4 ms·

3.5" I consider too small. Even for my little 12 year old sister I plan on buying a 3.7" Motorola Defy+ soon. I wouldn't get anything less than 4" for myself, a

3.5" I consider too small. Even for my little 12 year old sister I plan on buying a 3.7" Motorola Defy+ soon. I wouldn't get anything less than 4" for myself, and my next device is probably going to be a 4.3" one unless the Nexus Prime is just too awesome to pass up.

vacri 15y ago
I have a defy. It has some poor points (though it is a cheaper smartphone anyway), but what sold me on it was that the screen size was 'big enough' while the form factor barely bigger than the screen. Easy to pocket, light, and tough. Compare to the iphone 4, which while being a nicer phone, has huge great lumps off the top and bottom of the screen - which means less pocketability / ease of management - not to mention that most iPhone 4s are even larger (and less attractive) due to the plastic bumper. The form factor is what sold me on the defy over the first-class range of android phones, despite it being a bit underpowered and having one or two other issues, some of which were due to Motorola bloatware that went away when CM7 went on. I find that in portable devices, getting the right size for you is a much underrated question when people look to buy tech.
- dagw 15y ago
  I'm getting a defy+ for exactly that reason (that and the fact that it might actually not break on me). I've got several friends with with Galaxy S phones and I simply find them to damn big. Uncomfortable to hold when making calls and uncomfortable to shove into my front jeans pocket. While I'm obviously not begrudging people the right to buy huge phones, I just hope someone will stay off that bandwagon and keep making reasonable sized phones. If I need a big screen I've got my 7" tablet.
- morsch 15y ago
  Plus, it runs underwater. :D Didn't get a Defy in the end, went for the still-cheaper ZTE Blade, but the new Defy+ is very tempting.
2muchcoffeeman 15y ago
Rumor is that the Prime will have a 4.65 inch screen. Why stop there? The Galaxy Note is 5.3 inches. Android handsets are becoming ridiculous. We spent all this time trying to make things small, but in an effort to differentiate themselves, manufacturers started making things huge again. Most of the high end phones would not even fit comfortably in my jeans pockets.
- vidarh 15y ago
  The make things huge because it sells well. There's definitively a large market segment for whom the iPhone form factor is too small. Myself included - it was one of the big things that stopped me from getting one; I just can't type on the thing at a reasonable speed. My HTC Desire HD is more than small enough to fit in my pocket, and rests comfortably in my hand, and I love having a decent sized display and I can actually type on it at a tolerable speed. I could easily handle a device a bit bigger than that with one hand, I might just get one because it reduces the number of situations where the screen is "too small" for it to be nice to use.
- ZeroGravitas 15y ago
  The iPhone 4S has a 3.5 diagonal screen, but a 5.1 inch diagonal frame. Most Android phones are increasing the screen size while decreasing the bezel, but only the increased screen size gets quoted. The next generation using Ice-Cream Sandwich, such as the Prime you mention, can replace the capacitive keys at the bottom with on-screen buttons, just like Honeycomb tablets. The screen size alone doesn't tell you everything about the device size. This site shows a comparison (note you can click in the top right corner to resize the pictures to actual size) http://versusio.com/en/google-nexus-prime-vs-apple-iphone-4-16gb http://versusio.com/en/google-nexus-prime-vs-apple-iphone-4-... It's only slightly bigger, yet has nearly double the screen area.
  - 2muchcoffeeman 15y ago
    You should really compare sizes by lining up edges. They have not really decreased the bezel that much either. But area increases as a square so you get good returns. http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_i9100_galaxy_s_ii-pictures-3621.php http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_i9100_galaxy_s_ii-pictures-3... http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_evo_3d-pictures-3901.php http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_evo_3d-pictures-3901.php http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_desire_hd-pictures-3468.php http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_desire_hd-pictures-3468.php http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s_ii_hd_lte-4198.php http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s_ii_hd_lte-4198.php I'd handled the HTC Desire HD a fair bit (someone at work has one). The opposite end of increasing as a square is that small increases are bigger than they sound. It's a lot of phone there. I am sure a lot of people are fine with it. If they could make everything edge to edge, I'l be right there with with.

