Google stiffs Samsung on price, now wireless charging too Not content with undercutting Samsung's Galaxy S III mobile by two hundred quid, Google's Nexus 4 handset is using the Qi charging standard to provide the wireless charging Samsung still can't offer. Sammy's handset was announced with support for wireless power charging, and will get it eventually, but in the meantime Google ( …
"So for the additional notes the Samsung gear delivers 4G, a tenth of an inch in screen estate and an FM radio"
You mean 4G on some versions
And you forgot to mention the SD card slot on the S3, which was the reason I bought mine rather than the HTC One X and which it still has over the Nexus 4.
Although, granted, if the Nexus 4 had been announced earlier I would have probably gone for that instead considering the cost - an SD slot and FM radio I never use isn't worth £200.
One man's fragmentation is another's consumer choice.
A Fandroid decides if he wants his chosen OS on a phone with an SD card or not. He chooses the screen size he wants, if he wants a real keyboard or just a virtual one. FM radio? NFC? Or maybe he fancies a stylus... etc.. etc.
A Fruitdroid just crosses his fingers the great west coast oracle will give him what he was missing with the last model, and when it doesn't he still queues up and buys it.
A "Fruitdroid" who needs to do something an iPhone won't let him do will – and this might surprise you – buy another phone. Shocking, I know, but, contrary to what you appear to believe, Apple don't point a gun at your head and force you to buy their stuff when you walk into one of their stores. I've certainly never been held hostage in one.
I've even heard one Apple blue-shirt suggest a customer buys a particular model of (Windows-based) laptop instead of an Apple one after hearing their litany of requirements and budget. If they know you can't afford the model that would fit their needs, they'll be happy to suggest a low-priced competitor. It's not as if the customer was going to buy from them anyway, and they'll leave with a good impression of Apple's customer service too. (See one of my other posts on this thread for why that's a good thing for Apple.)
On styluses
Having owned a Sony-Ericsson P900 (and its predecessor) in the past, both of which were stylus-based, I can't say I've ever felt the need to own another stylus-based device since. My carpal tunnel hates the stylus grip position with a passion bordering on righteous anger, so I'd be in pain within minutes. (In fact, I haven't been able to write much of anything longhand for years as a result. In any case, I've been able to type at over 120 wpm. since my primary school days, so it's no great loss. My handwriting has always sucked anyway.)
That said... I'm surprised there hasn't been more call for handwriting recognition of Gregg* Shorthand on stylus-based devices. It seems such an obvious move for those who can write, and I'm well aware that many find handwriting more comfortable than typing. Despite a brief flurry of research papers dating back to the early '90s, there don't seem to be much work on this in the Android space today, which seems like a gap in the market to me.
* The UK's preference is for Pitman Shorthand, but that relies on line thickness as well as line length, which means the stylus would have to support pressure-sensitivity. It also adds complexity to the recogniser code. Studying the two, it seems to me that Gregg's is the better fit for tablets and 'phone-pads' like Samsung's "Note" series.
@Sean Timarco Baggaley "On styluses"
If you have a spare moment, I'd suggest to try a Samsung Galaxy Note II somewhere and put it through some handwriting recognition moves. I have a crappy handwriting at best and the Note II gets it still...
It's rather amazing to see how far this technique has come given that there are a lot less devices with styluses these days.
Agreed. There is a world of difference between the old, Nintendo DS style touch screens of old and the Galaxy Note implementation. They use licensed Wacom technology which is not only pressure sensitive, but also proximity sensitive.
If you can't get to a galaxy note, then go play with a Wacom tablet and do some photo retouching in photoshop, it's another world!
(My missus has a wacom tablet on her Mac Pro, and she won't let me "borrow" it for my photo work, I have to go and use it on her fruit flavoured machine instead... I feel unclean afterwards).
"The UK's preference is for Pitman Shorthand, but that relies on line thickness as well as line length, which means the stylus would have to support pressure-sensitivity. It also adds complexity to the recogniser code. Studying the two, it seems to me that Gregg's is the better fit for tablets and 'phone-pads' like Samsung's "Note" series"
Except the Samsung Note S-Pen is pressure sensitive.
They also stiffed Samsung - together with all users who already had adapters - by dumping MHL and going to a new HDMI-via-microUSB system called SlimPort.
That said Samsung - founding member of the MHL group - had already stiffed users by using an incompatible MHL on the S3.
Nothing like changing "standards" every year.
