Google Unveils Pixel and Pixel XL, the First Phones It 'Designed Inside and Out' (www.bgr.in) 197
At an event on Tuesday, Google unveiled the Pixel and Pixel XL smartphones, the first phones "designed inside and out by Google." Focusing less on the hardware, the company says the biggest selling point of the phones is Google Assistant, which will be available to users wherever they go. Both Pixels have a quad-core 2.15GHz 64-bit processor, 4GB of RAM, 32GB or 128GB of storage, a 12.3MP rear camera, an 8MP front camera, a fingerprint scanner on the back, and a USB-C port on the bottom. The major differences between the two are in size, display (5-inch vs 5.5-inch), and battery (2770mAh vs 3450mAh). The company says the rear camera on both phones is top-notch as well, scoring 89 on DxO, the highest ever for a smartphone. Both phones also come with "endless cloud storage," the company said. It will let users backup unlimited storage in full-resolution images and videos shot with the Pixel. Pricing starts at $649 for the smaller 5-inch Pixel, available for preorder today. Mark Gurman of Bloomberg shares the inside story of how these phones were conceived.
#madebygoogle (Score:5, Informative)
It's not made by Google, it's made by HTC. And they just rejiggered the HTC 10. http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_10... [gsmarena.com]
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Sounds like HTC did the design:
Managed by Google Marketing Dolts in California, USA
Designed by HTC in Taiwan
Built by slaves in Foxconn
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Apple phones are made by Samsung and other mobile manufacturers. Qualcomm is one of the biggest mobile processor makers in the world, even though they are fabless. That's just the reality of modern, global industry.
do people really talk to their phones? (Score:5, Insightful)
because i never see it and don't know anyone who does. other than doing it for safety reasons while driving this sounds like the most stupid thing ever. and i've tried Siri and Google Now and hate both
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Yup, I do.
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Everyone I know who does it, does it for stupid trivial shit and it still fails. It seems to be ineffective and greatly annoys those around them, but they don't seem to care when people are angrily looking at them for yelling "set timer for 10 minutes" 7 times.
Happens to android and iOS users
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Maybe it's an accent problem? I "OK Google" stuff all the time, including when I'm driving in my less than silent car, and have very little problem with it.
Re:do people really talk to their phones? (Score:4, Funny)
How the fuck is that possible? "Everyone"? Really? I am not a native English speaker - in fact, I have a Hungarian accent, and yet my phone understands nearly every single thing I tell it, including isotropic, peristalsis, tandem mass spec(trometry), atmospheric pressure photoionizatin, ICP plasma....
Fuck me, if I can get my phone to recognize ICP plasma, and NONE of your friends get to be understood at all... I am at a lack of words. Unless you're full of shit. Are you? Because that would be the simplest explanation.
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You probably have more interesting conversations with your phone than most people have with their cow orkers. Be nice to the poor sods.
Besides, Kardashian is really hard to pronounce correctly.
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I was searching for information about Ensign Harry Kim and dealings with the Cardassians and Google returned me information about some cosmetically-enhanced American chick.
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Something about wheels and handicrafts, I think.
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I do that all the time - I am actually quite amazed and amused at how well "my phone understand me". It perfectly interpreted terms such as reverse osmosis, peristalsis, electrospray ionization... so yeah, I do speak to my phone because I can't be assed to type on it when it understands 99% of my words, even the ones most people don't know what they are.
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Driving, the big key thing is driving.
Yes yes people actually talk to their phones, and when their not driving it looks and sounds quite stupid.
