All Things Android - Apps, Phones, Tablets - Discussion

HDR is better with still subject since it's taking a bunch of photos and mixing them together to get the best color accuracy. So yeah moving living targets may be harder to shoot correctly.

I got my Nexus 5 this morning, it is very nice but I could not use it more than 20 minutes before I rooted it just to change the DPI. The icons and text are comically huge by default.
Also I coming from 64GB down to 32 is not so simple, I had to choose which music I wanted to keep, and even then I have about 23GB of audio alone..

 

Samsung's 2014 phones will have nearly double the pixels | The Verge

Why... why...WHY, I SAY... WHY?

I just don't get the reasons as to why anyone would puta 4k screen into a smartphone.

 

Destroy your battery life?

 

Spec war. Samsung and LG sell a lot of phones based on spec-sheet comparison.

That said, I agree with you. More is not better with pixels once you can't see individual pixels. Higher pixel counts introduce lag, harm battery life, and don't do anything for you. In my opinion, anything over 720p for a midsize smartphone and 1080p for a phablet is a total waste (4.7" is borderline...my wife's 720p Moto X screen looks superb, but my GS3 has a slight "screen door" effect that allows me to see individual pixels).

 

The DPI on the Nexus devices has NOTHING on Samsung TouchWiz devices. Stevie Wonder could read a Galaxy S4's status bar.

But yea, the limited storage is going to hurt. But then I use Google Play Music for pretty much all my music, and it doesn't allow external SD storage... but I do have about 8GB of FLAC on my external 64GB mSD card.

I don't get the reasons why people complain. It's pushing tech forward. Be happy... if for no other reason than you being able to say you have a 4K display in your smartphone.

 

But it hurts battery life, increases lag during basic tasks, and keeps the price of phones artificially high. That's why I complain about a 4k screen when I can't even see individual pixels on a 1080p screen and barely see them on a 720p screen.

 

I like the dual core and 1.5 day battery life in my iPhone 5 thank you very much, and only on a 1440 mAH battery.

 

Adreno 330 is well more than capable enough of driving a 4K display. During games, it could do a pixel doubling and still look amazing on a display like that. All the while having the same battery life of any high-end device out right now.

That has less to do with the hardware and more to do with iOS being fully native Obj-C and Cocoa. Native is efficient.

 

Apologies for taking so long to reply, I've been rather busy and also a little unwell of late.
I don't mean to drag the thread back a week but, at the same time, I don't want to seem like I was ignoring you.

Maybe I'm missing something but when I looked at the first 4 slides CNet attached to their article, the ones in which they compare the S4 and HTC One directly, how they can reach the conclusion that the One produces less deviation.
Looking at the numbers, the reds and blues on the HTC seem to be way off, much worse than the S4. The greens are much better but only marginally-so compared to the Samsung.

The panels were always flexible, it's the rest of the handset that is the problem.

I can't help but wonder how much good that does the handset long-term.
Flexible circuitry and batteries are supposed to be a way aways yet, so you kind of have to assume they've still got conventional stuff in there.

 

Hey, I'm all for innovation. But I don't get it when new technology is added to devices which don't allow consumers to fully appreciate (in the case of smartphone 4k screens, not even remotely appreciate) the new technology.

 

AMOLED can be more accurate because there's really no limit on the amount of colors/saturation/luminance that it can provide. The only determining factor is how Samsung decides to calibrate. Stock, Samsung leans heavily toward over saturation and low luminance, making for very saturated, eye-popping colors. With other modes, though, (like AdobeRGB Mode) it can display almost perfect colors and even the correct color temperature. Samsung has the ability to blow IPS completely out of the water, but I'm not entirely sure why they haven't yet.

1080p, in the case of the HTC One, is beautiful. It's pixel dense, almost color correct (with DeltaE in check), but it's just not able to meet the mark. A 5" 4K screen would be better than the highest end print-quality. I say bring it.

 

For someone like you, maybe full color correctness is important. Not to the lay person. They're not gonna notice the difference between a 1080p screen and a 4k screen on their Galaxy S or Nexus. It's like adding a 41 MP camera to a cell phone. Looks good to have, but totally unnecessary.

 

It'll happen eventually. But I'm in no hurry. It won't be the distinguishing feature I purchase my next phone on, anyway. It'll be battery life & unlocked bootloader.

 

In response to the 41MP camera... it's almost DSLR quality in it's output. So, in terms of screen quality, I can definitely deal with that.

