Pixel 3/Pixel 3 XL

[LukinLedbetter]

So.....I have a shiny new white 3XL in my possession as of a couple days ago. Jumped on it when the Google Store did the $200 off, as it finally got to a price point that I felt was reasonable. I’ve been firmly planted in the iOS walled garden for the past 12 months, trying to convince myself that it was all I needed in my mobile experience. It’s not.

The last time I was on Android, a year ago, it was with a Pixel 2XL. Loved the panda XL, but the wife really wanted me to be a “blue bubble” again and I was intrigued by the iPhone X / AppleWatch combo. Those two pair perfectly and are simply unmatched by any offerings in the Android world.

Anyway, fast forward to now. I’m jumping back over on the 3XL and early impressions are very positive. I’ll spare all the descriptions and thoughts as they’ll mostly mirror what others have said. Suffice to say, I’m happy with it and can see myself sticking with it despite the pull to the Apple Watch. On that note, I’ve paired the 3XL with my Garmin Fenix 5 and it’s sufficient for notifications, but little else as a smart watch.

Got the Bellroy caramel leather case and I’m very impressed with that too. Good feel in the hand.

 

[michael9891]

@LukinLedbetter How do you find the fit of the Bellroy case? I’ve seen lots of reviews saying it’s misaligned and the buttons have to be pressed quite hard.

 

[LukinLedbetter]

@LukinLedbetter How do you find the fit of the Bellroy case? I’ve seen lots of reviews saying it’s misaligned and the buttons have to be pressed quite hard.

Buttons are a bit stiff. I'm hoping they'll loosen with use. The misalignment may be by fractions of a millimeter. If you're OCD then pass on it. Otherwise it's good

 

[mjschabow]

This is tough. I pre-ordered the Galaxy S10 + and I'm super excited for it. But on the flip side I've been using this phone for a week and I really enjoy it. The S10+ just looks leaps and bounds above this phone in almost every way.

I'm a bit disappointed in battery life in this phone too so I think I'm definitely going to go with the switch. Damn this phone is close though.

PS. I know it's not the way to live, but I also worry about the large amount of problems that I seem to be reading about people having with this phone as well. Like screen flickering. I know GrumpyMom had some issues too. Consumer confidence I guess.

 

[jamezr]

This is tough. I pre-ordered the Galaxy S10 + and I'm super excited for it. But on the flip side I've been using this phone for a week and I really enjoy it. The S10+ just looks leaps and bounds above this phone in almost every way.

I'm a bit disappointed in battery life in this phone too so I think I'm definitely going to go with the switch. Damn this phone is close though.

PS. I know it's not the way to live, but I also worry about the large amount of problems that I seem to be reading about people having with this phone as well. Like screen flickering. I know GrumpyMom had some issues too. Consumer confidence I guess.

I am with you on the battery life. It could be better and definitely not as good as my Xs Max. But the S10+ battery is supposed to be a beast! I haven't had a screen flickering though

 

[mjschabow]

I am with you on the battery life. It could be better and definitely not as good as my Xs Max. But the S10+ battery is supposed to be a beast! I haven't had a screen flickering though

Yeah and I think battery will be my deciding factor. I know there will be things that really bother me about the S10+. I tend to get picky about double apps but overall the phone looks like one of the best in years.

 

[nospleen]

I'm back on the 3XL. I'm a hot mess, but so are y'all.

 

[tbayrgs]

I'm back on the 3XL. I'm a hot mess, but so are y'all.

What were you trying out?

 

[nospleen]

What were you trying out?

iPhone Xr. I can't do the S models as the signal strength is poor at my house and they get worse reception. I liked it and enjoyed my Apple watch again, but I just missed the pixel too much.

I haven't sold the Xr, I may just keep it and switch when bored.

 

[noobinator]

This is tough. I pre-ordered the Galaxy S10 + and I'm super excited for it. But on the flip side I've been using this phone for a week and I really enjoy it. The S10+ just looks leaps and bounds above this phone in almost every way.

