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Nexus 5

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Re: Nexus 5

#371

Post by josteink »

sghill wrote: post #370
josteink wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Interesting, I would not have expected so much importance to be placed on unspecified rolling updates. The Galaxy Nexus was sold on software and on software alone. It's hardware was if not underwhelming, certainly not best of breed available in the market when it was launched. And it was launched with a price to match high-end phones from other Android OEMs. If you bought this phone, you bought it because you wante…

Fair enough, I'd be reacting similarly I'm sure. I get that two years is too short, but how long do you expect a device like this to be supported? I think I recall three major updates for my original iPhone, but by the last update it was almost unusably slow.

Google changed versioning schema when rolling out Jelly Bean. On Gingerbread, the various minor updates was versioned 2.3.3, 2.3.4, etc. On Jelly Bean, they were version 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3, but they were all still minor updates.

When you look at it that way, the Galaxy Nexus received one major update and that was it. That's less than most "flagship" consumer devices sold, which typically receive at least two.

As for what I expect from a Nexus, I demand a minimum of two, but find it reasonable to expect three. From this, it seems clear that Google has completely lost its commitment to the Nexus-brand, and to me that makes the Nexus-brand completely uninteresting.

Re: Nexus 5

#372

Post by robflynn »

pa5tabear wrote: post #210
robflynn wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had straight talk for a bit. If I used more than 2GB of data in a month they would threaten to cancel my service. I'm not sure how much you use but that's something to be wary of. Otherwise, my service was fine. They didn't do LTE at the time so I was stuck with 3G.

Did they threaten you about not using online media streaming?

They just said that I shouldn't do it much. They were fairly polite about it. I seem to recall there being a line in their user agreement that mentions prohibition of audio and video streaming, though I suppose it's not really enforced unless you exceed the limit consistently.

Re: Nexus 5

#373

Post by easytiger »

imurray wrote: post #347
Zak wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google really loves their geolocation. It's a bit absurd that when I'm signed in to Google, they still try to give me sites in German, Czech or Swedish based on my location when I've expressed my preference for English in my account settings (not to mention the browser's Accept-Language header). I'm guessing here, but I think there might be some correlation between people who travel internationally a lot and people w…

I used X11 forwarding over SSH to run a browser on my VPS Running a browser remotely in that way can be quite painful. Running Firefox locally you can tell it to use a socks proxy on localhost:1080 after connecting to your VPS with "ssh -D 1080". You may also want to set the about:config setting network.proxy.socks_remote_dns to true. Or you could use VPN software, but that's more to setup, and you already have ssh a…

Well that is the wrong thing to do in that situation.

Just use ssh -D to set up a socks proxy and use your local browser via your remote VPS. I fail to see how that isn't obvious

Re: Nexus 5

#374

Post by magnet_ball »

sghill wrote: post #370
josteink wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Interesting, I would not have expected so much importance to be placed on unspecified rolling updates. The Galaxy Nexus was sold on software and on software alone. It's hardware was if not underwhelming, certainly not best of breed available in the market when it was launched. And it was launched with a price to match high-end phones from other Android OEMs. If you bought this phone, you bought it because you wante…

Fair enough, I'd be reacting similarly I'm sure. I get that two years is too short, but how long do you expect a device like this to be supported? I think I recall three major updates for my original iPhone, but by the last update it was almost unusably slow.

It's not the amount as much as the lifetime.

I live in that ancient belief that you should be able to keep your phone functioning happily for 3 years, which is exactly what happened with my iPhone 4, by iOS 6 it became slow and kind of crashy but usable and it did everything I wanted it to (even if it didn't get all the new features like the new navigation or Siri).

But the main point is that it kept going for more than 3 years, and the Galaxy Nexus, a phone that was really expensive at the time does not get the new update just a year and a half after release. That's half of the lifetime I expect of a phone.

Re: Nexus 5

#375

Post by magnet_ball »

laughfactory wrote: post #318
gtaylor wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, these things are priced pretty cheaply for what you get. Even if you buy a new one every year, you're still coming in cheaper than buying most high end smartphones.

That's exactly how I feel. I'm absolutely overjoyed that I can buy a phenomenal phone--every bit the equal of an iPhone 5S (in my opinion)--for a fraction of the price. And my wife goes through phones so quickly that she's always in need of a new one. But since she's so hard on her phones, she always gets my hand-me-downs. It's a great system. I get the latest and greatest (like the Nexus 5) because I take good care…

It annoys me that people can't keep their phones in working order, you have paid hundreds of dollars on this piece of equipment and you treat it like a piece of shit and in 6 months you complain that it doesn't work?? Maybe if you had treated it like the delicate piece of machinery that it is it wouldn't have broken.

It's a blatant disregard for money and it annoys me deeply when I see someone throwing their 5 inches of glass on the table without a thought.

