Tech Battle: Nexus 6 | Galaxy Note 4

In a head to head of monstrous phones, which one wins? 

Samsung announced its first Galaxy Note device in 2011 at the IFA show in Berlin; initial reviews of the device were largely confused about just who would want to use such a large phone. That device, released about 3 years ago, was the start of a new phenomenon in the smartphone market - big phones were in. The original Galaxy Note had a 5.3", 720P screen - a screen that by today's standards checks in on the budget to mid-range scale. These days, we have the Galaxy Note series, but it's joined by several other big names in the market - the iPhone 6 Plus, the LG G Pro, the Lumia 1520, and of course, the Googorola Nexus 6. All have screens 5.5" or bigger. So let's break down two of the biggest phablets on the market - the Galaxy Note 4 and the Nexus 6. 

Hardware

Both the Nexus 6 and Galaxy Note 4 are surrounded by an aluminum frame around the sides which makes both devices feel premium and worth $700 of your hard-earned monehy. While both use a form of plastic for the back of the device, they do differ in general feeling and usability. The Nexus 6 has a hard matte-finish plastic and can be quite slippery and impossible to keep clean. The Note 4 has a removable matte-finish back, but it's of the soft touch variety that adds a good amount of grip to the device. Although Samsung devices of the past have been criticized for their unfettered use of glossy plastic, the material used here actually elevates the quality and in-hand feel of the device. 

The power and volume buttons on the Note 4 are more pronounced, and are quite a bit "clickier"; the Nexus 6 buttons are a bit mushy and less pronounced. The Note 4 also has a physical Home button that feels good to press and also wakes the device. 

The Nexus 6 has a curved back, ergonomically designed to fit in your hand. But this comes at the cost of table-top stability - it'll spin around on a desk or table, making use of gestures and swipes quite difficult as the Nexus 6 will spin around with the slightest touch. The Note 4 doesn't exhibit these annoyances with the flat back. But even without the ergonomic contours of the Nexus 6, the Note 4 feels quite good in the hand as the squared off design leads to a more confident grip. Although they differ in size slightly, the Note 4 is easier to use and manage; it feels smaller when holding it and using it which makes a big difference when trying to use the devices one-handed. More on that below.

Screen

Both devices have a quad-HD (QHD) resolution of 2560x1440 - the Nexus 6 at 5.96" and the Note 4 at 5.7". Both use AMOLED technology, and both look extremely sharp. Although both seem very comparable, extended use of each shows significant differences, and all of them are in the Note 4's favor. The panel on the Note 4 is brighter and more uniform with whiter-whites and brighter colors. Everything about it looks better to my eyes. That's not to say that the Nexus 6 has a bad screen - it's absolutely nice to look at - but it's clear that the Note 4 has one of the best screens on the market today, if not the best. 

Speakers

The Nexus 6 has dual, front-facing speakers. The Note 4 has a single rear speaker. I never struggle to hear my Nexus 6. Although the Note 4 gets loud enough in most situations, the sound quality just isn't there. This one's no contest - the Nexus 6 just has better speakers, full-stop. 

On-Screen Soft Buttons vs. Physical & Capacitive Buttons 

Although this is really up to personal preference, I did want to note a few thoughts here. First, I tend to prefer soft-buttons on my devices as they tend to make access to Google Now easier, and for me, result in fewer accidental presses, especially when passing the device around to other people. The biggest drawback for on-screen buttons is that they take up screen-real estate. But let's be honest; on a 6" device, you're really not lacking for space. I do like that the Note 4 has a physical Home button that wakes the device - this is especially useful when it comes to checking on notifications when the phone is on the table or seat next to you. 

Making Use of the Big Screen

Multi-window on the Galaxy Note 4

Some people buy big screened phones because they just want a bigger screen for movies, reading, and browsing the web. If you're one of those people, then either of these devices will work well for you, with a nod going to the Nexus 6, simply for having the bigger screen. But if you're someone who wants more features that allow for better use of the big screen, the Galaxy Note 4 is your winner. Multi-window, Side-key panel, one-handed features like screen minimizing are some of the software tricks that the Note 4 has that makes use of its big screen. Take a look at the screen capture on the right - Samsung's Multi-window feature lets you do two things at once, like browse the web and watch YouTube, or watch YouTube and keep an eye on Hangouts conversations. Although not every app is compatible with Multi-Window, many of the big apps are, like Facebook, Instagram, Hangouts, Chrome, and YouTube. 

The Nexus 6 doesn't actually give you any software add ons that make better use of the screen size. There's no split-window mode here, there's no optimizations for one-handed use (such as smaller windows, the ability to move around the Home/Back/Overview keys, split window functionality, etc.). This is pure Android that's the same on the Nexus 5, Nexus 4, and even the Moto X. Rumors point to updates to Lollipop that will introduce some key features like mult-window, but for now, Samsung gets it right by giving users the option to use the big screen as just a big screen, or more with these thoughtful and useful add-ons. 

The Note 4 does fail in one department, and that's the Notification Shade. Just look at how much room everything takes. The Quick Settings are quite useful, but they take up 1/3 of the room. I never use S Finder and Quick Connect, but I can't get rid of them. By the time you get to the notifications, you're already halfway down the screen, and any new notifications require lots of scrolling. 

Battery Life

I don't have any screenshots to show these statistics, but I'll speak to my experience with battery life on my devices. I'm not a big gamer, but I use my smartphone for just about everything else. Most of my screen-on time (SoT) is used by the following apps - Feedly, Reddit Sync, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and of course, SMS and Hangouts. My typical day lasts from 730am until bed-time, which is usually between 11pm to mid-night, about a 16 hour day. Both the Nexus 6 and Note 4 will last me until bed-time, but the Note 4 consistently has more juice left in the pack than the Nexus 6. They both have 3220mah batteries, similar internals (Snapdragon 805, 3GB RAM), and similar screen technology, but the Note 4 just lasts longer. To put my 16hr day into perspective - on the Nexus 6, I can usually make it to bed-time if my SoT is 3.5-4hrs or less. On my Note 4, I can usually exceed 4 hours, and most days, I can get past 5 hours SoT if I do use the device that long. It really makes a big difference in how I use the devices. 

