Even though Google cancelled their launch event due to Sandy, they still announced their new Nexus lineup today.

Nexus 4(.7) is an interesting looking phone. Glass front and back design form LG. Odd to me that it's lacking LTE, but Google appears to be retreating from Verizon a bit after the Galaxy Nexus issues. HSPA+ on T-Mobile should keep US users at near equivalent LTE speeds. Also has a Pre Touchstone like wireless charging option. Storage options limited to 8 and 16GB with no expandability, so not all that interesting to me. During my trip, the 64GB has been handy on my phone for keeping a wide selection of music and podcasts on the device. Also uses an IPS screen, so no pentile issues for those who are bothered by it.

Nexus 7, the 8GB version is gone (good), and now $199 buys a 16GB version. 32 GB is now at the $249 price point, and one with HSPA+ cellular is $299. If I were buying a Nexus 7 to use as my primary tablet, the $299 would be the device for me.

Nexus 10, a 2560x1600 screen (16:10 widescreen) Samsung built tablet. Launch price is $399 for 16GB or $499 for 32, so about $100 cheaper then a similar screen quality iPad. WiFi only. Hopefully it does well enough to encourage more proper Android tablet apps. My other disappointment with the Nexus 7 has been the clear scaled up phone apps from third parties.

Also announced, Android 4.2 Jelly Bean. Odd reuse of the name, but Android version schemes haven't had much consistency in the past. Newly added, the ability to create "Photo Spheres", aka the VR explorable photos showing everything around you. New Swype like option for input, multiuser option for tablets (nice), and an airplay like option for showing content wirelessly on TVs. They also added some new cards to Now and some other minor tweaks.

Overall looks like an evolutionary move in the Android space, bringing some more benefits to those in the ecosystem. I assume the 4.2 update should be out for my Nexus 7 by the time I get home, so I'll have to check it out then.

I'm glad the LG Nexus phone is still keeping the $350 price point. I've been waiting for this announcement for some time and I guess that's what I'll be going with for my next daily driver.

It was between the new Nexus and a Galaxy Note II. The price of the LG makes it a winner since the Note II will cost me $300 more and then I have to deal with daily CM10/CM11 flashing (I despise TouchWiz). The only thing I'm going to miss will be AT&T LTE. In the past 3 months, I've owned a Galaxy S III and Galaxy S II Skyrocket. While LTE is cool, it's not everywhere and it's a battery hog. I'll try to manage to survive without it.

I look forward to seeing the Nexus 10 in person, but I genuinely like the form factor of the 7. The price is a little high on the 10 to justify owning both the 7 and 10. If I want a bigger tablet to play around with, I'm looking at the Surface. I'm expecting it to have a Zune-style fire sale sooner than later...

For me, the biggest take-aways from the recent Google press has been what I consider more reasonable pricing tiers for configuration bumps. $50 buys you a storage upgrade of 16GB and another $50 buys you a cellular radio. While Apple products rightfully command a premium price, it's always struck me as gouging on the upgrades. $100 for 16GB and $130 for GPS and cellular radio.

And, leaving aside the fact that these products aren't going to make Google any money on the initial sale, it was also nice to see a realignment of specs versus price point. While 8GB wasn't passable on a tablet to begin with, contrasting again with Apple, I'm disappointed they (Apple) have kept their storage capacities static since the introduction of the iPad, and for too many generations running on iPhone/iPod.

I also have a Galaxy S III, but I'm using a different launcher since I didn't like the default look of it, so I don't think I see much of TouchWiz. I have not felt the need to go to CM yet, since last time I checked it wasn't really ready for prime time.

The US versions of the S III are based on Qualcomm chipsets. I'm no developer, but apparently Qualcomm is much more open to the romming community than Samsung's Exynos team. When I decided to sell my S III, the SGH-I747 build of CM10 was at M1 status. I'm not certain, but I don't think the Exynos-based phones have had an M release yet.

The Verge has some video of the Nexus 4 and 10 in action:
http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/29/3570034/inside-android-building-the-nexus-4-nexus-10-android-4-2

Native widgets on the lockscreen has been a long time coming.

My VZW Galaxy Nexus is now just under a year old, and I'm locked into a two year contract with VZW. Once that expires, assuming the wireless service pricing is the same as today, I'll go with the then-latest unlocked Nexus of some sort and T-Mobile's "bring your own phone" plan.

The biggest selling point for me is the Touchstone-style wireless charging. The ability to just throw your phone on a magnetic mount and have it charge is the big thing I miss about my Palm Pre (I went so far as to remove the guts of the Pre's back plate and tape them to my Nexus S so I could still use my Touchstones as non-charging mounts in my car and at home.)

My Sprint contract ends in June, by which point I reckon T-Mo will be either giving the Nexus 4 away or selling it dirt cheap. I'm sure there will be phones out at that time that will have better specs, and maybe some that are CyanogenMod-able, but unless they're leaps and bounds ahead, the Nexus 4 is probably my next phone.

Amusement: are there magnets in the phone itself or only in the charging base? I can see those magnets nuking lots of credit cards.

You haven't seen the Mythbusters episode on how hard it is to nuke a credit card then

Magnets in both, and what Andy said.

