Tag: nexus

Goodbye Nexus 5x?

I left my flat Thursday heading for a train to York. Turning on my bluetooth headphones I noticed my Nexus 5x wasn’t connecting. One look at my phone and I noticed the screen was off. So I turned it back on and noticed the bootloader loop I had heard so much about.

While I made my way to York University, I tried multiple times to turn it on using different methods and it was in the taxi when I could actually type in my code to unlock the storage. Of course once it rebooted, it was back to the loop again. I also remember at some point watching the boot loader animation throw a error message which I wasn’t quick enough to snap. But I do remember it saying the storage was corrupt and it needed servicing?

By the time I was home again, it was dead. No matter how much I held down the buttons nothing would happen. I charged it up but there was no lights. Luckily I still have my Nexus 5 with the messed up screen, I had also thought about switching to the Google Pixel 2, but at £629 for the 64gig version, I just can’t bring myself to hit order (its a serious load of money especially since my Nexus 5x was £200) especially since I wasn’t sure if I would be in Manchester to actually get it. I had not realised it not actually officially available yet!

In the end after working with my Nexus 5 for a day, I decided to get the Pixel 2 with 128gig and buy it from Carphone warehouse only because I can pick it up from Manchester or London if needed. Just he last 24hours has made realise how much I use my phone for things like Monzo, 2 factor auth and much more. In the meanwhile I’l struggle through with the minimum number of apps on my Nexus 5 & 7.

I may attempt to un-brick my Nexus 5x when I got more time and in our R&D lab with the right tools. But seeing how I was waiting for the Pixel 2, I guess its time really.

Android Oreo upgrade on my Nexus 5x

Nexus 5x with Oreo upgrade

3 days ago I received the OTA update for Android Oreo on my Nexus 5x. I wasn’t really expecting it, as I’ve been keeping an eye out for my next phone (which is likely to be a Google Pixel 2 even at its much higher cost than my Nexus 5x)

Honestly I haven’t seen much differences except the background tasks are now in your face. Which isn’t a problem as I don’t have a lot running all the time (Timeused, Pebble & Twlight), be interesting to see how long apps like Uber stay in the background

I have noticed a drain on battery, for example my battery is at 88% right now and will stay alive for the next 9 hours. But to be fair its a old battery, I think the same use on Android N would be closer to 92% maybe.

Some of regular menus are shifted around and the small text which I have my phone set to, really is actually small. I am surprised there is no native bluelight filter (redshift, twilight, etc) but I guess it might upset all those apps which do this.

The upgrade was painless, it took 42mins as I was watching an American TV show as it upgraded its self.

Generally I’m happy with the state of the upgrade and although I know this is the last upgrade for the Nexus 5x; it might keep the phone going even longer.

My nexus 5x battery is pleasingly decent

I got to say this isn’t bad going for my nexus 5x with 4g, WiFi, Bluetooth and NFC on all the time. I was using my Bluetooth headphones at work for music and calls. Plus I got my pebble smartwatch on all the time.

I was pleased to see so much power without turning anything off or doing anything special to save power.

Material Design in Android 5: Lollipop

Nice use of natural materials

All my Nexus devices have been updated to Android 5: Lollipop and I’m getting use to the changes.

My old 2012 Nexus 7 was first to be upgraded, about a week after the release of Lollipop. Then a week and half later my Nexus 5 was upgraded. I thought the Nexus 5 would be first honestly.

The Nexus 7 had problems, the upgrade was fine but it got really really slow afterwards.  I wiped the cache a few times and that helped but after a day of use, it would go back to super slow. In the end I had to wipe the whole device and just start a fresh. Luckily Google made the process much quicker and easier. Using NFC on my Nexus 5, it sets up an adhoc network and transfers most of the settings across. Only real issue is setting up all the individual apps.

Android 5 is actually really nice, its like the jump from Android 2: GIngerbread to Android 4: Icecream sandwich (we don’t talk about Android 3: Honeycomb). Icecream sandwich’s Halo interface was great and to be honest Material design is a little weird to get use to. But you get use to it and the way it works. In actual fact the interaction design of the interface is well thought out.

I basically think of everything being pieces which are viewed from a top down view. The shadows help with this and the motion makes things very clear. My own gripe is the flat colours but the edge to edge pictures help break things up quite a bit. I would say its not as revolutionary as the Windows Metro interface but its smarter and is a lot clearer.

