Pixel 8?

[Oyeve]

Initial impressions very good. Little things add up. Better speakers. Flat screen. Can tell the cameras are better. Face unlock that unlocks secure apps. The screen is just much higher quality overall.
I do love the matte back finish. Sure it will be in a case but sometimes I do take it out, that will be nicer. Haptics are great.

Will take a week to feel out the battery and test the cameras more and see about how hot it runs. Did not run hot when doing all the setup, just warm.

Pixel watch, glad I kept it, but they really need to make two sizes. I don't have big wrists, so this is just big enough to work for me, but I want more screen real estate on the watch. The biosensor is off to a good start - tracked my long dog walk this evening with the Fitbit integration. Love media controls, don't need to take my phone out to change tracks or volume when not using true wireless buds.

The Pixel Buds Pro - amazingly small and a pretty decent sound. Love the quick ANC to transparency mode. Custom EQ. will test call quality over the next week. I have some high end earbuds but these are a nice super compact set of buds for taking mass transit and being on foot going in and out of places.

My s22 ultra to pixel 8 pro transfer didn't work. Only apps and not local files. I'll copy over my music files tomorrow. Haptics are a bit harsh as in very strong. Speakers a better than the 7. Screen is great and the system is snappy. The thermometer actually works well. Cameras are great as well.

 

[MrSquished]

Also while the charging is just a bit faster, it's noticeable

 

[MrSquished]

Noticed quite a bit more headroom with a couple bluetooth devices I have. The ifi go pods and the fiio BTR7.

Usually I need to keep my volume on my 7 pro at the highest and adjust on the devices. But now I can get the volume I want and have a bunch of headroom still on the volume control on the phone.

Not sure if an Android 14 thing or a pixel 8 thing

 

[VashHT]

Didn't take me long to set mine up yesterday, I only really transferred photos from my iphone. So far seems like a nice upgrade, camera is definitely a step up from the 6 pro and everything feels a lot faster. Haven't tried the speakers but it's nice to hear the bluetooth seems a bit better as I use that a lot more for audio.

Only complaint I have so far is that Face ID doesn't seem to work very well in low light, other than that it's really fast and the fingerprint scanner works quite well so at least that's there as a backup.

I'm so glad they went back to a flat screen, put a screen protector on right after I opened it and got it on perfectly with no dust or anything trapped underneath. Only annoying thing is I bought the protector from Spigen and did not realize there's a black border around the protector, not sure why companies do that.

 

[MrSquished]

After a nice long walk with the dog on a bright sunny day, this screen is far superior to the 7 pro. Even wearing my decently tinted polarized Maui Jims, where with my 7 pro I'd not see the screen well in bright light, this was easy peasy.

Yes the Face Unlock is still just a front camera. In order to unlock in lower light they would need more sensors such as an IR type sensor, and maybe another. This is why the iPhone had the notch and now the dynamic island. I'm torn if I want a notch and the better face unlock or not.

There are a lot of great tools in Extend Unlock where you can keep the phone unlocked when connected to any bluetooth device, or in locations like home or at work or at a family member's home.
I didn't remember missing face unlock with the 7 pro, I didn't have much of an issue with the FPS of course.

 

[spdfreak]

Noticed quite a bit more headroom with a couple bluetooth devices I have. The ifi go pods and the fiio BTR7.

Usually I need to keep my volume on my 7 pro at the highest and adjust on the devices. But now I can get the volume I want and have a bunch of headroom still on the volume control on the phone.

Not sure if an Android 14 thing or a pixel 8 thing

If you still have the 7, you can compare since 14 rolled out yesterday. I got it on my 6 but haven't noticed any real differences.

 

[Oyeve]

Ran my first benchmark alongside the pixel 7 pro.

 

[MrSquished]

If you still have the 7, you can compare since 14 rolled out yesterday. I got it on my 6 but haven't noticed any real differences.

I'll have to turn on the 7 pro and see if it updates

 

[MrSquished]

If you still have the 7, you can compare since 14 rolled out yesterday. I got it on my 6 but haven't noticed any real differences.

Only the pixel 8 does it, doesn't happen on the 7 pro running 14.

This is not directly to true wirless earbuds. These are to the two devices I have which connect via BT and into those you plug in wired IEM's. That's where I now have all this headroom.

 

[MrSquished]

A few days with the phone and this is pretty damn good hardware. It starts with the screen, which is just tip top, the haptics are on point, The speakers are good, It's definitely faster than the seven pro, So far battery and heat are good but need more time. Cameras are fantastic. The software is just really good, I still use Nova though. All your most common interactions are just on a higher level than previous pixel phones and I was pretty happy with the seven pro.

I'm glad I kept the watch it's actually really useful, but they seriously need to come out with a 44 or 45 mm case version. The 41 mm looks small on larger wrists and even though it is about the smallest that looks normal on me, I want more screen real estate. I want bigger text on that little screen. I have 48-year-old eyes.

Couple things I read today is the pixel 8 series will have completely lossless USBC audio out. Also the pixel 8 series can also output video via USBC.

