Galaxy-Nexus VS iPhone 4S ?

[djshack]

I find it interesting that the best advantage the iPhone has, is barely being touched upon here.

The apps!

If you're trying to compare the two phones in terms of specs, you're missing 95% of the story.

The apps have really opened up the platform, from the mainstream categories like photography that rivals a DSLR (I usually leave my thousands of dollars in photography equipment at home now) and games with graphics that rival consoles, to very niche categories like sending me push notifications whenever a certain script is run on my desktop at work, connecting very specialized hardware like the Jawbone UP/iRig audio products, or wirelessly sending audio/video to my speaker system/home theatre with the push of a button.

These things simply are either completely unavailable on Android, or are so buggy and unintuative that only the most technical of us can get it working (and even then, expect to use the Force Close button a lot).

Not to mention the Apple made apps like Siri, iPhoto, iMovie, Find my Friends, Find my iPhone, iCloud, GarageBand and FaceTime.

That's what I've seen through first hand experience. Anecdotally, I've read that the Android mail apps all differ from device to device, and none of them do mail conversations well. I've read that Android devices store your email password in clear text and don't encrypt the file system when locking the phone. I've read the Android camera app doesn't have hardware video stabilization. I haven't looked up any of that though, so I'm not sure if it's accurate.

In any case, the hardware trumps all Android phones in all hardware-related benchmark tests (not browser-based tests), so I'm not even sure why hardware is being discussed:

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Smartphone11/369

The only reason to get an Android device, is if you value homepage customization above everything else iOS offers, or if you don't want to spend a lot of money. Widgets have been shown to reduce both battery life and performance, but hey, some people like them.

I agree. I had a Sprint NS4G since May, and just switched to the iPhone 4S on AT&T, going on two weeks now. I could not be happier with this phone (unless battery life was a bit better).

Putting aside the NS4G's horrible cell and wifi reception issues and Sprint's horribly slow 3G network, I still enjoy the iPhone significantly more. The apps--both third party and stock--are significantly better. They're prettier, smoother, and simply function better. I no longer have to wade through mountains of crap apps to find one good one.

Further, this phone is just more polished in every possible aspect than any Samsung phone or Ice Cream Sandwich. Sure, the display is smaller, but the keyboard is so much better I still type much more accurately on the iPhone.

Overall, I can't imagine going back to an Android phone at this point. Then again, I've been a Mac user for years now, and say the same about Windows, so I may be a bit biased.

 

[cynics]

have both in the household and in my opinion the only thing that iPhone does better than Galaxy Nexus is the camera, which is total rubbish on gnex and fantastic on the iphone.

Not a fan of iOS on the small screen, works way better on the bigger screen of the tablet. Android is the total opposite - great on the phone, crap on tablets.

I appreciate your opinion but I feel the opposite.

iOS is very app centric. Whereas a large screen android works great esp with flash player and USB hosting (pointer shows up when you plug in a mouse). So it's more like a laptop (to me). There some quirks when forcing the ui string to desktop cause of the touchscreen interface but for the most part it works.

Like those games from "html5 free games" didn't work on my iPad 2. It just gets frustrating, if I pull out a tablet I just want it too work at least work better then my phone.

With the openness of android at least in comparison it's great for using apps like twonky (like AirPlay minus the appletv) which is great because I have 96 gb of storage on my tablet to store movies and music.

But I prefer the compact size of the iPhone and how quick and simple it is for a mobile device.

I'll always prefer the smooth ui of iOS on a phone because most the time I don't care if background task are forced to shut down. But on a tablet if I start loading a web page and click home, when I eventually go back I expect it to be loaded not stopped and force to reload while I stare at it.

Anyway that's why I prefer the iPhone w/ Android tablet combination. Opinions will very obviously.

 

[DodgeV83]

I appreciate your opinion but I feel the opposite.

iOS is very app centric. Whereas a large screen android works great esp with flash player and USB hosting (pointer shows up when you plug in a mouse). So it's more like a laptop (to me). There some quirks when forcing the ui string to desktop cause of the touchscreen interface but for the most part it works.

Like those games from "html5 free games" didn't work on my iPad 2. It just gets frustrating, if I pull out a tablet I just want it too work at least work better then my phone.

With the openness of android at least in comparison it's great for using apps like twonky (like AirPlay minus the appletv) which is great because I have 96 gb of storage on my tablet to store movies and music.

