A lot of technology, many innovative features and a wonderful
interface. All this in a slim and graceful body.
It has been discussed about the Google Phone since 2007. But the company
launched it as an operating system that largely consists of open
source. On the fifth day of the new year a new phone was introduced from
Google, namely the Nexus One. The phone is made by HTC, but Google is
behind both software and sales force. So now we have the phone to test.
Surprisingly thin
The first thing that beats us, when we pick up Nexus One of the sales
package, is that it is thinner than we expected. It is for example
significantly thinner than HTC Tattoo. It is of course, higher and wider,
which is the price for a larger screen.
The design is stylish in black and two different shades of gray. Power
button is on top, the volume key is on the left side and at the bottom
you will find a scroll wheel similar to the HTC Hero and Magic. Scroll wheel works great and is
useful when you, for example, move the cursor to edit text.
Additionally, you’ll find four touch-sensitive keys – a back key, a key
that gives you more choices, a home key and a shortcut to search.
We miss, however, a camera key. The absence will allow you, among other
things, lose freedom to focus where you want when you take pictures.
Many of them also miss their own keys to answer, reject and put on call.
This we experienced as an adoption case.
AMOLED
Screen
The screen utilizes most of the phone’s front side, and measures 3.7
inches. It must be regarded as a big screen, but it is not so great that
we had to change grips on the cell phone when you press the other end
of the screen.
Display technology is AMOLED. This means that each point is lit up in
itself, rather than the entire screen is elucidated. It gives better
contrast in dark tones and brighter colors. The screen is about as
bright as Samsung Galaxy, which is impressive. With good
contrast and color on top of it, the screen has full joy to use.
At the same time, the monitor is energy efficient compared to the
traditional TFT technology. The resolution of the Nexus One screen is
800 x 480 pixels. This is a high resolution, and the result is crisp
images in the screen.
The screen is also of the capacitive type. This means that the sensor
capacitance in your finger and requires only a touch to react, instead
you need to press into the outer surface as you do in the resistive
screens. This means that you do not use the stylus and screen can be no
more inaccurate than resistive screens, but on the other hand, it is
more responsive than resistive screens. There is also an advantage that
the screen surface is hard, so it resists scratches far better than
resistive screens.
Precise
Capacitive monitors are often a little more imprecise than resistive
screens, and there are some inaccuracies in Nexus One. The screen is
still one of the best.
Inaccuracies can be most easily measured by drawing diagonal lines
across the screen slowly in a drawing program. Inaccuracies appear as
irregularities in the form of recurring fluctuations on the line you
draw. The Nexus One has some fluctuations, but nothing feels inaccurate
to the screen or that it has something to say under normal use.
The edges of Nexus One are impressive. Its lines often take a turn even
if we let finger straight out to pass the edge of the screen. The Nexus
One screen is precisely the way out to the edges, and the line does not
turn at all.
Android 2.1
The Nexus One has the Android 2.1 (Eclair). We have previously tested
the phones with the Android 1.5 and 1.6, but the Nexus One is the first
phone we get into the test bench with Android 2.1.
The screen lock has been overhauled, and now you can choose to lock up
phone or turning on and off the sound by pulling in two different
Apple-inspired slide blocks horizontally on the screen.
Standard background is based on squares that lit up in a pattern based
on Google colors. If you press somewhere on the background to trigger,
the light goes out of the point you pressed. This has no utilitarian
value, but may well be helping to improve the impression many have of
phone.
In sleep mode, you have five screens which you can use as per your needs
with optional widgets that shows the weather forecast activities and
something similar, or shortcut icons that give you a quick passage to
the programs you use most. This is easily accomplished by keeping your
finger on a point in a few seconds, and then you can move the icons by
doing the same to wherever you want. Do you want to delete the icon;
drag it into the trash that appears at the bottom of the screen.
When we open the menu, we see that the visual upgrades go deeper. The
icons hazards in from the edges and gives a good first impression. The
menu is a grid of 4 x 4 icons, and the rest of your programs can be
found by scrolling down.
Hold finger over an icon for more than a second, pop your desktop up and
you can place a shortcut to the icon here.
As usual in Android you are only presented for the most common choices
in all applications and menus that can be found in the phone. You will
need more options to press on the touch-sensitive dial key. This makes
the phone user friendly without compromising functionality.
