Google IO 2013 thread

[Red Storm]

at l ghz, the nexus 7 is noticeably slower than most new phones, it definitely needed a refresh. the lack of a nexus 4 refresh is disappointing too, but understandable. it just wouldnt make sense with stuff like gs4 out at this point. they should call that new gs4 the gs4 nexusripoff for the price theyre charging. this has to be the worst google i/o ever, like christmas without presents....

They update in the fall. They already said this was an I/O more focused on developers coming in. The AOSP GS4 is very close to the normal GS4 price, I'm not sure why you think it's supposed to be priced like the Nexus 4.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Thing is Hangouts does not show as much info as What's App, and I was expecting it to at least match them.

What do you mean? The only other things I can see in Whatsapp that's additional is the last online time and a status message. Either way you can't choose to be offline there.

I think in comparing Hangouts to the other messengers out there like Facebook, Line, iMessage, Kik, etc. it's ok. It certainly can use some beefing up, but I don't think it's really fundamentally deficient.

I do wonder how current Google MEssenger conversations will be treated. That seems to be a separate app right now, and I have quite a few threads going on there about Ingress.

What's interesting is Hangouts uses phone numbers to locate people. This is similar to Whatsapp and Kakao, and unlike Kik and Facebook Messenger. To me it should filter the list like Whatsapp by phone # only. But if it's using this phone # feature, it should also serve to replace the SMS app. However, I imagine that to be tricky given OEMs stick their own SMS apps in. It'll be tricky to deploy, and Google's best bet is to integrate this for AOSP devices where the Messaging app can be quickly replaced.

 

[OBLAMA2009]

anybody here get their free chromebook pixel?

 

[poofyhairguy]

What about Samsung gimmicks like eye tracking, etc? How much of that will be left?

I bet very little.

Not many of these Google S4s will be sold. But for doing it, Samsung wins back all those developers who are now fapping to Sony because Sony helped get CM running on their devices.

 

[Aikouka]

One thing I'm glad is that they didn't release a new Nexus tablet... unless I missed that announcement! I'm trying to off-load my ASUS tablet, and having a cheap competitor (with possibly better specs) would probably hurt my bottom line.

Oh, one thing that I found interesting was the whole Google Now on the computer. Now, I was just reading Live Blogs, so I may not have gotten the full picture. Is that going to be something that just runs on our PC, and we can simply talk and have our PC do stuff for us like our phone would? I think it could be a lot of fun to try it out. I'm not sure if it's as useful on a computer as it is on a mobile device since the biggest benefit of Siri for me is avoiding having to type long search queries on a touch screen. I can type pretty quickly, so that's not a big deal on a PC!

They don't lower your bill. If you buy the phone outright that simply means you aren't financing the phone, so you obviously wouldn't have to pay the extra monthly amount for the loan. The plan price does not change.

We're really saying the exact same thing, but I figured people understood what I meant by "reducing your price."

You've been reading too many of those sensationalist "subsidized pricing is evil" threads.

Why do you say that? My post didn't have any negative remarks about subsidies. I simply claimed that if you're on AT&T, then you can purchase the same hardware (not the same firmware) two different ways for a significant difference in price ($450 difference), but there's no monthly difference. In other words, is the out-of-the-box "unchained" phone that worthwhile?

I don't think that subsidies are a terrible thing, but I really do wish that companies were more transparent about them like T-Mobile is now. However, that really goes against the grain of a business making the choice that garners the most profit without truly hurting their bottom line.

 

[bearxor]

Why do you say that? My post didn't have any negative remarks about subsidies. I simply claimed that if you're on AT&T, then you can purchase the same hardware (not the same firmware) two different ways for a significant difference in price ($450 difference), but there's no monthly difference. In other words, is the out-of-the-box "unchained" phone that worthwhile?

I don't think that subsidies are a terrible thing, but I really do wish that companies were more transparent about them like T-Mobile is now. However, that really goes against the grain of a business making the choice that garners the most profit without truly hurting their bottom line.

Well, because you said this...

Also, this is sort of off-topic, but $650 seems higher than I expected. I always heard that Apple had the highest unsubsidized prices, which caused carriers to have to pay quite a premium to be able to sell the phone since they pay that subsidy to Apple. $650 is the same price as the unsubsidized 16GB iPhone 5, so that surprised me a bit.

And most of the "Subsidies are bad" threads focus on and blame the iPhone for inflating device prices. The theory is that Apple charged a lot for the iPhone, but because of the subsidy, people only pay $200 and don't realize the true cost. Therefore, it let every other manufacturer raise their price. So, if we eliminated subsidies, phones would have to compete with each other in an open market, lowering the price.

You said that you have "always heard" that Apple gouges carriers on be iPhone, which led me to believe you've read a couple of articles or posts about it but had never really looked or researched it for yourself. Because then you would know that smart device prices have always been in the 600-700 range, so you would have never had made the comment that you did to begin with.

 

[dagamer34]

My guess on Nexus 7: HiDPI screens from LG weren't ready yet. And I did find it suspicious that we had seen absolutely no hardware component leaks, since that would be pulling off something Apple hasn't done in years since they need to manufacture so many.