They aren't going to power the whole smartphone with 5mA, merely act as a normal HDMI. Power will work with TVs that support SlimPort, or if only HDMI then you can connect an external power source to the adapter (just like MHL). The difference with MHL is that with MHL you are forced to connect an external power source to use it with a normal HDMI TV at all -- SlimPort does not force you to do this.
This move looks like it will flatten the entire Android phone platform, possibly bankrupting a few phone manufacturers with it.
I would be interested in knowing the profit margins involved, and the details as to whether Google is funding this etc.
I always thought back in 2007 that the Nexus model was a bad one for what was supposed to be an open platform, and that Google should have stayed out of it on the hardware side. Instead it seems that Google have absolutely no interest in applying fairness to the Android platform, whereby unless you are in bed with Google (getting subsidised devices sold with minimal margin, getting access to early source-code that your competitors do not, getting the final AOSP release and all updates made specifically to only work on your device) then you have absolutely no chance to compete. I believe thisto be a major factor in why firstly HTC (now struggling) and then Samsung came to dominate Android.
I can see why Google could have wanted to do this for where Android was behind in tablets, but for the phone market where Android dominates already it is just destructive.
Remember people, while short-term the Nexus 4 is a great bargain for consumers, long term reduced competition is in nobody's interest.
I predicted this not long ago, saying Google would starting locking down Android and screwing the OEMs.
Vertical integration means Google obviously doesn't pay itself for access to Google Play. Welcome to the future, this is why Samsung invested in Tizen as they could see this coming.
When you think about it the idea of paying Google to have Google Play just so Google can get a 30% cut of everything sold on it then it just makes Android look all the more preposterous. I also find disconcerting the amount of apps that are sold on Google Play that are essentially DRM-locked to Google Play -- something that I rarely see highlighted as an issue of concern by Android users.
If I were an Android manufacturer I would be looking to try and form an alliance with all other Android manufacturers to fork quickly and kick the Google spy machine out of the loop. It would be in their interests to also come up with a viable alternative to Google Play where any cut on apps is distributed amongst themselves.
I'd say it is much more likely HTC's problems are caused by things like - poor customer service, slow software updates, bad software, too many devices on the market (I'm starting to think HTC have an aim to create a different smartphone for every single person on the planet) - despite starting this year unveiling the One line of phones and claiming they weren't going to release as many phones as last year..... The HTC One X is a nice looking phone - but - I get 2 bars less signal continuously than a motorola defy+, 90% of the time I pick it up and it says it has no signal - and yet in the battery section it says "time spent without a signal: 0%", the GPS is not great, battery life is not great, multitasking sucks, power management of the quad core processor is still rubbish - the phone spends more time at full speed than it does at low speed. The only thing that is actually really good about the phone - is the camera. I'm seriously considering selling One X and getting a Nexus4 if nothing else - it's got to have better software!
I disagree. The retail price of contract-free handsets is artificially high at the behest of the telcos, who can then offer you the phone "free" or heavily subsidized as a carrot to tempt you onto a nice fat contract. That kind of market distortion is rarely good for consumers. What Google's Nexus 4 pricing might do is bring a bit of reality to contract-free handset pricing, making it more attractive to buy a handset outright than with a contract, and thus make both the handset market and the contract market a bit more transparent. Low margins and cut-throat competition deliver great value for consumers in the PC market, and as smartphones are commodity items these days, there's no reason why that market shouldn't go the same way. If a few of the existing manufacturers can't handle that, there are plenty of others that will step in.
Carphone Warehouse are only selling on contract too. Since I live in Ireland I'd only be interested in SIM free. I can deliver to the UK if I must but I'd rather not. Google's page doesn't even show up from Ireland so I had to use Tunnelbear to get my name on the list.
The only thing I don't get is that Google bought motorola. And yet they still hire all these otehr companies to make their nexus stuff.
Wouldn't it be better for them to simply (he says) rename motorola to Nexus, and have them, an internal google company, handle all nexus handsets / tablets?
I know there's probably a good reason they get asus / lg to do it instead (probably cheaper) but still, right now it seems like the motorola buy was for everything but their hardware.
I'm guessing Google don't want to have a hardware company that is (unlike this story tries to make out) always undercutting and bettering their partners.
Samsung have had a crack of the Nexus whip, same to HTC and now ASUS and LG (and Samsung again). This helps to keep the partners on side, as well as the diversity of products.
