Galaxy Nexus vs iPhone 4S

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Dec 30, 2005
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Interesting article for those deciding between Galaxy Nexus and iPhone 4S

http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer...ng-galaxy-nexus-vs-iphone-4s-head-head-review


Summary

Design: the Galaxy Nexus is bigger, thinner and lighter
Both devices are made from premium materials, with Samsung opting for high-grade plastic on the back whereas the Iphone uses glass and has a polished steel frame around the outside. The Galaxy Nexus feels more durable and is likely to survive more drops than the Iphone, which is susceptible to having its screen cracked.

The only screen criteria that are noticeably different are the brightness and text input. When set to automatic brightness, the Iphone 4S is brighter, as can be seen above, making text easier to read. Of course, the brightness on the Galaxy Nexus can be turned up manually, but this will chew up more battery life.

Hardware: the Galaxy Nexus has more power, but the Iphone 4S is still smoother
Despite having a faster processor and double the memory, the performance of the Galaxy Nexus is not noticeably faster than the Iphone. In fact, actions such as reorientation of the screen, pinch-to-zoom and transition between apps are smoother on the Iphone 4S, a testament to the cohesion between Apple's software and hardware.

Camera
An area where the Iphone 4S has a definite hardware advantage is the camera. Credit where it is due, the 8MP camera is the best camera we've seen on a smartphone and outdoes the 5MP camera on the Galaxy Nexus. Colours on the Galaxy Nexus appear a bit washed out, and images are very noisy compared to the Iphone 4S when zooming to the highest level.

Operating system: Google's Android 4.0 innovates whereas Apple's IOS 5 plays it safe

Voice recognition: Siri is more fun to use than Google Voice

Google's Voice feature is rather mundane compared to Siri. It is possible to dictate emails and text messages, but the accuracy fluctuates. It is best to speak slowly to ensure an accurate transcription. However, Google's voice recognition trumps Siri in the ability to search for directions and sync with the ever reliable Google Maps. There are also a number of other features such as the abilities to transcribe voicemails, screen callers and personalise a greeting - but these are available to US users only at present.

Battery: the Galaxy Nexus outlasts the Iphone 4S
The Li-Ion 1,432mAh battery in the Iphone 4S struggles to keep the device running for a full day, owing to the IOS 5 battery bug. The sealed back makes it impossible to swap out the battery, and those who use their devices heavily will need to carry a charger and make sure they are near a power source during the day.

Overall: Tough call
If we were to pick one, we would wholeheartedly take the Galaxy Nexus, as we prefer the openness of Android, the apps are plentiful and the larger screen is great for web browsing and watching videos.
 
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I don't know how it would be a hard decision to make. To me, they're both totally different phones with several trade-offs and few similarities. All you have to do is decide what your priorities are in a phone and choose the one that excels in the areas that are important to you.
 
Once the bug in iOS 5 is fixed iPhone battery life will destroy the Nexus.

I'm running iOS 5.0.1 or whatever it is on a regular 4 and it lasts 2.5 days with pretty regular use. It will last 2 days with very heavy use. I only charge my phone every other night once it reaches 20%.
 
Once the bug in iOS 5 is fixed iPhone battery life will destroy the Nexus.

I'm running iOS 5.0.1 or whatever it is on a regular 4 and it lasts 2.5 days with pretty regular use. It will last 2 days with very heavy use. I only charge my phone every other night once it reaches 20%.

Odd, co-worker of mine has a regular (Verizon) 4 and has to charge it every night still. All she really does is text/talk on it. She didn't say what % it's usually down to every night, but she said it wouldn't last the next day if she didn't charge it at night.

As long as it gets through a day with moderate/heavy usage is all that really matters though. If you're sleeping all night, it would be kind of dumb not to go ahead and charge your phone so you don't risk it getting low or dying the next day.
 
Once the bug in iOS 5 is fixed iPhone battery life will destroy the Nexus.

I'm running iOS 5.0.1 or whatever it is on a regular 4 and it lasts 2.5 days with pretty regular use. It will last 2 days with very heavy use. I only charge my phone every other night once it reaches 20%.

Say what? I hear this from people all over forums but I have yet to meet one in real life. My 4s lasts maybe 10 hours of moderate use which is par for what I see. If I never use my phone, or very light useage, then I'll get a good two days out of it. 12-24 hours of moderate to heavy use would be a godsend and what I would call excellent and that is what I'm hoping for on the Nexus.
 