The phone also supports multi-touch, such as Iphone. This may have
limited value in ordinary programs and with that you must use both hands
to zoom with two fingers at a time, but the technology can be nice to
have the games and entertainment applications of various kinds.
Car Home
Car Home offers you easy access to voice search, navigation (but not
really turn-by-turn), search and contact list. When you tell your mobile
where you are, you can choose whether to drive, take public transport
or walk. Voice Navigation enables you to call contacts, or search for
what you say on Google.
Only full keyboard
In Nexus One, you will not find a mobile keyboard layout when you want
to enter text. You need to clear up with a full keyboard. We think it is
quick to write with the full keyboard, but I wish there was a keyboard
with standard telephone set so that it is easier to write with one hand.
This must eventually download from the Android Market.
Auto completion and word suggestions work very well and has a habit of
making it possible by typing much faster than without the aids.
With a responsive and accurate capacitive screen, writing goes quite
excellent typing text messages quickly on full keyboard. Add cell phone
down, you get a bigger keyboard in the widescreen, and it’s even easier
to take the keys.
Other than text messages, we also appreciate that in the new
Android-version it is possible to know the time you received text
messages. This has not been possible in 1.5 and 1.6 if you received text
message the day before, and instead, you’ll know that you received
message yesterday. Now go into the message details to see time.
Good response
It is not often we see phones that are as fast as Nexus One. No
applications or features hanging, and the phone respond immediately on
everything you do.
To get a good response in a telephone, you need both well-functioning
software and hardware. In Nexus One, you will find a 1 GHz processor of
type Qualcomm QSD 8250 that is running on the Snapdragon platform. This
is exactly the same processor used in the Windows Mobile phone HTC HD2.
It has cache of about 512 MB, and it seems as if the Nexus One uses
cache in a good way so that it responds instantly no matter how much we
try to run simultaneously and how many programs we stacks in the
background as each occupies a little cache.
Good
conversations
When the phone rings, drag a post-box to the right to reply, or you do
the same with a reject box to reject the call. This works well because
it is not easy to answer or hang up whenever you take out the phone from
your pocket.
During the conversations, you can easily take the keyboard. The phone
has in fact a light sensor which means the screen is off when you hold
it against your ear and immediately activated as you lift the phone away
from ear to, for example, allow you to make a key selection or activate
the loudspeaker.
Sound quality during conversations is completely flawless, and we are
particularly impressed with noise cancellation. Even when we talk on the
phone with loud music on stereo, you can not hear the other side any of
the background noise while voice is clear and distinct. This is
impressive.
The secret is that the Nexus One has a separate microphone on the back
which captures the noise of the environment. The sound that is captured
here, invert the sound sent during a call so that background noise
disappears.
You can also set the volume in your own high-end device, and we can keep
phone a little away from your ear and still hear the partner’s
conversation easily. Handsfree speaker also works well when you have
phone left on table.
You will find the below things in the package along with Nexus One:
- Battery
- User
Guide - USB cable
- Charger (230V ~)
- Headset with
3.5 mm mini-jack with Remote (also acts as a hands-free) - Memory
Card (Micro-SD, 4GB) - Carrying case tailored for Nexus One
Design and usability
- Form: Touch
Screen - Size: 11.9 x 5.98 x 1.15 cm
- Weight: 130 grams
- Display:
AMOLED, 3.7 inch, 480 x 800 pixels, capacitive touch screen - Shortcut
Keys: Volume, return, options, home, search, scroll wheel - Input
and output: Micro-USB, 3.5 mm mini jack - Short place: Micro-SD
- External
antenna socket: No - Menu System: Android 2.1
Nexus One has impressed when it comes to usability and menus. The
technology front is also not so very bad.
Much
technology
Super-3G is in place, with both HSDPA and HSUPA. It means good speeds
downloading and uploading with max speed of respectively 7.2 Mbps and 2
Mbps. This works in all three frequencies, providing you good speed even
if operators are using 900 MHz frequency to improve the super-3G
coverage.
When coming to mobile network, Nexus One thus has everything you may
require, and phone works in most of the world’s mobile networks.
Nexus One also has Wi-Fi, so you can connect to wireless zones to have
internet access. For some reason we were not able to operate Android
Market on wireless networks. We could search for programs, but the
download did not start until we turned off the Wi-Fi.
Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR support enables fast wireless file transfers to
local For example, your PC, and a supplied cable does the job even
faster. It is also possible to use the Nexus One as a mass storage.
