After months of watching for Verizon to release the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, it subsequently landed final week (after a few delays). The internet hype for the Galaxy Nexus had basically made this device out to be the unicorn of Android; it might do and be the whole thing that everybody ought to have ever wanted in a cell phone. Then while it launched, Verizon had the body of workers that become now not prepared, now not enough stock, and a few service hiccups to make matters extra hard. Even with all the demanding situations, the tool has made its way into the hands of keen buyers. Bloggers and evaluations are starting to are available, and everybody has their opinion. Some of those critiques are based on what consumers anticipated the tool to be; a few are primarily based on what consumers desired the device to be. After weeks with the Galaxy Nexus as our daily driver, we felt that it ultimately became time to throw our hat into the hoop and let you recognize definitively what our influence of the pure Google Galaxy Nexus telephone is.
Unboxing:
The Verizon Galaxy Nexus is available in a simple white field (vanilla even). Inside the box itself is the straightforward redlining and of the path of the device itself. Accompanying the tool is an 1850 battery, fashionable micro-USB charger, headphones, and the route instruction guide.
Initial Impressions:
Upon commencing the container, you spot what you have been expecting some of these many months—the Verizon version of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. Just searching for the tool, your initial influence is WOW that display screen is HUGE. You take it out of the box and sense it for your palms and cannot wait to peer what is lurking beneath it is curved outdoors.
Once you turn the tool on, you are greeted with a new book series that takes some of the Honeycomb boot series queues. The boot sequence itself indicates the skills of the Super AMOLED Screen. The blacks are black; the colors are bright and vibrant. After the booting is finished, you get your first taste of Ice Cream Sandwich and the way the Android OS will address your revel in from now on.
Hardware:
After you get handed the display screen length and colorations, the primary element you know is how mild the Galaxy Nexus is in your arms. It’s not light in a reasonably-priced feeling way, but I can not trust how light that is on my fingers. The smartphone additionally fits your hand higher than you would anticipate, understanding that it has a 4.Sixty five” screen. I changed into looking ahead to it to experience massive and awkwardness but, without having to have space for touch keys, the telephone isn’t larger than it desires to be. The curved design makes it feel just right inside the hand.
The display screen and weight of the phone are just two aspects of the cellphone that make up a device that seems like Samsungs designers went above and beyond to deliver a hardware experience that hasn’t been seen or felt earlier than.
The Frame:
There are two easy difficult buttons on the tool’s sides; on the left aspect, the usual extent rocker, and the right has the electricity/standby button. The bottom of the device has the Micro-USB port and the headphone jack; other than that, the device is clean lines all around the tool’s lining.
The Back:
The again panel is something of a piece of discussion right now. It’s no longer a conventional tough plastic (or kevlar) defend piece; it’s a bendy snap in piece that the device feels almost flimsy. Once the SIM card and battery are in the vicinity and you snap the lower back in the area, it feels more solid than you may imagine on its personal. Also, the back has moderate diamond ridges that maintain it from feeling slippery or week. Against the palm of your hand, you are aware of it’s there, and in your fingers, you know it’s not going to slip or slide out like a number of the “smooth” backs on phones, just like the Thunderbolt or the unique Droid.
You also have the 5MP rear-facing camera with LED flash; we’ll do a full digital camera write up one by one; however, suffice to mention that coming from the 8MP shooter within the HTC Thunderbolt I changed into to start with worried about what my shots had been going to seem like, after every week with the phone, I don’t have any motive to hold round a factor and shoot digital camera anymore.
The Front:
The front of the Galaxy Nexus is ruled by way of its four.65″ curved glass screen. At the device’s pinnacle are the in-call speaker (that is the handiest ruin within the easy surface), the proximity sensor (under the glass), and the front going through a digital camera. The lowest of the face, hidden under the glass, is a notification LED, which takes a bit of getting used to as it is a departure from the same old pinnacle proper notification indicator. Right now, it is lighting fixtures up white whilst you get any notification (e-mail, textual content, ignored name, etc.); however, I can see developers tying their notifications to the led and with any luck changing the shade or the blink fee.
Overall, the front seems sleek and elegant, and just displaying it to human beings makes them prevent and pay interest.
The Guts:
The Galaxy Nexus is powered with the aid of a twin-core 1.2GHz, with 1GB of RAM and 32GB of the onboard garage. It does not characteristic an SD or Micro-SD card slot, so there is no alternative for expandable memory. Google is betting that users will make use of cloud garage for a whole lot of their needs. Because the Galaxy Nexus syncs nicely with Google Music, Google Docs, and Picasa, many of your high quantity wishes are included.
The processor is snappy and performs tasks with seemingly little effort, switching through apps, monitors, multitasking, all feature with no hiccups. Even walking games like the newly launched Modern Combat 3 don’t take a toll on the device’s overall performance.
