***Official G-Nex first impressions thread*** Love it? Hate it?

[eaknet]

I just picked one up from Best Buy today. I'm hoping this changes my opinion of Android after a bad experience with an Eris. Also picked up an extended battery. I need to get a better case, but they didn't have squat, just a screen protector.

The Eris should never have been released, IMHO. Good call on the extended battery; I eventually went with a Seidio 3800mAh, but I'm on the road most days and can't be bothered to think about charging.

 

[eaknet]

I just picked one up from Best Buy today. I'm hoping this changes my opinion of Android after a bad experience with an Eris. Also picked up an extended battery. I need to get a better case, but they didn't have squat, just a screen protector.

Regarding cases, a lot of people like the Diztronic rev 3, easily found on Amazon or their website. Supppsedntonworknwith the OEM extended battery as well.

 

[blkbeltkid17]

I got the sedio surface case for the vzw extended battery and haven't looked back I love the sleak black look and the feel

 

[fury-s12]

few days into ownership of a GN, huge change from the old eclair i had running, but after few days of use and figuring out what was where now im loving it, the changes are pretty much all good, the holo theme rocks and all the new things are all plusses, my only negatives are trivial and not really the phones fault lol...

contact syncing, is still crazy you end up with contacts from various google accounts, a real issue when you have a years old gmail full of random contacts lol plus google+ circle contacts and of course regular phone contacts, of course you can hide the ones from gmail or whatever of course but when you want to keep the "good" ones it requires more work, im hoping the google data merger and me sitting there for a few days cleaning and merging my contacts will give me a comprehensive contacts list to sync in future.

google search bar - permanent and if removed the real estate is unusable, im pretty sure that breaks various google UI rules and the geneva convention, worse still is that you have to be rooted to properly claim back the space (as all launchers need root to mimic ics 100%)

swype- seriously should be a default keyboard lol

 

[blkbeltkid17]

Humm try nova launcher and you should be fine it is the closest to stock launcher

 

[Rook85]

Just picked up a Galaxy Nexus a few days back from Verizon.
Came over from sprint after they changed contract terms and got out without an ETF (Wife didn't like the service).
My previous phone was a Nexus S 4g. A lot of design similarities.
My wife bowed to the iphone 4s pressure but I've been pleased with android.

ICS is great, build quality is decent, I like the curved class carryover form the Nexus S. Signal strength has been so so. I'm hoping 4.04 will fix that.
What are you guys seeing for -dbmtypically in good situations. I'm getting -75 at best and typically indoors of -93 to -120 in poor areas.
Not sure how concerned to be. Haven't received lots of calls to judge yet.
I need my phone to work as I'm often on-call.

 

[DannyJSlone]

I haven't had the search bar in forever. It is just like stock with a few extra tweaks that are great. It gives you the top area to use where the search bar is and allows much more customization.

 

[fury-s12]

ye i am using nova launcher now, its good because it lets you take back that real estate plus many more options just a pity it breaks the nice widgets drawer display unless rooted, which i dont wanna do just yet

 

[Sandroidfan]

Just picked up a Galaxy Nexus a few days back from Verizon.
Came over from sprint after they changed contract terms and got out without an ETF (Wife didn't like the service).
My previous phone was a Nexus S 4g. A lot of design similarities.
My wife bowed to the iphone 4s pressure but I've been pleased with android.

ICS is great, build quality is decent, I like the curved class carryover form the Nexus S. Signal strength has been so so. I'm hoping 4.04 will fix that.
What are you guys seeing for -dbmtypically in good situations. I'm getting -75 at best and typically indoors of -93 to -120 in poor areas.
Not sure how concerned to be. Haven't received lots of calls to judge yet.
I need my phone to work as I'm often on-call.

Galaxy Nexus is the first phone displaying the data signal strength (4G or 3G) instead of 1X phone signal strength. Also for some reason, it's maxed at -75dbm on display even when it's better than that. So it's not much concern as phone signal is always better than what's displayed on Nexus.

 

[DoctorEyeSight]

Hi All,

I had a blackberry pearl with T-mobile for 5 years and I was enjoying the phone until I realized that we have been in a realm where there are way more better devices and services.