Re: Nexus 5

#376

Post by fulafel »

Zak wrote: post #191
OoTheNigerian wrote: post #6

As an African/Nigerian I am not even allowed to see what it looks like. Talk less of trying to make a purchase [1]. Last Night, I had to lie that I am in the US so I would be allowed to by Remote by 37Signals on my kindle. Quite ridiculous and annoying. http://imgur.com/eS8agor

Google really loves their geolocation. It's a bit absurd that when I'm signed in to Google, they still try to give me sites in German, Czech or Swedish based on my location when I've expressed my preference for English in my account settings (not to mention the browser's Accept-Language header). I'm guessing here, but I think there might be some correlation between people who travel internationally a lot and people w…

Ignoring the browser language pref (Accept-Language) to get you to make an account - this annoyance has been there since they started offering different language versions.

Re: Nexus 5

#377

Post by Zak »

fulafel wrote: post #376
Zak wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google really loves their geolocation. It's a bit absurd that when I'm signed in to Google, they still try to give me sites in German, Czech or Swedish based on my location when I've expressed my preference for English in my account settings (not to mention the browser's Accept-Language header). I'm guessing here, but I think there might be some correlation between people who travel internationally a lot and people w…

Ignoring the browser language pref (Accept-Language) to get you to make an account - this annoyance has been there since they started offering different language versions.

It also ignores the fact that I'm signed in to my account. There's a separate preference cookie that remembers the language, but it has to be set for each country-specific domain. There's http://google.com/ncr but that doesn't solve the problem across all google services. Buying things is especially problematic.

Re: Nexus 5

#378

Post by cptskippy »

josteink wrote: post #360

I'd be a lot more interested in this if Google didn't just shutter everyone's trust in the Nexus program by obsoleting the Galaxy Nexus, a phone less than two years old. It only got one major OS upgrade since launch, which is less than most regular Samsung phones (which typically receive two). Basically, Google's flagship phone wtih 1GB RAM just got dumped on. By Google. As they launch Android 4.4 which "should run g…

I doubt anyone at Google was thrilled about dropping support but I suspect this was an unavoidable conclusion they came to based on the loss of support from the supplier of the CPU for the Galaxy Nexus.

The Galaxy Nexus uses a TI OMAP CPU and last September(2012) TI announced it was stopping development of OMAP solutions and shifting it's focus to embedded processors. In November it then laid off 1700 people in the OMAP division and moved everyone remaining into their embedded division.

This was around the time Jelly Bean was released and probably before development on KitKat started. Considering how tumultuous layoffs and reorganizations are, it wouldn't surprise me if any engineering support Google needed from TI fell on deaf ears. This leaves Google in a very awkward position.

Re: Nexus 5

#379

Post by cptskippy »

alexhill wrote: post #297
Recoil42 wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Nexus 5 is actually physically smaller in all dimensions than the Nexus 4.

Nexus 5: 69.17 x 137.84 x 8.59 mm [1] Nexus 4: 68.7 x 133.9 x 9.1mm [2] It's wider, taller but half a mm thinner. [1] http://www.google.com.au/nexus/5/ [2] http://www.google.com.au/nexus/4/

I'd convinced myself that it was significantly bigger to avoid being tempted by it, and maintaining this disillusionment through sheer laziness. Seeing those numbers has me checking my bank account. You are a very bad man.

Re: Nexus 5

#380

Post by josteink »

cptskippy wrote: post #378
josteink wrote: post #360

I'd be a lot more interested in this if Google didn't just shutter everyone's trust in the Nexus program by obsoleting the Galaxy Nexus, a phone less than two years old. It only got one major OS upgrade since launch, which is less than most regular Samsung phones (which typically receive two). Basically, Google's flagship phone wtih 1GB RAM just got dumped on. By Google. As they launch Android 4.4 which "should run g…

I doubt anyone at Google was thrilled about dropping support but I suspect this was an unavoidable conclusion they came to based on the loss of support from the supplier of the CPU for the Galaxy Nexus. The Galaxy Nexus uses a TI OMAP CPU and last September(2012) TI announced it was stopping development of OMAP solutions and shifting it's focus to embedded processors. In November it then laid off 1700 people in the O…

Considering how tumultuous layoffs and reorganizations are, it wouldn't surprise me if any engineering support Google needed from TI fell on deaf ears. This leaves Google in a very awkward position.

Sure that's a reason, but it's not an excuse.

Had something like this happened to for instance Microsoft or Apple, they would have footed the bill, engineered a solution, and lived up to what they promised their customers in the first place.

That's why you have a profit-margin after all: To foot the bill when (and not if) something unexpected happens and doesn't go according to plan.

Here Google is just cascading their own problems with their own sub-contractors directly on to their customers and saying, "Hey! Sorry. You're screwed. And btw we'll keep the money you paid us".

That's totally unprofessional and completely uncool.

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