Just Black Pixel 2 XL 128 hands on Review.

[shalemail]

I KNOW you have all been waiting with bated breath for my review of the Pixel 2 XL. In fact @lunatic59 has already called me out.

I have a Pixel (5in) review in that forum as well.

Okay here we go. I purchased the Pixel 2 XL 128 through my Fi account on payments and did get the device protection. I learned today that my warranty now extends for at least 2 years, maybe 3 depending on how you interpret it. That pleases me. Additionally, 3 years of OS and security updates guaranteed is a nice peace of mind add-on. Like many I wanted the Penguin color scheme but I wanted my phone quickly more than I wanted that color, not only because I am impatient but because my wife will be adopting the Pixel and finally joining me on Fi. Yay.

As was the case with my Pixel review, this is just my opinions based on my experience in my situation. Might not apply to some, might to others.


Okay, without further ado my review.

PROS
Screen: Amazing. It's not perfect, it's not a Samsung panel, it's not saturated. I don't mind the more muted colors (they are only really in the OS functions - not the apps) It might be Gotham's history with clowns but I am not a fan of garish colors.
Size: It's barely larger than the OG Pixel, it's smaller than the N6 and proportioned such that it fits well in my hand and pockets. I am a HUGE fan of the size of this phone.
Speakers: Wow is it nice to have front facing stereo speakers again. I didn't realize how much I missed them, I mean I MISSED them the whole time I used the Pixel, but man o man are they great. These speakers are not as loud as the N6 but seem more crisp. They sound AMAZING.
Build: It's solid as a rock, very light but solid. For those used to the curved glass of Samsung or LG and the like, you might not like this phone -out of a case- because there's a noticeable lip where the glass meets the frame. It's not unruly but it's there and if I didn't use it in a case it would bug me, might even be what I'd categorize as a big deal to me were it not cased 24/7. Check it out in person and you'll see what I mean. Otherwise I really like the refinements from series one to two. I'll again use the hot rod analogy I appreciate the build quality of this phone the same way I appreciate horsepower over chrome and paint. I don't care about wireless charging and prefer a metal chassis.
Camera: So far so good, but I need more time to have fun. I'll just say it now, it's incredible, no one can argue that.
Fingerprint scanner: Faster and more accurate than the first, which honestly I didn't think was possible.
Battery: If it ever dies I'll let you know. 6 hours of SOT yesterday - it never broke a sweat - had over 30% left when I went to bed.
Speed: See: World Land Speed Record https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_speed_record
Performance: See speed above plus ... IT NEVER EVEN GOT WARM.
UI: Vanilla Android if you want the other crap, you'll hate it, if you want REAL Android the way Google intends it to be, here it is. I'll personally NEVER go back.
Always On Display: I like it. Haven't even turned on my LED yet.
Now Playing: Haven't had a chance to try it out, going to do so tonight.
Edge Sense: It rocks, the most surprisingly pleasing "add" to this phone for me so far. Makes assistant ... more usable ... to me at least.
24/7 Assistance: Again great value add.
Vibration: Best haptic feedback and vibration motor I've ever had in a phone. Best word for it: Refined.

CONS
I struggled to think of any at this point.
It doesn't have a headphone jack (don't care)
It doesn't wirelessly charge (don't care)
It's only IP67 (don't care)
No expandable storage (don't care I'll never fill 128 GB)
Screen - I guess, I mean it's really nice to my eyes, but I am sure people out there could nit pic it. I love this phone, screen included.


I'll be posting pictures and adding more to this as I go along. This is literally my "FIRST 24 HOURS" review at this point, I opened the box at 1:30 yesterday afternoon.

 

[Mittar]

It's funny that the people dissing the screen are either reviewers (it's their job), or don't have the phone. Everyone that I've seen that has the phone absolutely loves it and considers the screen concerns to be minor.

 

[shalemail]

AH - thought of something I omitted.
We'll call it an additional "CON" pending further developments.