I then purchase with Verizon, the iphone 4s due to conformity and apple using their advertisements and tacticts. Initially, I loved the feature of SIRI on the iphone 4s and the camera and the phone was very simple and it's layout was straight forward. I was looking for a case and I went to the apple store, and OMG the customer service was horrible! It took them 20 minutes to have a sales rep or whatever those dudes with apple shirts are called to come and talk to me about cases! I straight up told the manager "I think I might get a Galaxy Nexus "

So, I end up thinking...Hmmmmm.....I have a 3g phone, why shouldn't I get a 4gLTE phone with a bigger super-amoled HD screen - I would be paying the same price monthly! Why not have faster internet? Why not have FREEDOM!

So I exchanged and paid the difference, and here I am, with my brand new Galaxy Nexus Oh, and I got double data, 4gb, for $30

I LOVE the screen on this phone. However, Keep in mind people, I am NEW with android, never been with android systems. I wish this phone would of had SIRI, and I wish Verizon would make their damn 4gLTE network work where I live - The 4gLTE network does not work at my home - Home is very important b/c I do most of my surfing here!

So my complaints on the iphones 4s and galaxy nexus are as follows:

iphone 4s: Small screen! Antenna and battery life sucks, get dropped calls, and 3g network, I like 4gLTE (time to upgrade grandpa )

Gnexus: Low ringtone volume - How smart of Samsung the put the speaker right at the bottom where our hands can cover it! Very smart!, Low headset volume, 4gLTE does not work everywhere - Why did I upgrade? I upgraded to get 4gLTE, not go back to damn 3g! & My last complaint is sometimes surfing on the internet, my original webpages get lost, and also OMG the battery life sucks on this, it sucks it up so good - I was on the bus streaming youtube videos for 1 hour, and battery went to 40% WTH? ANd last but not least, sometimes phone shuts off on it's own!!! Iphone 4s never did this to me.

But overall, GNexus wins, but please anyone if you can please help me get over these complaints....I'm willing to learn. Thanks people.

 

[Sandroidfan]

Gnexus: Low ringtone volume - How smart of Samsung the put the speaker right at the bottom where our hands can cover it! Very smart!, Low headset volume, 4gLTE does not work everywhere - Why did I upgrade? I upgraded to get 4gLTE, not go back to damn 3g! & My last complaint is sometimes surfing on the internet, my original webpages get lost, and also OMG the battery life sucks on this, it sucks it up so good - I was on the bus streaming youtube videos for 1 hour, and battery went to 40% WTH? ANd last but not least, sometimes phone shuts off on it's own!!! Iphone 4s never did this to me.

But overall, GNexus wins, but please anyone if you can please help me get over these complaints....I'm willing to learn. Thanks people.

You can use volume+ to boost your speaker volume. It's not fault of Gnex that there is no 4G/LTE service in your area yet. Until that happens, you'd better put your Nexus in 3G/CDMA only mode and it will easily double your battery life. You can do that in settings/wireless/mobile network.

 

[Logank]

I've had mine for about 4 days now, and love it. I haven't noticed any of the problems that I read about while I was trying to decide between this and the rezound. I haven't experienced 4g yet, but that's because I'm kinda out in the country. It's ok though, because it's still faster than other peoples phones around me.

 

[dalesponyrider]

Got mine yesterday. Absolutely love it! Gave my old Nexus One to hubby, or rather I said he could have it in a few days until I decided whether to keep my new Nexus. He won't have to wait at all! Although I am an aged, numpty I am finding my way round it, albeit slowly and with an awful lot of help from you guys (as it was in the beginning)!

I love the screen, the speed, the feel of it in my hand (I am a woman and don't have big hands), and the easy navigation.

Will probably be asking lots of silly questions like I did when I first got my N1, so please remain patient with me!

 

[rsmin]

Just got mine three days ago and love it. WiFi good, GPS good, screen is beautiful. I was at the end of my contract, and on the spur of the moment during the leap year sale i jumped on it sight unseen. I didn't know about the sale till about 8 p.m. on the 29th, so almost didn't do it because I usually like to give these things some time to research. I knew i would stay with android, because i loved my droid dx and i have the transformer prime. But my decision was going to be between the nexus and razor max, so it didn't give me much time to come to a conclusion. I went to this forum first then a few more and finally pulled the trigger on the nexus. Worst case scenario, i could just return it within the 14 day window. But that won't happen now because i just love this phone. I do feel sorry for those that may have gotten a bad one (or two), but i didn't. This thing is just as a phone should be. I did go to Verizon on Saturday just to eyeball the razr max and it looks like a great phone as well, so i don't think you can go wrong with either one. I just feel for me I like the Nexus. Would like to give thanks to all those that post their comments on this forum, because it was your comments that helped me make my decision to go with the Nexus

 

[tmoney23]

Well, I read all the problems with poor radio signal, and was hoping it wasn't true. I got my Nexus last week ($100 off leap year deal) and it could not hold a signal longer than 10 minutes without dropping in and out. Went to store got a new sim card, and no luck.
Just exchanged it for the RAZR MAXX.