 

[MrSquished]

discovered this app which allows you to totally tweak out your status bar, including with gestures. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tombayley.statusbar&hl=en_US&gl=US

I can now hold and slide my status bar to immediately adjust brightness while showing me the current screen brightness. I can also double tap it to turn the flashlight on and off. I can long press the status bar to turn off the screen. And I can swipe to immediately launch a lot of actions, in my case, going straight to settings.

android is so powerful.

 

[Oyeve]

Couple things I read today is the pixel 8 series will have completely lossless USBC audio out. Also the pixel 8 series can also output video via USBC.

Video out has been left out. You have to root the phone to get usbc DP. Who the hell roots phones in 2023.

 

[MrSquished]

Video out has been left out. You have to root the phone to get usbc DP. Who the hell roots phones in 2023.

I just scanned that headline my bad. So it is capable, but it's locked for now. Interesting, and also potentially stupid. Maybe they want to iron some things out hopefully, and will enable it. OTherwise that is dumb.

 

[Oyeve]

I just scanned that headline my bad. So it is capable, but it's locked for now. Interesting, and also potentially stupid. Maybe they want to iron some things out hopefully, and will enable it. OTherwise that is dumb.

Yea, i'm thinking it wasnt quite ready for primetime but wanted to release the phone before apple 15 takes all the thunder. I can wait a bit IF google enables it. I am more excited about the lossless audio. Winter is coming and that when I carry around my DACs and headphones as I can tuck the DAC/Amp and all the cables into my jacket/coat pockets and use full sized quality wired headphones instead of crappy BT ones.

 

[VashHT]

I'm pretty impressed with the camera on this so far, definitely better quality than my 6 pro, especially if you're cropping anything.

 

[MrSquished]

almost a week with the phone. Battery is better so far but not by much, over the 7 pro. Which I was ok with, but expected more. The slightly faster charging is noticeable though. Will see after 2 weeks so adaptive battery can fully kick in. I'm noticing this phone is quite noticeably snappier on certain common interactions - like checking for updates to your apps in the play store, and other instances.

 

[MrSquished]

By the way a great tip for battery life is to go into developer options and turn off always keep on mobile data even when on Wi-Fi

That can help with faster network switching when you leave Wi-Fi but it's definitely a battery drain especially if you don't have great signal

 

[VashHT]

Well I'm an idiot and accidentally threw out my free pixel watch, think there's anything I can do to get a replacement for it? I hadn't taken it out of the shipping box yet and my wife put it with other boxes to be taken out and I forgot about it until a few hours after it was gone. I was going to use it and sell my original pixel watch, guess it's not that huge of a loss but was hoping for the free upgrade.

 

[skriefal]

You can buy another.

Otherwise no, not really. Unless it's still sitting in the trash can... which you've presumably already checked.

I'd definitely be annoyed at myself if I did that!

 

[VashHT]

Lol yeah didn't really think there would be a way, really annoyed I didn't check the box before I tossed it.

 

[MrSquished]

I would cry a few fears

 

[MrSquished]

I had heard of bedtime routine on Android but never checked it out stupidly enough.

anyway, you can reallly save battery when you sleep, by having things like the AOD turn off during a set amount of time.

since 5 nights a week I generally have the same sleep schedule, I set it up. Last night my battery lost almost 5% vs more like 8%, bedtime routine on from 1am to 7am

 

[MrSquished]

man last Friday I went to see the NY Philharmonic at Lincoln Center in the renovated David Geffen Hall. About 40 minutes into the concert I took my phone out because my pocket was warm, and it was super hot! I checked later in my temp app, and also usage stats, and it was at like 48 degrees for 30 minutes, and turns out the camera was on the whole time in my pocket! First time that's ever happened. The battery life has cratered the last couple days. I have had almost every pixel and multiple nexus phones so I did what I had to do. I got an RMA from Google since I bought it at the Google store. I feel a little guilty, but I told them it was battery life related so if they just put a new battery in there, it's a great refurbished phone.

 

[MrSquished]

Two weeks with the replacement phone and very impressed. The first 5 days battery life was up and down but as the phone learned my usage, it's been a dream since. Rarely gets warm, battery life is very good, smooth, no bugs. Tracking with Accubattery it's the best battery life I've ever seen on an android device. Nova can have some slight hiccups but that's because Google has gimped some things third party launchers access. Which is terrible of them, it's just a bs decision to do that. It's not very often so ok.

The watch has been quite nice as well. I use it most weekdays, track my steps and for some notifications. Nice to use to just check certain things without grabbing the phone. Do wish it had a slightly bigger screen. The fitbit ap doesn't even have a dark mode yet, but this feels like a good product that will be refined further. A nice gen 2 device though.

 

[nisryus]

Just saw this as the kid was researching for his replacement phone (of course I am not buying it for him! I would get it for myself! XD)

Google says bumpy Pixel 8 screens are nothing to worry about

Display "bumps" are components pushing into the OLED panel.

arstechnica.com