In unlike earlier versions of Android, you can finally pass the files
via Bluetooth, without necessarily setting up a connection between PC
and mobile phone to transfer files.
Both Bluetooth and USB transfer worked great with Ubuntu, and the speed
is also about as good as it can be with these technologies.
A-GPS, compass and accelerometer
Phone has assisted GPS, so it finds your location faster by checking the
approximate position of the GSM antennas. In addition, it only finds
the approximate position by means of GSM antennas and Wi-fi networks.
Further set the phone with a digital compass and accelerometer. Last
Standby makes among other things that the screen turns when you turn the
phone.
Extended reality that impresses
These technologies ensures that it is possible with a number of exciting
services on mobile. Google has, among other things, added "Goggles" on Nexus One. This program is an example
of what is called extended reality, or "augmented reality".
When you open Goggles, viewfinder pops up. You can then point around
with the camera to see what’s around you. Point towards for example the
National Theater, you can then press the text that comes up and bring
out More information about the National Theater. When we point it around
the office Feedback we get up 20 different businesses and locations.
Each of these locations has a number of reviews, and it appears grades.
Are you in an area with many restaurants, you can, in other words,
individually choose a nearby based on the rating from others who have
used Google’s services.
In addition, Goggles search for things you take picture of. If you take
the picture of a logo on a product, appears company name and information
about the company or product. If you take the picture of a building,
chewing gum pack or a snuff box’s on the same. This works far from
perfect, but often you still get impressive results.
Street View
By imposing the phone services you also have Google Street View with the
latest images, and this works just great. You can easily pan by
dragging the thumb in all directions across the screen, and you can move
along the street by clicking on the arrows. When you are looking up an
address in Google Maps, you also get easy access to view the site in
Street View where it is available.
Currently it is mainly Oslo, Trondheim and Bergen that is occupied by
Street View.
New Google Maps
The phone has Google Maps preinstalled. We are talking about the new
version of Google Maps: version 3.4.0. Here you will find Latitude
support, so that you can see your friends on the map if they also have
Latitude. In addition, you will find easy access to Street View when you
have selected an address.
Lightning-fast web
browser
The browser in Android is, and always has been, lightning quick and
simple in use. The Nexus One is even faster than before Android phones,
because the hardware is better and therefore rendering is easier. Nexus
One is a small notch faster than Iphone on loading web pages.
All web pages appear in a good way, and the browser cut 93 of 100 points
in the Acid3 test. This test looks not only at your browser ability to
handle JavaScript and DOM mainly, but also a number of second web
standards.
We also appreciate that your browser supports multiple tabs, and you can
then surf the eight sites on time.
Slightly
deficient e-mail functionality
The Nexus One has two e-mail readers. One for your regular e-mail
account, which also handles a majority of e-mail accounts on the same
interface if you have multiple e-mail addresses you use. The second
e-mail reader is Gmail. The latter has push functionality, which allows
your emails to be "pushed" in and you are notified of received e-mail
about while it was successful.
The overview is also good. Unread e-mail is marked clearly, and the
e-mail is very easy to forward, mark as unread, and reply.
Nexus One can view HTML e-mails directly to your e-mail reader, and
phone also supports common attachments such as images, office documents
and PDF files.
In the regular e-mail reader, you can not choose signatures, and you can
not search. It seems we are a little strange, when both of these
features are in place in the Gmail browser.
Have
and have not?
We find no office software that can open Office files in menu on the
Nexus One. As we open a .doc file from an e-mail, it appears however
Quickword that shows us the contents. In the application process we can
not see that it is running something Quickword.
Quickoffice is thus in there somewhere, but you do not see it. You can
not simply open Office files that you have not received by the e-mail.
The phone has no file manager, and thus you can not open QuickOffice
files that you transfer to the phone either.
Synchronizing
in all directions
Nexus One is the king of synchronization. Not only has the Gsync that
synchronize Gmail, Gcal and contacts you have made in Google services,
but it also syncs to both Exchange servers and Facebook.
Facebook application in the Nexus One allows you to synchronize all
contacts the first time you open the program. Then pop it up pictures,
phone numbers, email addresses and other contact information that
Facebook friends have made on their profile. This was also possible in
for example HTC Hero, but here you had to connect one and one phone jack
to its Facebook profile.
Exchange synchronization allows advanced users happy, and synchronize
email, calendar and phone list on an Exchange server for those who have
access to it.