One hardware feature in the tool that has been getting a lot of press is the NFC chip. This is best the second cell phone inside the US to have an NFC chip built-in (the Sprint Galaxy S being the first). Unfortunately, Google Wallet is not enabled on the device, and apart from Google Beam, there isn’t something to be had to benefit from this new addition. It goes to be a while before developers begin building apps that use NFC because of the dearth of devices supporting it right now; however, the opportunities for it are countless.
Software:
This is where the device’s real splendor starts of evolved to polish, with the first flavor of Android 4.Zero Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS). Everything looks like this is what Google intended while to start with released Android. Gone are the veggies that have observed Android because of launch and income. The brand new softer blue makes it feel greater inviting. The software program’s responsiveness is fantastic. A few are the way to the dual-middle 1.2GHz processor and 1GB of RAM, but the software itself feels extra strong and extra labored out than preceding versions of Android, even Honeycomb.
ICS has made the feel and use of Android greater intuitive and purifier, without getting rid of any of the competencies or “electricity” that customers have had from the start. Switching thru monitors and apps is finished through swiping. Moving and uninstalling apps works the same as on other Android versions. Still, now you may institution apps collectively into folders with the aid of truly losing them on the pinnacle of one another. Within folders, you may re-arrange apps as you would like and engage with apps, but the folder floats over the home screen, you continue to realize that you don’t sense like you’re diving too deep to get to something.
Individual apps open quickly, and you may manage the apps you have running at any time by using clicking on the menu button. This pulls up a faceted bar that shows all your recent and going for walks applications similar to Honeycomb’s reveal. From this sidebar, you may switch between apps without problems or near them utilizing honestly swiping them. The ability to close apps from inside this sidebar is a new and great addition to ICS; I cannot inform you how many times Honeycomb I saw an app and just wanted to shut it but couldn’t.
Also, knowing that your tool goes to be driven updates from Google, so you’re going to be on the ultra-modern and finest builds for at least one year makes it that a good deal sweeter.
Real-World Usage:
What most people want to know is “must I buy the Verizon Galaxy Nexus,” and one of the primary questions they have is “what about the battery life” nicely, I’ve been the use of the tool as my each day driver for a week now and felt I could effortlessly solution those questions. First and principal, if you’re within the market for a brand new cell phone or improve eligibility, I endorse that you buy the Galaxy Nexus without even hesitating. This device is everything I turned into anticipating and more; it has made me prevent worrying if I would run out of battery lifestyles or if I needed to uninstall apps or root my tool to make it run smoother and faster.
Day 1:
Day 1 utilization turned into quite much trendy for any new device, preliminary set up, downloading maximum used apps (Facebook, Social Scope, Reader, etc.), setting up syncing, and every day scheduled activities. Like all new gadgets, the battery came with a more or less 40% charge to get commenced, and you can see from the screenshots below how it performed.
Day 2:
Day 2 usage was given a bit more intense, plenty greater app use, net browsing, basically placing the tool thru the paces to look what it could do. Battery usage became better than Day 1; however, it nevertheless wasn’t out of the ordinary.
Day 3:
Day three changed into greater preferred utilization, calls, emails, browsing, app use, downloading apps, and more tweaks to settings. Battery use with the tool switching robotically between 3G/4G and using WiFi when wished became quite spectacular, particularly thinking about the display screen and the processor.
Day 4:
Day four persisted with trendy use and no real changes to settings. Again making use of fashionable 3G/4G puts the tool mechanically detecting the strongest signal and utilizing WiFi whilst needed.
Day 5:
On day 5, we ran into a chunk of a hiccup with Google Currents; it was constantly jogging and constantly trying to sync and stay lively; it used a whole lot of battery and positioned a large drain at the tool. Once Currents became un-installed, everything turned back to normal, and we feel at ease with the battery life. We see 14 hours of battery lifestyles on an ordinary foundation with standard d usage.
Overall Impressions:
My ordinary effect of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus is that that is the whole lot that Google meant Android to be. The hardware is exceptional, light, and responsive. The OS, Ice Cream Sandwich, is fluid and easy. It’s intuitive and consumer-friendly more customer going through than every other Android model thus far, and definitely takes the combat to Apple in terms of simplicity and “just working.”
There are a few insects to iron out, and we’ll get into a number of those in other posts, but this tool is a specific buy if you’re inside the marketplace for a brand new phone. Even in the case you weren’t on Android before; this is a device that you need to consider switching for severely. Besides the bells and whistles of it being a natural Google experience device, you get the advantage of Verizon’s 4G community (in which to be had) that is quicker than anything on the market and makes residing cellular a real fact.