My hope is that since it seems like an updated Nexus 7 is a bit away, they aren't going to go with a Snapdragon S4 Pro, but instead with a S600 or maybe even an S800 or Tegra 4.

 

[OBLAMA2009]

look how dead this thread has become, sort of tells you how excited people are about todays lack of interesting announcements. googles probably getting out of the hardware business anyway. with all the high end and now low end stuff they really dont need to be coming out with nexus stuff anymore, the regular manufacturers can handle all that

 

[poofyhairguy]

I am very excited about today's event. I think most of that is that I don't have money burning a hole in my pocket right now, so I like hearing how my current devices will improve.

 

[lopri]

Isn't this a 3 day show? There may be something new tomorrow and the day after?


Posted from Anandtech.com App for Android

 

[s44]

I'd expect a Nexus 4 successor this year to pack at least a S600 chip, but possibly a S800.

It already has the S600, as we know.

I suspect the release of the, ahem, Nexus S4 is a sign of things to come. Google was going to really piss off the OEMs if it kept pushing high-end specs for half the price, and it was pissing off users by limiting battery, storage, camera to subpar levels. My bet is that the next high-end Nexus will also be a de-brand (Sony maybe) at full prices, which certainly doesn't preclude a Nexus 7 style super-budget killer.

As I said after CES: Nexus 4i anyone?

 

[ChronoReverse]

The Nexus 4 has the Snapdragon S4 Pro which is a bit below the S600.

 

[ponyo]

I can't believe Nexus GS4 is real. I wonder if HTC had any idea about this. HTC One became irrelevant today.

 

[Hunt3rj2]

I can't believe Nexus GS4 is real. I wonder if HTC had any idea about this. HTC One became irrelevant today.

Maybe the Dev Edition, but I'm pretty sure the Dev Edition was never meant to sell well anyways.

 

[bearxor]

It already has the S600, as we know.

Was there a spec leak for the next Nexus I missed?

 

[QueBert]

I can't believe Nexus GS4 is real. I wonder if HTC had any idea about this. HTC One became irrelevant today.

Irrelevant how? The HTC still has way better build quality and way better speakers. Google phone or not, it's still a plastic feeling toy. The One's on a totally different level.

 

[dbk]

no love for CDMA

Irrelevant how? The HTC still has way better build quality and way better speakers. Google phone or not, it's still a plastic feeling toy. The One's on a totally different level.

Irrelevant as in .. crappy sales figures. I don't know how else you would judge its relevance but I might be biased :>

 

[foghorn67]

look how dead this thread has become, sort of tells you how excited people are about todays lack of interesting announcements. googles probably getting out of the hardware business anyway. with all the high end and now low end stuff they really dont need to be coming out with nexus stuff anymore, the regular manufacturers can handle all that

Wat? Not every desirable object is shiny. That's for end users.

This is Google I/O. You do know what Nexus devices are for, right?

If you had your wits about you, you would be smart enough to realize the killer API's, integration and so on. That's what pushes Google to dominate. Entice the devs.

 

[mosco]

anybody here get their free chromebook pixel?

I got mine. It's the LTE model which is cool. They had Verizon people on site if people wanted to use it.

My company already has one for testing, so will probably take this home and use it as a second laptop.

 

[s44]

Was there a spec leak for the next Nexus I missed?

Perhaps you missed the successor device being introduced on stage today?

 

[Ravynmagi]

I didn't expect a phone, so the fact that a Galaxy S4 Nexus-ish phone was announced was a nice surprise.

I was hoping for a new 7 inch tablet and sad that one wasn't announced. However I guess it's not a shock since we've had no leaks of a new Nexus tablet yet and Google can't keep secrets that good usually. Still hoping we see a new 7 inch tablet later this year.

I was pleased by the Google Play Games stuff. Though I'm reserving excitement until I see games actually use these features. Apple has cloud saves and a lot of games still don't use it there.

As a person with a Nexus 4, iPad 4, and some other Android tablets, I'm happy to hear of the various cross platform features Google is rolling out. I'm all for Google making money off iOS.

I've been wanting to use a streaming music service for a while. I tried out Spotify but was a bit confused by the interface and never really gave it much of a try. But now that Google is getting into this, I'll give All Access a try, perhaps I'll find it more intuitive to use.

Some other stuff looked good too. So overall I think it was a good Google IO. Though yeah, new hardware announcements always make things better. But after the poor receptions of Nexus Q and the poor launch of Nexus 7 and 4, maybe Google is taking some extra time to get things ready for their next piece of hardware.

 

[bearxor]

Perhaps you missed the successor device being introduced on stage today?

Haha, I understand what you're saying now.

I still think there will be a Google developed device this fall though.

 

[poofyhairguy]

The S4 roms are gonna be sick!

 

[Fire&Blood]

Wow, looking at feedback many are "disappointed" because they "expected" new devices. Wishful thinking has no impact on reality, as if all of a sudden people have forgotten fact that product launches are on annual basis. What's the average age of blog comment posters, 7?

 

[Phokus]

Here's that Google Maps burn on Apple Maps:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=Lp-DB_77QLk#t=378s

HAHAHAHAHAHA