vacri 15y ago

I have a defy. It has some poor points (though it is a cheaper smartphone anyway), but what sold me on it was that the screen size was 'big enough' while the form factor barely bigger than the screen. Easy to pocket, light, and tough. Compare to the iphone 4, which while being a nicer phone, has huge great lumps off the top and bottom of the screen - which means less pocketability / ease of management - not to mention that most iPhone 4s are even larger (and less attractive) due to the plastic bumper. The form factor is what sold me on the defy over the first-class range of android phones, despite it being a bit underpowered and having one or two other issues, some of which were due to Motorola bloatware that went away when CM7 went on. I find that in portable devices, getting the right size for you is a much underrated question when people look to buy tech.

dagw 15y ago
I'm getting a defy+ for exactly that reason (that and the fact that it might actually not break on me). I've got several friends with with Galaxy S phones and I simply find them to damn big. Uncomfortable to hold when making calls and uncomfortable to shove into my front jeans pocket. While I'm obviously not begrudging people the right to buy huge phones, I just hope someone will stay off that bandwagon and keep making reasonable sized phones. If I need a big screen I've got my 7" tablet.
morsch 15y ago
Plus, it runs underwater. :D Didn't get a Defy in the end, went for the still-cheaper ZTE Blade, but the new Defy+ is very tempting.

2muchcoffeeman 15y ago

Rumor is that the Prime will have a 4.65 inch screen. Why stop there? The Galaxy Note is 5.3 inches. Android handsets are becoming ridiculous. We spent all this time trying to make things small, but in an effort to differentiate themselves, manufacturers started making things huge again. Most of the high end phones would not even fit comfortably in my jeans pockets.

vidarh 15y ago
The make things huge because it sells well. There's definitively a large market segment for whom the iPhone form factor is too small. Myself included - it was one of the big things that stopped me from getting one; I just can't type on the thing at a reasonable speed. My HTC Desire HD is more than small enough to fit in my pocket, and rests comfortably in my hand, and I love having a decent sized display and I can actually type on it at a tolerable speed. I could easily handle a device a bit bigger than that with one hand, I might just get one because it reduces the number of situations where the screen is "too small" for it to be nice to use.
ZeroGravitas 15y ago
The iPhone 4S has a 3.5 diagonal screen, but a 5.1 inch diagonal frame. Most Android phones are increasing the screen size while decreasing the bezel, but only the increased screen size gets quoted. The next generation using Ice-Cream Sandwich, such as the Prime you mention, can replace the capacitive keys at the bottom with on-screen buttons, just like Honeycomb tablets. The screen size alone doesn't tell you everything about the device size. This site shows a comparison (note you can click in the top right corner to resize the pictures to actual size) http://versusio.com/en/google-nexus-prime-vs-apple-iphone-4-16gb http://versusio.com/en/google-nexus-prime-vs-apple-iphone-4-... It's only slightly bigger, yet has nearly double the screen area.
- 2muchcoffeeman 15y ago
  You should really compare sizes by lining up edges. They have not really decreased the bezel that much either. But area increases as a square so you get good returns. http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_i9100_galaxy_s_ii-pictures-3621.php http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_i9100_galaxy_s_ii-pictures-3... http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_evo_3d-pictures-3901.php http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_evo_3d-pictures-3901.php http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_desire_hd-pictures-3468.php http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_desire_hd-pictures-3468.php http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s_ii_hd_lte-4198.php http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s_ii_hd_lte-4198.php I'd handled the HTC Desire HD a fair bit (someone at work has one). The opposite end of increasing as a square is that small increases are bigger than they sound. It's a lot of phone there. I am sure a lot of people are fine with it. If they could make everything edge to edge, I'l be right there with with.