Once the bug in iOS 5 is fixed iPhone battery life will destroy the Nexus.

I'm running iOS 5.0.1 or whatever it is on a regular 4 and it lasts 2.5 days with pretty regular use. It will last 2 days with very heavy use. I only charge my phone every other night once it reaches 20%.

I understand you're not an Android fan from previous posts, but using hyperbole doesn't help your side - it just makes you look like a fanboy.

Heavy use to me is constant gaming or web browsing.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4971/apple-iphone-4s-review-att-verizon/15

The 4 gets 9.7 hours of web browsing, or 3.92 hours of gaming. This is not 48 hours, or 2 days.
 
Odd, co-worker of mine has a regular (Verizon) 4 and has to charge it every night still. All she really does is text/talk on it. She didn't say what % it's usually down to every night, but she said it wouldn't last the next day if she didn't charge it at night.

I'm at 88% right now and I unplugged it at about 530 this morning. In that time I've had Words with Friends open for about 30 minutes, sent about 30 text messages, read/sent several emails on the phone and surfed the [H] for about 10 minutes when I was waiting to get my haircut along with about 10 minutes of Angry Birds in the same waiting period. When I get home from work after the first day it's at about 50% and the second day it's at about 20%.

EDIT: The words with friends time was a gross overestimation, fixed.
 
I understand you're not an Android fan from previous posts, but using hyperbole doesn't help your side - it just makes you look like a fanboy.

Heavy use to me is constant gaming or web browsing.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4971/apple-iphone-4s-review-att-verizon/15

The 4 gets 9.7 hours of web browsing, or 3.92 hours of gaming. This is not 48 hours, or 2 days.

Your definition of heavy use and mine is different.

Also, say what you want, I charge my phone every other night and it never goes below 10%, and I use my phone more than my wife who has an incredible, and it has to be charged every 15 hours or so. She hates her phone.

Tomorrow night when I go to charge my phone I'll try to remember to take a screen shot of "Time since last full charge."
 
I would expect the Verizon/CDMA Nexus to get a bit better battery life too though since it has +100 mAh on the GSM version. I know that's to compensate for the 4G radio, but you can disable that, which would make it more comparable to the iPhone anyways since it doesn't have 4G. I wouldn't use 4G much anyways since I never saw the point in needing 10+ Mb/s on a phone if 95% of what I'm doing is web browsing and e-mail. But it's nice to have the option for when I want to download a podcast or something.

Like I said before; if it gets through a day, that's all that matters to me. The car dock has a charger built in too, so that makes it less of an issue, esp. if you use the phone for navigation.
 
Your definition of heavy use and mine is different.

Also, say what you want, I charge my phone every other night and it never goes below 10%, and I use my phone more than my wife who has an incredible, and it has to be charged every 15 hours or so. She hates her phone.

Tomorrow night when I go to charge my phone I'll try to remember to take a screen shot of "Time since last full charge."

LOL, my wife hates her Incredible too. All wives should stick to the iPhone.
 
I will point out I DON'T use Bluetooth or wifi on my phone so they are both disabled. I do allow location updates for weather/maps.
 
LOL, my wife hates her Incredible too. All wives should stick to the iPhone.

Lol, indeed. My wife likes her Droid a lot, but I think she'd like the iPhone better if I could convince her to get a phone without a keyboard. It's like the iPhone was designed for women since they usually don't like too much customization (that brings complexity along with it). If the Droid 4 isn't out by Christmas and/or doesn't have as good battery life as its predecessors, then I might get her the 4S.
 
i picked up the 4s on release, but i returned it and went back to my dinc. i didnt hate the iphone and ios (love my ipad's), but having family and friends with those speedy 4G phones made me feel like i was running 56k..... so 4G on the nexus makes it easier for me to choose and wait.
 
I will point out I DON'T use Bluetooth or wifi on my phone so they are both disabled. I do allow location updates for weather/maps.

Lol your definition of heavy use is my definition of light use.
 
I've been reading/watching a bunch of different material on iPhone 4s/GNex, but every time I hear something new about the GNex I want it more.

To whoever said it comes down to preference:
Absolutely. Both phones have something the other does not have, and it comes down to what you want/need more.
On a similar note: I hate those <smartphonea> is better than <smartphoneb> arguments for that reason.
 