Microsoft seems t be the one who tries to crap on its partners and suppliers (Nokia special privileges, Surface tablet, HTC etc).
This post has been deleted by its author
All of the articles I've seen comparing the S3 to the Nexus 4 seem to use over-inflated prices for the S3.
Amazon are selling the blue 16gb S3 for 389.99 (not the £430 quoted in the article)
While the equivalent 16gb Nexus 4 is 279.99. (not the 8gb £230 price quoted).
It's still a bargain, and I would have bought one had I not bought an S3 last month (Doh!), but £110 is a far cry from £200.
" but for most of us the Qi standard will fulfil our wireless charging needs. Just as soon as we work out what those needs are exactly"
Simple really. Combine with RFC to make in-car use simple.
Add a flat, non-slip pad to the centre console, which is a charging pad with a RFC chip in it. Get in a car, pop your phone on the pad, starts charging, and the RFC tells the phone to turn on Bluetooth, if it's the first time, it passes the connection details as well and instant connection with no messing around. If you open your car door without picking up your phone, the car starts beeping in the same way as leaving your keys in or lights on. Pick your phone up, loses RFC connection and turns off Bluetooth.
Car manufacturers... no need to thank me, a free car will cover it.
where this persistent belief that Google charges manufacturers to license its apps on Android (mainly Google Play, since once you have that, you can get everything else) . As detailed here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Play#Device_compatibility , the license is free of cost if your device passes the compatibility test. Somewhere in the depths of the Android documentation, they even say that they'll help you out, free of charge.
Wouldn't it be difficult to prove that, by selling an LG-manufactured phone, Google are involved in predatory pricing, as such a practice would damage Google-owned Motorola Mobility. Probably why Google didn't commission Motorola to build any of the Nexus line, to avoid such allegations.
Also UFS to be MS friendly I think, though its probably more for TV usage than PC. Onboard HDMI means there's less need to pull a card and pop it in the TV.
You could use run a samba server when there's a ready power supply and talk over wireless.
Any news on screen quality & brightness rather than just resolution?
There is software on the Play market and leads from all leading electrical retailers which together allow you to connect any USB storage to your droid phone. So for the sake of about £5, you can take a small lead and e.g. a USB microSD card reader and carry TBs of video with you on holiday.
So the missing SD issue is only fairly major, not very major.
... or I could just buy the 64GB model and not have to faff about with tiny, irritating pieces of plastic that will be instantly lost down the back of a sofa within picoseconds of having been removed from that bloody maddening blister pack that always manages to find a way to slice strips off my thumb.
Not that I'm bitter or anything.
And I can't say I miss the manual file-handling bollocks either. Quite why anyone thought implementing that feature from Windows CE / 6.x was a great idea escapes me. Sure, it's 'flexible', but it's also a world of hurt if you're the "good with computers" member of a family that refuses to listen to your advice when making its IT purchasing decisions, but is more than happy to waste hours of your life afterwards when they can't work out which of the myriad bloody menus and icons is the gateway to a particularly obscure* setting.
* (for very small values of 'obscure'. Like "How do I setup the internet connection with my service provider?")
Sammy is getting stiffed - there is no love between Google (who want to make a buck out of Motorola but really just care about search) and Amazon (who strip Android bare and have their own store) and all the other manufacturers who wait for Google to fleetingly look their way before moving on to the next.
Who gets the next Nexus...? If I were Samsung I would not be happy - there is no brand loyalty with Android as there is with Apple / iOS.
Life looks simpler in Apple world just get a new handset every 2 years or even longer. Most of these Android devices will be junk in 2 years time. The manufacturers make short term profits building Android and helping Google in the long term. Just wait until Google decide that Motorola should start paying it's way and screw HTC, Samsung etc.
My local library has a white box near the reading room, with a red circle painted on it. I asked what it's for.
My Finnish is nowhere near good, but I asked more. "Do you have a mobile?" "Er, yep". "Well if you need to charge it, give me your library ticket, and I'll give you an adapter"
It was a small ring, they have several for lots of different 'phones. As my Nokia N8 was short of power, I took advantage of it, and charged it fine. I didn't really like the idea of plonking my N8 on a magnetic field*, but it was OK.
*Only convenient charging point in our kitchen is next to the microwave, so I charge my devices there. I mistakenly placed Girlie's netbook on the oven, while charging it. She heated up a cup of coffee in the mic. and almost bricked it. Only a lot of F9's got it back...
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
