After using my Galaxy S3 for almost 3 and a half years, I decided to upgrade to a new phone. The GS3 has been a great phone, but has been feeling long in the tooth for months now. With a bunch of new phones released as of late, I decided to pull the trigger and get a Nexus 6P.
My reasons for choosing the Nexus 6P ultimately came down to a few things. I did not have an opportunity to test drive the Note 5's. I would like to try out the physical keyboard, but there were none at any Samsung or phone stores I visited. I wanted to get an unlocked, non-carrier branded phone. That is not so easy in Canada. I waited for some full reviews for the N6P and was sold. Timing was right as news broke of it becoming available again on the Play Store the day I wanted to get one.
When I first got the phone and turned it on, I was happy to see that there was an easy way to transfer my apps to the new phone. It only transferred my apps, but that was enough for me. I didn't have much other than music that I would have wanted to transfer over. My important photos are downloaded to my PC.
I chose to redo my music and songs from scratch. I manage them on my PC with Windows Media Player. I repicked my more than a thousand songs and transferred them to my new phone. One thing I am really disappointed in is that album covers don't transfer over. Also, my old Cover Art Downloader app no longer functioned. I found other apps, but it was a tedious process to download the cover art to my phone and then match them up on my music player.
One of the signs that my phone was on its last legs is the fact that the music play stutters from time to time. I would have to reboot my phone weekly as the stuttering become a problem from time to time. I have my phone automatically play music when I start up my car. It's nice to be able to enjoy my music without having to worry about having to reboot my phone.
It has been a bit of an adjustment going from a 4.8" phone to a 5.7" one. I have pretty much given up on one handed use. Even carrying it around, I want to hold it with 2 hands. The larger size does come with its advantages. I find typing easier as the keys are bigger. Also, the huge screen allows me to have 8 rows and 6 columns of icons. I use Nova Prime Launcher and it is great being able to reduce the number of home screens I need.
The front facing speakers are great for watching videos. I always hated my old phone where the person I am facing is hearing the sound better than I can watching the video. No such issue with the N6P. The only sound issue is that I often carry my phone in my belt holster. The speakers are pressed up against the inside of the hoster, so the notification and ringtone sounds may be a bit muffled. Still it is loud enough that I don't have an issue hearing a ringtone except in noisier environments.
By far the coolest feature is the fingerprint reader. I have an iPhone 5S for work and the fingerprint reader is a favourite feature of mine. Now I get that feature on my personal phone as well. The placement felt awkward at first. After over a week with the phone, I am getting used to it now. I had thought that there would be short comings with the placement on the rear, but so far, I am fine with it. When I want to unlock it, I would want to pick it up anyway. I mount it in my car to use Waze for driving navigation. While mounted, the fingerprint reader is actually above the back of the mount. I can reach around and unlock the phone with my fingerprint. It is also very fast. The only thing I have a bit of a concern is that I may forget my pattern lock as I don't use it as often any more.
Performance was obviously an improvement over my old phone. One thing I did notice was that Waze did not seem as smooth on the N6P as it did on the GS3. Whenever I made a turn, I noticed that the GS3 was smoother rotating the map. It's not really an issue, but it was definitely unexpected. For everything else, the N6P obviously blows the GS3 away. I also noticed that the battery runs way cooler on the N6P than on the GS3. The GS3 heats up quite a bit, especially when running Waze. The N6P is no where near as warm under the same conditions.
I did have some issues with notification sounds. I have custom notification sound files on my phones. I use a text-to-speech engine to generate sound files. If I get an email, I have a sound file that says, "You have received email." I never confuse another phone's notification with mine. There were some apps that either would not play these custom notification sounds or would not allow me to select them at all. It turns out that the solution is to allow the apps access to my phone storage. Android now allows better control over app access to various parts of your phone. It's something that wasn't obvious to me, but the community on Android Forums helped me out with this.
I am disappointed that the built-in alarm app would not play a song of mine as an alarm tone. I had to download a third party alarm app. It worked well until one day I left my phone unplugged. The battery saving doze feature put my alarm app to sleep. This is another new Android feature I didn't have on my old phone. I had to make sure I configure my alarm app along with a few others to not fall asleep.