+1

The only difference with me is that I might go through the trouble to get out of my Verizon contract early to do so. I have no love for Verizon. If Google announces a car dock for the Nexus 4, I'll be waving goodbye.

Any word on removable or glued-in battery in the N4?

Also, I'm not sure that it's going to be any quicker (datawise) than the GN -- both do HSPA at 21mbit/sec max. Right? And neither has the 42mbit/sec flavour of HSPA. Edit: nor the 84mbit/sec flavour.

Finally!

Although the problem at Apple seems to have been eradicated (Forstall has been given the boot).

Still, in a couple of weeks I will hopefully get my hands on one of these!

Right now, I'm one of the "grandfathered" VZW customers with unlimited 4G service. That's sweet while I've got it. When my contract comes up, and I want the new hot phone, I'll either have to pay full price, in order to keep my old pricing, or I'll have to get metered service. Not interested.

I figure I'll milk VZW for all they're worth, then switch to T-Mobile later on.

The Swype-style gesture typing in Android 4.2 looks like it might be a winner. If the prediction quality is anywhere close to Swiftkey's, I think I'd use it instead.

What I find funny is that both Swiftkey and Android its self are adding Swype functionality. I guess the previous keyboard update already added some limited Swiftkey-like word prediction, though.

Huh, didn't realize Swiftkey was getting Swype-y. If so, I'll check it out, but the advantages of something integrated with the OS instead of tacked on as an app will be hard to overcome with slightly better predictions. (I don't use any of the import predictions from Twitter/email/etc. stuff.)

The competition for better keyboards in the Android marketplace is nothing if not a singularly monumental benefit for the platform. Don't like your keyboard? Try another!

Yeah, I never allow Swiftkey to have access to all that stuff. The problem I have with the app learning my writing is that I'm often using it to write myself notes in incomplete sentences, which really messes up the learning function.

Good luck to anybody on the other side of the pond looking to get a N4 in a couple of hours.

In the UK it was a nightmare, I managed to get straight through for a 16GB and through to the final order page and then it came back with an error for my postcode because it was in lower case rather than upper case

Then all hell broke loose, cart kept emptying, checkout would timeout, then the 16GB went out of stock.

Eventually managed to get a 8GB, which wasn't my original intention, but we have a teenage girl in the house who'll be quite happy to have it as a hand me down once 16GB versions are readily available, although might wait a bit incase a 32GB version pops up a-la the N7.

Would have waited for the 16GB but having sold my 4S I'm currently sporting a £10 samsung phone that basically just operates as a phone, it's been hard enough without a smartphone for the past week, can't carry on without one!

Good luck, you'll need it.

You'll do fine with just 8GB for starters. Unless you want to load it up quickly with lots of video files and stuff.
I think I'm using about 7GB right now on my GN (aka. N3), and that's with tons of apps loaded on.

So.. should last you until the initial rush is over, at least.

Yeah, that was my theory! I'll probably still be on the 8GB come next nexus cycle!

I didn't actually store any video or music on my iPhone, just apps. I had a 32GB but I'm pretty sure I was well under 8GB on that!

TomTom (I think) was probably the biggest consumer of storage out of all my apps.

Yeah, TomTom will take up some space, for sure. I don't have offline GPS apps loaded on mine at present (no good ones exist for here), but I do have some cached Google Maps for big chunks of Ontario.

Cheers

That's something I've wondered about with google maps, you can save stuff for offline use - but does it update the saved data? Say, when you're at home on WiFi would it refresh it it to get the most up to date data?

Or does it just use old data forever until you delete it and re-add it?

Oh, and don't forget to "unlock" the bootloader BEFORE DOING ANYTHING MUCH with the phone. That's because "unlocking" the bootloader wipes the phone back to factory-fresh again.

So get that part over with immediately, and only THEN start customizing and adding apps etc.

"Unlocking" the bootloader is simple, and is a necessary prerequisite for later "rooting" the phone if desired.

Best "how to" link for this stuff.
Dead simple to do on Linux; tougher (driver issues) on MS-Windows.

http://galaxynexusroot.com/galaxy-nexus-...indowslinuxmac/

My iPhone has 25GB of non video/audio content on it I appear to have 249 apps installed

I think I'd struggle a bit with 8GB

I already have to trim some of my music to fit, I could really do with Apple making a 128GB phone...

IMO, the iPhone should start at 64GB - with the current 16GB price point. Not that Apple need to do anything like that to improve sales of course.

Wow! That's the total opposite of me, I think I had maybe 2 pages of extra apps.

Phone gets used for email, internet and maps mainly (my biggest gripe with iOS6). The main third party apps that I used to use were small apps like Train times.

That's good going though 25GB in apps!

8GB or so is photos. I like to have all the photos I've ever taken on an iPhone on hand and leaving the full size ones in the photo roll is easier than messing about with syncing.

I write apps as part of my job, so part of having so many installed is as I trying lots of stuff out from the App Store just so I keep on top of what people are up to.

Also, about 2GB of the 15GB of apps is UK and European TomTom and probably two thirds of the rest is made up of a handful of large games.