Google's Nexus 4, 7, 10 Strategy: Openness At All Costs 359
MrSeb writes "There have been plenty of rumors about how the Nexus program was going to grow and change with this year's announcement. Now that we have all the details, it looks like almost none of them were right. There is no Nexus certification program, and the dream of multiple Nexus phones seems well and truly dead. What we do have is a range of device sizes with the Nexus 4, Nexus 7, and Nexus 10. However, the Nexus program has been altered in one important way: we know what Nexus means now. There can no longer be any doubt: a Nexus device is about openness first and foremost. Last year the technology sphere was busily discussing whether or not the Verizon Galaxy Nexus was a 'true' Nexus device. This year we have an answer: a Nexus controlled by a carrier is no Nexus. Rather than get in bed with Verizon, Sprint, or AT&T to produce an LTE version of the Nexus 4, we have HSPA+ only. Even the new Nexus 7 with mobile data is limited to this enhanced 3G standard. And then there's the pricing: The super high-resolution (2560×1600) Nexus 10 tablet starts at just $399; The Nexus 7 is dropping in price to $199 for a 16GB tablet; The Nexus 4 with 16GB of storage is going to sell for $349, exactly the same as the old Galaxy Nexus was until yesterday. To put this into perspective, the LG Optimus G, which the Nexus 4 is based on, sells for $550 without subsidy. Google is pushing the idea of openness with the Nexus devices, but it's not an entirely altruistic endeavor. By giving us cheap and open devices, Google is making sure it's in control — not the carriers. That's better for the consumers, but it's also better for Google."
They need to expand. (Score:2, Informative)
Google need to expand the Play Store to more countries. Not only apps, but music, books and movies too!
Google should also sell its Nexus devices in more countries too.
USA and Europe are not the only places in the world...
it's about wrestling control away from carriers &a (Score:5, Informative)
Can recommend Nexus again. (Score:5, Informative)
In some countries and on some carriers one of the promises of the Nexus brand was broken: we didn't get timely OS updates.
I felt this was a breach of trust - the sort of thing we expect from our carriers and some manufacturers - and it meant I couldn't recommend the Galaxy Nexus to others.
Fortunately, it seems that what happened with the Galaxy Nexus was not acceptable to Google either, and I'm really impressed with the lengths they are going to - bypassing the carriers completely in my country - to set things right.
They will probably only sell a tiny number of the new Nexus w/o carrier support but then again, the carriers' were never going to like or promote a phone that came unlocked and with broad carrier support - so they did little to promote the G'Nex anyway.
So, I'm disappointed that the new Nexus doesn't have LTE, but there is some sense in it (see the linked below for a good explanation) and I believe that the Nexus is once again worth recommending to friends*.
http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/29/3569688/why-nexus-4-does-not-have-4g-lte [theverge.com]
(*assuming the reviews don't uncover lots of bugs or unexpected shortcomings.)
Re:Meet the new boss (Score:5, Informative)
All Nexus devices can also be unlocked and rooted in a straightforward process. That they don't come in this way is a protection for the average Joe who doesn't know what "rooting" even means and who'd just be vulnerable to a malicious app trying to elevate its own permissions.
Nexus devices are still consumer devices.
Re:Openness (Score:5, Informative)
If it was all about openness, then why no micro sd slot
What has openness got to do with a micro sd slot!? I in no way defend not having one. I think that cripples the devices. Seriously you could have talked about the APACHE license, or binary drivers. Merging the Linux kernel, opening up the 1st Party proprietary programs on Android, or highlight the GPL programs available on android! [use http://f-droid.org/ [f-droid.org] ]Not having a microsd slot is about creating artificial different price points for your device. The truth is when compared to the competition it is the most open.
Re:Meet the new boss (Score:5, Informative)
1. When you buy a Galaxy Nexus or Nexus 4 from the play store it comes with an unlocked bootloader.
2. You can restore factory images quite easily, google provides all of them [google.com].
3. You are correct about no root access out of the box, you need to do that yourself.
Re:No LTE, less space than a nomad (Score:5, Informative)
Do you actually carry multiple batteries?
Serious question. I hear people gripe about this all the time, but I don't know ANYONE who actually carries extra batteries. I only hear of people either carrying a charging cable or asking to borrow one.