My biggest gripe with phones in the past is battery life. I'm an extremely heavy user. The biggest drain on my battery is when I drive. I always have music playing over BlueTooth audio in my car and almost always have Waze running. On my previous two phones, I would use a car charger and even then, my battery would drain slowly in the car. I hate having to charge my phone during the day. My GS3 even had a 3500 mAh extended battery. Even then, I had to keep my phone charged in the car and I still run out of juice at times before the end of the day.
So far, I am very impressed with the battery life. I did charge up my battery once during the day, but judging by how much I had left at the end of the day, I didn't have to. So far, I had no need to charge it up in my car.
The quick charge is nice, but I find that for my use, I have it when I don't need it and don't have it when I do. If I can only get quick charge in one place, the place I would choose would be in the car. That is the only place where I absolutely cannot get quick charge. Actually, I can if I get an inverter, but getting an inverter to charge a phone is overkill. The place where I use my quick charge the most is when I'm sleeping. When I charge my phone overnight, I don't need quick charge. I sleep for several hours, so if it takes 5 hours to charge up my phone that is fine. Charging my phone in 90 minutes while I'm asleep doesn't give me anything.
Speaking of charging my phone in the car, the N6P comes with a USB 2 to USB-C connector. It is 2 inches too short to reach from my car adapter to where I mount my phone. The solution to reach those 2 inches is to buy a USB extension cable that is 2 meters long. It feels like a waste with so much cable dangling doing pretty much nothing.
The USB-C connector does not allow me to use all of my cables that came with all of my previous phones. I pretty much have the one quick charge cable plus a USB 2 to USB-C cable and I had to buy a 2-meter extension cable. I'm also holding off on buying any additional cables so far. Partly because of the recent stories of incompatible cables. Also, partly because I don't really need anything more yet. The battery life is good enough so far that my car charging apparatus is stowed away. My quick charge cable is by my bedside right now. I carried it around once, but didn't need it when I was out.
I don't have much to say about photos as I only took one picture an that was of a legal document. I do like that you can start up the camera by double tapping the power button.
Overall, I am very satisfied with the Nexus 6P and would recommend it to anyone. For people upgrading to older phones with older versions of Android, keep in mind that you may have to configure your phone for doze and permissions. The lack of charging cables is something of a bummer right now with the new USB-C connectors.
My reasons for choosing the Nexus 6P ultimately came down to a few things. I did not have an opportunity to test drive the Note 5's. I would like to try out the physical keyboard, but there were none at any Samsung or phone stores I visited. I wanted to get an unlocked, non-carrier branded phone. That is not so easy in Canada. I waited for some full reviews for the N6P and was sold. Timing was right as news broke of it becoming available again on the Play Store the day I wanted to get one.
When I first got the phone and turned it on, I was happy to see that there was an easy way to transfer my apps to the new phone. It only transferred my apps, but that was enough for me. I didn't have much other than music that I would have wanted to transfer over. My important photos are downloaded to my PC.
I chose to redo my music and songs from scratch. I manage them on my PC with Windows Media Player. I repicked my more than a thousand songs and transferred them to my new phone. One thing I am really disappointed in is that album covers don't transfer over. Also, my old Cover Art Downloader app no longer functioned. I found other apps, but it was a tedious process to download the cover art to my phone and then match them up on my music player.
One of the signs that my phone was on its last legs is the fact that the music play stutters from time to time. I would have to reboot my phone weekly as the stuttering become a problem from time to time. I have my phone automatically play music when I start up my car. It's nice to be able to enjoy my music without having to worry about having to reboot my phone.
It has been a bit of an adjustment going from a 4.8" phone to a 5.7" one. I have pretty much given up on one handed use. Even carrying it around, I want to hold it with 2 hands. The larger size does come with its advantages. I find typing easier as the keys are bigger. Also, the huge screen allows me to have 8 rows and 6 columns of icons. I use Nova Prime Launcher and it is great being able to reduce the number of home screens I need.
The front facing speakers are great for watching videos. I always hated my old phone where the person I am facing is hearing the sound better than I can watching the video. No such issue with the N6P. The only sound issue is that I often carry my phone in my belt holster. The speakers are pressed up against the inside of the hoster, so the notification and ringtone sounds may be a bit muffled. Still it is loud enough that I don't have an issue hearing a ringtone except in noisier environments.
