10 ms·

KitKat issues aside, there are a few minor concerns with the phone that seem to be causing the most issues: The vibration motor is at the top of the phone. Th

KitKat issues aside, there are a few minor concerns with the phone that seem to be causing the most issues: The vibration motor is at the top of the phone. This is causing some people to complain on XDA that the haptic feedback is weak or non-existent. When you run a vibration test its easy to hone in on exactly where the motor is located which seems a bit off to me. The speaker is absolutely anemic. I 'feel' the sound vibrating the back of my phone more than I can hear it through the single tiny speaker located at the bottom of the phone. Companies need to start emulating the HTC One and place the speakers on the front. Otherwise the device feels elegant and the texture allows for a softer grip that allows longer use without getting crab hands. Now KitKat (and specifically Hangouts) is a different story altogether...

cliveowen 13y ago
What are the issues about KitKat you're talking about?
- pearjuice 13y ago
  For starters it's the lag which at this point seems to be so nested into the core that unless vital components get rewritten from scratch, will not fade away anytime soon. Every reiteration of Android sees a new stab at taking the lag and overall unresponsiveness away, but all they do is adding work-arounds or surface optimizations.
  - corresation 13y ago
    What lag are you talking about? Even critics of Android have offered up that the Nexus 5 is smoother and silkier than even the iPhone 5s. The single and only lag complaint I've seen was an utterly ridiculous "scroll up and down quickly in Chrome" video preview on the Verge. Not only does it have zero association with actual use, iOS displays exactly the same so-called "lag" on premium devices with complex websites like the Verge. The lag beast has been slayed. Perhaps mostly through just enormous computational horsepower, but it is a non-complaint.
    - pearjuice 13y ago
      >Perhaps mostly through just enormous computational horsepower, but it is a non-complaint. You just proved my point. They are not fixing anything, just adding work around after work around and one of them is throwing more horse power at it. The inherent problem is still there, they just keep covering it up.
      - corresation 13y ago
        I didn't "prove" anything. I offered up side comment conjecture. At this point I'm unsure what your motives are.
    - saturdaysaint 13y ago
      There were recent touch responsiveness benchmarks that show that even the iPhone 4 outshines the latest Android models. http://bgr.com/2013/09/20/iphone-android-touch-screen-responsiveness/ http://bgr.com/2013/09/20/iphone-android-touch-screen-respon... I'm a very happy owner of a 2013 Nexus 7, but I have to say I think this is perceptible. It's not showstopping or even disorienting, but it does translate in performance critical tasks like web browsing and gaming being slightly less satisfying. With an iPhone, scrolling feels like you're manipulating a piece of paper under your finger; Chrome on my Nexus 7 doesn't quite achieve that illusion. Then again, the OS itself feels way more nimble than iOS: things like text-to-speech, app installs and multi-tasking are way more satisfying on Android.
      - hrkristian 13y ago
        Reading your comment I had to try this out, now down to the hardware it's proven that iDevices beat out Androids by quite a bit with regards to responsiveness, although I can't find the article describing it, but safe to say I know there's a difference. However, I own a Samsung Galaxy S1 (that's 2010 era, people) running CyanogenMod 10.1.3 (that's 4.2.2) and my responsiveness is... just fine! Pulling down the slider I get the very slight initial lag (simply because my phone is crazy slow), and the slider itself does lag behind but that seems like it's by design. Next I am on my homescreen; ADW Launcher, and I'm running running some taxing animations with 1x Animation Scale. There is no input lag. I can get the initial lag and again that is just my phone being a wreck by today's standards, but going back and forth the animation is as responsive as could be. Based solely on my anecdotal evidence, I call BS.
  - Spittie 13y ago
    Leaving the "lag does exist or not" issue aside, Google is working on a Dalvkit replacment called ART (http://source.android.com/devices/tech/dalvik/art.html http://source.android.com/devices/tech/dalvik/art.html). KitKat ship with an experimental version of ART, and it seems to perform better in synthetic benchmarks than Dalvkit. People online are also reporting a smoother experience with it (but it might be placebo, I don't think there's a scientific and unbiased comparative between the two yet).
- ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
  Well Google Hangouts on iOS7 can make and receive phone calls for your Google Voice account but KitKat cannot. Hangouts is considered the primary SMS application but even though option screens exist you cannot make Voice your primary app for texting. This means voice control is effectively useless. I'm extremely disappointed that Google launched such a tight integration with such key functionality missing. I've also had to clean my phone off twice because Google's backup service continues to think the phone is new so it keeps sending me a bunch of crap I don't want on my phone. I haven't seen a lot of lag issues yet, but I've only had it for 24 hours or so.
toomuchtodo 13y ago
Would you buy it again if you had to do it over again? I'm on the fence, having an aging Galaxy Nexus.
- ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
  I get to play with a lot of phones in my company so would I take it over the: Galaxy Nexus? Yes. Nexus 4? Closer, but still yes. Galaxy S3 and S4? Yes, because Samsung is really pissing me off with their lack of speedy updates. HTC One Play Edition? Undecided. Merging the two together would be the best phone (speakers on One, the proud buttons and texture on the N5) but I wouldn't trade one for the other at this point.
  - bduerst 13y ago
    I went from the Galaxy Nexus to the Samsung S4, and I wouldn't do it again if given the chance. The unremoveable bloatware and need-to-root for certain features is beyond frustrating. It's like that Dell laptop you got back in the early 2000's, except you need to reinstall the OS to run it normally.
    - ajross 13y ago
      The GS4 is available in a Google edition without the Samsung junkware...
    - CapitalistCartr 13y ago
      How practical is it to do just that, reinstall the OS, say Kit-kat? If its pretty easy, I wouldn't mind doing it.
  - vinhboy 13y ago
    Nexus5 or GN3 for T-mobile? The ONE must have feature for me in native tethering, which is available on the Nexus4, and I presume will be available on the Nexus5. Thoughts? Thanks.
    - 13y ago
mscrivo 13y ago
Great, those were precisely my top 2 gripes with the Nexus 4 and I was hopeful they received enough complaints about it to rectify it, but I guess not. Too bad I already ordered the 5, but if its as bad as you say, I may have to sell it and just give up on Nexus and get the HTC One.
- ufmace 13y ago
  I'd recommend the Play edition HTC one, which I've been using for 4 months, since it was released. Updates seem to be only a week or so behind Nexus phones. Everything else seems pretty similar to the 5, except that the case is metal, the speakers are loud, and the camera is probably better. The loud speakers are the biggest difference to me - this is the loudest smartphone I've ever owned, and I was coming from the barely-there Galaxy Nexus. I really wish they'd put some more effort into the speakers and camera on the Nexus phones, though the Verge review implies that the meh Nexus 5 camera is mostly software.
eitally 13y ago
So far, my biggest gripe with KitKat is that there is literally zero customization available for the launcher, and if you switch to something like Nova (my previous choice), you lose the 1) easy access to a Google Now screen, and 2) "Ok Google" voice search. This wouldn't ordinarily bother me much but there are two big UI/UX gripes I have with the KitKat launcher: 1) To quote a Reddit meme, the icons are just... too damn big! Yes, the screen is lovely and the new icons are perfectly good looking, but they're huge! Even on a 5" 1080P screen, you are only allowed a 4x4 grid. I used a 6x6 grid on my Galaxy Nexus and think that size is far more appropriate, especially if you want to take advantage of multiple widgets on your homescreens, or a mix of widgets and shortcuts on the same homescreen. 2) Related to the first complaint, you can't create app folders in the app drawer. This makes it impossible to "hide" things like LightFlow, News & Weather, Keep Screen On, the default Email client, or other utilities and random apps you don't ever want to see. At least you get five rows of four, but still, the icons are infuriatingly large. I haven't played with the camera enough to comment, and the battery is light years better than my Galaxy Nexus so I have no complaints there (yet). I do carry a Powerstick (http://www.powerstick.com http://www.powerstick.com) in my briefcase when traveling, though. The fact that you can now do both video and voice, or just voice, Hangouts while on cellular networks is enough for me to overlook quite a few issues. One last tidbit: the new dialer & phone app is much, much better than the old stock one (imho, this is something Samsung really did a good job of with Touchwiz), but it is not intuitive and there are some wonky things about it, like the fact that the standard dialing screen only shows 3 of your starred contacts and there is no apparent way to scroll/view the rest of your favorites. I'm expecting a 4.4.1 sometime not too long from now because there are enough things lacking polish to warrant a few extra weeks in the oven. As for the hardware, not a huge fan of the sharp edges, but it does feel good in the hand and the small side bezels make it feel smaller than a 5" phone should.
- mcintyre1994 13y ago
  Re number 2, is disabling apps from settings not a stock feature? I've never needed to hide apps in the drawer, I just disable them and they never bother me.
  - 13y ago
Pxtl 13y ago
I'd have hoped Google would've learned about the importance of a good speaker with the N7. Seriously, good speakers are not optional. Then again, I wonder how much of the "your speakers suck" problem is really just "OMG netflix why the hell are your streams so quiet"?
- lelandbatey 13y ago
  Do you prefer to not use headphones? Because it's a problem I pretty much never think about because I always use headphones.
  - Pxtl 13y ago
    I absolutely prefer to use headphones, when they're available. But I prefer not to have one more thing in my pocket getting tangled up with my keys.
    - josu 13y ago
      Use one of those pouches that come with some earphones.
      - cenhyperion 13y ago
        Those are pretty big to be throwing in your pocket. A lot the time I leave the house with nothing but my jeans to carry stuff. Pocket space is a limited commodity.
  - paul_f 13y ago
    I would hope that you could use the Nexus 5 as a speakerphone too.