No, but I want to replace the small battery with a large on. I used my Nexus Galaxy with the standard battery for 2 months before replacing it with battery that would last 2 days, which is what I need.
Re:Meet the new boss (Score:4, Informative)
Unroot and re-lock the thing before you send it in for a warranty.
Since there's no guarantee you'll even get the same device back with a warranty return, what you should really do is make a nandroid (1:1 backup) first and then restore the phone to factory state (bootloader, recovery, rom, data, and all). Then whatever phone you do end up with can be restored to your 'old' phone in a few minutes, and you don't have to worry about who has your data, and unless the FBI is spying on you no one will ever know you did those naughty unlocking and rooting things.
I'm glad for you, Americans.. (Score:4, Informative)
Perhaps Google may succeed in putting the idea of a fully owned phone into the minds of the general American public. We in India and Europe have long since been accustomed to buying cellphones off the shelf from the manufacturer's shop without any contract or any carrier crippling the internals.
Re:Openness (Score:2, Informative)
If they didn't charge $100 for 16GB upgrade, I would say those were solid reasons. But since they are gouging massively on the Flash upgrade (just like Apple) those reason carry less weight.
Re:No LTE, less space than a nomad (Score:4, Informative)
...but I want to be able to have the ability to use microSD cards to keep my media on and be able to easily change it in and out...
If you put your music on Google Music, you can tap-hold on an album or artist and select "Keep on device", and it'll cache it on the device for offline listening. When you're tired of it, uncheck the same option and it'll be garbage-collected.
Honestly, dicking around with sync programs and SD cards would be much harder work.
They need something like that for movies. I suspect it'll come eventually.
Re:Openness (Score:2, Informative)
1) It's supposed to guide carriers/mfgs away from partitioning the memory on their phones (apps/music/etc). The Nexus standard is for a single volume that the user can fill with whatever they like.
You mean it's better to have one tiny storage area than to have multiple storage areas, one of which the user can make as big as (s)he needs? Wait, what?
Nope (Score:3, Informative)
*cough*wrong*cough*
IS-95 and its successor, CDMA2000 are both "Code Division" air interfaces. And they thus share some concepts of "Code Division" on the air interface with UMTS's WCDMA - but that's where it's stops. UMTS WCDMA is really based on FOMA from NTT/DOCOMO, which shares little in common with IS-95/CMDA2000.
The UMTS/WCDMA architecture scales signficantly better than IS-95/WCDMA - which is why GSM 3G networks consistently beat the crap out of Qualcomm CDMA networks. Additionally, your statement about everyone transmitting at once? Wrong again. While its possible to do (and was done on earlier UMTS implementations) modern GSM 3G networks use scheduled resources. Each device in a HSPA state has a dedicated control channel, and their transmis receive time is scheduled...
Also wrong is the part about 2G being used for voice communications. In 3G GSM systems, WCDMA is also the air interface for voice.... Which is why can make a voice call and use data on 3G GSM networks, which you can't on Qualcomm CDMA networks. GSM won.
CDMA lost. That is, Qualcomm's CDMA lost. The succesor to Qualcomm CDMA, UMB ("Ultra Mobile Broadband") also lost. Nobody wanted it. When verizon pulled out (who is majority owned by Vodafone - a GSM carrier) and went the GSM 4G route, LTE, Qualcomm gave up and jumped on the LTE bandwagon.
You're like 99% wrong dude. Read some wikipedia articles or talk to those of us who work in the industry, but don't just assume because one stanard shares the acronym of another standard that they're the same thing. They're not, far from it.
Re:Openness (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, well I don't. I don't and I don't want to have to buy one and I don't want to have to carry one and charge one and sync one.
Yes, exactly. It's simply egocentric and flawed to say "I'd just buy an MP3 player" - as if there is any merit in reason to that statement.
I store offline maps, offline music and offline documents on my 2-year old 32GB microSD card. This means that I always have a PND, an MP3 player and a sizeable USB-stick with me. Reading data off it is easy, always possible and a lot more power-efficient than streaming it from the cloud.
I've even (temporarily, admittedly) used an old 8GB microSD card in an SD adapter as a replacement in a camera (and I'm pretty sure the 32GB will have a similar function in the future). The versatility of dirt cheap internationally standardized little slabs of large amounts of solid state memory is just amazing.
Sure, having an SD slot has some drawbacks, but not having one is unnecessarily stupid.