But I prefer the compact size of the iPhone and how quick and simple it is for a mobile device.

I'll always prefer the smooth ui of iOS on a phone because most the time I don't care if background task are forced to shut down. But on a tablet if I start loading a web page and click home, when I eventually go back I expect it to be loaded not stopped and force to reload while I stare at it.

Anyway that's why I prefer the iPhone w/ Android tablet combination. Opinions will very obviously.

A quick search of the AppStore shows many apps with Twonky compatability, including an official app, though I haven't used them and can't vouch for their quality. I have personally used some similar apps like Air Video and others, so the capability is definitely there. If you want to plug in a mouse, however, that won't work without jailbreaking.

If that's a requirement, I'd recommend using Android over jailbreaking an iOS device personally, though I know some disagree with me on this. Apple will never implement mouse support on an iPad, mainly due to the UI issues you mentioned above.

I haven't run across any html5 games that don't work on the iPad/iPhone, but I never really tried before today All of the games ran smoothly, but i don't have my keyboard setup right now, so I can't test them fully.

Regarding the browser issue, thats another thing I don't expect Apple to address. It comes down to keeping the devices running smoothly. These devices aren't really that powerful when compared to our desktops, and even then I've seen web pages bring performance down to a crawl. If you're on a quad core with 8gb of ram, a browser should never be able to affect performance...but it can. Especially if you're on a platform that Flash doesn't work well in, like any mobile device, or Linux on the desktop. YouTube videos run smoother on my iPad than my quad core Linux desktop. I'm not surprised Adobe abandoned Flash on mobile devices.

I tried one of those apps on my iPad 2/iPhone a while back, that never reloads the open tabs for you, and I noticed a very obviously slowdown in performance with more than a few tabs open. This never happens in Safari. Every time one of my friends shows me their Android device, things start to slow down and they pause their "demo" to go back and close some apps so performance improves. Apple will never go down that road, even if it means limiting their OS. If that type of control is important to you, you'll never be satisfied with an Apple device.

 

[ntrigue]

A friend that was very serious about iPad and owned each iPhone switched to the Galaxy Nexus and won't come back.

 

[cynics]

A quick search of the AppStore shows many apps with Twonky compatability, including an official app, though I haven't used them and can't vouch for their quality. I have personally used some similar apps like Air Video and others, so the capability is definitely there. If you want to plug in a mouse, however, that won't work without jailbreaking.

If that's a requirement, I'd recommend using Android over jailbreaking an iOS device personally, though I know some disagree with me on this. Apple will never implement mouse support on an iPad, mainly due to the UI issues you mentioned above.

I haven't run across any html5 games that don't work on the iPad/iPhone, but I never really tried before today All of the games ran smoothly, but i don't have my keyboard setup right now, so I can't test them fully.

Regarding the browser issue, thats another thing I don't expect Apple to address. It comes down to keeping the devices running smoothly. These devices aren't really that powerful when compared to our desktops, and even then I've seen web pages bring performance down to a crawl. If you're on a quad core with 8gb of ram, a browser should never be able to affect performance...but it can. Especially if you're on a platform that Flash doesn't work well in, like any mobile device, or Linux on the desktop. YouTube videos run smoother on my iPad than my quad core Linux desktop. I'm not surprised Adobe abandoned Flash on mobile devices.

I tried one of those apps on my iPad 2/iPhone a while back, that never reloads the open tabs for you, and I noticed a very obviously slowdown in performance with more than a few tabs open. This never happens in Safari. Every time one of my friends shows me their Android device, things start to slow down and they pause their "demo" to go back and close some apps so performance improves. Apple will never go down that road, even if it means limiting their OS. If that type of control is important to you, you'll never be satisfied with an Apple device.

I appreciate you reply.

I have a wifi iPad2 which I gave to my girlfriend. I had the Xoom got fed up and got the ipad2 then I found I missed the Xoom and gave the iPad to my gf.

I love technology. Just like you and I can debate android vs iOS forever I do the same thing on android forums when iOS is looked down upon. In a perfect world I'd take things from ios, windows, and android to make the ultimate mobile operating system.

Anyway on slow downs with gingerbread and honeycomb you can't technically kill an app without an app. The os is designed to kill background usage if foreground requires it. An app suspended is like one that was never opened. The only reason I have an app killer is to stop a misbehaving app, ICS addresses this.

