Mobile Phone Thread S2

[Cassius_Smoke]

Can someone advise me what's better out of...

Samsung Galaxy Note 9

Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus

My RAZER 2 phone, which was already a replacement to a defective one last November, has fried my SD card and refuses to read my SIM card. THREE will replace it but they want a £100 excess which I'm not happy about given that it's literally 6 months old, when I look after my kit very carefully (my iPhone 4 still looks new and I used that for ~5 years), and they've said that they no longer carry the RAZER 2 and can only offer a replacement.

I know ****-all about Android phones and don't want to learn. Can someone just tell me which of these is better, and if they're comparable to the Razer 2? Like do they have a 120hz screen, front-facing Atmos speakers, etc.?

I can't directly help. But this website might be useful.

https://m.gsmarena.com/compare.php3?&idPhone2=9163&idPhone1=9363

[Cassius_Smoke]

I have just upgraded from my Samsung S9 to an S20 FE. The FE model is the 'cheaper' version of the S20 with the plastic back, rather than glass...

Display:
The regular S20 has a QFHD display and the FE has FHD+, however both phones run a 120hz mode which when enabled on the S20 downgrades the screen to FHD+ anyway and lets face it, why would you not want 120hz turned on. So while on paper the S20 has the better display, in practice the are both the same. They both have HDR+ and the FE is 6.5inch instead of 6.2.

Guts:
The S20 has 16gb ram and the FE has 8gb ram. Again, however, the S20 in Europe has the exynos chip, were as the FE has the better Snapdragon regardless of region. So again, while on paper, the S20 is better, the FE still holds up because the CPU is better. I can tell you from using it, its slick as ice.

Camera:
Both the S20 and FE have the same cameras, except the FE has a better 35mp front facing camera.

Battery:
The S20 has 4000mAh and the FE has 4500mAh, so a larger battery. Also, with it not having 16gb of ram to push and an overclocked exynos chip, the battery life is much longer.

Looks:
The FE has a plastic back and doesn't sport the slight rounded edges to the screen. Neither of which bother me, especially once its in a case. The FE also comes in a wider range of colours. Mine is red...never had a red phone before.

Overall:
I highly recommend it. In practice its actually on par or better than the S20. The display is lovely and bright and with 120hz and HDR+ everything is much more vivid and smooth.
I'm running Retroarch on it and it's much better then my S9. I guess if you use your phone to run some heavy apps, you might want that extra ram, but honestly the snapdragon shows itself to be the better CPU.

[Nu-Eclipse]

Google Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro are coming this Autumn.

They will be the first Pixel devices to move away from Qualcomm Snapdragon and showcase Google's custom "Tensor" SoC.

Embedded Tweet

[wakka]

Very intriguing. I'm liking the design. It's actually distinctive, which is no mean feat when phones have for some time looked as similar to one another as washing machines do.

The sound of a new competitor in chips is interesting, too. The results Apple have had with using theirs for desktop have been really impressive. I'm interested to see how this might shake the processor space up further.

[teddymeow]

Just had to buy my wife a new phone. Youngest grabbed her current one and dropped it into a full potty!!!

Managed to bag a OnePlus Nord N100 for £99 from John Lewis. It's spec enough for what she uses.

[Nu-Eclipse]

Very intriguing. I'm liking the design. It's actually distinctive, which is no mean feat when phones have for some time looked as similar to one another as washing machines do.

The sound of a new competitor in chips is interesting, too. The results Apple have had with using theirs for desktop have been really impressive. I'm interested to see how this might shake the processor space up further.

As much as I want a truly premium Pixel device, I'm not quite sold on the 6/6 Pro just yet.

Yes, the devices look distinctive. But all the speculation is that they will be larger phones - 6.4" and 6.7" for the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro respectively. I'm a Pixel 4 XL user and that is 6.3". I personally am looking to move away from larger phones and back to a smaller form factor, although larger devices are obviously popular with many others.

Also, while I do welcome Pixel devices finally using custom silicon instead of Qualcomm Snapdragon processors (longer user support if nothing else!), Google's track record in hardware QC since going from Nexus to Pixel isn't impressive. Apple have pretty much mastered custom SoCs in their hardware because they've been doing it for years and years now, so the comparison isn't valid imo. Samsung's very own Exynos SoC isn't exactly pulling up trees in Galaxy devices. That said, if Tensor can deliver half of what Google are promising then that would admittedly be a significant leap from the performances that the current Pixel devices offer and would bode well for the future.

