Phones Google Pixel 2 / Google Pixel 2 XL

[Sparky2012]

Next year probably different QC issues from different manufacturers and higher price tags.

Probably... but I’ll take my chances on waiting Can only get better surely, especially for the Pixel line where with the 3rd version they’ll surely put in a solid display after this years disaster.

 

[5105973]

Over 24 hours in and I am still on the fence with this 2 XL.

I'm almost wishing that the temptation didn't get the better of me with it as it has left me in a bit of a dilemma.
I am missing the hardware of my X, and some of the software functions. I know this sounds ridiculous, but Android's emoji are flat out terrible. And weirdly, they've changed them in WhatsApp so they no longer look like the iOS ones... I know this is petty, but it's these little things that I use daily that add up.
I like how emoji are all the same across all apps for iOS.

Also, Instagram stories (which I also use daily), has a major issue with any Android phone it would seem. When video is filmed and uploaded, the quality takes a huge hit whereas with iPhone it remains very smooth. Another annoyance.

I am getting used to the size of the Pixel 2 XL, but whenever I pick my iPhone X up it feels like a comfortable pair of slippers haha.
I guess I liked the X more than I knew.

I had a look at the smaller Pixel 2 today, albeit a bolted down display model I couldn't pick up, and I actually liked it more than I thought I would. But I prefer the overall design of the 2 XL.

The problem I've got is I can't return the Pixel 2 XL unless there is a fault with it. I can return it within 14 days and change it for something else but cannot physically return it.
Part of me is tempted to return it for an LG V30 which has just had £100 knocked off today so is now £699. Same price I got my 2 XL for.
The concern there though, is if I didn't like that then I couldn't swap again. You only get one swap and that's it, again, unless it's faulty.
Knowing me I'd swap for the V30 and then prefer the 2XL and put myself in an even bigger pickle.

The reason why I like the look of V30 is because it looks like the X haha. So hardware wise it's as close as you'd get it, but it also apparently performs really well and has a decent camera. All good things.
Any advice from anyone?!

Given how many qc issues have been discussed on the 2XL it’s a bit ironic you can’t find any on the one you have.

It seems to me Instagram has a customer service issue it needs to resolve because there are probably more almost as many Android users out there as iPhone users among Instagram customers. Maybe even more?

It’s been a long time since I texted on any of my Android phones but I recall being able to use iOS versions of emoji on them. Yep I just checked and I have them on Textra on my Samsung. I downloaded them from the Play Store if I remember correctly. Textra was really good for my needs in terms of texting with my husband. It just falls apart sending full quality video. However I’m just learning to send links to my Google Photos account now when I want to share stuff like that via text. Even when I’m using iMessages. It saves someone having to download a video if they are on the go and have weak signal.

I don’t have WhatsApp installed on my Samsung anymore. I’ll go see what I can find out.

 

[Aneres11]

I think I have decided that I’m returning the Pixel 2 XL. The hardware is just not up to snuff for me.
It doesn’t feel premium for this price, yes it’s much cheaper than an iPhone X and software is probably better, but that’s another story.

I’m going to swap it out for an LG V30, just because I can. Resale in the U.K. for both Pixel 2 XL and V30 are similar so I may as well use the swap out to give the V30 a try. I would have swapped to the smaller Pixel to try but that’s now gone back up £100 to £629 rather than the £529 it has been this past week. The resale on that won’t be anywhere near £629 on that so I’d be losing more than the V30 resale.

That’s how it is in my weird mind anyway haha. The camera on the Pixel is the only thing I will miss. It is absolutely outstanding. Need I even say it. But comparison shots with the X in low light and the Pixel is just head and shoulders above.
I honestly think I’d be happier with the smaller Pixel, but not happier with that over my X.

 

[Aneres11]

Ignore all that. CPW website has Pixels with £100 off still so I may be in luck. If that is the case I will go for the smaller one. I can't tell you how much of a breath of fresh air a smaller phone has been in the iPhone X.

A 6" display is too big for me. I have really small hands for a guy and this is just too large. What's weird is, the Pixel 2 XL is almost the same height as my XZ Premium was which I adored, and had no problems with the size of. But I had used bigger phones all year up until the Essential and then the X, and a smaller device has suddenly become ideal again. Something I never thought I'd hear myself say.