Once the bug in iOS 5 is fixed iPhone battery life will destroy the Nexus.

I'm running iOS 5.0.1 or whatever it is on a regular 4 and it lasts 2.5 days with pretty regular use. It will last 2 days with very heavy use. I only charge my phone every other night once it reaches 20%.

heh I have a Motorolla Defy running Android 2.3.4 & get a full 2 days of fair use (atleast an hour or so of calls & about 5 hours of web browsing from wifi as well as 50ish sms messages daily). Like your iPhone 4 my phone also has absolutely nothing to do with the review of 2 separate & newer devices then either of ours.
 
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Once the bug in iOS 5 is fixed iPhone battery life will destroy the Nexus.

I'm running iOS 5.0.1 or whatever it is on a regular 4 and it lasts 2.5 days with pretty regular use. It will last 2 days with very heavy use. I only charge my phone every other night once it reaches 20%.

I can say I have never seen anyone in real life with battery life that good, not people I would call "very heavy users"
 
Your definition of heavy use and mine is different.

if you are a very heavy user...i wonder what i am

i do things like leaving Andchat IRC connected, do a lot of web surfing(at 4G speeds no less), have it set to auto push email from gmail and corporate exchange accounts which includes both calendars with notifications for meetings and stuff, use the camera a lot, use it as an mp3 player for at least a couple hours a day, get updates from google+, google talk, google chat, etc.......

i dunno....but I really think your definition of very heavy use is fairly light

at any rate i get a good 10-12 hours out of a battery and considering what i do with it i am very happy with that. for $35 i got a samsung desktop dock which came with a spare battery too. when i go to bed at night, i turn off my phone and put it on the charger, i wake up and go to work with a full charge, use the phone all day, and before leaving work i take 20 seconds to swap my used battery for the freshly charged one in the dock, and go home, with a full charge, then i use it off and on in the evening, as much as i want, without worrying about the battery. Also, if i am planning on going on an extended stay away from the norm, i toss the second battery in my pocket, and now I suddenly have a good 24 hours of very heavy constant use with me. The battery is barely bigger than a USB thumb drive...or a older full size sdcard in a protective case...much smaller and lighter than a lot of other things people typically keep in their pockets, so it's not a problem at all to have it on you.
 
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Man, the Nexus looks sexy and smooth in all these videos. Can't wait. Hate my POS Droid X. Beam looks nice as well.
 
i wish my contract didn't run until middle of 2012....wonder what my ETF would be now..too much on top of the new phone price
 
hrm...not sure, would be nice if they showed it on their website in my account, it only shows my billing statement
 
hrm...not sure, would be nice if they showed it on their website in my account, it only shows my billing statement

Most carriers make it extremely complicated to find out any information relating to canceling, for obvious reasons. ;)
 
Most carriers make it extremely complicated to find out any information relating to canceling, for obvious reasons. ;)

i know it's prorated, but i wonder about if i would lose my grandfathered unlimited data in doing it.....nevermind, it's getting too expensive, i am very happy with my Charge right now and by July I should be able to get a sweet deal on a Nexus running AOSP by then
 
i know it's prorated, but i wonder about if i would lose my grandfathered unlimited data in doing it.....nevermind, it's getting too expensive, i am very happy with my Charge right now and by July I should be able to get a sweet deal on a Nexus running AOSP by then

With att I know I would. But I've been contemplating leaving att for a while, like both services but the area I'm moving to has poop att coverage
 
Iphone like said before is for the more simple users who don't want to "mess" and "play" around with their phones- android.
 
if you are a very heavy user...i wonder what i am

i do things like leaving Andchat IRC connected, do a lot of web surfing(at 4G speeds no less), have it set to auto push email from gmail and corporate exchange accounts which includes both calendars with notifications for meetings and stuff, use the camera a lot, use it as an mp3 player for at least a couple hours a day, get updates from google+, google talk, google chat, etc.......

i dunno....but I really think your definition of very heavy use is fairly light

at any rate i get a good 10-12 hours out of a battery and considering what i do with it i am very happy with that. for $35 i got a samsung desktop dock which came with a spare battery too. when i go to bed at night, i turn off my phone and put it on the charger, i wake up and go to work with a full charge, use the phone all day, and before leaving work i take 20 seconds to swap my used battery for the freshly charged one in the dock, and go home, with a full charge, then i use it off and on in the evening, as much as i want, without worrying about the battery. Also, if i am planning on going on an extended stay away from the norm, i toss the second battery in my pocket, and now I suddenly have a good 24 hours of very heavy constant use with me. The battery is barely bigger than a USB thumb drive...or a older full size sdcard in a protective case...much smaller and lighter than a lot of other things people typically keep in their pockets, so it's not a problem at all to have it on you.