Promising stuff on paper but it's very much wait-and-see for me.

[wakka]

It’s interesting that they’ve gone bigger. I kinda thought people were over very big phones at this point. Apple sell substantially more non ‘Max’ iPhones as I recall (and the price difference to get the Max if you’re already buying a Pro is £100, so not huge).

Yeah, who knows what will happen with Tensor. Just good to see more competition in this area.

[nonny]

As much as I want a truly premium Pixel device, I'm not quite sold on the 6/6 Pro just yet.

Yes, the devices look distinctive. But all the speculation is that they will be larger phones - 6.4" and 6.7" for the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro respectively. I'm a Pixel 4 XL user and that is 6.3". I personally am looking to move away from larger phones and back to a smaller form factor, although larger devices are obviously popular with many others.

Also, while I do welcome Pixel devices finally using custom silicon instead of Qualcomm Snapdragon processors (longer user support if nothing else!), Google's track record in hardware QC since going from Nexus to Pixel isn't impressive. Apple have pretty much mastered custom SoCs in their hardware because they've been doing it for years and years now, so the comparison isn't valid imo. Samsung's very own Exynos SoC isn't exactly pulling up trees in Galaxy devices. That said, if Tensor can deliver half of what Google are promising then that would admittedly be a significant leap from the performances that the current Pixel devices offer and would bode well for the future.

Promising stuff on paper but it's very much wait-and-see for me.

Yeah I think I am the same here although I do like/want a bigger sized phone. We haven't really seen a decent large pixel phone since they skipped the XL models. I used to love my Pixel 2 XL.

So I am glad to see Google re-attempting a real flagship but I am mindful that to date it's been the cheaper A models that have really hit the mark just on a function versus cost perspective and the flagship models have been decent but not amazing (5 was good but I think 4 was a disaster).

Given their track record with hardware it remains to be seen just how the 6 pans out but so far I think it looks great. Just I'm personally really cautious...

[Nu-Eclipse]

Official Pixel 6 and 6 Pro promo material recently leaked by Carphone Warehouse ahead of the official Google reveal stream on the 19th (Tuesday week) but quickly taken down.

Thank goodness for the Internet Archive!


Pixel 6 Official Promo

Pixel 6 Pro Official Promo

[teddymeow]

That Pixel 6 Pro looks lush!

May consider switching now that OnePlus are seemingly ditching Oxygen and using a weird combo of it and ColorOS from Oppo.

[Nu-Eclipse]

That Pixel 6 Pro looks lush!

I agree with you. It certainly looks like it will be packing extra tech that won't be in the standard Pixel 6.

I personally just can't be rocking a 6.7" handset though - that's basically a phablet. Even the standard Pixel 6 will be 6.4" and I'm finding that to be excessive, even though I currently use a 6.3" Pixel 4 XL!

I really want to find out more. Roll on October 19th!

[teddymeow]

Who manufactures Google phones now?

It used to be HTC, didn't it?

[Nu-Eclipse]

Who manufactures Google phones now?

It used to be HTC, didn't it?

Technically, it still is.

Google acquired most of HTC back in 2017.

[teddymeow]

Technically, it still is.

Google acquired most of HTC back in 2017.

Oh, cool.

I had an HTC HD7 Windows phone BITD which I loved and then an HTC One S (maybe that's where Microsoft got their naming system from???) which was also great.

[nonny]

I agree with you. It certainly looks like it will be packing extra tech that won't be in the standard Pixel 6.

I personally just can't be rocking a 6.7" handset though - that's basically a phablet. Even the standard Pixel 6 will be 6.4" and I'm finding that to be excessive, even though I currently use a 6.3" Pixel 4 XL!

I really want to find out more. Roll on October 19th!

I used to say this but I've recently got a Poco F3 which is 6.67" and basically I got used to it after a matter of hours and can no longer go back to "small" phones. So whilst I'm really happy with the Poco F3 right now (was only £230) I really think the Pixel 6 Pro has the looks and function to be the best handset out there this year... the iphone 13 just looks so boring in comparison, mate got one and was raving about it but it's honestly ugly.