 

[wedgemoose]

tmoney, I am not doubting you one bit here but I can't beleive people are still saying this. I have had mine sijnce launch and NEVER had that problem. I am in Sales and travel all over the country. Good signal spots and bad singnal spots and this phone is just as good as my T-bolt was. I have had a few normal (all Cell Phones) signal drops but nothing out of the ordinary. But again, i believe you. But i don't know why it is still being said all the time. I would have noticed it by now.

P.S. I live in a weak area. My house is basically a "dead spot". And the Nex does the exact same thing as my t-bolt did??????

 

[tmoney23]

Yeah it may have just been a bad phone. Trust me i really wanted to like the phone, and I did like everything else about it. They offered to give me a new Nexus, but i didnt want to take the chance and really looking forward to the battery life of the Maxx.

tmoney, I am not doubting you one bit here but I can't beleive people are still saying this. I have had mine sijnce launch and NEVER had that problem. I am in Sales and travel all over the country. Good signal spots and bad singnal spots and this phone is just as good as my T-bolt was. I have had a few normal (all Cell Phones) signal drops but nothing out of the ordinary. But again, i believe you. But i don't know why it is still being said all the time. I would have noticed it by now.

P.S. I live in a weak area. My house is basically a "dead spot". And the Nex does the exact same thing as my t-bolt did??????

 

[wedgemoose]

Yeah it may have just been a bad phone. Trust me i really wanted to like the phone, and I did like everything else about it. They offered to give me a new Nexus, but i didnt want to take the chance and really looking forward to the battery life of the Maxx.

Like I said "I don't doubt you". I never doubt anyone. I know how frustrating it can be. I just can't beleive that I am that lucky. I never have luck. And way too many people say what you say. Maybe my t-bolt sucked also and I'm an idiot and didn't realize it had bad service also.

I have my one to two dead spots that I have had since getting Verizon (15 years ago) but always have signal every where else. One of my places I have to travel to is Middlesboro, KY and I get signal there. If you ever saw Middlesboro you wouldn't believe I could get gas there nevermind a cell signal.....Haha

anyways the Razor seems nice. so at least you don't have to suffer. And i would kill to have your batt life!!!!!!! enjoy

 

[brounmoney]

So I have had the phone for 3 days and love some things, but there things I don't love as much.

Design: I love the design and the curved screen. I had the Nexus s so not to much design change, but what they did change was for the best. At first I thought it might be too big, but now i am getting more comfortable with it.

OS: love ICS. I was waiting on the nexus s to get it, but was still a no go. ICS is just so fast and looks so good. By fare the best OS on any phone.

Display: Now this is where I have mixed thoughts. The size and picture of the display are awesome, but the brightness on auto is not not very good. Kind of low I think. With the battery life just not being that good I guess it could not stand to be much more bright.

Battery: Ok this is the one thing I just don't like. My first day with the phone I got about 16.5 hours before it just completely died. Now some may say that is good, but I really did not use my phone that much. I have seen some improvement over the last day and a half, but still not close to the nexus s battery. I could go 15 hours and still be at 60% left. Oh and by the way I have the GSM galaxy nexus on AT&T. I have ordered the extended battery and that should be here this week so we will see what that can do for me. I know everyone wants the sleek design, but man I would not have minded a little thicker phone with more power.

If any one with the GSM nexus has any pointers for battery life I am all ears. I have done the normal and cut off NFC, and only turn it on when I need it. One thing I will not do it mess with the brightness. As I said before auto is already a little low, so I will not be messing with that.

Over all the phone is awesome just a few things that may be fixable. We shall see.

 

[Sandroidfan]

So I have had the phone for 3 days and love some things, but there things I don't love as much.

Design: I love the design and the curved screen. I had the Nexus s so not to much design change, but what they did change was for the best. At first I thought it might be too big, but now i am getting more comfortable with it.

