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Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

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Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#21

Post by aroch »

piquadrat wrote: post #10

More than the fact that tickets like this get closed, I find the way that they are closed infuriating. You would think that dozens of comments, many of them with lots of details, would merit a more extensive answer than a single > contact customer support. How about "Thanks for all your comments. Unfortunately, this is the wrong forum to report problems like this. Please contact the Nexus customer support and let the…

Google is "Nexus customer support", they just don't particularly care about doing that job. Google drops support for their own developer phones faster than Samsung and HTC do.

E: To address the initial downvoters: why don't you explain yourselves. How is Google not responsible for supporting nexus devices? They're sold directly by Google, they're produced for Google, and they're heavily marketed by Google. Google provides the software and hardware support directly after purchase and handles RMAs directly. Google depreciates Nexus device support in HTC has released lollipop upgrades for devices that are >2 years old. Samsung has also released lollipop upgrades for devices >2 years old.

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#22

Post by arihant »

zumtar wrote: post #9

If you have time (and the inclination) then you could report this to the technical support department of the mobile telco you are using. You won't get instant gratification that you would by using a bugtracker but technical reports back to the vendor (in this case Google) do eventually get sent upstream. If enough people complain via Google's channels then the bug will be brought up at higher levels eventually . The…

You know, that is a valid option. When iPhone 4's telephone broke because of the "grip of death" antenna issue, Steve Jobs himself came out, apologized, offered a free bumper case to mitigate the issue. Compare that to this.

And the telco of Nexus is Google! Google just pointed to contact Google.

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#23

Post by furyg3 »

Of course there are multiple rationales for choosing a platform, but support is certainly one of them.

A while ago someone made a nice graph of how good Apple/Google are at maintaining OS support for their devices, it's pretty informative (although I'd like to see a new one). http://www.fidlee.com/android-support-vs-ios-support/

In this case the Nexus 4 is still officially supported by 5.0... but not being able to call on a phone seems like unsupported to me.

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#24

Post by gabemart »

In the link #440 reports that disabling "NuPlayer" fixed the issue. This setting is in Settings > Developer options under "Media".

I've also found that NuPlayer plays unpredictable havoc with an audio playing app I wrote that is currently on Google Play. Some users on Lollipop report audio glitches, silence or weird bluetooth issues. Disabling NuPlayer fixes these issues. I wish there was a way for me, as a developer, to force use of the old AwesomePlayer system for my app in particular, but have no idea if this is possible technically. I certainly haven't found a way to do it.

But what I find surprising is that NuPlayer is labelled "experimental" in Developer options but is enabled by default. Isn't that a bit weird?

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#25

Post by patentAbuse »

Touche wrote: post #13
patentAbuse wrote: post #5

This is a terrible precedent Google is setting, and it is going to cause considerable harm if it gains traction: It's one thing to stop upgrading "older" devices, but quite another to actually break critical, regulated functionality. The Google employee who decided this was a "small" issue apparently doesn't realize that the inoperation of basic voice functionality of cellular devices is the fuel for fat, deserved la…

I think they are starting to regret the Nexus line as they don't make any money off of it and users have high expectations. You can tell, imo, that they are looking to just slowly kill it off.

The Nexus line really saved Android -- it was always the excuse (the best word I can think of) when other devices had update, performance, or security issues. "Well it isn't Android, it's Samsung/HTC/Motorola/Sony/etc, because my Nexus...". It was a critical line.

Google may have killed the Nexus line by making the 9 and 6 so uncompelling, but I doubt it was intentional. They're just a company that has a chronic difficulty prioritizing customer service. Further I don't really think it's "high expectations" to demand that voice functionality works (again, this stuff gets you in serious trouble with regulators. If this were raised to the FTC and/or CRTC, you can bet Google would find a fix extremely quickly).

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#26

Post by josteink »

adlpz wrote: post #11
thomaslutz wrote: post #7

I will never buy a Nexus tablet or phone again. Still no Lollipop for the razorg.

