Just played with the VZW Nexus for 20 minutes

[Khallos]

I walked into our local Verizon store and played dumb asking about the Nexus. In fact, the manager was very forward and our conversation went something like this, and she was really talked as fast as it seems:

Me: "I want to upgrade to a 4G phone, but I was waiting for--"
Her: "--You're waiting on the Nexus, right?".
Me: "Yeah, and I heard that today--"
Her: "--No, it got delayed, we don't have any release date or pricing information. Do you want to play with a demo?"
Me: "Sure!"

A few minutes later she brought out a "demo" model, though I really don't think it was actually a demo model as it actually had a SIM card and didn't have any security stuff on it or anything. Then, here's the crazy part, she just handed me the phone and walked away, saying "Just come to the desk and give me the phone when you're done". If I was clever I would have said something like "Okay, I'll be at the desk in two years" but I'm not that quick. Also, this wasn't your typical small strip-center Verizon store, this is a very, very big one and I was around the corner from the desk and right next to the exit. It was almost like she was begging me to steal it.

Anyway, the phone was fast as hell, as the screen is as pretty as advertised I installed and ran the speedtest app on it and got ~18-20mbps download speed and ~8-10mbps upload speed and I'm in Little Rock where we JUST got 4G. My main concern and the thing I was looking at the whole time was the size of the screen and making sure it wasn't too big for my hand (I'm 6'3" and have pretty big hands, but I was still concerned), and it really doesn't feel too big at all. When navigating within apps I didn't have to re-position the phone at all, but when I wanted to use the soft buttons at the bottom, I did, which wasn't a huge issue IMO.

I would have taken a picture, but my OG Droid's lens is busted...

I don't want to bore you with the same thing you've read in a million reviews, but if you have any questions let me know and I'll try to answer them as I've had a decent amount of time to inspect the phone.

I was really wearing down emotionally with all these delays in the release, but this has given me my second wind and now I think I can make it to the finish!

[StupidGenius]

Did you see what version it was running? 4.0.1, 4.0.2 or 4.1?

[Khallos]

TL;DR It was 4.1

Oh! Right, I forgot to mention that.

When I turned it on, it looked like it was the first time it had ever been turned on because it immediately tried to update (I've also heard that this is part of the standard boot sequence, so I don't know) but it went through the update process, which was suspiciously fast, and when I went to check the OS version it was 4.1.0

So, I don't know if that means it ships with 4.0.x and then you are immediately upgraded to 4.1 or if that was just part of the bootup...

[Killuminati]

Feel like I should put on an act at my local Verizon store to ease my way into some alone time with this phone. Of course if that doesn't work, I might just make a scene about how terrible this release is going. By the way, I believe it checks for updates like that every time the phone boots up.

[GoBears]

Any opinions on the camera? That's probably the biggest concern I have. Thanks.

[Khallos]

Any opinions on the camera? That's probably the biggest concern I have. Thanks.

I love the features of the camera (touch to zoom, panoramic view, face effects, etc...) but I'm probably not the best to comment on the picture quality as I'm not anything close to an expert in photography and all the pics that I took were under very bright flickering fluorescent lights. Also, I was only able to look at the pictures on the phone itself and not blow them up on a computer monitor or print them out or anything. That being said, all the pictures that I took were definitely in focus and looked great to me. I recommend that when the phone is released you go play with it at the store and see if it's what you're looking for.

Like I said my OG Droid's lens is broken and has been for over a month and it hasn't really bothered me enough to get it fixed/replaced, so the camera wasn't a big deal to me other than the cool things you can do with it.

[Xsist]

I just played with one also. The camera is great. It seems as though a lot of the reviews have talked badly about the camera. I'm thinking that because it's "instant" pic taking, after it auto focuses, the slight moment at hitting the button makes it blurry. As for color. It looked beautiful. As long as you play with the settings, you can take great pics with it. Requires a bit of tweaking. But this is why we have androids and not iphones. I must say though, I think the rezound takes better pics. Here's one I took of the nexus.

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using DroidForums

[Khallos]

I just played with one also. The camera is great. It seems as though a lot of the reviews have talked badly about the camera. I'm thinking that because it's "instant" pic taking, after it auto focuses, the slight moment at hitting the button makes it blurry. As for color. It looked beautiful. As long as you play with the settings, you can take great pics with it. Requires a bit of tweaking. But this is why we have androids and not iphones. I must say though, I think the rezound takes better pics. Here's one I took of the nexus.

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using DroidForums

Wasn't it weird that they just let you play with it without it being connected to anything? I really think that they have a ton of them in the back of the store and they just went back there and opened one up and will probably end up selling the one I was playing with. JMO

[just4747]

I just played with one also. The camera is great. It seems as though a lot of the reviews have talked badly about the camera. I'm thinking that because it's "instant" pic taking, after it auto focuses, the slight moment at hitting the button makes it blurry. As for color. It looked beautiful. As long as you play with the settings, you can take great pics with it. Requires a bit of tweaking. But this is why we have androids and not iphones. I must say though, I think the rezound takes better pics. Here's one I took of the nexus.

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using DroidForums

Beautiful in those pics..

Gonna go try my luck at Best Buy, Verizon, and Radio Shack now lmao.

[jcardona1]

I just played with one also. The camera is great. It seems as though a lot of the reviews have talked badly about the camera. I'm thinking that because it's "instant" pic taking, after it auto focuses, the slight moment at hitting the button makes it blurry. As for color. It looked beautiful. As long as you play with the settings, you can take great pics with it. Requires a bit of tweaking. But this is why we have androids and not iphones. I must say though, I think the rezound takes better pics. Here's one I took of the nexus.

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using DroidForums

Those are some really sharp pics of the Nexus! Taken with the Rezound? That phone has a great camera.

P.S. I hope you cleaned the lens on the Nexus before taking pics. Has chicken grease finger prints all over it