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The one and only thing I use Siri for is "Siri, take me home" at the end of an Uber shift when I'm somewhere I have no idea what the best route out of it is. Instantly navigates me home, which I usually only need for the first few turns until I'm back on the highway or whatever. For anything, it's pointless. It never plays the music I ask for, never interprets my commands to text someone correctly (Like say the pax I'm on the way to pickup). Siri sucks. Hard. To the point I get fed up and yell at her :-)
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[do people really talk to their phones] because i never see it and don't know anyone who does. other than doing it for safety reasons while driving this sounds like the most stupid thing ever. and i've tried Siri and Google Now and hate both
It used to be a useless gimmick, but the tech has come on massively recently. I use it a lot for certain specific tasks on my phones and tablets
I haven't used Siri in a while, but Google Now and Cortana especially work really well for me. If I want to call somewhgere that isn't in my contacts then I use voice. "Call the Apple store on Regents Street, London" is quicker than googling for a number and dialling it. Also, for playing music, it's a ton quicker, just tell the device what you want to play and it d
Not in public... (Score:2)
That would be weird. But I use it all the time for general searches if I'm not going to disturb other people because it's significantly faster than typing.
Yes, I use Siri often (Score:2)
Siri, remind me when I get home/to the office to...
Siri, text my wife that....
Siri, take me to home/whatever
Siri, set an alarm for 8:00am
Those are the things I do multiple times per week, there are other less common uses but those I find are the most useful and they work pretty much 100% of the time.
Price... (Score:5, Informative)
Let's see what happens when sales remain flat. Nexus had good prices (except for the nexus 6) with decent hardware. Selling the pixels starting at 649$ seems arrogant at best. For that price most people will choose the iPhone and get a faster phone to boot (1 year old iPhone 6S even beats the Note 7)
I just hope the Nexus program lives on. If android is about choice, we should be able to have a phone with google-provided updates for 350$. I don't want to switch to Samsung, LG, or even custom roms
Re:Price... (Score:4, Interesting)
The price is very disappointing, as is the spec really. Doesn't seem to have optical image stabilization, the Achilles' heel of the 5X and 6P. No wireless charging, no SD card slot... Might as well wait for the 6P to go on sale as it is discontinued.
Re:Price... (Score:5, Informative)
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I'll wait for independent reviews. They showed similar demos of the software stabilisation for the 5x/6p and it looked good, but the results people actually get are pretty poor.
It's not just video. They have massive pixels for good low light performance, but if the camera is moving when you take a shot it can't really unblur the image.
OiS is popular for a reason.
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Still outrageously expensive, and I definitely wont be buying any portable device without a micro-sd slot.
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"7 hours of battery with a 15 minute charge"
Sorry, but that's bullshit marketing at it's finest. My Note will last over 110 hours on a single charge with the battery saving features enabled, so 7 hours of battery life is like 6% of the capacity. OTOH, typical screen-on-time for even good AMOLED phones using apps with light colored backgrounds is rarely over 5-6 hours without special settings to save power. That would imply up to a 140% charge in just 15 minutes. They may as well have said it will charge up
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Agreed. I paid £240 for my Nexus 4, which was an excellent price at the time and the main factor in my purchase. Turned out to be a good investment too, as I'm still using it now almost 4 years later, and it still does everything I need and want a phone to do. Lack of 4G isn't a problem because I don't want to stream HD movies to my phone (who does this?) and I don't play fancy games which I suspect might be a little slow on a 4 year old GPU. I don't anticipate needing an upgrade for the next year or
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Not in 2012, but now yes probably. The Elephone Trunk I bought my dad recently for £50 (near enough same spec as the current Moto G) would do me perfectly well right now. Same would probably apply to 90% of people out there buying £600 phones on contracts though, mobile phones ran out of innovation a couple of years ago, now the biggest feature of this new phone is supposedly is Google Assistant, which would run perfectly well on that £50 phone.
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It's even worse than all that. The new phones are exclusive to Verizon. WTF??
How does this jive with Project Fi. It's like they completely abandoned the Nexus phone ideology.
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... also available, unlocked, on the Google Store.
Re:Price... (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know who's paying $600+ for their phones, but it seems that there's a lot of people doing it. Because manufacturers keep producing phones at this price. The most I've ever spent on a phone was $300, and my last one was $200. For $200 I think I'm getting a pretty good experience from my phone. Certainly things couldn't really be 3 times better with a $600 phone. I only see myself spending less and less in the future as low end phones become more powerful. I paid $600 for my last desktop computer, and it sure does a lot more than my phone. No only that, but it's easily repairable, so I'll probably have the majority of the components for a decade. I'm currently replacing cell phones about every 2 years. At that rate, who can afford $600 phones. Even if it lasts 3 years it still isn't worth it to me.