 

Again, what's the point of having something that HQ on a smartphone? I mean, yes. The Lumia's camera sensor can take in a lot of light and detail, but a DSLR have a lot of ground in the fields of low light, zoom, and lenses. I think Sony has the right idea with their viagra lens add ons. In the category of displays, if you were to put a 720p display into one of them Galaxy Watches, you would not be able to tell the difference between the 720p screen and the one's its got in it now. All's it would do is force the OEM to dedicate more memory and CPU power to drive such a display.

 

Displays and cameras scale up just like memory. I see no reason why not to have a 4K screen and 41MP camera when you have 4GB of memory. It'll happen eventually.

If you're arguing that it doesn't make much sense now then I agree. I'd say it'll be in top end phones in two or three years. If at that point you don't see a difference, don't buy it.

 

It feels to me like they're going to run out of room in this spec war. At this point it's getting close to diminishing returns. After a point, higher resolution screens and jumbo megapixels aren't going to make a difference. Who ever comes out with the next innovative and practical form factor change will become the leader.. That's why I thought that flexible display Samsung video was interesting. It makes me wonder what other manufacturers see as the future for our handsets.

 

That's for sure, but I knew when buying a Samsung device that I'd have to use a different launcher and a custom ROM to get the most out of my phone. I kind of wished to stay stock on my Nexus.
I have the DPI set to 350, it looks pretty great now.

As for the music, it's too bad Google All access is not available in Canada.. I have more than enough mobile data and I would love to be able to stream high-quality music everywhere.
I'll have to downsize my collection soon anyway, 23GB filled my phone almost entirely!

 

Why not just use Spotify or Xbox Music for Android? I've used all three at one point or another, and I wouldn't say that GPMAA is inherently better than the other two services (both of which I think are available in Canada). I'm currently using Xbox Music.

 

FLAC on a phone? What do you do? Have an AC-powered DAC OTG'd to your phone in a rolling soundproofed room?

I've tested the discernibility of uncompressed vs compressed in a typical outdoor environment even with a pair of flagship customs and the results are that there's still too much background noise at safe listening volumes to tell a worthwhile difference.

 

Well, it's mostly because I'm lazy and didn't convert it to CBR MP3.

That "soundproofed portable room"... that needs to become a thing. Definitely could use one of those.

 

I'm pretty certain there's a comparatively large difference in runtimes as a result. There are OTF transcoders / library managers which can make it painless: I use FLAC in my master library and I'd never put it on a mobile device because it makes no sense at all - from a quality or practicality aspect.

 

I don't know. I can certainly tell the difference between the average mp3 and a flac file.
Provided you use good quality headphones of course.

 

On the move? Really?

 

Same here. I started going with FLAC over MP3 because I didn't want to make the effort to recode. PowerAmp does handle the FLAC files noticeably better than the MP3s, especially with respect to the equalizer.

In other news: Google starts testing ART, a potential replacement for Dalvik in Android — Tech News and Analysis

I am not a android architect, so I may not understand all the implications of this...but I find going from a JIT compiler to an AOT compiler will speed things up a good amount, yes?

 

Well, Not exactly when I am running but when I'm at school, at work or waiting at the DMV, the difference is noticeable.

 

Unless you have multi-driver customs with very high isolation - and even then it's debatable - isolating the placebo (like e.g. a giant I AM LISTENING TO FLACS' sticker on your desk) might be less of a drain on the batteries, not to mention the extended time when swapping out music.

(I mean, unless we're comparing with 128K CBR's and below)

 

Why don't you just upload your music library to Google Play Music? Pretty sure that's what HAL is talking about. That's what I've been doing for the last year or so since I got that 6GB data plan.

 

I'm not sure how to do that...

 

Exactly. Anything I add to my iTunes library is automagically uploaded to Google Music, instantly accessible from all my devices without having to sync a damn thing.

I HATE having to sync my iPad to add music, because I don't like iTunes' music subscription service (iTunes Match) and I VERY rarely purchase music from Apple. I prefer Google because they have a web interface for their music, they let you download it twice (on any device and unlimited times with the Google Music Desktop sync client), and the quality is 320Kbps CBR MP3... not 256Kbps AAC.

EDIT: Basically, all the FLAC I have on my phone is Passion Pit. Their music can't be compressed. Even in the highest MP3/AAC setting, it turns into a steaming pile.

 

I envy your hearing. I'm having a very hard time discerning the difference between LAME encoded 320Kbps CBR MP3s and FLAC in the Foobar2000 ABX test. That's with a pair of Sennheiser HD 650 headphones amped by a FiiO E17 in a quiet environment, but I'll admit that I didn't perform the test for very long or with a great variety of music.

 

Try a compressed version of Passion Pit - Sleepyhead. Then try a FLAC/ALAC version.