Anyway and I may regret saying this cause of my previous post. But if I reset and restart my tablet for example and run a useless benchmark test (lol) like linpack or quadrant I get the same results if I have 50 apps open in the background. Currently my tablets been on for at least a month without me killing any apps.

I like how background apps will run until resources are required vs iOS way of running them for 5 seconds then suspending them.

Like I mentioned that's only for tablet use. I like that on a iphone, better battery life and faster ui.

 

[cynics]

Btw dodgev83 (what dodge? I had a Dakota RT).

The thing that bugs me is coming FROM Android to iOS is the permissions. The app sleep cycle is a good example. Since it can't run in the background you need to set your alarm as your are going to bed.

I like the app but because of the permissions I got annoyed and end up not using it.

I feel like android has already overcome that hurtle and just has some minor stuff to figure out with background apps and it's battery life. Whereas iOS hasn't addressed it at all.

I'll still prefer an iPhone but I think in the not so distance future an amazing Android or Windows phone will come out and I won't look back.

 

[DodgeV83]

Btw dodgev83 (what dodge? I had a Dakota RT).

The thing that bugs me is coming FROM Android to iOS is the permissions. The app sleep cycle is a good example. Since it can't run in the background you need to set your alarm as your are going to bed.

I like the app but because of the permissions I got annoyed and end up not using it.

I feel like android has already overcome that hurtle and just has some minor stuff to figure out with background apps and it's battery life. Whereas iOS hasn't addressed it at all.

I'll still prefer an iPhone but I think in the not so distance future an amazing Android or Windows phone will come out and I won't look back.

Dodge Viper, though I don't own one...yet

I definitely understand your issue, I have the same problem with Sleep Cycle, my girlfriend can't use it at all, since she likes to fall asleep to Netflix.

I don't have much experience with the Android method of app management on a Tablet, so I don't yet have an opinion on which methodology would work best. How would Android, on a tablet or phone, react to an app in the background consuming 80% of the CPU? If I open up a game, video or flash website, then switch to my email and stay in my email for hours, does the 80% CPU app keep running? If the mail app stays under 20% utilization, it will never need more resources, but I can't imagine my battery will last long under a constant 80% CPU draw.

A friend's grandma sent me an email the other day about a problem with an app on her iPad 2. It was clear she needed to reset the app and start it again, but she couldn't follow my instructions for doing so. I asked her to double tap the home button to bring up the tray, then hold her finger on the app and hit the little X. The next email I get contains, "What/where is the Home button?" then proceeds to tell me she dragged the app "down below", but is afraid to hit the X because last time she did that, the app was gone forever and she didn't know how to get it back. She was on her way to the Apple store to get it fixed until I simply told her to turn the iPad off and on.

These are the people the iOS methodology is made to protect. If you know your way around a computer (and from what I've seen, most people don't), you may prefer the Android way of thinking. Unfortunately, loving the Android way of thinking might not be worth missing out on all the great apps and the Apple Ecosystem that iOS offers. It's a judgement call.

I used to be a big Windows Mobile fan before Android was around, and after years of dealing with it, got fed up with all of the custom roms and instability of the platform. I bought an iPhone and couldn't have been happier.

 

[jaimcnutt]

I have the iphone 4 s and I have the galaxy nexus. Each phone has its own pros and cons. The iphone has a much better camera but that is about it. Asm everyday user I would highly suggest the galaxy nexus. If you have the right apps installed and have it configured the correct way with custom rom's and a custom kernel I get mybattery to last for the entire day plus part of the next day there are benny ops out there that will turn off wifi automatically as well as dada when you're in a wifi zone and little things like this which helps with the battery immensely. The bigger screen is a must as well as being curved it does make a big difference in comfort when talking on the phone. Want to know how touse an android phone to its full potential you will never go back.

 

[aneftp]

Verizon CDMA/LTE Samsung galaxy nexus has a horrible antenna design. Poor signal strength. I loved the gnex but Samsung just can't design a good quality CDMA antenna. I had the gnext for 3 1/2 months until selling it.

When my friends droid razr and my Verizon iPad LTE can get LTE signal at my house while gnext can't. The problem is the antenna on the gnex.

Heard similar complaints on antenna with the Samsung droid charge on Verizon as well as Sprint Samsung Nexsus S 4G.

The gsm Samsung models don't have the antenna issues.