I'm a bit disappointed in battery life in this phone too so I think I'm definitely going to go with the switch. Damn this phone is close though.

PS. I know it's not the way to live, but I also worry about the large amount of problems that I seem to be reading about people having with this phone as well. Like screen flickering. I know GrumpyMom had some issues too. Consumer confidence I guess.

My advice would be to use the s10 for your two weeks or whatever before unloading your pixel. Then after a week or so make a decision.

 

[mjschabow]

My advice would be to use the s10 for your two weeks or whatever before unloading your pixel. Then after a week or so make a decision.

Good call. The pixel is part of my trade-in so I think a lot depends on how soon I need to actually send that back. But if I do have a couple weeks I think that's the best-case scenario. I really do like this phone but the flashiness of the Galaxy obviously drove me to pre-order

 

[OdT22]

We (wife & I) really liked our Pixel 3 XLs over the past 3 months. No real complaints beyond our lack of familiarity with Android. The hardware never had a glitch and they performed great for us.

The reception on Google Fi wasn’t great and it has ended up forcing us back to our old provider, the only one that works where we live and commute through (US Cellular). So we are back to iPhone since they don’t offer the Pixel and we never had any problems with iPhones.

Switching back to iPhone and our old provider has cured our reception issues, but we both realize we were probably more comfortable with iOS all along.

Anyhow Pixel was a mostly positive experience. But in my case, I need a phone that works where I go. If it wasn’t for reception issues, we wouldn’t have switched back.

FWIW, we went with the XRs

 

[mjschabow]

We (wife & I) really liked our Pixel 3 XLs over the past 3 months. No real complaints beyond our lack of familiarity with Android. The hardware never had a glitch and they performed great for us.

The reception on Google Fi wasn’t great and it has ended up forcing us back to our old provider, the only one that works where we live and commute through (US Cellular). So we are back to iPhone since they don’t offer the Pixel and we never had any problems with iPhones.

Switching back to iPhone and our old provider has cured our reception issues, but we both realize we were probably more comfortable with iOS all along.

Anyhow Pixel was a mostly positive experience. But in my case, I need a phone that works where I go. If it wasn’t for reception issues, we wouldn’t have switched back.

FWIW, we went with the XRs

That's so interesting because I switched from the iPhone XS Max to the Pixel 3XL and my reception has been 20 times better. That's on US Cellular.

 

[OdT22]

That's so interesting because I switched from the iPhone XS Max to the Pixel 3XL and my reception has been 20 times better. That's on US Cellular.

No kidding? I don’t think I’ve ever talked to another US Cellular customer outside of the county I live in. Small company here. But their tower is a 10 minute walk from my home if you’ve got the lungs for it. Takes me a bit longer to get up there.

SW Washington state here. They do well for us locals on reception. I hear they are much bigger in the Midwest.

 

[mjschabow]

No kidding? I don’t think I’ve ever talked to another US Cellular customer outside of the county I live in. Small company here. But their tower is a 10 minute walk from my home if you’ve got the lungs for it. Takes me a bit longer to get up there.

SW Washington state here. They do well for us locals on reception. I hear they are much bigger in the Midwest.

Yeah I have them in Wisconsin and they're really good. The only complaint I have is that where it's supposed to say US Cellular as my carrier, it says Roaming Indicator Off. Service works fine but it's just a cosmetic thing.

 

[OdT22]

Yeah I have them in Wisconsin and they're really good. The only complaint I have is that where it's supposed to say US Cellular as my carrier, it says Roaming Indicator Off. Service works fine but it's just a cosmetic thing.

Right on. We don’t have as many options here for reception, so the google Fi project (shares US Cellular towers if you don’t already know) was our first chance at trying a different provider and a clean android experience. We gave it a good college try and it was mostly all positive. I’ll keep paying attention to the Pixel. We honestly had no issues with them. Great devices. Just need to stop hopping from the towers or from our WiFi. Lag in every telephone conversation was painful.