Tomorrow morning I'm off to pick up my Christmas present to then give to my parents to wrap up. You wouldn't think I was 29 years old haha. Whilst I'm there I will swap the Pixel out as the electronics store I'm going to has a CPW built inside it as they're sister companies. As a side note, my Xmas gift is a Google Pixelbook which I'm pretty excited about...
I kept being asked what I wanted for Christmas and didn't really want anything specific so we always just give each other money when that happens so I thought I'd put it towards a Pixelbook and make up the rest myself. Exciting stuff!

If the smaller Pixel doesn't do it for me then it's X all the way until something else entices me.

 

[5105973]

Ignore all that. CPW website has Pixels with £100 off still so I may be in luck. If that is the case I will go for the smaller one. I can't tell you how much of a breath of fresh air a smaller phone has been in the iPhone X.

A 6" display is too big for me. I have really small hands for a guy and this is just too large. What's weird is, the Pixel 2 XL is almost the same height as my XZ Premium was which I adored, and had no problems with the size of. But I had used bigger phones all year up until the Essential and then the X, and a smaller device has suddenly become ideal again. Something I never thought I'd hear myself say.

Tomorrow morning I'm off to pick up my Christmas present to then give to my parents to wrap up. You wouldn't think I was 29 years old haha. Whilst I'm there I will swap the Pixel out as the electronics store I'm going to has a CPW built inside it as they're sister companies. As a side note, my Xmas gift is a Google Pixelbook which I'm pretty excited about...
I kept being asked what I wanted for Christmas and didn't really want anything specific so we always just give each other money when that happens so I thought I'd put it towards a Pixelbook and make up the rest myself. Exciting stuff!

If the smaller Pixel doesn't do it for me then it's X all the way until something else entices me.

Oh wow a lot of decision making has been going on! Sorry not to get back to you sooner. I couldn’t really find much solution to getting iOS emojis on Android short of rooting.

I’ve had a weird day. I’ve been doing stuff but getting sicker and got to the point I can breathe only if I don’t move much. My husband was trying to take me to the hospital but I wouldn’t go. I’ll see how I am tomorrow. I might have pneumonia or bronchitis. I have a ridiculously high pain and misery tolerance so it’s hard to tell with me. I’ve been playing Animal Crossing on my X. I’m not suffering. I’m happy. I just can’t breathe too well. I cough like crazy when I move. Then I give myself a headache. I just wish I could sleep but I keep choking. I’ll probably have to sleep sitting up. I’m going to read about Pixels until I zonk out.

I think if I get a white Pixel 2 like I’m hoping to I’m going to get a D Brand skin to turn it into a baby Panda. I really love the Panda look but like you, Aneres11, I can’t find the price to value in the larger phone.

 

[Radon87000]

That’s insane that they wouldn’t price match. Jeez, that’s so stupid of them. Very Dilbert (the comic about the idiocies of corporate bureaucracy) of them. It almost seems like they’re just trying to get a lot of practice in processing returns.

Despite my being sick I went out last night with my X and my S8+ on a drive through a Christmas light show. With my 2016 phones I got terrible results trying to take pics of lit up wireframe displays from a moving car. What a difference a year makes...I got some really good shots on the 2017 Samsung and iPhone. The X outperformed the S8+ in most cases especially in terms of color accuracy. I was wishing I had a Pixel 2 to test as well. 2017 has definitely been a good year for smartphone cameras.

The X is an amazing phone but for me the Achilles heel is the battery life. My husband says he gets good battery life on his but mine drains fast. Playing Animal Crossing Pocket Camp on it doesn’t help. But using the camera drains it a bit fast, too. I usually charge this phone twice a day. My 7 Plus was once a day to a day and a half, even with very heavy camera use. Well it used to be anyway. iOS 11 wrecked that for a long time and it took several iOS 11updates to get some of that excellent battery life back.

Still, my 7Plus isn’t the same phone on 11 that it was on 10. The smoothness is gone. It gets choppy when I’m not expecting it. I’m starting to worry someday in the not too distant future my very eXpensive and smooth X is going to start performing like cheese on the next iOS upgrade, too. With Apple showing both some innovation in hardware but some strategic weaknesses in software, for me there has never been a better time to pit the top Android phones against the iPhones. 2018 better see all of them bringing their A game. Especially Google.