Of the new features, in general we are missing a simple notebook, a
Converter, countdown and stopwatch. The latter two were under "clock" in
Android 1.6, but now you have to download special programs for this.
Calendar, calculator and voice recorder are in place, as well as GTalk
with support for instant messaging function but not VoIP.
The calendar is not equal to that in earlier versions of Android. Here
it is easy to activate the reminder, and you get a full overview of your
appointments. Though you have no support to such part deals with
others.
All in all, there are some things on your calendar and e-mail reader
with a pro user soon will miss, but for most places Nexus One with the
most features may require a mobile phone. Phone also impresses with new
and innovative services from Google, and has much Technology inbuilt.
Large battery
The battery in the Nexus One is of 1400 mAh, and will manage 7 hours
mobile calls in the 3G network, and rest time is provided for 250 hours.
If you use the internet actively then it provides Google the phone for 5
hours in 3G. Playing the video phone will last for 7 hours, and under
Music playback it will last for 20 hours.
This is a big battery with good specifications, but Nexus One is also
perfect for heavy use on the internet, while it certainly synchronized
over the Internet. We felt, therefore, that we had to charge your mobile
about once a day under hard use. It includes synchronization, a lot of
internet use, gaming, music and a little video.
Technology and features
- Mobile Web: GSM 850,
900, 1800, 1900 MHz, UMTS and HSPA 900, 1900, 2100 MHz - Internet
speed: UMTS (3G), HSDPA 7.2 Mbit, HSUPA 5.76 Mbit, GPRS / EDGE - Wireless
transmission: Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR and A2DP - Retrieving
e-mail: POP3, IMAP4, Exchange - The quoted battery life: 3G: 7
hours of talk time, 10.4 days rest, GSM: 10 timed talk time, 12.1 days
rest - SAR value: 0867 W / kg
- Internal memory: 512 MB RAM,
4 GB included memory card (Micro SD), 512 MB of memory reserved for
system - Browser: Google’s own
- Address: Unlimited
- Calendar:
Unlimited - E-mail reads: HTML function, missing the search
function and the signature feature of the regular e-mail reader - Features:
Alarm clock, calculator, voice recorder, Web Browser, GPS applications - Synchronization:
Exchange, Gsync, Facebook Sync
Nexus One has impressed us so far, but to achieve an equal impressive
roll of the dice the phone must stand to music playback, entertainment
and photography.
Phone has an output of 3.5 millimeter mini-plug. This output can be used
for hands-free or regular headset for music.
A lot of good sound
We plugged a set of earphones of type-a751, and jumped to when we heard
the loud sound carrier at full strength. Typically, the highest volume
quite suitable, while in the Nexus One, we had to adjust the volume down
a few notches.
The next thing we notice is the prominent bass phone delivers to the
headset. It reaches deep bass tones the undersigned have not heard
before with the same earpiece connected to the PC, but that only appears
on home stereo. This can of course vary widely according to the
earphones or headsets you use.
No matter how much bass there is in music, its still vowel crystal clear
like a blanket over the entire. In jazz music, trumpet sounds
completely natural but the bass is often little more prominent than we
like in our headsets. Else in jazz both string instruments and drums are
lifelike and detailed.
In metal and brass band music as it happens a lot at once, we think it
is mostly well presented. It could well have been a little more air
between the instruments, and cymbals stroke struggling to get with the
sound when they need through the sound stage.
All in all, we like Nexus One as MP3 players. It is well suited for both
noisy and quiet music, and we are impressed especially of the best
sound in the latter.
The interface to the music player, there is little to say on. Here, you
sort by artist, album, song or create your own playlists.
In addition, we find a music store from Amazon in our Nexus One. You can
buy music and download it directly to mobile phones.
Entertaining?
When you set up on a packed tram or bus and badly need entertainment to
forget how much you uncomfortable are than you will find the Nexus One
phone helpful.
The reason is primarily the Android Market. Here it is impressive
amounts of digital entertainment applications and games. You can put the
music in the background, download it to the powers of the game, and
play for hours.
How the phone is delivered, however, no games built. There you will find
the entertainment with the music player and a Youtube client that lets
you see all the YouTube videos with a few keystrokes. This client lets
you upload your own video clips directly from mobile.
Camera
The camera does not provide much better than typical office phones.
Detail reproduction is low, because the details slip out, and especially
in corners of the picture is unclear whether it appears in full
resolution.