Helen Keller could hear the difference.

 

Trying to install BeanStalk.. Got it to work fine, looks great, but I couldnt get my contacts to load. I recovered to my backup for now

 

BeanStalk?

 

My bad, its a Note 2 ROM.
[ROM][11/04/13][4.3] BeanStalk 4.3 RC 1.1 + W03Tweaks v1.6.1 *The Fine-Tuned AOSP* - xda-developers

My contacts should be synced with google, but after setting that up, none of my contacts were recognized.

 

I grabbed a FLAC version of said song, converted it with the settings found below, and then threw the two files in the ABX comparator. It was a nightmare. For some reason, I felt a tad uneasy performing the test. I think it has to do with how hard I was trying to tell the two apart while being unable to do so. I had almost given up when a friend led me to give Wish I Had an Angel by Nightwish a try. The richer audio and wider soundstage somehow made me able to tell the lossy and lossless versions apart. Deciding which letter corresponded to which was still a time consuming and difficult process to me, but the fact that I was suddenly able to score a perfect 6/6 on my first try honestly surprised me despite the required effort. With the added knowledge of what to expect in terms of miniscule differences that the human ear is capable of picking up, I went back and redid the test for Sleepyhead. I had to strain myself even further with this song but after some time I was left with a score of 99,6% probability that I'm actually able to hear a difference and not just working on placebo and guessing. After presenting that result, I'd like to stress again how the difference wasn't obvious to me. I would never have been able to distinguish lossless from 320 kbps lossy if I was seeking enjoyment from the music I was listening to.



Finishing this off, I'd like to recommend giving the ABX test a try to everyone that's interested in audio. Foobar2000 is available in a portable format and installing the ABX component is as easy as double-clicking an executable. :thumbsup:

 

Loving my Nexus 5 so far. The only thing I would have changed would be a bigger battery. Other than that it is awesome. I am very glad I got the black version as well. My friend got the white one and it doesn't feel as good in the hand. The white version has a glossy side, and the back isn't as grippy as the black one.

 

Man, but the white looks soooo much better... For that alone I'll be totally getting the white N5, if I do get to buy it.

 

I like the look of white more than black, but I muuuuuuuuuuuch prefer the feel of matte plastics to glossy. If the Nexus 5 ever comes to US Cellular (which I doubt it will), I'd take the black over the white based on feel.

 

Wait, isn't the back of the white one also matte? I thought the only glossy part were the sides?

 

Haven't seen one in person; I just remember hearing "glossy" as to the white and assumed they were talking about all the white bits, but I don't know that for sure.

 

The white Nexus 5 doesn't have the soft touch feel that the black version has like the Nexus 7 2013, but it isn't glossy either; It's an off-white color.

 

I assume the white version doesn't have the soft-touch back in order to prevent it from picking up a ton of dust and discoloring a day after you get it. I definitely like the black one better. Much more minimalistic and elegant in my opinion.

 

I was so mad when they launched the Nexus 4 in white, I wanted a white version of the phone. Heck my iPhone is white too, definitely prefer white as a phone color.

 

I'm getting more into audio quality as well. One reason I keep my Galaxy S Captivate. It has a good sounding Wolfson DAC. But I convert all my new CDs to Apple Lossless. At least iTunes now offers 320kbps. Just wish I had all my old CDs so I could get Lossless versions. Or a way to convert my massive music library to Lossless. Sadly that ain't happening. Sucks getting into it so late. I have way to many iPods to switch from Apple Though I may Rockbox my 5.5G iMod.

When I get home, it'll be time for a new phone. Currently working with an XT912 DROID RAZR maxx. The Captivate is a dedicated audio player. Well see what phones are available when I return stateside in March. I'd be leaning toward something with a micro SD slot, but DAC quality will also play a role.

Sent from XT912 / CM10.2

 

Just use a proxy to sign up. Won't need to use a proxy for anything else. Now don't ask me how to do that...

 

Interesting. To me, I can hear the difference so easy... I figured it would be night/day for everyone. But then, everyone hears things a bit differently. I'll have to give that a try.

Loving both my white Nexi, but I have to admit that the Nexus 4 outclasses the 5 in a big way when it comes to looks. White/Chrome/Silver/Black is a beautiful combination. The Nexus 5 is more utilitarian while the white Nexus 4 is like pure elegance.

 

Whilst I'm not one for the looks of a phone (they all look like phones to me...), one thing I do feel is that white phones never look nice.

 

+1 for using "whilst"

That said, I really like white phones. Can't explain why, really, but I love the color on phones.

 

Yeah its just smooth matte plastic on the white version, no glossy or soft touch features.