I wish Google would stop trying to emulate the iPhone strategy so closely and instead realize they can drop the prices a little bit, emphasize the simplicity of their hardware and the versatility and capability of their software in contrast to Apple’s complex, expensive hardware and rigid one size fits all approach to software. That’s actually sort of what they are doing now, but they botched it by pricing the phones a little bit too high especially considering their QC has been horrible and they don’t have the reputation and carrier support to charge Apple level prices. And they picked a bad time to remove the headphone jack. They jumped the gun by at least a year. Especially with Samsung still including it.

Getting back to battery life for a moment, I’ve been reading the Pixel 2XL yields some amazing battery life. I can’t remember how my Pixel 2 did. I think it was good for a small phone.

I hope this post makes sense. Still sick and still feels like my head is stuffed with wool.

You should check if your 7 Plus is being throttled. You may have gotten a defective battery.

 

[Aneres11]

Nice little haul. I feel like a tech reviewer. Difference is, google didn’t send me this for free haha.

Hope I like smaller Pixel more.

 

[michael9891]

Nice little haul. I feel like a tech reviewer. Difference is, google didn’t send me this for free haha.

Hope I like smaller Pixel more.

Did you get the free Google Home & £100 off with the Pixelbook?

 

[convergent]

Nice little haul. I feel like a tech reviewer. Difference is, google didn’t send me this for free haha.

Hope I like smaller Pixel more.

Nice haul!

 

[nospleen]

Nice little haul. I feel like a tech reviewer. Difference is, google didn’t send me this for free haha.

Hope I like smaller Pixel more.

Let me know what you think of the Pixelbook! I've been eyeing one.

 

[jamezr]

Gotta do a write up on the Pixelbook @Aneres11
Look forward to reading your thoughts!

 

[Aneres11]

Did you get the free Google Home & £100 off with the Pixelbook?

Sadly not. I got it for £899 as I bought it from Currys and got 10% staff discount using my old work mates card.
The google home would have been SWEET but I have an Echo which has all my lighting and smart plugs attached to it at home and I have the Mini which came with my Pixel 2 now so that’ll suffice.

And @jamezr i will most definitely write up on it once I’ve opened it up Christmas Day and had a blast!

I have just unboxed the Pixel 2. I already know I prefer the size. Good signs thus far.

 

[michael9891]

Gotta do a write up on the Pixelbook @Aneres11
Look forward to reading your thoughts!

Same! I had a look at one in Best Buy and seems really good. If I were to buy from Google while I’m in America, I could get the 256gb for less than the 128gb costs in England. And that takes tax into account as well.

Although it looks like apps don’t run full screen? I opened Keep, Note etc and couldn’t see a way to make them full screen, only Chrome.

 

[Aneres11]

I’ll check out all the apps when I get some time with it. I’ll be like a kid on Christmas Eve knowing I’m getting the Pixelbook haha.

Just setting the Pixel 2 up now. Copying from my iPhone as it’s not finding a back up from my gmail account which is odd as my 2XL was backed up this morning.

Twice it’s got to 1 minute remaining and told me to reconnect the cable, which was not disconnected either time, so I’ve just skipped and will start afresh. Very annoying.

Looks good in white. I like it. I toyed with the idea of the blue, but felt white looked a bit cleaner. The black wasn’t an option as that didn’t tickle my fancy at all haha.
Straight out the box the screen looks decent. Couldn’t say the same for the XL which looked terrible until it the phone was updated to the latest software and ‘saturated’ was chosen.

Be interesting to see how the screen on the normal sized 2 looks with these different colour options.

Also, blue shift no where near as prevalent as it was on the XL I had.

 

[fjd726]

How are the bezels on it? Thinking of getting the regular 2 as well.

 

[Tig Bitties]

My gosh I am in LOVE with this case;

https://www.amazon.com/Google-X-Level-Mobile-Guardian-Protective/dp/B076BJG8YF

Fit like a tight glove, has a nice grip, not too slippery, and not too sticky. And it's super slim, very thin. It preserves the original feel of the phone.

My first case I got was the official Google Fabric case, and man that case made the phone more slippery, like a wet bar of soap. Plus it was way too thick and bulky.

This XLevel case is exactly what I like.

 

[co.ag.2005]

My gosh I am in LOVE with this case;

https://www.amazon.com/Google-X-Level-Mobile-Guardian-Protective/dp/B076BJG8YF

Fit like a tight glove, has a nice grip, not too slippery, and not too sticky. And it's super slim, very thin. It preserves the original feel of the phone.