 

[batting1000]

edit

 

[mbell1975]

4S has sub-par battery life, tiny screen so watching videos and browsing the web is unbearable, OS is locked down so customization is limited to changing your wallpaper and making folders (which is also limited in how many icons is can contain, 9), front camera is abysmal, and Siri is a gimmick which you'll really only use to show off to your friends or conversate with when you're really bored (doing the actual action is easier than telling Siri to do it). About the only good thing is this apps and the camera.

My Galaxy S2 has a large 4.52 inch screen with amazing colors and allows me to actual see what I'm doing. I can customize it however I please without voiding my warranty (to extent, so I'd have to root to running other OS versions). Battery life is great and videos are great. Front camera is clear, back camera is identical to the 4s and comes with built in photo editing features, and Android has had voice assistants (Vlingo and some have them built in as well as more being downloadable). Sure, I can't tell it I love it or tell it to 'close the podbay doors', but who cares?

My 2 cents

I found different results with my S2. Battery life was awful and thats on 3G. I never even used 4G unless I wanted to be grabbing a charger every 4 hours. The colors did pop nicer than the 4s but the clarity and sharpness was nowhere near the 326ppi display. I couldn't care less about customizing my icons. They are icons that launch apps, big deal. Also couldn't care less about front facing cameras. I am not a girl taking FB pics, so I never use it. The main camera is for sure better on the iPhone. I am a photographer and believe me I have tested the hell out of the cameras on both devices. The S2 over saturates everything, even in the video. 4s has more realistic colors but they need to be enhanced to make them pop a bit more. The lens and optics used in the iPhone are vastly superior to the ones used in the S2, its not even close. The virtual assistants on Android are a joke compared to Siri. You have to word things very specifically and even then, half the time it would say its still learning that feature. Something simple like setting an alarm, so it was pretty much useless. I will give the advantage to the S2 on screen size, better keyboard and the ability to use a different messenger. However, I found the iPhone to be superior with pretty much everything else.

 

[jkim3691]

4S has sub-par battery life, tiny screen so watching videos and browsing the web is unbearable, OS is locked down so customization is limited to changing your wallpaper and making folders (which is also limited in how many icons is can contain, 9), front camera is abysmal, and Siri is a gimmick which you'll really only use to show off to your friends or conversate with when you're really bored (doing the actual action is easier than telling Siri to do it). About the only good thing is this apps and the camera.

My Galaxy S2 has a large 4.52 inch screen with amazing colors and allows me to actual see what I'm doing. I can customize it however I please without voiding my warranty (to extent, so I'd have to root to running other OS versions). Battery life is great and videos are great. Front camera is clear, back camera is identical to the 4s and comes with built in photo editing features, and Android has had voice assistants (Vlingo and some have them built in as well as more being downloadable). Sure, I can't tell it I love it or tell it to 'close the podbay doors', but who cares?

My 2 cents

I own a 4s and the battery does just fine. Would I be more comfortable with a little more time? Absolutely. But I'm not stressing running out of battery by the end of the day. I'm usually at 50% or so by the end of the day. If you're someone that knows anything about jailbreaking, it opens up a huge world of customization. If there was no jailbreak I would seriously hesitate buying an iPhone (I HATE the stock UI). But luckily with jailbreak not only have I been able to make my iPhone look amazing, but even more functional. Like a swiss-army knife, I can get things done on my phone quickly and easily.

Is the SG2's front facing camera any better? Aren't they all pretty bad? And who really cares about the front facing camera...

I have plenty of friends with Android phones and I don't know if this is a Samsung thing or not but they all have that hideous green tint to them that make the colors look off. I hate that. The retina display shows things accurately and sharply the way they should be. The only thing left to be desired for me in regards to an iPhone is a slightly larger screen (4" is big enough) and 4g. I don't plan on getting the new one until the jailbreak is released though. Running stock on my 4s for however long was a killer for me.

 

[theman123]

Just bought an iPhone 4s. I was down to the Razr Maxx and the iPhone. I really didn't like the Nexus. Ice Cream Sandwich didn't blow me away, and the Maxx is getting it soon. The battery is bad on the Nexus as well.

I say, if you go android, look at the Maxx.