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The most I've ever spent on a phone was $300... I'm currently replacing cell phones about every 2 years. At that rate, who can afford $600 phones.
People like you that buy a new phone every 4 years.
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at these prices, seems that after next year when i get the last android OS, i will have to resort to custom roms to get the latest versions. I only upgrade phones to get the latest OS anyway. For my use (texting, calls and some browsing) the 5X will serve me good for a while
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Like, the very people who buy Galaxy S7/iPhone 7 and make them successful phones? Yeah, those.
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Especially at that price.
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For that price most people will choose the iPhone
Some how I think the people who chose iPhones over Androids flagship phones, and vis-versa couldn't give a rats ass about the price.
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Or the OnePlus 4 when it debuts because it will likely have better specs and a lower price than the new Pixel.
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To be honest, you're exaggerating the importance of the performance in the smartphones. A three year old Nexus 5 has enough power to provide smooth web browsing, video playback, and so on. I think the only demographic that really cares about the SoC power is the mobile gamers.
Given the same price, I personally will still choose Google phone over LG, Samsung, etc (and don't get me started on the iPhone). Why? Google phones come with a relatively lean software setup. A typical Nexus phone had something like 5
Google Page? (Score:2)
Where's the Google page for this? I don't see it in the store or at /pixel.
I'm assuming it has no SD card slot, CDMA reception, or a battery that can be quickly removed for security, but I'd like to at least look. I'm really surprised it has no more RAM than my four year old phone, though.
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It supports Project FI thus both CDMA and GSM bands. Also Verizon is selling this in their stores.
How much RAM do you want or expect in a phone? What do you use that needs more than 4gigs of RAM?
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More RAM would be useful for switching between apps so the app and its state stay in RAM, avoiding a swap out penalty for those that save their state, a swap in penalty for reloading that state, and worse, going to the network when the state isn't saved completely, or worse yet, those that just reset to a "just launched" mode whenever they get swapped out.
Re:Google Page? (Score:4, Insightful)
Where's the Google page for this? I don't see it in the store or at /pixel.
It's at the adorable madeby.google subdomain [google.com]. Because of course that makes sense.
I'd also like to know why it's so difficult for Slashdot editors to include a link to the Google page. Shitty link farms like BGR obviously don't link back to Google but it would be nice if Slashdot would hold itself to a higher standard.
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$650, all the way up to $770? (Score:2)
Holy crap, $650? Did I miss a memo, or is that outrageously high?
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I'm also a little skeptical about this "google assistant". It sounds one step removed from Clippy "It looks like you're trying to buy IED supplies, would you like me to find some local wholesalers and notify local authorities?"
Don't understand justfication for Pixel (Score:4, Interesting)
Project Fi (Score:2)
Did they mention any possibility of Project Fi support with these new phones, or is it time to look at the older 5x / 6p models once they go on sale?
Re:Project Fi (Score:4, Informative)
89 (Score:5, Insightful)
"89? 89 what?"
"I don't know, but you have to admit, it sounds like a lot of them."
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Re:89 (Score:5, Informative)
Strange, since they gave it an 86. [dxomark.com]
This is why Pixels will fail (Score:5, Interesting)
Now at the same price bracket as Note 7/SGS7 here's the list of features you will not get:
Updates to new major Android versions will be ceased just 24 months after the release. Google is out of their minds.
Re:This is why Pixels will fail (Score:5, Informative)
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Heh. I picked up a moto G4 for $130 with sales tax from that deal that Amazon is offering. It came with ads/bloatware but I was able to remove them with a readily available tool.
It technically does have a 5.5" 1920x1080 screen, a large battery, 2 gigs of RAM, and a quad core processor. It's also technically slow as a snail compared to the phones you listed, equivalent to a good phone probably at least 2 years old. ...But it works fine. You can browse the web. Use maps. Send texts. Answer phone calls.
water resistant? (Score:2)
Let me guess... (Score:2)
That's some giant Pixels (Score:2)
It seems that i'll have to go with one of Sony's Xperia Compact phones if i actually want small size with decent hardware, but despite owning a PS4 the notion of getting computer hardware from Sony makes me a little uneasy.