OS: love ICS. I was waiting on the nexus s to get it, but was still a no go. ICS is just so fast and looks so good. By fare the best OS on any phone.

Display: Now this is where I have mixed thoughts. The size and picture of the display are awesome, but the brightness on auto is not not very good. Kind of low I think. With the battery life just not being that good I guess it could not stand to be much more bright.

Battery: Ok this is the one thing I just don't like. My first day with the phone I got about 16.5 hours before it just completely died. Now some may say that is good, but I really did not use my phone that much. I have seen some improvement over the last day and a half, but still not close to the nexus s battery. I could go 15 hours and still be at 60% left. Oh and by the way I have the GSM galaxy nexus on AT&T. I have ordered the extended battery and that should be here this week so we will see what that can do for me. I know everyone wants the sleek design, but man I would not have minded a little thicker phone with more power.

If any one with the GSM nexus has any pointers for battery life I am all ears. I have done the normal and cut off NFC, and only turn it on when I need it. One thing I will not do it mess with the brightness. As I said before auto is already a little low, so I will not be messing with that.

Over all the phone is awesome just a few things that may be fixable. We shall see.

You can turn off auto brightness and manually set it around 30%. I found that to be plenty bright for indoors and brighter than auto setting most of time.

As for battery, use WiFi whenever available and also disable Google+, Gtalk if you don't use them much. Believe or not, disabling those two apps makes more than 50% gain on battery life for me. Mine is Verizon LTE version, so can't speak for battery gain on GSM version though.

 

[Homan13PSU]

Now that I've had my Nexus (Verizon) for a week I feel I can adequately chime in with a first impression on this;

I...love...this...phone. I was a bit worried coming from my Incredible, as that in its own right was another great phone and I was a little worried that I was going to have a let down. But I haven't. Sure, I've had some minor problems, but with a phone running Google's latest and greatest I think some growing pains are expected.

Battery life: I can get through a day without having to plug in or carry a spare battery with me. I generally run on Wi-Fi at home, and at work signal can be very spotty so I'll see some extreme run-down in the office as it bounces back and forth between radios. But, like I said I can get through an entire day (7:00ish to 10:00 ish) on moderate use so far.

Signal/Call quality: Work is probably the worst place for signal for me (for a variety of reasons). My phone bounces back and forth between 4 and 3G all day (my Incredible did this as well between 3G and 1X). Beyond being in the office Northern Virginia is very well covered under Big Red's 4G spectrum and if I'm out and about I rarely see a 3G signal on my phone. Call quality is great. Voices are clear, and I'm not experiencing that call volume issue some of you around here were early on.

Apps: Handcent appears to not like sending MMS messages anymore. I'm not sure if this is due to it not being completely updated for ICS, or what; but I switched to Go SMS and the MMS problem appears to be gone. The only other app I was seeing an issue with was SportsTap, but that updated last night.

I haven't decided to root yet, something I'm sure I'll do within the next week. Very happy with this purchase, I can see myself owning this phone for a long, LONG time.

 

[cgcurse]

Just got mine today from VZW, and it's everything I wanted and then some. The screen is very clear, and scrolls with no jerkiness at all. It's bigger than my LG Ally, but it's lighter, and fits in my hand surprisingly well. The in-call sound quality is great, text quality is crisp and clear, and the ICS keyboard is a million times better than Froyo (2.2). Right now, on Day One, I'd give the G-Nex a 10/10.

 

[sqterry]

Go to your settings & then the sound section & click the vibrate on touch box. Welcome I came from an iphone 2 but I started out with android just decided to go back to 1 iPhone was boring to me

 

[erric]

Well, I had the 90 day experiment with my Galaxy Nexus. For reference, I went from the Blackberry Pearl>HTC Touch Pro>Motorola Droid>iPhone 4>Droid Charge>Galaxy Nexus so I've kind of been all over the place these past few years. I really wanted to love my Galaxy Nexus, but the device made it extremely difficult.

I had to replace my original Galaxy Nexus the first week I had it due to the NFC not functioning properly. My second Galaxy Nexus didn't have any flaws, other than those that exist as part of the Galaxy Nexus (short battery life, signal attenuation).

What I liked about the Galaxy Nexus:
-ICS is, without a doubt, the best iteration of Android. For the most part it's smooth nice to use
-Large, HD screen.