With a lot of downsizing, for example, if you print the picture out of
half A4 page, you get a reasonably well mobile photo that is good enough
when you do not have your camera available. Color reproduction is good;
you see details in dark areas in the image and the Nexus One expose
over or under expose not too much.
A little annoying is that you can not control the focus. When you take
an image that is focused on, and then take photo when it is focused. It
allows the focus point that is always right in the picture.
Nexus One also has video recording, with a resolution of 720 x 480
pixels and 20 frames per second or higher (depending on the lighting
conditions). Video clips are of good quality, but with the rapid
movements of the camera the picture becomes very grainy.
Altogether, Nexus One in other words, has a good music player, while the
camera is entirely at periodic. No games preinstalled, but with Android
Market, and lots of free applications easily available to, however,
Nexus One entertains you.
Multimedia
- Media
Features: Randomness, repeat, playlist - Media Sizes: MP3, eAAC
+, WAV, MP4, H.263, H.264 - FM Radio: No
- Wireless stereo
(A2DP): Yes - Media Outputs: 3.5 mm mini jack
- Java
Support: No - Games and Entertainment: Youtube application,
Facebook application, Amazon’s music store - Camera Resolution: 5
megapixel - Autofocus: Yes
- Zoom: Yes, digital
- Flash
or LED flash: Yes, LED - Video Recording: 720 x 480 pixels, 20
images in seconds - Other: Setting white balance, color effect,
geomarking
Conclusion
In pictures, we see that the Nexus One can seem a bit boring. In
reality, however, we think that it is impressive slim, and it is very
rounded in the corners that brings perceived comfort in hand.
The screen is 3.7 inches high, has good resolution and is based on the
AMOLED technology. This means that it uses little power, while it has a
lot more powerful lighting than most competitors and shows much better
contrast and bright colors. The resolution is so high that the screen is
razor sharp.
Nexus One has a 1 GHz Snapdragon processor and much cache, which makes
it lightning fast. It does not hang in the menus, and it runs
applications quickly.
Another place the phone is lightning quickly is on the Internet. It has
super-3G to get the fastest speeds in the mobile network, as well as
Wi-Fi for connecting to wireless networks. With the rapid hardware,
Nexus One is the browser notch faster than the Iphone, which is
impressive.
Bluetooth connection allows, in contrast to the HTC Hero, ability to
send files directly to other Bluetooth devices such as mobile phones,
and you do not need to set up a connection to your PC to transfer files
between these.
In the Nexus One, you have two programs that should be able to impress
all and everyone that is based on mobile GPS, ability to locate you
using the mobile network, and its built-in compass. One is Google
Goggles and the other is Google Street View.
The first of these allows you to photograph buildings, products, logos
and other, and a few seconds later you’ll see information about the
product. If you take the picture of a can of liver pate, you’ll get a
bunch with information about anything else you took the photo of.
When you point your mobile phone around you will also provide up points
of interest nearby. There may be restaurants, hotels and much other.
Click, for example, a restaurant, you’ll see the second use and review
of the restaurant – with an average grade.
Google Street View allows you to select any place in most of Oslo and
Trondheim, and see photos from the street. On each photo you can pan
around you, just as if you are on the point itself.
Of synchronization solutions, Nexus One has more, including a solution
that synchronizes all your Facebook contacts so that phone list is
filling up with people you never talk to, including image, Facebook
status, phone number, e-mail addresses and street addresses.
MP3 player in the Nexus One can play music through a standard 3.5
millimeter jack. This allows you to connect to Your favorite headset
without any transitions. Sound quality is absolutely impressive.
Nexus One can also entertain in other ways. It has a Youtube application
with the ability to upload. It also has Android Market, where you can
download countless free games and free applications.
And last but not least, the sound quality of calls is absolutely
fabulous. Nexus One has a noise cancellation feature that allows you to
speak in enormously noisy environments without the counterparty may have
trouble hearing you. Battery life is also good.
There is very little negative to say about Nexus One. The camera may
have been better, and it could have had a more advanced calendar and
e-mail reader to satisfy professional users.
Positive
points
- Fabulous video
- Very good noise
cancellation in talks - Good response
- Good browser
- Many useful and entertaining services
- Good MP3 Player
Negative points
- Calendar and e-mail
reader could have been more advanced - Slightly high prices in
Norway preliminary