It's the apps (Score:2)
I've been using iPhones since 2008 since my work pays for them. At this point I have tons of apps that I've purchased (and that I use) that I would not want to repurchase if I moved to Android. If google was to say "if you purchase a Pixel, and if the iOS apps you own also exist in the play store, we will pay for the apps, this is a one time deal between this date and this date" then I'd jump on over.
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Speaking purely financially: A top of the line Apple you can find similar specs on Androids frequently for $200 less. If anyone has $200 worth of apps then they have other problems!
If you prefer Apple it doesn't really matter if you could switch to Android for less though.
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Why would having $200 worth of apps be a problem? Just a really good dictionary app (with great etymologies) can cost $30. I have a great personal wiki app that cost $6. I use anki, and while I can't recall the cost it was somewhere in the $30 range. I have tons of boardgame apps and each of those costs around $5. Getting up to the $200 range after nearly 10 years of having a smartphone is very easy.
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The have board games like stone age, castles of mad king ludwig, carcassonne, ticket to ride, pandemic, agricola, san juan, splendor, galaxy trucker, tsuro, patchwork, paperback, AACBAS, etc. built in? Cool! I put out $30 for a dictionary that has wonderful etymologies. I'm thrilled to learn that that same dictionary is built into android. I have tons of apps that I happily paid money for that aren't the types of things that are built into any OS.
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Well, since I'm not the one paying for my smartphones or my data plan I'm not really too worried about it. My only outlay is the apps I purchase.
Root? (Score:2)
I wonder if the phones will be rootable. And if they can be rooted, I wonder, (given that they're made by HTC), if users will be able to truly root them.
I rooted the last HTC phone I had, then proceeded to delete Facebook, Twitter, and the rest of the shovelware I had no use for. On the next hard reset, all the crap was back. Repeatedly. I never could find the file(s) from which they restored it - I suspect it was in an unaccessible boot location. Also, custom ROM's weren't available, because on this partic
From TFA (Score:2)
"Though manufactured by HTC, both smartphones feature the âGâ(TM) logo and are touted as âMade by Googleâ(TM)."
As if this were any different from "though manufactured by Samsung, the phones feature the Apple logo and are touted as 'made by Apple'."
Asshats.
qualcomm (Score:2)
G designed it inside and out, except it's just another Snapdragon platform. G didn't make their own ARM SoC, which is the heart of any Android device.
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Google's arrogance is incredible. They are the last to release their 2016 smartphone based on SD820/821, and a very long while after the releases of spec-by-spec pretty similar products from Samsung, LG, HTC, Oneplus, etc. They advertise this as something new and revolutionary and demand a premium price.
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Sorry, but they're one of the first ones to release on 821. If you're going to lump 821 with 820, you may as well say Google is the last to release a phone on the 800s.
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We can safely lump those 821 and 820 together. 821 is using the same "Kryo" compute cores and the same Adreno GPU as 820, clocked slightly higher. Nothing revolutionary there AT ALL.
Of course, we can't lump all the 800s together. However, the situation is quite similar to say the relationship between Snapdragon 800 and 801. The same cores, core count, and GPU. The 800 came out first, and then 801 came out with a slightly higher clocked CPU and GPU. I had phones based on 800 and 801, and there was practicall
Nope. Will still use the Nexus 5 and wait. (Score:2)
So much closer to anything they have offered since the Nexus 5, but still not a suitable replacement for my Nexus 5 because of the first two negatives.
- I want wireless charging option.
- I want a reasonable price- this is too high.
I could even overlook the price if it has wireless charging. I just do not want to give up that incredibly convenient feature. Here are the positives and don't cares:
+ I want lots of battery life. This has it.
+ I want a freaking 3.5mm headphone jack. This has it.