What I didn't like:
-No uniformity across apps (this seems to be something that Google is trying to fix)
-I personally don't think that the screen looks as nice as the IPS screen on the iPhone
-I felt that the size of the phone was too large
-Battery life (I had to switch LTE off completely or risk losing 25% of my battery life just on the ride to and from work)

I switched to the iPhone 4s and, to tell you the truth, it makes me wonder why I switched from the iPhone 4 in the first place. After jailbreaking, I have everything just the way I want it (for now). No doubt I'll probably switch back to Android if the Samsung Note (Journal) or Samsung SIII comes to Verizon, but I'll probably end up switching back to Apple when the iPhone 5 is released (I can't help it, I'm one of those people).

While some people complain about the battery life on the iPhone 4s, I've found that it's pretty unbelievable. I stream Spotify at work for six to eight hours a day, and I'll get home with 50% of my battery left. With heavy usage (Spotify streaming, constant email, texting, whatsapp), I'll get at least 14-16 hours out of my phone without having to charge it.

Just wanted to share my thoughts on the Galaxy Nexus. My wife is still using hers and she loves it. She came over from the Thunderbolt, so the battery life is similar. Her only complaint is that the Thunderbolt held onto a signal far better than the Galaxy Nexus. She also turned off LTE due to battery life.

 

[brounmoney]

Well, I had the 90 day experiment with my Galaxy Nexus. For reference, I went from the Blackberry Pearl>HTC Touch Pro>Motorola Droid>iPhone 4>Droid Charge>Galaxy Nexus so I've kind of been all over the place these past few years. I really wanted to love my Galaxy Nexus, but the device made it extremely difficult.

I had to replace my original Galaxy Nexus the first week I had it due to the NFC not functioning properly. My second Galaxy Nexus didn't have any flaws, other than those that exist as part of the Galaxy Nexus (short battery life, signal attenuation).

What I liked about the Galaxy Nexus:
-ICS is, without a doubt, the best iteration of Android. For the most part it's smooth nice to use
-Large, HD screen.

What I didn't like:
-No uniformity across apps (this seems to be something that Google is trying to fix)
-I personally don't think that the screen looks as nice as the IPS screen on the iPhone
-I felt that the size of the phone was too large
-Battery life (I had to switch LTE off completely or risk losing 25% of my battery life just on the ride to and from work)

I switched to the iPhone 4s and, to tell you the truth, it makes me wonder why I switched from the iPhone 4 in the first place. After jailbreaking, I have everything just the way I want it (for now). No doubt I'll probably switch back to Android if the Samsung Note (Journal) or Samsung SIII comes to Verizon, but I'll probably end up switching back to Apple when the iPhone 5 is released (I can't help it, I'm one of those people).

While some people complain about the battery life on the iPhone 4s, I've found that it's pretty unbelievable. I stream Spotify at work for six to eight hours a day, and I'll get home with 50% of my battery left. With heavy usage (Spotify streaming, constant email, texting, whatsapp), I'll get at least 14-16 hours out of my phone without having to charge it.

Just wanted to share my thoughts on the Galaxy Nexus. My wife is still using hers and she loves it. She came over from the Thunderbolt, so the battery life is similar. Her only complaint is that the Thunderbolt held onto a signal far better than the Galaxy Nexus. She also turned off LTE due to battery life.

This is my opinion and most likely I am one of the few, but I truely believe verzion ruined the GNex. The battery life problems are coming from it running on LTE. Almost all the LTE on verizon have bad battery life except for the razor maxx. I understand that LTE is supper fast, but really how many places have LTE. It is a really new technology that needs work. I kind of wish Verizon would have just held off on putting the LTE on the GNex. It has really hurt google and the nexus devices.

I have the imported GSM on Att and love it. Battery life for me is about the same as the nexus s which I can get about 18 hours of use on moderate use. I think that is pretty good. Verizon has made GNex their flagship phone and added their crap ware to it. It really takes away from the nexus. I don't see apple letting AT&T or Verizon put crap ware on the iPhone. Google should have just stuck with their guns and said not to Verizon. erric I think you got a far inferior phone to the GSM one which is a shame. I think the iPhone is truely the only phone Verizon has not messed with. I really hope you try android again and maybe think about a different carrier. A carrier with a sim card, so you can import the better versions of phones.