Google is well know for their abysmal costumer support, but this is just the last straw; a telephone that cannot make calls, not even emergency 911/112. And such issue is marked as "Priority-small" and dismissed. It was good while it lasted, but it's clear now that Google not only cannot be depended on for their software (see Google Reader), but also cannot be relied on for our hardware needs. At least they have the…

> but it's clear now that Google not only cannot be depended on for their software (see Google Reader)

How about all versions of Android 4.3 and down? 60% of the Android user-base is now without updates for critical security errors.

Their support is ridiculous.

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#27

Post by zumtar »

arihant wrote: post #22
zumtar wrote: post #9

If you have time (and the inclination) then you could report this to the technical support department of the mobile telco you are using. You won't get instant gratification that you would by using a bugtracker but technical reports back to the vendor (in this case Google) do eventually get sent upstream. If enough people complain via Google's channels then the bug will be brought up at higher levels eventually . The…

You know, that is a valid option. When iPhone 4's telephone broke because of the "grip of death" antenna issue, Steve Jobs himself came out, apologized, offered a free bumper case to mitigate the issue. Compare that to this. And the telco of Nexus is Google! Google just pointed to contact Google.

> And the telco of Nexus is Google!

It isn't, Google doesn't run their own mobile network or mobile virtual network (yet).

Contacting the technical support team of the company that provides you the SIM card that is inserted into the Nexus device will have an effect.

I know it seems backwards because the issue has actually been introduced with Google's OTA update but those technical support calls get escalated and eventually they'll end up back at Google (via the team that deals with carrier interaction).

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#28

Post by e40 »

gabemart wrote: post #24

In the link #440 reports that disabling "NuPlayer" fixed the issue. This setting is in Settings > Developer options under "Media". I've also found that NuPlayer plays unpredictable havoc with an audio playing app I wrote that is currently on Google Play. Some users on Lollipop report audio glitches, silence or weird bluetooth issues. Disabling NuPlayer fixes these issues. I wish there was a way for me, as a developer…

Is NuPlayer a 5.0 only option? (My son's Nexus 5 isn't in front of me.) Using 4.4.4 here, with no plans to upgrade.

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#29

Post by JohnTHaller »

fridek wrote: post #3

This is your second submission of it after https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8838578 I agree this may haven't been resolved nicely, but hidden extrapolation from a few employees to the whole company is not cool on your side either. There are people in there, working their butts off to make one of the largest open source projects better.

Funny that you got downvoted considering the OP is a new account that seems to have been created to post this exact story.

Re: Remember broken Nexus telephony? This is how Google treats it's customers

#30

Post by morganvachon »

aroch wrote: post #21
piquadrat wrote: post #10

More than the fact that tickets like this get closed, I find the way that they are closed infuriating. You would think that dozens of comments, many of them with lots of details, would merit a more extensive answer than a single > contact customer support. How about "Thanks for all your comments. Unfortunately, this is the wrong forum to report problems like this. Please contact the Nexus customer support and let the…

Google is "Nexus customer support", they just don't particularly care about doing that job. Google drops support for their own developer phones faster than Samsung and HTC do. E: To address the initial downvoters: why don't you explain yourselves. How is Google not responsible for supporting nexus devices? They're sold directly by Google, they're produced for Google, and they're heavily marketed by Google. Google pro…

Well...the phone itself is over two years old now, which means it's about 18 months out of support if you're equating it with certain other vendors' devices; Nexus phones actually fare better than some other devices. That said, the fact that Google decided to push 5.0 to it is in itself amazing to me, Nexus status or not.

I have a Nexus 4 that runs 5.0, and when I've switched to it from my Windows phone I've noticed that I randomly have no call audio in the cellular dialer as well as the Hangouts dialer. I guessed it was something to do with the 5.0 release but I figured as little as I use the phone, it was nothing to worry about. But the more I think about it, the more I'm tempted to revert to 4.4 since this is my only backup phone, and I'd rather have it ready to go at the expense of playing with 5.0.

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