+ I want a decen
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With such a long list of deal-breaking requirements, I don't think you will ever buy a new smartphone. Meanwhile the prices for 32GB Nexus 5X have dropped to well below 300USD since this summer, and I suspect the 6P will also drop down by the holidays.
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"- I want wireless charging option."
yeah, me too. I have a great wireless charger in my car. I drop in my phone and drive. It is just so convenient. I don't know why they dropped the wireless charging feature. Looks like I'll be keeping my Nexus 5 a for another year or two.
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Get a standalone wireless charger, and plug it on the USB port. Problem solved!
EoL for Lastest Nexus Devices? (Score:2)
So... the Nexus 5x and Nexus 6P are deleted? EoL? Just like that?? They're only *just* one year old, and even their cases and accessories have vanished from the Play Store along with the old Nexus devices...
Re:End of AOSP? (Score:5, Informative)
AOSP has been dead since Google Play Services became the good part of android
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Yes and No. A good part of the benefit of AOSP was that Google Play Services wasn't included. Everyone was shouting they wanted a Google free Android phone.
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Tin-foil aside, the benefit of AOSP is you can replace the firmware with a community ROM, long after Google has discontinued support for your Nexus device.
I do use f-droid but all the 'popular' apps are on Play. So for me it's Google-lite rather than free. The stock firmware includes dozens of Google apps, most of which I'll never use that keep wanting to update and because they're baked into the image, difficult to remove.
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the whole point of buying the google is they didn't have anything on top of the stock android.
What is "stock android" if not the version that Google put out? Don't kid yourself, the "vanilla" version of Android has always been exactly what Google wanted it to be. The only difference is that now instead of other vendors saying "Ha I know better, I won't use feature x" they now longer have the choice.
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I am altering the deal.
Pray I do not alter it any further.
Nope. (Score:2)
The whole point of buying google was that their boot loader was unlocked, and the hardware was documented and relatively open, and you could install whatever the shit you wanted.
(Even full blown GNU/Linux, Open WebOS, SailfishOS... even some hacked embed Windows for shit and giggles).
If Google isn't locking the new phones, a sizeable portion of their consumer base will still buy them.
If the non-AOSP parts aren't excessively intrusive and destroying the experience, a lot of the remaining portion will keep b
Re:Nope. (Score:4, Insightful)
If the non-AOSP parts aren't excessively intrusive and destroying the experience
The non-AOSP parts are the parts that define the Google "experience" of being excessively intrusive and datamining the shit out of you. Seriously, how do you think that this "assistant" works without being excessively intrusive?
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I love that there's 3 different whole points to buying from google.
Clearly everyone had different reasons.
For me it was:
1) Stock Android
2) Price
3) root for the early versions, but adding screenshot to the OS reduced that for me
4) Custom ROMs
In that order.
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Very much yes [twitter.com].
Drill it! (Score:2)
You can still drill one into it, if it misses a jack.
(Just don't forget to put the phone in the Microwave to recharge it's battery if it stops working while the drilling is in progress).
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Fine Print: Offer applies only to those with unlimited data, constant WiFi connections or don't mind high cellular bills.
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If your primary concern is to make sure your phone can't track things you do then the last company you want to buy it from is Google. Your issue has nothing to do with batteries.
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Quick Charge obviates the need for a user replaceable battery
No, it really doesn't.
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Don't want no 'fucking stereo jack', thankyouverymuch. I put my phone in my pants pocket. I want it to stay there.
Quietly.
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Because it isn't a 6P.
Phones come in all sorts of sizes. There are no rules stating all phones should be the same size as the 6P
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There are no rules stating all phones should be the same size as the 6P
Madness! Surely every manufacture slavishly copies Apple.
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The iPhone 7 review has been out for a week now. It scored an 86, placing it in a 4 way tie for 8th place along with flagships from LG, Samsung and HTC which were released 12-18 months ago.
I'm pretty sure DxO is happy to test any phone that a manufacturer sends them, but I'm somewhat concerned that it wasn't a "off the assembly line" version, and that Google could have easily sent them a handset that was picked for best performance from a larger batch.