Quite interesting when you look at the other human interfaces guidelines in software.

Pure Google, Pure Nexus…

I wondered down to the Orange/EE shop the other day, as I was sure my contract ran out Valentine’s day. Well I was wrong, it ran out in November last year! This was a shock because not only was I paying more than I needed to but I was running around with the HTC1x with the terrible battery and touchscreen problem.

Well I decided to stay with Orange/EE mainly because of the discounts I have built up (25% off my line rental) and I do still like the idea of Orange Wednesdays. So took the free boxed Samsung Galaxy S4 and sold it on ebay the same day for the same amount of money I spent on a brand new Google Nexus 5 (something I should have gotten ages ago)

The Nexus5 is as you would expect amazing. I do miss my HTC1x but I certainly don’t miss the battery life. The Nexus has that LG characteristic of harsh edges. But its a nice size and nice look.I went for the Black one over the White and Red one. Running Android 4.4 KitKat isn’t such a big deal as I have the same on my Nexus 7. Its goodbye to Jellybean, although I’m keeping my HTC1x for now. Not quite sure what else to do with it.

If I sold it on ebay, I would have to declare the fault and that means it won’t sell for much at all. Maybe it can be a back up phone or my new work phone?

What ever happens, I’m looking forward to a pure Google experience not a Google, HTC and Orange shared experience.

Reminder that Jobs wasn’t always right

1984-steve-jobs-ipad

Got to love the new Google Nexus 7.

Recently I have seen a lot of people with the Apple ipad mini, so much when I see someone with the ipad full. I can’t help but touch it and lift it. Usually saying something like “wow its really that big and that heavy!”

Although I use to get ratty when people confused my Samsung Tab 7+ with the ipad mini

So ironic being the fact the Galaxy 7+ was released in the middle of fight between Samsung and Apple. Apple said the Galaxy tabs looked like the ipad and got the Galaxy Tab 8.9 and 7.7 blocked in different parts of the world. Samsung fighting the blocks, decided to make a Galaxy Tab 7+ which I ended up buying.

Back to the point…

People making the mistake of thinking my Galaxy 7+ is a ipad mini… Thats finally starting to go away now the market is flooded with 7inch tablets.

Steve Jobs famously announced, there is no need for a 7inch tablet.

No tablet can compete with the mobility of a smartphone, its ease of fitting into your pocket or purse, its unobtrusiveness when used in a crowd. Given that all tablet users will already have a smartphone in their pockets, giving up precious display area to fit a tablet in our pockets is clearly the wrong trade-off. The 7-inch tablets are tweeners, too big to compete with a smartphone and too small to compete with an iPad.

These are among the reasons we think the current crop of 7-inch tablets are going to be DOA, dead on arrival. Their manufacturers will learn the painful lesson that their tablets are too small and increase the size next year, thereby abandoning both customers and developers who jumped on the 7-inch bandwagon with an orphan product…

Well he was so wrong, even Apple themselves ended up building the 7.9inch ipad mini. But more interestingly is the overall demand for 7inch tablets is very high.

My next phone… Its that of the year again

Google Galaxy Nexus

Yes its that time again… Time for the phone upgrade and I’m really not sure which one to go for?

I want to get another Android phone but I don’t want to get another Gingerbread (Android 2.3) phone because thanks to Cyanogen I’m already enjoying Gingerbread on my HTC Desire. This means the HTC Sensation is a no and the LG Optimus is heck no running Froyo. I’m also thinking although I really like the Samsung Galaxy S2, and it will be upgrading to Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4). I’m interested to see what else might be hitting the market soon… No idea when the Samsung Galaxy Nexus is coming to Orange but I might wait and see what comes in the next few months.

What would you do…?

Would I get a Google Nexus One?

Get your nexus here

I like what Google have done with there own mobile phone. Lots of nice software tweaks to a frankly great phone. There’s no doubt that HTC make the best mobile phones in the world, be them for Microsoft like the HTC HD2 or for Android in the form of the Droid or now the Nexus One.

Would I buy one myself? Well my contract does run out soon but the Nexus One doesn’t come on Orange or Tmobile in the UK which means I won’t get the data package it deserves. I’m still feeling the HD2 which has a even larger screen at 4.3 inches.

Anyway you can now buy the Google Nexus phone online today at Google’s own microsite.