The Winner: Samsung Galaxy Note 4

I'm a huge fan of stock Android, especially the Material Design used in Lollipop on the Nexus 6. It's beautiful, but not quite as functional. The Nexus 6 is a great device - awesome build quality and build materials, good screen, decent camera, great speakers, and good-enough battery life. But the Note 4 takes the best that the Nexus 6 hardware has to offer, and improves on almost all of it: similar build quality/materials, better screen, better camera, and better battery life. The software features that Samsung's TouchWiz adds to the Note 4, although not quite as visually attractive as the Nexus 6's pure Material Design, add a lot to the device.  And the S-Pen is a fun addition that doesn't get use everyday, but it does help with annotating Snapchats, editing photos, and clicking links in the browser. 

Samsung has really come a long way in just a year. I owned the Galaxy Note 3, and I never felt like it was that great of a device. The build quality was poor (the chromed-out plastic trim was the biggest offender here, with a terrible in-hand feel and you could even pull it away from the body; not cool for a $700+ device), and TouchWiz was super bloated and buggy. Although Samsung could still make some improvements to its TouchWiz on the Note 4, it's lighter, faster, and less in-your-face in its latest incarnation. So if I had to choose just one of these to keep, hands-down would choose the Note 4. But I get to keep both, at least for now.  

Tech Rant - iOS/iPhone Notifications

Notifications on iOS are cluttered

I’m looking at my iPhone 6 right now – on my main screen, I have red badges everywhere. 1 unread text message, 7 calendar invites, 5 new Twitter notifications, a Swarm notification a missed phone call, and over 100 unread emails. And then when I swipe down to get into notification center, I see a list of a bunch of notifications from a lot of different apps, many of which I’ve already dealt with on different devices; Swarm and YouTube are good examples. Some notifications are consistent with the red badges. Some aren’t. I have no idea. But the worst part of iOS notifications is that if the screen is on and I miss a notification, I’ll actually have no idea that I missed it. I spend a great deal of my day on calls with my clients or team members. The iPhone will usually be on speakerphone, with the screen dimly lit as I may be referencing emails on it, or doing something else on it while I’m on the call. I’m not always looking at the phone as I might be reviewing notes, looking at some documents, or looking around the room. Once I’m done with the call, I don’t get a list of all of the notifications I might have missed while I was on the call. As we all know, iOS lockscreen notifications disappear as soon as the device is unlocked. I have to hunt around to see what is it that I truly missed out on. 

Versus Android

On Android, I know what notifications I missed at all times since the top status bar gives me that information. More information is provided when I swipe the notification drawer down. No mess, no fuss. Even with hundreds of unread emails, new SMS and Hangouts messages, and various apps telling me information that I have to know, I always know what it is that I have going on that’s truly a NEW notification.

iOS7 came and went without making major changes to the OS - yes, we got increased translucency, got rid of skeumorphism, and introduced some additional features, but the core operation of iOS and its notifications remains unchanged. Hopefully, Apple looks to reinvent iOS soon in the future, with a major focus on notifications. 

Tech Rave - Smartphones have paved the way for new technology

Nest. Uber. Breathometer. Hue. Chromecast. Instagram. Kevo. Apple Pay. Whatsapp. As smartphones have become ubiquitous, new hardware, products, and services are being introduced to better our lives as consumers. Once upon a time, we wouldn't leave the house without our wallets/purses and keys. Today, we don't just make sure that we have our smartphone with us when we leave the house, we have them by our side constantly - they're often the first thing we reach for in the morning, and often the last thing we touch before going to bed. As I noted in my last post, the average person spends 3 hours on their smartphones everyday. Smartphones have replaced our watches, cameras, and dedicated GPS units, but they've helped to create all new categories of products and brand new services. 

Take Uber as the perfect example. Anyone living in a big city like Chicago or NYC knows how obnoxious hailing a cab in a rainstorm or in freezing temperatures used to be (upstreaming, anyone?). But that's largely a thing of the past. Now, you can hail any type of car service - taxi, black car, or even carshare - with a few simple taps on your smartphone. After a driver accepts your fare, you're notified which cab/car is yours, and off you go.

Snapchat

Two of the fastest growing social networks, Instagram and Snapchat, are beating older competitors like Facebook because they were designed for smartphone use. Think about that for a minute - Facebook works fine as a mobile app, but it's better when used from your computer (especially when you're supposed to be working). Snapchat and Instagram don't even really work from a computer. The creators of these apps knew that social apps should focus on use from a smartphone; but to the point of this post, Snapchat and Instagram can only exist in world full of smartphones. 

There are other products out there that you may not even heard of because they're in the nascent stages of their development and introduction to the consumer market. The Kwikset Kevo is such an example - it's a Smart Lock that pairs to your smartphone using Bluetooth Low Energy to automatically lock and unlock your front door as you leave and get back home. Although the Kevo falls squarely into the "because we can" category, I can see it replacing the physical keyring in the near future because of the sheer convenience of such a product not only in daily use, but when giving access to your home to others without the need for duplicating your own keys.

Smartphones have taken up residence as one of the most used, and perhaps, most important, things in our lives. We live in an exciting time, and as CES approaches next week, I can't wait to see what new technology visionaries have dreamt up to make our lives easier, safer, and more enjoyable.