 

[csurfr]

We (wife & I) really liked our Pixel 3 XLs over the past 3 months. No real complaints beyond our lack of familiarity with Android. The hardware never had a glitch and they performed great for us.

The reception on Google Fi wasn’t great and it has ended up forcing us back to our old provider, the only one that works where we live and commute through (US Cellular). So we are back to iPhone since they don’t offer the Pixel and we never had any problems with iPhones.

Switching back to iPhone and our old provider has cured our reception issues, but we both realize we were probably more comfortable with iOS all along.

Anyhow Pixel was a mostly positive experience. But in my case, I need a phone that works where I go. If it wasn’t for reception issues, we wouldn’t have switched back.

FWIW, we went with the XRs

You went back to US Cellular from Fi?

 

[OdT22]

You went back to US Cellular from Fi?

We did. At a substantially larger cost. I really needed the cellular reception. (my wife just wanted back on iphone, in her case)

 

[csurfr]

We did. At a substantially larger cost. I really needed the cellular reception. (my wife just wanted back on iphone, in her case)

That’s weird, as Fi uses Sprint / T-Mobile / US Cellular towers. I wonder why you couldn’t get signal.

 

[OdT22]

That’s weird, as Fi uses Sprint / T-Mobile / US Cellular towers. I wonder why you couldn’t get signal.

Us too. We really thought we had a chance at a different carrier for once. Just so we could try a different phone. The phone service was hit & miss though. Either USC isn't playing fairly, or google isn't. Not sure which is guilty.

 

[mjschabow]

As much as I've complained about battery life in the least week, I must say, I'm nearing 5.5 hours of screen on time. I used to dream about achieving that back in the day. Maybe I'm just used to iPhones and how they rarely drain on idle.

 

[5105973]

This is tough. I pre-ordered the Galaxy S10 + and I'm super excited for it. But on the flip side I've been using this phone for a week and I really enjoy it. The S10+ just looks leaps and bounds above this phone in almost every way.

I'm a bit disappointed in battery life in this phone too so I think I'm definitely going to go with the switch. Damn this phone is close though.

PS. I know it's not the way to live, but I also worry about the large amount of problems that I seem to be reading about people having with this phone as well. Like screen flickering. I know GrumpyMom had some issues too. Consumer confidence I guess.

It's mostly my husband who was having problems. He was having incidents of severe lag and freeze ups.

He's also seen the problem reported on Android Central where streaming music over Bluetooth causes the camera to lag and even crash (when taking video).

We both have had call problems. Signal strength appeared fine but the sound got choppy and even cut out for brief moments.

It was that which made me decide to keep my main sim in my iphone Xr . In this respect the Xr isn't any worse than my iPhones before the Xr. I've been wrestling with wretched call quality on iPhones for years. But the Xr and the S9+ and even my HTC 10 from a couple years ago set a standard for phone performance and the 3XL doesn't measure up as long as this weird sound drop out exists.

When there is no drop out, the sound is overall pretty good. We haven't quite figured out what causes it to go choppy and cut out. The connection is not dropped but the sound cutting out makes it seem so. Thankfully it's been rare so far.

Battery life is acceptable for my use on most days. But I'm at a place in life where my days can become atypical without warning. Which is why I'm glad I carry two phones and have no plans to stop while I have 3 elders left to care for.

The 3XL is in most respects my dream phone when it is working as expected. But I did know going into this, that Pixels in general are a work in progress and they weren't necessarily going to give me the overall consistency and reliability I was used to getting from my iPhones the last three years or so.

Samsung up until the S9+ was a mixed bag for me, as well. So far, I'm really enjoying my foray into the Android world. It just keeps getting better and looks very promising.

By the way, it has been a long journey on iphone and I can't say it was a consistent and reliable journey on iOS all these years, either. A few of my iPhones and many versions of iOS have been real poop storms.