 

[onthecouchagain]

Switched from a Nexus S (with ICS) to a 4S, and now currently trying to find a way to get a Galaxy Nexus. With smartphones, I'm convinced more than ever that stock Android is the better platform. Unless iOS 6 brings some significant improvements to the keyboard, the browser, mail, and to a few other general quirks, ICS is where it's at. A larger screen for the next generation iPhone would be nice, although I'm not convinced that would resolve the shortcomings of the software.

iOS is far better experienced on the iPad.

 

[frank.deale]

I have a Verizon Galaxy Nexus that has no issues. Its the best electronic device I've ever owned for reasons people have already stated. But I also like IOS and have a iPod Touch that I use at home when not on my MacBook Pro.

I enjoy having exposure to both operating systems, each of which has strong merits, and see no need to argue over which is better.

 

[PacificBeach]

How does the A5 stack up to thr Galaxy Nexus CPU and GPU? What are the benchmarks?

 

[mbell1975]

How does the A5 stack up to thr Galaxy Nexus CPU and GPU? What are the benchmarks?

Well...the Galaxy Nexus was a bit better in CPU tests but the 4s beat it in GPU tests as expected.

http://gizmodo.com/5861245/the-galaxy-nexus-outperforms-the-iphone-4s

 

[daihard]

I had been using iPhones (3G, 3GS and 4) until I switched to a Galaxy Nexus last week. It is an unlocked GSM model running on AT&T.

The bigger AMOLED screen definitely gets my thumbs up compared with the iPhone Retina screen. I line my 4 side by side with the GNex, and the difference in contrast and "freshness" of the colours is pretty obvious.

The biggest reason I've switched, though, is the flexibility and customisability of Android. The fact that you can tweak almost all aspects of the OS, even UI and launchers, has been highly appealing to me. You can even build your own custom OS image and kernel if you wish.

On smoothness, I find the GNex to be about as smooth as my wife's 4S, so there you won't regret getting either IMO.

In terms of applications, I've been able to find almost all my favourite iOS applications on Google Play as well. The only major one that's missing from Android is Pinterest, but I can use the web interface for now.

One clearly negative thing about the GNex, at least IMO, is the battery life. I'm lucky if it lasts longer than 10 hours. Don't know how it compares wit the 4S, but it's definitely MUCH worse than the 4.

In terms of the cameras, a lot of people seem to be missing the fact that the GNex has a very fast shutter speed. I can't speak for other people, but this halps me take sharp photos greatly.

 

[DodgeV83]

I'm pretty sure the J is the emulator. The game was used from

http://www.html5minigames.com/?q=taxonomy/term/8

I can do a different game that doesn't have the letter J any where in it if you like. The results will be the same.

I was just looking for something that displayed FPS. Since I have both devices if you have a link to something I can post pics of performance.

The link was about another useless benchmark test. Here is how useless benchmarks are.

Linpack

Linpack after its last update a couple days ago

My phone didn't get any slower. So why the difference, oh yeah cause benchmarks suck and only real world performance matters. And the best way I find is actual FPS.

After playing with Linpack on my iPhone 4S a bit today, I see what happened here. The first screenshot you took from before the update was with:

Problem size: 200
Number of runs: 50

After the update your screen shot was at:

Problem size 500
Number of runs 10

I tried to reproduce your results, and this is what I got:

It seems the scores went lower because the parameters used to calculate them changed. If both devices calculate using the same settings, it should be valid.

 

[DodgeV83]

After playing with Linpack on my iPhone 4S a bit today, I see what happened here. The first screenshot you took from before the update was with:

Problem size: 200
Number of runs: 50

After the update your screen shot was at:

Problem size 500
Number of runs 10

I tried to reproduce your results, and this is what I got:

Image

Image

It seems the scores went lower because the parameters used to calculate them changed. If both devices calculate using the same settings, it should be valid.

After reading a little more about this, it seems the numbers are inflated if the problem size is too low, something about the processors of today being too fast to accurately judge with such a small problem set. Once the problem set is above a certain level, things are equalled out.

The Android Linpack app runs at a 550 Problem Size. My iPhone 4S gets 80.86 Max Mflop/s without multithreading, and it stays consistent even when I choose a 2000 Problem Size.

As I've been saying, the iPhone 4S CPU is way ahead of the competition:

This video shows the HTC One X Multi-threaded Linpack benchmark. The highest he got was 117, lowest 106.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=Jiw2kWSU9s4#t=236s

I ran it three times in Multi-threaded mode, for comparison's sake:

Again the iPhone 4S comes out on top.

