Some nice thoughts here, thanks for pointing this out Phil Nickinson

[G+_Marlon Thompson]

Some nice thoughts here, thanks for pointing this out Phil Nickinson

 

Originally shared by Jean-Baptiste “JBQ” Quéru

 

Flagship Android Devices

 

I'm having a look at the Samsung Galaxy S4, HTC One, LG G2, Sony Xperia Z1 and Moto X on a few aspects: navigation buttons, cell radios, openness.

 

Navigation buttons

 

Samsung and HTC are still stuck in the Gingerbread days, with hardware buttons.

 

LG got the memo that they should be moving to software buttons, but sadly they totally missed the point and included a menu button on their navigation bar, such that their navigation bar is a hodgepodge of actions that affect the current screen (menu) and actions that move to another screen (home, back).

 

Sony and Motorola both use the proper software navigation bar.

 

Cell radios

 

Samsung, HTC and LG all seem to fall in the same bucket: neither offers 5-band UMTS, and they all have limited LTE options that don't allow going around easily.

 

Sony has 5-band UMTS in all models. Their US model does LTE on both AT&T and T-Mobile and has 1 of the EU LTE bands, while their EU model has all LTE EU bands plus T-Mobile in the US.

 

Motorola has 5-band UMTS, plus LTE that covers both AT&T and T-Mobile. At least that's the developer edition, the specs for the carrier editions are fuzzy.

 

Openness

 

The situation with SIM-locking and bootloader locking is unclear with Samsung. Worse, they seem to be adding some form of region-locking. There's a Verizon-only developer edition of the Galaxy S4, but that doesn't do me any good. The Google Play edition is probably reasonable there.

 

HTC seems to now support bootloader unlocking on all their devices. I expect that their devices are SIM-locked, but no screwy region-locking. There's a Google Play edition.

 

LG doesn't seem to say anything around openness, so I assume there's none.

 

Motorola seems to allow unlocking the bootloader on most variants, and I'm betting that the developer edition isn't SIM-locked.

 

Sony has been a pioneer in terms of openness, being the only OEM in my list to provide files that allow building AOSP for their devices. I note though that unlocking the bootloader on the Z1 is said to kill the camera (uh?). Edit: Apparently there's a workaround for the camera issue.

 

In all that, I'm not seeing any direct evidence that any of those manufacturers provide factory images to get back to stock after experimenting with custom systems. Edit: Maybe Samsung does, but I can't find the files. Edit: Apparently Sony does as well. At least they have instructions on how to apply such files.

 

Honorable mentions

 

Nexus 4, now discontinued: modern navigation bar, widely compatible UMTS but no LTE, very strong openness.

 

Oppo N1, not available yet: Gingerbread-style buttons, widely compatible UMTS but no LTE, exact openness TBD but the signs are very encouraging. I'd love to see AOSP support, CM support with Google apps, and official factory images.

 

Conclusion

 

In a nutshell, my personal conclusion: Sony's Xperia Z1 is my winner here. Motorola's Moto X is my close second. Neither is perfect, but they are both at a stage where they only need some fine-tuning, not some fundamental changes. Samsung, HTC and LG are very far behind, to the point where I can't get myself to take them seriously. Even though it's gone, Nexus 4 remains the phone I compare other phones to. Oppo can differentiate themselves, especially if there's a variant of CyanogenMod that ignores the hardware keys and uses a proper Android navigation bar instead.

[G+_George Fromtulsa]

I really like the hardware HOME on my Samsung. Whatever orientation the phone's in, I can find the button. I also like the functions it includes. See all of my "home" launcher panes, see open apps flip to my start page. I miss all that on my Nexus 7 tablet, mostly because it is possible to rotate the device and "lose" the software buttons.? On my phone they're always next to the visible "Hardware Home."

[G+_George Fromtulsa]

Using the N7 last night, and thinking about this, the power and volume rocker switches are hardware buttons, hard to find by feel, which is why I orient the tablet with the nearly invisible front camera left and top in landscape, which puts it right and top in portrait, and puts the side hardware buttons in a known location. Nasty surprise wen some music or video stats blaring at high volume, and the volume rocker is "lost."