 

[spinedoc77]

In fairness to Apple, they made significant improvements to their cameras and software last year and iPhone XS, XS Max and Xr are very competitive with the Pixel 3 camera now. They do a beautiful job properly exposing a scene with fewer crushed blacks than Pixel photos sometimes have or blown out highlights as previous iPhones going back to iPhone 8 were putting out. So if you want to stay in the Apple ecosystem, an upgrade to the 2019 iPhones (or finding a deal on the 2018 iPhones when this year's models are released) is worth your consideration.

While I am a huge fan of my Pixel 3Xl, I've watched my husband smack down some irritating glitches this week on his, so I would have to say that the Pixel path needs more refinement. I like what I'm experiencing enough to plan on investing in an upgrade to Pixel 4. But when I see others struggling to decide between iPhone and Pixel right now, or feeling they're missing something staying with iPhone, I feel compelled to point out where the experience needs work. Because I want people who do switch to do it as an informed decision and not get any nasty surprises and go back to iOS thinking that's it, Android sucks, never going to try that crap again. That's not an accurate view either. Pixels are headed on an upward trajectory and just need a few more pieces to fall into place to really rival iPhone. And I really want that to happen because Apple grew complacent in so many ways and needs a wake up call to get hungry again. It took awhile to become fully apparent but they are now running the very kind of business Steve Jobs cautioned against in more than one interview.

If you truly are interested in trying Android, keep an eye out on developments in wearables this year and next. There are indicators Google is about to get serious in this space.

I myself will be trying out Samsung's latest watch release. It looks like it will do enough to replace my Apple Watch (if I need it to) but I am keeping only "cautiously optimistic" on that point. The Apple Watch is indeed very compelling and a tough act to follow.

iPhone cameras are complete garbage, yeah I'm definitely a bit bitter. I have a huge amount of pictures of my kids taken in either moderate lighting or maybe just a little bit dim, and every single one of them is grainy. For the $1000+ I spent on my XS Max I am seriously disappointed in the pictures it takes. If the lighting is perfect, ie: full daylight, the pictures are stunning. But any type of non perfect lighting and forget it. I've checked this on 2 Max's so far, and 2 regular Xs's. I'm super impressed with my Pixel XL's night mode, but really prefer iOS so I'm really torn. Apple really REALLY needs to do something about it's moderate/low light camera performance with the next iteration.

 

[mjschabow]

iPhone cameras are complete garbage, yeah I'm definitely a bit bitter. I have a huge amount of pictures of my kids taken in either moderate lighting or maybe just a little bit dim, and every single one of them is grainy. For the $1000+ I spent on my XS Max I am seriously disappointed in the pictures it takes. If the lighting is perfect, ie: full daylight, the pictures are stunning. But any type of non perfect lighting and forget it. I've checked this on 2 Max's so far, and 2 regular Xs's. I'm super impressed with my Pixel XL's night mode, but really prefer iOS so I'm really torn. Apple really REALLY needs to do something about it's moderate/low light camera performance with the next iteration.

Agreed 100%. I took a great picture of my kiddos and posted it on Facebook. Once I looked at the picture on my laptop I realized how noisy the photo was, and the lighting want even that bad!

I've only had the pixel for a week and unfortunately haven't had a lot of time to play with the camera. Sounds like it's much better though.

 

[spinedoc77]

Agreed 100%. I took a great picture of my kiddos and posted it on Facebook. Once I looked at the picture on my laptop I realized how noisy the photo was, and the lighting want even that bad!

I've only had the pixel for a week and unfortunately haven't had a lot of time to play with the camera. Sounds like it's much better though.

It's night and day. If it wasn't for the massive massive privacy issues Google has and my lack of trust in them, and for the fact that I think iOS is a better OS for my needs, I would switch full time to the Pixel XL. It's a nice phone overall and the night sight is pretty incredible. Honestly I'd be happy with good pictures in moderate lighting situations, but the Pixel takes it to the extreme and you can literally get a good picture of something you can barely see with your eyes due to darkness.