazza »

prmoustache wrote: post #850
peapod91 wrote: post #786

The dominance of the negativity in these comments is noteworthy. Personally, I thought it was a exciting update with major hardware improvements, some compelling AI demos and use cases at a similar price point as the past. Top tech reviewers e.g. MKBHD has similar impressions. Mostly just curious as to why there are ~0 positive comments here. I suspect could be: 1) anti-google HN bias - perhaps deserved? 2) it's simp…

I guess mostly because the only thing new smartphones offer is faster cpu, more memory (which I don't really need, a 10y old smartphone handle my current load correctly) and a better camera and an always bigger footprint. The only thing I like is the possible better camera sensors, but that won't make me shed thousands of dollars for it. If I have the choice I'd rather have a more compact model with the camera qualit…

> I guess mostly because the only thing new smartphones offer is faster cpu

The next killer-feature in the race to the bottom is probably software, not hardware, and is near realtime translation. Samsung is airing an advert for that right now, but it's not real time.

Better "AI" with a faster CPU and everyone has their own Babel fish.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#889

Post by iakov »

shiroiushi wrote: post #819
Lammy wrote: post #795

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> any other ideas? Call it disappointment I guess. No phone from any manufacturer has felt totally “right” to me in years in the way that phones from a decade ago did. It makes sense from a business perspective since smartphones were effectively complete way back then. The business needs a way to justify selling me a new one so it's been a long slow downhill of shit-I-don't-care-about ever since. I especially miss th…

Yeah, exactly. Phones aren't going in a positive direction at all. What I want is a phone with excellent battery life, a great OLED screen, a great camera, plenty of local storage (and expandable with a microSD card), durable/rugged, and fast enough to feel snappy and not laggy. I don't want AI bullshit, stupid features that tie me to cloud services and help advertisers build profiles of me, can't-delete bloatware, s…

You're describing an iPhone. I've switched from Android to SE2 in 2020, and bought 15 last year on release day to get the type-c charging. I feel it ticks most of your boxes:

* excellent battery life - can't complain about it. I'm not streaming YouTube on 5G on the phone, and I've found out that it can last about two days per charge with light use - messenger apps, phone calls, emails. YMMV of course. * a great OLED screen - it's bright & crisp. I haven't seen a better screen in person yet. * a great camera - it's a very good camera IMO. Takes good shots of people and nature and shoots impressive videos of music shows in dark basements. * durable/rugged - not sure about 15, but my SE2 was abused and dropped. The metal sides were dinged, the screen had a few nasty scratches, but the phone held up together very well. * fast enough to feel snappy and not laggy - iOS is much nicer and snappier that any of the Android phones (HTC Desire S, Galaxy Note II, Xperia Z3, Xiaomi Mi6) I've had. * don't want to buy a brand-new $1000 phone every year or two - I think iPhones do last a few years, given the fact that my wife uses 13 and has zero desire (or reasons, really) to upgrade.

The only requirement the iPhone doesn't fit is the storage - Apple charges an absurd price for storage upgrades on all of their devices. I went with the cheapest option and pay for a large iCloud subscription, and it seems to work well - the photo and file sync between the phone, Macbook & even my Windows machine is seamless and quick.

It also feels nice to give my money to a company that doesn't shove ads down my throat. Apple are not saints, they collect a lot of data and telemetry that I'm not a fan of, but at least they are not a corporation that is built on advertising.

Re: Google Pixel 9 Pro

#890

Post by miah_ »

j_timberlake wrote: post #827
peapod91 wrote: post #786

The dominance of the negativity in these comments is noteworthy. Personally, I thought it was a exciting update with major hardware improvements, some compelling AI demos and use cases at a similar price point as the past. Top tech reviewers e.g. MKBHD has similar impressions. Mostly just curious as to why there are ~0 positive comments here. I suspect could be: 1) anti-google HN bias - perhaps deserved? 2) it's simp…

I'm very bullish on genAI, and I bought the new phone, but I really don't think the features shown are that exciting yet. It feels like they're laying the groundwork for more powerful AI to be ready to do things in your phone apps, and the current features are just paving the way. The killer-app (that isn't porn) is going to be asking your phone to order food and it guesses correctly what you want while cross-checkin…

Being able to order food is only useful for those who live in an area where there is food to order. Here in rural Michigan I can count on one hand the number of times I've ordered delivery in the past 3 years.

AI has been totally useless to me in my life. Give me a headphone jack and better SMS spam filtering. No new phone has better features than my Pixel6a and it isn't even that great.

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