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One tidbit of information you may have missed throughout the Nexus S storm that came our way last week was that its NFC chip – supplied by NXP – was half-baked: you can only read data. Outward transferring is a necessity if we ever want our phones to become wallets and if we ever want any other cool use cases to come to form here in America.
Thankfully, NXP says the limitation is only temporary and assures us that the NFC chip inside of the Nexus S will soon support the full range of features seen in devices in regions where the technology is already popular, such as Japan. They didn’t say when we’d be seeing the changes exactly, but NXP mentioned that the functionality would be worked in with future updates to Android 2.3. (Meaning we can assume things will be all good by the time Honeycomb arrives.) Until then, your Nexus S (that mostly everyone who wants one will have in three days) is a glorified QR code reader. Awesome! [via NFC World]
I dont know why Im getting this but Im just getting it… the god damn Nexus brand.
Oh man.
After 2 years of Android, the Nexus branded phones are the only Android phones I actually take serious. They don’t come off as another phone that is just about making another buck.
Learning from Apple are we, by making the next generation phone have only a couple of major updates. Android is better though. Will patiently wait for the next Nexus and stick to my ever faithful N1 for now.
Well I would assume they will have the tech ready by the time they have any practical applications. It’s not as if all the retail stores in the US are going to have readers overnight.
Reasons I will not buy this phone:
– No HSPA+ (4G);
– Hummingbird = current gen cpu (not next gen);
– No HDMI-out;
– No SD card slot; and
– 4″ screen (I want at least 4.3″)
@Scotter
The fact that you state 4.3 inches as a minimum makes me question your judgement massively.
@G8D
I agree 4 inches is perfect size and anything over 4.3 for me is just way to big IMO
I agree with G8D. I have the Vibrant and 4 inches is awesome. And the difference between 4 and 4.3 is not that much that I would diss on 4″.
Also the Humming bird processor with its awesome GPU is sweet and outperforms most all other phones currently out. Also Devs usually develops for more phones than the next a greatest which makes the Nexus S a good all around phone hardware vise.
@chris and swehes: This 4″ sweet spot thing is silly. The 4″ phones are as big, and most often bigger than phones with a 4.3″ screen. Case and point, the Epic is bigger in size than the Evo. If, and only if they decide to make a smaller phone with a 4″ screen, will it be a sweet spot.
Our country is so far behind compared to Japan, Korea, India and others when it comes to cell phone technologies and pretty much technology in general. We need to get back to a time when America was the powerhouse for all things tech, manufacturing etc. It’s a shame we feel the need to outsource everything in order to make a buck. We’ve lost so many jobs in this country due to outsourcing and NAFTA I don’t think we’ll ever get back to becoming a true leader in the global marketplace.
Im pissed cause they didn’t put ans sd card slot or 720p recording and the fact it does not have dual flash and the camera is only 5mp not 8. Also that the processor sucks,come on hummingbird current gen (cpu) not next gen…. Tmobile should have and awesome phone, I mean verizon has the droid incredible and x and at&t has a whole bunch of awesome androids and tmobile now just started with this, tmobile is way behind,,,, so disapointed
@tim
I know if you actually read my post it says anything over 4.3 inch screen is too big. I have no problem with a 4.3 inch screen but after that its more of a tablet than a phone
@jackson please explain how AT&T has a better line up then T-Mobile?
Also bare in mind that T-Mobile and Sprint are the only carriers that have Android phones with FFCs. Where is Verizon and AT&T on that front? I think you are just blowing smoke.
@Jackson: us G2 owners beg to differ.
tmobile is lacking way behind in the android phones??? c’mon, be serious, tmobile was the first to support android, with the G1… and have been the leading supporter of android since. look at the g1, g2, mytouch brand, cliq brand, defy, vibrant, and right now the only brand to officially offer a contract discount for the nexus s, and can’t forget that they were the only carrier to have a contracted version of the original nexus one. they have proved themselves to be the biggest supporter of android, followed by verizon.
and for the one stating that the 4″ phones are in all actuality bigger than 4.3″ phones… and using the epic to make your point… you are really misinforming alot of people. look at the rest of the galaxy s lineup. the vibrant, captivate and fascinate… they all have 4″ screens, and are much smaller than the evo 4g, and droid x and so forth. as for the size of the screen, i could care less if it’s 4″ or 4.3″. if i had to choose right now, i would go with the 4″ just because it’s the only size we can get the super AMOLED screen in. if they made the sAMOLED screen in 4.3″ sizes, i would go with that!
jeremy I don’t know about you but I just got a 55″ Vizio TV and it’s great!
@jackson
I beg to differ on the cpu. Yes, the cpu is not next gen, but it has been proven that it is the best of current gen. Droid Incredible (a Neuxs One), and X do not have better cpu then Nexus S. Also, t-mobile will not sell this phone, it’s a BestBuy exclusive ( maybe only for now? ).