My email pushes at the most often rate I can set it to(10 minutes I think?)

Also, I don't use wifi. I live in Idaho...we have the slowest internet in the COUNTRY. 3G is faster than my internet. Also, I have a Zune. The iPhone is absolute garbage for music play back. I didn't buy it for an ipod, I bought it for a phone. I don't use my camera that often, either. I've never turned Bluetooth on, either.

I mostly use it to surf the web and play games(Words with Friends, Angry Birds, NFL Fantasy league, different and various apps, maps, etc). Apparently I'm not as hardcore of you guys.

Either way, all I know is I use my iPhone the EXACT same way I used my Incredible and Droid 2 and BOTH those phones had to be on a charger by two o'clock every day.
 
My wife has an Iphone 4, and I'm Android for now. I really enjoy my wife's Iphone, and absolutely LOVE my Ipad 2. I like that Android is so customizable, but have had bad experiences with the Droid and Droid X. Choppy, buggy, lot's of force closes, etc.. So I'm hoping ICS and the Nexus will be what I've been waiting for.

I don't do brand loyalty, I just use what is best for me. IF the Nexus isn't the melding of great hardware and great OS that everyone thinks, then I will most likely go Iphone. They just work, as we know. Iphone's are definitely for the person looking for "simple". But not for simple users per say. I consider myself an advanced user, and the Iphone is second on my list of phones, following the Nexus.

I'm really hoping the Nexus is a lot better than my Droid X.....
 
Have the dinc2 now, It's pretty good, but the new Nexus definately has my attention. Dinc2 battery life isn't bad at all, I'd call it moderate use after 12 hours my battery is showing 45% right now. About 4.5 hours web surfing, 15 minutes worth phone calls, 40 text messages and lost track of how many emails, but a lot. I keep a spare battery just in case, but have always made it home (20 hours) with battery life to spare.

A phone with a non user replacable battery is just plain idiotic IMHO. I have a $5.00 Anker branded battery in my phone right now and the OEM one in my jacket pocket just in case.
 
My email pushes at the most often rate I can set it to(10 minutes I think?)

Also, I don't use wifi. I live in Idaho...we have the slowest internet in the COUNTRY. 3G is faster than my internet. Also, I have a Zune. The iPhone is absolute garbage for music play back. I didn't buy it for an ipod, I bought it for a phone. I don't use my camera that often, either. I've never turned Bluetooth on, either.

I mostly use it to surf the web and play games(Words with Friends, Angry Birds, NFL Fantasy league, different and various apps, maps, etc). Apparently I'm not as hardcore of you guys.

Either way, all I know is I use my iPhone the EXACT same way I used my Incredible and Droid 2 and BOTH those phones had to be on a charger by two o'clock every day.

My Charge has a Wolfson audio codex and headphone amp capable of high nitrate and 300 ohm high end headphones. Its better than most mp3 players so I don't have to carry two devices. I almost never use my phone as a phone, mostly a.surfing internet device, more like a small tablet. I'm not judging you on your use, just saying that there is such a thing as heavy use with good battery life on something outside of an iPhone. By the way the most frequent email setting is "push" which is instant. I get email and calendar notifications from our exchange server at the same instant it shows up on my wired desktop on my desk.
 
My Charge has a Wolfson audio codex and headphone amp capable of high nitrate and 300 ohm high end headphones. Its better than most mp3 players so I don't have to carry two devices. I almost never use my phone as a phone, mostly a.surfing internet device, more like a small tablet. I'm not judging you on your use, just saying that there is such a thing as heavy use with good battery life on something outside of an iPhone. By the way the most frequent email setting is "push" which is instant. I get email and calendar notifications from our exchange server at the same instant it shows up on my wired desktop on my desk.

I'm sure some phones are good at playing music. i saw HTC has a phone with Dr. Dre Beats in them now, that very well may sound good, but the iPhone sounds like absolute shit for music, so I don't use it for that.
 
Apparently with the static people are getting on the Rezound now, I'm not sure if it would be good for even that.
 
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