There was a "Known Issue" going on yesterday with Fi when I was setting up the phone. I am currently running my standard sim from my OG Pixel in the P2XL - when trying to initialize the esim it was timing out and giving error T120 (to everyone not just me) so Fi customer service walked me through getting it set up for standard sim and it now works. I was and am looking forward to the esim and will report back once that part gets worked out.

 

[shalemail]

Clarification on the new warranty on the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL, I read the actual statement from Google, it's a full 2 year warranty now for all (Pixel 2 line) phones foreign and domestic. Not an additional 2 years, an additional year on top of the original year, 2 total.

Still pretty darn awesome in this day and age.

 

[codesplice]

Awesome, glad to hear you're loving it!

 

[shalemail]

I have no more "Cons" to add after the first 6 days with the phone. That in and of itself is a "Pro" in my book.

Pros
Now Playing: I have to admit I'm very impressed, now that said I've never had Shazam or any of those apps that do this sort of thing. Overall I'm highly impressed, we went out Friday night and though the bar was somewhat chaotic it still picked up several songs correctly. While driving in the car it nailed them every time. So I suppose the moral of the story is if it can hear the song it's pretty foolproof if you're in a bad situation noise wise it might have trouble. I'm a music geek and it's like having the best game of "who's the artist" with someone that never misses. You gotta be quick to beat it. Two thumbs up. Very cool.


Active Edge: The more I use it the more I like it. I do agree with many reviews, it needs to be able to do more things, but I see why they don't and won't. I use assistant now. I almost never did on the Pixel. Google wants you, nay NEEDS users to use the assistant. And darn it I fell into their trap. I use it daily now. And she's learning, so that's cool. Anyway Active Edge is cool and convenient and I like it. Two thumbs up.

Live Wallpaper: This is super cool. I almost never use stock Wallpaper on my phone, been since the first Moto X ... I am using the live "World comes to you" and it's amazing.

Battery: I'll let you know if I ever have a bad experience in this dept, which to this point I have not. It's the Energizer Bunny of cellular devices, I mean battery for miles. Highly impressed with the performance here.

Screen: I suppose I can see why some wouldn't love it but I am at a loss as to why or how anyone would hate it. It's capable of incredible beauty, but at times seems quite pedestrian. I like it all the time and sometimes love it. When it's kicking butt it looks amazing. If that's confusing, I mean if I am watching something beautiful, it looks amazing, if I am on Android forums it's quite pedestrian. Hope that makes sense.

Camera: Boom. It's insane. I'll post some pictures here soon.

All for now. More to come.

 

[codesplice]

Baby Pixel 2 here but I heartily agree with the comments on Now Playing, Active Edge, Live Wallpaper, and the Camera.

I had kind of dismissed Now Playing as a bit of a gimmick, but it works surprisingly well. I like how it doesn't intrude on what I'm doing or force me to press any buttons - but if I just happen to be curious I can glance at my phone (without even waking it!) to find out what song is playing. Very cool little added touch, and I love that it doesn't use any mobile data to do its magic.

Same with the Active Edge. I've used Assistant for quite a while now, but Active Edge is by far the easiest/quickest way to access Assistant.

I had been stuck on the "Calming Coastline" live wallpaper (those waves are just too cool) but switched to the "Marvelous Marble" one this morning. The live/realtime cloud coverage is neato.

And yeah, the camera. WOW. It's good.

 

[Brian706]

I really love the now playing also. It was a feature I used fairly often in the past. But I'd have to unlock my phone and access the widget.

It's so nice to have it automatically happen. Plus, I discovered last night that it doesn't just work on the lockscreen. I was using my phone while watching a show. Wasn't even attempting to find out what song was playing but happened to pull down my status bar and bam, I see the current song info right there.

So if you're using your device and a song pops up it looks like you can just swipe down and it shows in the notification area. Have not attempted to repeat this yet.

 

[Brian706]

Are you guys using the always on display? I turned mine off almost right away. It just felt weird. It does seem potentially handy, but I dunno. I figure if I pull the device out of my pocket to check the time or something it activates ambient display anyway... So I don't really see the big need to have it always on.