cliveowen 13y ago

What are the issues about KitKat you're talking about?

pearjuice 13y ago
For starters it's the lag which at this point seems to be so nested into the core that unless vital components get rewritten from scratch, will not fade away anytime soon. Every reiteration of Android sees a new stab at taking the lag and overall unresponsiveness away, but all they do is adding work-arounds or surface optimizations.
- corresation 13y ago
  What lag are you talking about? Even critics of Android have offered up that the Nexus 5 is smoother and silkier than even the iPhone 5s. The single and only lag complaint I've seen was an utterly ridiculous "scroll up and down quickly in Chrome" video preview on the Verge. Not only does it have zero association with actual use, iOS displays exactly the same so-called "lag" on premium devices with complex websites like the Verge. The lag beast has been slayed. Perhaps mostly through just enormous computational horsepower, but it is a non-complaint.
  - pearjuice 13y ago
    >Perhaps mostly through just enormous computational horsepower, but it is a non-complaint. You just proved my point. They are not fixing anything, just adding work around after work around and one of them is throwing more horse power at it. The inherent problem is still there, they just keep covering it up.
    - corresation 13y ago
      I didn't "prove" anything. I offered up side comment conjecture. At this point I'm unsure what your motives are.
  - saturdaysaint 13y ago
    There were recent touch responsiveness benchmarks that show that even the iPhone 4 outshines the latest Android models. http://bgr.com/2013/09/20/iphone-android-touch-screen-responsiveness/ http://bgr.com/2013/09/20/iphone-android-touch-screen-respon... I'm a very happy owner of a 2013 Nexus 7, but I have to say I think this is perceptible. It's not showstopping or even disorienting, but it does translate in performance critical tasks like web browsing and gaming being slightly less satisfying. With an iPhone, scrolling feels like you're manipulating a piece of paper under your finger; Chrome on my Nexus 7 doesn't quite achieve that illusion. Then again, the OS itself feels way more nimble than iOS: things like text-to-speech, app installs and multi-tasking are way more satisfying on Android.
    - hrkristian 13y ago
      Reading your comment I had to try this out, now down to the hardware it's proven that iDevices beat out Androids by quite a bit with regards to responsiveness, although I can't find the article describing it, but safe to say I know there's a difference. However, I own a Samsung Galaxy S1 (that's 2010 era, people) running CyanogenMod 10.1.3 (that's 4.2.2) and my responsiveness is... just fine! Pulling down the slider I get the very slight initial lag (simply because my phone is crazy slow), and the slider itself does lag behind but that seems like it's by design. Next I am on my homescreen; ADW Launcher, and I'm running running some taxing animations with 1x Animation Scale. There is no input lag. I can get the initial lag and again that is just my phone being a wreck by today's standards, but going back and forth the animation is as responsive as could be. Based solely on my anecdotal evidence, I call BS.
- Spittie 13y ago
  Leaving the "lag does exist or not" issue aside, Google is working on a Dalvkit replacment called ART (http://source.android.com/devices/tech/dalvik/art.html http://source.android.com/devices/tech/dalvik/art.html). KitKat ship with an experimental version of ART, and it seems to perform better in synthetic benchmarks than Dalvkit. People online are also reporting a smoother experience with it (but it might be placebo, I don't think there's a scientific and unbiased comparative between the two yet).
ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
Well Google Hangouts on iOS7 can make and receive phone calls for your Google Voice account but KitKat cannot. Hangouts is considered the primary SMS application but even though option screens exist you cannot make Voice your primary app for texting. This means voice control is effectively useless. I'm extremely disappointed that Google launched such a tight integration with such key functionality missing. I've also had to clean my phone off twice because Google's backup service continues to think the phone is new so it keeps sending me a bunch of crap I don't want on my phone. I haven't seen a lot of lag issues yet, but I've only had it for 24 hours or so.

toomuchtodo 13y ago

Would you buy it again if you had to do it over again? I'm on the fence, having an aging Galaxy Nexus.

ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
I get to play with a lot of phones in my company so would I take it over the: Galaxy Nexus? Yes. Nexus 4? Closer, but still yes. Galaxy S3 and S4? Yes, because Samsung is really pissing me off with their lack of speedy updates. HTC One Play Edition? Undecided. Merging the two together would be the best phone (speakers on One, the proud buttons and texture on the N5) but I wouldn't trade one for the other at this point.
- bduerst 13y ago
  I went from the Galaxy Nexus to the Samsung S4, and I wouldn't do it again if given the chance. The unremoveable bloatware and need-to-root for certain features is beyond frustrating. It's like that Dell laptop you got back in the early 2000's, except you need to reinstall the OS to run it normally.
  - ajross 13y ago
    The GS4 is available in a Google edition without the Samsung junkware...
  - CapitalistCartr 13y ago
    How practical is it to do just that, reinstall the OS, say Kit-kat? If its pretty easy, I wouldn't mind doing it.
- vinhboy 13y ago
  Nexus5 or GN3 for T-mobile? The ONE must have feature for me in native tethering, which is available on the Nexus4, and I presume will be available on the Nexus5. Thoughts? Thanks.
  - 13y ago

mscrivo 13y ago

Great, those were precisely my top 2 gripes with the Nexus 4 and I was hopeful they received enough complaints about it to rectify it, but I guess not. Too bad I already ordered the 5, but if its as bad as you say, I may have to sell it and just give up on Nexus and get the HTC One.

ufmace 13y ago
I'd recommend the Play edition HTC one, which I've been using for 4 months, since it was released. Updates seem to be only a week or so behind Nexus phones. Everything else seems pretty similar to the 5, except that the case is metal, the speakers are loud, and the camera is probably better. The loud speakers are the biggest difference to me - this is the loudest smartphone I've ever owned, and I was coming from the barely-there Galaxy Nexus. I really wish they'd put some more effort into the speakers and camera on the Nexus phones, though the Verge review implies that the meh Nexus 5 camera is mostly software.

eitally 13y ago

So far, my biggest gripe with KitKat is that there is literally zero customization available for the launcher, and if you switch to something like Nova (my previous choice), you lose the 1) easy access to a Google Now screen, and 2) "Ok Google" voice search. This wouldn't ordinarily bother me much but there are two big UI/UX gripes I have with the KitKat launcher: 1) To quote a Reddit meme, the icons are just... too damn big! Yes, the screen is lovely and the new icons are perfectly good looking, but they're huge! Even on a 5" 1080P screen, you are only allowed a 4x4 grid. I used a 6x6 grid on my Galaxy Nexus and think that size is far more appropriate, especially if you want to take advantage of multiple widgets on your homescreens, or a mix of widgets and shortcuts on the same homescreen. 2) Related to the first complaint, you can't create app folders in the app drawer. This makes it impossible to "hide" things like LightFlow, News & Weather, Keep Screen On, the default Email client, or other utilities and random apps you don't ever want to see. At least you get five rows of four, but still, the icons are infuriatingly large. I haven't played with the camera enough to comment, and the battery is light years better than my Galaxy Nexus so I have no complaints there (yet). I do carry a Powerstick (http://www.powerstick.com http://www.powerstick.com) in my briefcase when traveling, though. The fact that you can now do both video and voice, or just voice, Hangouts while on cellular networks is enough for me to overlook quite a few issues. One last tidbit: the new dialer & phone app is much, much better than the old stock one (imho, this is something Samsung really did a good job of with Touchwiz), but it is not intuitive and there are some wonky things about it, like the fact that the standard dialing screen only shows 3 of your starred contacts and there is no apparent way to scroll/view the rest of your favorites. I'm expecting a 4.4.1 sometime not too long from now because there are enough things lacking polish to warrant a few extra weeks in the oven. As for the hardware, not a huge fan of the sharp edges, but it does feel good in the hand and the small side bezels make it feel smaller than a 5" phone should.

mcintyre1994 13y ago
Re number 2, is disabling apps from settings not a stock feature? I've never needed to hide apps in the drawer, I just disable them and they never bother me.
- 13y ago

Pxtl 13y ago

I'd have hoped Google would've learned about the importance of a good speaker with the N7. Seriously, good speakers are not optional. Then again, I wonder how much of the "your speakers suck" problem is really just "OMG netflix why the hell are your streams so quiet"?

lelandbatey 13y ago
Do you prefer to not use headphones? Because it's a problem I pretty much never think about because I always use headphones.
- Pxtl 13y ago
  I absolutely prefer to use headphones, when they're available. But I prefer not to have one more thing in my pocket getting tangled up with my keys.
  - josu 13y ago
    Use one of those pouches that come with some earphones.
    - cenhyperion 13y ago
      Those are pretty big to be throwing in your pocket. A lot the time I leave the house with nothing but my jeans to carry stuff. Pocket space is a limited commodity.
- paul_f 13y ago
  I would hope that you could use the Nexus 5 as a speakerphone too.