<story><title>Pixel 5</title><url>https://store.google.com/product/pixel_5</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>TheCapn</author><text>From the very initial scroll through things, I&amp;#x27;m not impressed.&lt;p&gt;Now I&amp;#x27;m not a habitual phone upgrader, I tend to replace my phone when the old one wears down or breaks. I bought the Pixel 4 after my Pixel 1 died and was fairly unimpressed overall. Their headlining market points for the Pixel 5 just... aren&amp;#x27;t that interesting.&lt;p&gt;- 5G: Doesn&amp;#x27;t really matter to me. 4G is plenty fast for everyday use and I wouldn&amp;#x27;t try heavy enough streaming off data to even need to increase&lt;p&gt;- Wireless charging: not new&lt;p&gt;- Photos in the dark: not new&lt;p&gt;- Google Assistant: not new... and honestly, kinda crap. I turned off a lot of permissions on my phone and the assistant is virtually useless now. I can&amp;#x27;t give it commands from the lock screen or do even basic things with it unlocked while driving. At this point I&amp;#x27;ll probably root and just put a custom ROM on there because nothing google packaged with the phone is all that useful.&lt;p&gt;The battery is nice, but its also not worth a $800 price tag.&lt;p&gt;I think Google needs to stop chasing the iPhone and go back to the Nexus style of simple+good+affordable. Even the 4a seems like a stronger value proposition imo.&lt;p&gt;EDIT:  I just noticed that they brought back the fingerpint unlock on the back? Okay, that is a huge plus; the face unlock is a generally shitty feature usability wise. I was kinda upset when I gave up wireless charging for the Pixel 1 but fell in love with the fingerprint unlock on the back. When I went to Pixel 4 and lost the fingerprint in exchange for Wireless charging I kinda felt like I made a poor choice. Now that they &lt;i&gt;finally&lt;/i&gt; combined the two I&amp;#x27;ll give them credit.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>rtkwe</author><text>&amp;gt;  Google Assistant: not new... and honestly, kinda crap. I turned off a lot of permissions on my phone and the assistant is virtually useless now.&lt;p&gt;This kind of feels like the complaints that a site is broken then you find out the person commenting has disabled javascript. Of course it&amp;#x27;s less useful with all the permissions locked down.&lt;p&gt;Anecdotally I find it really useful, I get people have privacy concerns but given I&amp;#x27;m not willing to uproot my email and change all the sign ups I&amp;#x27;m using either gmail or direct google login for I&amp;#x27;m already pretty exposed to Google. I use it a lot driving since I can just squeeze the bottom sides of the phone to launch it.&lt;p&gt;As for the fingerprint reader that&amp;#x27;s weird, they had both on the Pixel 3 (at least the XL version I have), don&amp;#x27;t know what would have changed to make it not possible on the 4.</text></comment>
<story><title>Pixel 5</title><url>https://store.google.com/product/pixel_5</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>TheCapn</author><text>From the very initial scroll through things, I&amp;#x27;m not impressed.&lt;p&gt;Now I&amp;#x27;m not a habitual phone upgrader, I tend to replace my phone when the old one wears down or breaks. I bought the Pixel 4 after my Pixel 1 died and was fairly unimpressed overall. Their headlining market points for the Pixel 5 just... aren&amp;#x27;t that interesting.&lt;p&gt;- 5G: Doesn&amp;#x27;t really matter to me. 4G is plenty fast for everyday use and I wouldn&amp;#x27;t try heavy enough streaming off data to even need to increase&lt;p&gt;- Wireless charging: not new&lt;p&gt;- Photos in the dark: not new&lt;p&gt;- Google Assistant: not new... and honestly, kinda crap. I turned off a lot of permissions on my phone and the assistant is virtually useless now. I can&amp;#x27;t give it commands from the lock screen or do even basic things with it unlocked while driving. At this point I&amp;#x27;ll probably root and just put a custom ROM on there because nothing google packaged with the phone is all that useful.&lt;p&gt;The battery is nice, but its also not worth a $800 price tag.&lt;p&gt;I think Google needs to stop chasing the iPhone and go back to the Nexus style of simple+good+affordable. Even the 4a seems like a stronger value proposition imo.&lt;p&gt;EDIT:  I just noticed that they brought back the fingerpint unlock on the back? Okay, that is a huge plus; the face unlock is a generally shitty feature usability wise. I was kinda upset when I gave up wireless charging for the Pixel 1 but fell in love with the fingerprint unlock on the back. When I went to Pixel 4 and lost the fingerprint in exchange for Wireless charging I kinda felt like I made a poor choice. Now that they &lt;i&gt;finally&lt;/i&gt; combined the two I&amp;#x27;ll give them credit.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>tomlu</author><text>I lost my Pixel 3 recently and upgraded to a Pixel 4 (but had a Pixel 1 as well). You skipped right to the worst incarnation - no fingerprint unlock, mediocre battery life.</text></comment>