 

[codesplice]

If you've got Android Wear, Now Playing also pops up a low-priority notification there so you can see what song is playing without having to pull out your phone at all. Nice!

And yes, I'm using Always On with my baby Pixel 2. I spend a lot of time with my phone just sitting on my desk so it's nice to be able to glance down and see if I've missed any notifications.

 

[shalemail]

Pictures as promised. (We'll start with the portraits.)

 

[shalemail]

 

[Mittar]

Great shots. The only minor issue that I see is the back ear of the dog is faded out, since it's behind the focal plane. Pretty minor though considering the iOS version regularly fades out hair and hats.

 

[shalemail]

Forgot to mention. I am running on the eSIM now. It was easy as pie once the Fi side issue was resolved. I like it.

 

[Brian706]

I used it and switched back and forth between my old pixel and new. Works like a charm.

 

[shalemail]

Wow, the battery. I can't say enough for the battery life. I mean it's stupid good. It's the one thing on this amazing device that continually blows me away. I got up at Midnight last night (had to potty) unplugged the Pixel as it was at 100% and it is my night light to traverse the darkened halls. Didn't plug it back in afterwards. So ... been off the charger for nearly 12 hours (granted from midnight to 4:30 am it was idle) I am sitting at 65% 19 hrs 44 min remaining with 2 hours of screen on time. I mean really? I am just in awe. I was teasing a guy on Monday that I hadn't seen 30% or below for days. He has an S8+ and he barely makes it through a work day.


I will say tho, it's finicky about how you charge it. Mine prefers it's stock charger and sometimes balks at other chargers. No biggie.

 

[shalemail]

Oh how about color reproduction ..

 

[shalemail]

Today's Google Photos Stylized Shot, Fall in the neighborhood.

 

[shalemail]

Sad panda update. (No pun intended.)

Less than 24 hours from my birthday and my Pixel 2 XL has become Disco Pixel. It's randomly flashing on lock screen (lock and unlock) and every time I get a pop-up notification on the always on display it flashes.

Now I mean like a camera flash. and sometimes once others 2 or 3 flashes.

I thought I'd gotten a "good one" .... I guess not.


Now, do I RMA or return? (This is my last day of my 15 day return window.)


Sigh.

 

[shalemail]

I RMA'd it. I can't go back to a phone that does not do all the things I love about this phone. So fingers crossed.
But here's a nice picture I took this morning.

 

[codesplice]

Damn, sorry to hear that you ran into the flashing screen issue. I've seen some suggestions that disabling adaptive brightness might help, but that sounds like a software workaround to a hardware problem to me. I think going for the RMA was the right call.

I bet your replacement device will be even better!

 

[shalemail]

Damn, sorry to hear that you ran into the flashing screen issue. I've seen some suggestions that disabling adaptive brightness might help, but that sounds like a software workaround to a hardware problem to me. I think going for the RMA was the right call.

I bet your replacement device will be even better!

It's not adaptive brightness, it's the always on display. I disabled it, hard reset and re-enabled it and it's golden. I sent Google an email. It's software it's fixable, not a screen issue. My replacement is already shipped tho so I will still check it out. I'm still amazed by this phone. This is not an issue worth not getting or having it.

 

[Mittar]

Really hoping that all the issues will force Google to up it's QA game.

Also hoping that by the time I get mine, this stuff will be worked out. It's supposed to ship in a week.

 

[shalemail]

My RMA P2 XL has arrived. I ran home and picked it up about 1:45. It does look a bit nicer. My first one was manufactured on Oct. 3rd, this one was manufactured on the 28th. I do love how easy it is to set up. It's been done for 30 minutes. So less than an hour from box to up and running. Funny thing? I have been waiting for the Nov security update on the original one, this one had it waiting as soon s I powered it on. Hmmmm.



Anyway, I will update as things arise, but suffice to say I am a happy camper.

 

[shalemail]

Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery Battery


All day battery. If you want a phone you'll NEVER EVER have to worry about battery. This is the one. Wow.



The speakers on my (new) new Pixel 2 XL are louder and clearer. I had no complaints with the last one, I am blown away by this one. (The sound)