My first case I got was the official Google Fabric case, and man that case made the phone more slippery, like a wet bar of soap. Plus it was way too thick and bulky.

This XLevel case is exactly what I like.

I've been wanting to try out the xlevel case. I had the same sentiments when I tried out the fabric case, way too slippery. I always felt like the phone was about to slip out of my hand

 

[Aneres11]

How are the bezels on it? Thinking of getting the regular 2 as well.

The bezels are... there.
Sounds silly but there's nothing else to say about them really. You can't not notice them, but they don't really detract from the phones experience.
I used an XZ Premium for a lot of this year and that thing had huge bezels. I loved the phone though and they didn't bother me in the slightest, but that did have a bigger screen.

So far, I love that I can actually use this phone with one hand. I also love that the only thing that is compromised with this smaller device is the battery - it has the same specs, internals, CAMERA (drools) and IMO the screen is better.
But it's all about having a phone that's useable one handed for me right now.

 

[nospleen]

My gosh I am in LOVE with this case;

https://www.amazon.com/Google-X-Level-Mobile-Guardian-Protective/dp/B076BJG8YF

Fit like a tight glove, has a nice grip, not too slippery, and not too sticky. And it's super slim, very thin. It preserves the original feel of the phone.

My first case I got was the official Google Fabric case, and man that case made the phone more slippery, like a wet bar of soap. Plus it was way too thick and bulky.

This XLevel case is exactly what I like.

Thanks for the tip. Just placed my order.

 

[Aneres11]

Does it not upset those of you who have Pandas by putting cases over the black and white beauty?!

 

[Tig Bitties]

Does it not upset those of you who have Pandas by putting cases over the black and white beauty?!

I love my super slim Xlevel case, it is all black covering up the Panda looks.

I also ordered a Peel clear / silver case, bit that frigging thing is taking forever. I placed the order 9 days ago with expedited shipping and have yet to receive it. I've emailed customer support twice and they say will get back to me, and never do.

But I will say running a Black theme and this black case, the phone looks amazing, a good black theme like Swift Black transforms this phone into a work of art. And I actually like this thin case as accent

 

[5105973]

I’m surprised to read that fabric feels slippery.

I liked the bezels on the Pixel 2. I liked them on my iPhones. Bezels don’t bother me.

What bothers me is a phone whose performance or battery life dramatically reduces within six months of purchase.

Anyway I’m reading all the news about a Google poaching former Apple employees. Seems stuff is about to get serious. Google has already done a lot with the software and if they can get it together on the hardware side that would make them formidable competition for Apple and Samsung. It’s an exciting time to be a fence sitter.

I know there are other players to keep an eye on, but Apple, Google and Samsung are the ones in which I personally have the most interest.
[doublepost=1514078273][/doublepost]

You should check if your 7 Plus is being throttled. You may have gotten a defective battery.

I think my battery was/is great but the OS was definitely doing horrible things to my battery life.

iOS 11 all but destroyed my friend’s iPhone 6. She was trying to figure out how to fit a new iPhone into the budget and then all this news broke and I sent her the links and told her to look into getting a new battery instead, so that she could buy a new iPhone when she really wanted to, rather than shoehorn a new phone purchase in when it’s not convenient. She’s not a power user or a phone aficionado. She just wants something that works, which her phone did just fine until iOS 11.

I wonder how many people out there had perfectly working iPhones until iOS 11 made them think their phone didn’t have the processing chops anymore and that’s why their phones slowed down. Not because of an aging battery and stealth throttling. Stuff like this is why I don’t just settle down happily ever after with Apple and have “commitment issues” with my phones. Lol. Well that and it’s a hobby at this point.

 

[michael9891]

Took a few pics in Nashville to see how the Pixel does with the bar signs. They've all been resized by 50%.

 

[BoxerGT2.5]

Does it not upset those of you who have Pandas by putting cases over the black and white beauty?!

It’s why I haven’t put a case on mine. I find it hard to cover up the panda.

 

[Wildo6882]

Took a few pics in Nashville to see how the Pixel does with the bar signs. They've all been resized by 50%. View attachment 743505 View attachment 743506 View attachment 743507 View attachment 743508

Nice! Man I love Nashville. Which is funny, because I hate country music. But that is one incredibly fun little city.