By far the coolest feature is the fingerprint reader. I have an iPhone 5S for work and the fingerprint reader is a favourite feature of mine. Now I get that feature on my personal phone as well. The placement felt awkward at first. After over a week with the phone, I am getting used to it now. I had thought that there would be short comings with the placement on the rear, but so far, I am fine with it. When I want to unlock it, I would want to pick it up anyway. I mount it in my car to use Waze for driving navigation. While mounted, the fingerprint reader is actually above the back of the mount. I can reach around and unlock the phone with my fingerprint. It is also very fast. The only thing I have a bit of a concern is that I may forget my pattern lock as I don't use it as often any more.
Performance was obviously an improvement over my old phone. One thing I did notice was that Waze did not seem as smooth on the N6P as it did on the GS3. Whenever I made a turn, I noticed that the GS3 was smoother rotating the map. It's not really an issue, but it was definitely unexpected. For everything else, the N6P obviously blows the GS3 away. I also noticed that the battery runs way cooler on the N6P than on the GS3. The GS3 heats up quite a bit, especially when running Waze. The N6P is no where near as warm under the same conditions.
I did have some issues with notification sounds. I have custom notification sound files on my phones. I use a text-to-speech engine to generate sound files. If I get an email, I have a sound file that says, "You have received email." I never confuse another phone's notification with mine. There were some apps that either would not play these custom notification sounds or would not allow me to select them at all. It turns out that the solution is to allow the apps access to my phone storage. Android now allows better control over app access to various parts of your phone. It's something that wasn't obvious to me, but the community on Android Forums helped me out with this.
I am disappointed that the built-in alarm app would not play a song of mine as an alarm tone. I had to download a third party alarm app. It worked well until one day I left my phone unplugged. The battery saving doze feature put my alarm app to sleep. This is another new Android feature I didn't have on my old phone. I had to make sure I configure my alarm app along with a few others to not fall asleep.
My biggest gripe with phones in the past is battery life. I'm an extremely heavy user. The biggest drain on my battery is when I drive. I always have music playing over BlueTooth audio in my car and almost always have Waze running. On my previous two phones, I would use a car charger and even then, my battery would drain slowly in the car. I hate having to charge my phone during the day. My GS3 even had a 3500 mAh extended battery. Even then, I had to keep my phone charged in the car and I still run out of juice at times before the end of the day.
So far, I am very impressed with the battery life. I did charge up my battery once during the day, but judging by how much I had left at the end of the day, I didn't have to. So far, I had no need to charge it up in my car.
The quick charge is nice, but I find that for my use, I have it when I don't need it and don't have it when I do. If I can only get quick charge in one place, the place I would choose would be in the car. That is the only place where I absolutely cannot get quick charge. Actually, I can if I get an inverter, but getting an inverter to charge a phone is overkill. The place where I use my quick charge the most is when I'm sleeping. When I charge my phone overnight, I don't need quick charge. I sleep for several hours, so if it takes 5 hours to charge up my phone that is fine. Charging my phone in 90 minutes while I'm asleep doesn't give me anything.
Speaking of charging my phone in the car, the N6P comes with a USB 2 to USB-C connector. It is 2 inches too short to reach from my car adapter to where I mount my phone. The solution to reach those 2 inches is to buy a USB extension cable that is 2 meters long. It feels like a waste with so much cable dangling doing pretty much nothing.
The USB-C connector does not allow me to use all of my cables that came with all of my previous phones. I pretty much have the one quick charge cable plus a USB 2 to USB-C cable and I had to buy a 2-meter extension cable. I'm also holding off on buying any additional cables so far. Partly because of the recent stories of incompatible cables. Also, partly because I don't really need anything more yet. The battery life is good enough so far that my car charging apparatus is stowed away. My quick charge cable is by my bedside right now. I carried it around once, but didn't need it when I was out.
I don't have much to say about photos as I only took one picture an that was of a legal document. I do like that you can start up the camera by double tapping the power button.
Overall, I am very satisfied with the Nexus 6P and would recommend it to anyone. For people upgrading to older phones with older versions of Android, keep in mind that you may have to configure your phone for doze and permissions. The lack of charging cables is something of a bummer right now with the new USB-C connectors.