I do agree with most of posters that Nexus S doesn’t impress me and I have a Nexus One. I would prefer a 4.3″ but I’m sure it will suck out all the phone juice. Nexus S feels like a Samsung Galaxy S 1.5 and I know Google should wait a bit to release a new phone. Maybe Tegra 2 or some other dual-core chip.
@Jeremy
You might want to take an economics course. NAFTA and outsourcing and such benefit everyone including us. What hurts us is protectionism and people who are unproductive.
Only Samsung tops Samsung Performance and Displays.
The Hummingbird is More Efficient than the Tegr 2 if it was running on 1 core instead of 2. So with that said I have high expectations for Samsung Orion Dual-Core although some of the advantages to Tegra 2 is some PC games will get ported.
Nexus S is perfect until 2012 by then I should have an available upgrade again. No HSPA+ isn’t a deal breaker, T-mobile average speeds aren’t going over 7.2mbps yet. 4in SAMOLED is perfect size, 4.3 is too big imo. No sd slot is a disappointment but then again I can’t remember when I ever came close to filling 16gb’s, my whole iTunes library is about 5gb’s. I’m not really gonna store videos on this, if anything streaming will do fine. The app store apps depending on who you are won’t fill up maybe even 2gb’s so what about 9 more gb’s? Pictures that I will always move from my device to computer. I can’t think of a way to really fill up 16gb’s. It still would had been nice to have an option for more though. HDMI out?? why the hell do you need that when you have DLNA and 3.5? how often does anyone even put their cell phone on their tv?
It seems like all the reason people come up to not get it is because its not the highest of end devices but its perfect Stock Android 2.3 on a Samsung. Why is more needed? Android isn’t even optimized for dual-cores yet. 720p will eventually come to Nexus S via update like Nexus One.
Also people that complain about the lack of features its not Samsung’s fault.
Stock Android doesn’t do half the things that all these devices with customized UI’s do. Almost all the things in Sense UI, Touchwiz 3.0, Motoblur and so on are manufacturer additions.
Stock android doesn’t have 720p or HD recording built in. Think about that next time you want a stock android experience.
@Scotter: I think it doesn’t support 4G because most carriers in the world don’t use 4G and the phone is also being sold outside of America =\. if they did they would of needs specific carries to have their own variant of the phone which will probably have them take control of when the a new firmware update gets released and that could be forever with some carries..
Nexus S was delayed and some sites said it was because Android 2.3 was not optimized for Dual core… if Google couldn’t get their firmware to work with a dual core processor i don’t think another company can, so you can wait for a dual core processor but i don’t think it will live up to its expectations till it gets put on honeycomb.
Sorry about any grammar or spelling mistakes ;)
yeah, crappy specs aside, i don’t want my phone to be a “wallet”, especially through RFID, which is all NFC is at it’s core. you may as well just take your credit cards out of your pocket and wave them around begging people to take them off of your hands for you.
If you ‘love’ android, get a nexus. If you just ‘like’ android, don’t worry about it.
@ jackson
Hummingbird Processor Sucks? Please Please PLEASE for the LOVE of all that is good… PLEASE EXPLAIN. You really think that “current gen (cpu) not next gen” means it sucks???
Do u think id be able to tap my credit card to the phone for bill payments, and other online purchases?? That’d be pretty cool.
@nemesys: Every one of the galaxy s phones are the same size, or bigger than the evo in length and width. They are just slightly thinner. You should check your specs.
Evo: 4.8 x 2.6 x .5
Epic: 4.91 x 2.54 x ,56
Fascinate: 4.91 x 2.52 x .41
Captivate: 4.83 x 2.52 x .41
Vibrant: 4.82 x 2.54 x .39
Somebody please explain why a 4.3″ screen is too big, but 4 is the sweet spot. The Evo is not bigger than these phones.
Nexus IS ANDROID
Is this an iphone forum? What a bunch of morons! You jack offs keep blabbering… while us developers get things done so you can complain about something
and this phone does not record in 1280x720p. =P
@tim242
I think you are missing the point. A 4.3″ screen is bigger than a 4.0″ screen, even in the case when the phone is smaller. The screen _itself_ is too big. It’s a question of comfortably using the touch display. A bigger screen also means bigger pixels, which annoys me on the current low-res screens.
Finally, in general, a 4″ phone can be built smaller, if it’s designed correctly.
I’m disappointed too about the Nexus S, actually a Nexus2, (against Google’s statement there will be no successor forN1 )
Nexus S has a plastic casing, no micro-sd slot, no 8 MP camera on the rear at least, no 4G support like hsdpa.
So I stick with my N1 which I consider the best phone ever still!
Tegra 2’s GPU is more power-efficient than Orion/Hummingbird’s respective GPUs, and sufficiently stronger than Hummingbird’s.
Tegra 2’s CPU is dual-core, easily better than Hummingbird
Tegra 2 accelerated Flash HD in the browser super butter smooth, unlike Hummingbird’s…etc
Seriously, they should have gone with the new generation SOCs for the Nexus S. What a waste of a gorgeous screen.
No SD slot? Really? Everything else looks great though.
I’m on a 600mhz Aria running CM6.1.