New phone who dis
Jun. 9th, 2019 01:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
psipsyRecently, I finally had to get a new phone. The one that I was using for 6 years was constantly running out of internal storage, no matter what I tried to clear out. And the new display I put on last year? Broke that when I dropped it. What did I end up getting? A Google Pixel 3a.
For as much as I grumble about the things Google does, they seem to have gotten something mostly right here. It has things like a standard headphone jack, the ability to remove apps or at least prevent them from being installed (no Facebook app), it can work in other countries, and it eschews some of the more pointless design fads found on other new phones, such as the notch for the front camera and curved displays that make picking up the phone almost impossible with human hands. Oh, and it doesn't cost as much as a down payment on a car.
What I'm losing is the ability to remove the battery, and the 3a does not have a slot for a microSD card for additional expansion. I begrudgingly accepted the non-removable battery thing a few years ago, and the only thing that made the lack of storage expansion acceptable is that the phone has 64GB already.
The thing about the FB app, and others, was a bit of a sticking point with other phones. As it turns out, Samsung and a few other phone makers made a deal with FB to include that app on their phones, and it can't be deleted. However, Google is bigger than FB, and can afford to tell them to go pound sand. Thus, the phones directly made by Google are devoid of a lot of the bloatware that plagues other phones. Personally, I think FB is something that doesn't need to be an app in the first place. I access it through a mobile browser (Opera) and it works fine.
"But the Pixel is made by Google and they're probably worse than Facebook when it comes to ads and tracking!" True, doing anything with Google is a waking privacy nightmare. At the same time, anyone who gets an Android phone is playing on Google's turf. If I'm going to swallow poison, I might as well have the whole dish.
The built-in camera on it is pretty good. I'm not going to get rid of my DSLR setup anytime soon, just saying it's good. I can see smartphone cameras eventually getting good enough to surpass my T3i from 2011, but by the time that happens, the DSLRs that will be available will be even better. A DSLR will always have a big sensor, big glass, a big package full of electronics dedicated to taking pictures, and a big variety of settings and controls, with buttons and dials. The internals of a phone are much more cramped, and the camera has to share that space with the rest of the phone's functions.
As for what to do with the S4, I already got another display for it. The plan is to wipe it clean and then keep it as a backup. Oh, and there's also an app that allows one phone to access the camera in another. It's proven handy before.
For as much as I grumble about the things Google does, they seem to have gotten something mostly right here. It has things like a standard headphone jack, the ability to remove apps or at least prevent them from being installed (no Facebook app), it can work in other countries, and it eschews some of the more pointless design fads found on other new phones, such as the notch for the front camera and curved displays that make picking up the phone almost impossible with human hands. Oh, and it doesn't cost as much as a down payment on a car.
What I'm losing is the ability to remove the battery, and the 3a does not have a slot for a microSD card for additional expansion. I begrudgingly accepted the non-removable battery thing a few years ago, and the only thing that made the lack of storage expansion acceptable is that the phone has 64GB already.
The thing about the FB app, and others, was a bit of a sticking point with other phones. As it turns out, Samsung and a few other phone makers made a deal with FB to include that app on their phones, and it can't be deleted. However, Google is bigger than FB, and can afford to tell them to go pound sand. Thus, the phones directly made by Google are devoid of a lot of the bloatware that plagues other phones. Personally, I think FB is something that doesn't need to be an app in the first place. I access it through a mobile browser (Opera) and it works fine.
"But the Pixel is made by Google and they're probably worse than Facebook when it comes to ads and tracking!" True, doing anything with Google is a waking privacy nightmare. At the same time, anyone who gets an Android phone is playing on Google's turf. If I'm going to swallow poison, I might as well have the whole dish.
The built-in camera on it is pretty good. I'm not going to get rid of my DSLR setup anytime soon, just saying it's good. I can see smartphone cameras eventually getting good enough to surpass my T3i from 2011, but by the time that happens, the DSLRs that will be available will be even better. A DSLR will always have a big sensor, big glass, a big package full of electronics dedicated to taking pictures, and a big variety of settings and controls, with buttons and dials. The internals of a phone are much more cramped, and the camera has to share that space with the rest of the phone's functions.
As for what to do with the S4, I already got another display for it. The plan is to wipe it clean and then keep it as a backup. Oh, and there's also an app that allows one phone to access the camera in another. It's proven handy before.