 

[Bugeyeblue]

I had the Verizon iPhone 4, then the Verizon galaxy nexus, and now the Verizon 4s. I'm sure there will be people saying I didn't set up the phone right, but with the galaxy nexus and an OEM extended battery, the phone was dead after about 10 hours of very light usage. This (battery life) is something I just don't understand about android. I had 4g off, screen brightness turned almost all the way down, 20 or so texts and maybe 5 phone calls at 1 minute each. Every time I checked the battery on the nexus, it would be down about 5% more. I just don't get how a phone can go through battery at 10% per hour without even using it, with 4g off, push email off, location services off, Facebook checking once per day, and whatever other advice I could find online to try to keep the battery from dying can be praised by anyone. Plus, the call quality was total crap, sounded bad on both ends of all calls I made, and could never get a gps lock. I've had a lot of android phones, and I don't think I could use any of them after having the 4s. I LOVE switching phones and trying out new hardware/software, but I just can't get over the huge daily-usage app problems and lack of decent battery life with most android phones.

 

[daihard]

I had the Verizon iPhone 4, then the Verizon galaxy nexus, and now the Verizon 4s. I'm sure there will be people saying I didn't set up the phone right, but with the galaxy nexus and an OEM extended battery, the phone was dead after about 10 hours of very light usage. This (battery life) is something I just don't understand about android. I had 4g off, screen brightness turned almost all the way down, 20 or so texts and maybe 5 phone calls at 1 minute each. Every time I checked the battery on the nexus, it would be down about 5% more. I just don't get how a phone can go through battery at 10% per hour without even using it, with 4g off, push email off, location services off, Facebook checking once per day, and whatever other advice I could find online to try to keep the battery from dying can be praised by anyone. Plus, the call quality was total crap, sounded bad on both ends of all calls I made, and could never get a gps lock. I've had a lot of android phones, and I don't think I could use any of them after having the 4s. I LOVE switching phones and trying out new hardware/software, but I just can't get over the huge daily-usage app problems and lack of decent battery life with most android phones.

Did you have the Facebook app installed on your GNex? That app was the single biggest battery drainer for me. I have a GSM GNex with a standard 1700 mAh battery. I used to get no more than 6-7 hours out of it. Now that I've restricted background data on the Facebook app (as well as disabling its notifications), my battery life has improved dramatically - 10+ hours easy.

 

[Bugeyeblue]

Did you have the Facebook app installed on your GNex? That app was the single biggest battery drainer for me. I have a GSM GNex with a standard 1700 mAh battery. I used to get no more than 6-7 hours out of it. Now that I've restricted background data on the Facebook app (as well as disabling its notifications), my battery life has improved dramatically - 10+ hours easy.

Yeah, I had the Facebook app installed, but did the same thing you did and restricted it to basically not do anything unless I opened the app. I tried deleting it for a few hours at one point as well, just to see if it would help... I didn't notice any recovery of battery drainage.

 

[b24pgg]

I'd go with the Galaxy Nexus. I could fill a book with all the reasons why I'd make the decision, but here are some of my big reasons:

1. 4G LTE.
2. Free wireless tethering.
3. Widgets and custom Notification Bar status indicators.
4. Google Navigation.
5. Ability to change default programs/choose from multiple programs to perform a task.
6. Custom fields in contacts sync properly on Android when using Exchange (i.e. Gmail). Custom fields do not sync on the iPhone.
7. LED notification light. Have a missed call/voicemail/email? Green light. Whatsapp message? White light. Facebook message/text? Blue light. Low battery? Red light. I love being able to just look at my device without having to turn on the screen and know if anything is waiting for me.
8. Google sync is compatible with anything and everything, vs iCloud which is limited to Apple devices.
9. Better integration via the sharing API.
10. Better integration of apps...i.e. Google Voice integrating into the native dialer and auto-detecting international numbers to intercept those calls and dial them via Google Voice rather than your carrier, or apps like Fox to Phone or Chrome to Phone.
11. Open source platform.

 

[onthecouchagain]

[*]LED notification light. Have a missed call/voicemail/email? Green light. Whatsapp message? White light. Facebook message/text? Blue light. Low battery? Red light. I love being able to just look at my device without having to turn on the screen and know if anything is waiting for me.

Cannot stress how awesome this is.