As a Nexus fan I have been waiting for a new phone for a couple of years. I know Motorola made the Nexus 6 but somehow I wasn’t really drawn to it so I stuck with my Nexus 5 a little bit longer.
My first Nexus was the HTC Nexus One which I loved not only for its design but also for the user experience that Android gave. Unfortunately though as phones got increased their storage capacity and RAM, the little Nexus One got left behind. I upgraded to the Samsung Nexus S and found that this was a far superior phone but again with application sizes increasing and utilising more of the CPU and RAM it began to slow down. Next came the Samsung Galaxy Nexus with has a beautiful design and curved body. It also provided a larger screen and they fixed the auto brightness issues which plagued the Nexus S. When the Nexus 4 came along I didn’t feel the need to move but since using one I kind of regretted that. Then came the LG Nexus 5. This phone was amazing but I believe it is still up there. It may not have the CPU speed to match the latest phones or the highest quality of camera but the fact that I had this phone for 2 years and Google still chose to release Marshmallow for it that it is still quite a current phone.
When I heard about the Google LG Nexus 5X and the Huawei Nexus 6P phones I started getting the inkling that it was time for a change. The specifications were released and I immediately ruled out the 6P due to its sheer size. I know it has much better hardware but for me it’s not always about the fastest processor. The feel of the device in your hand has a lot to do with it as that’s where it is when you are using it generally. After briefly using the Motorola Nexus 6 I knew that it would not suit me.
The Nexus 5X however, this got me very excited as I saw it as a direct step from the Nexus 5. I quickly preordered he 16GB model on Google Play’s store for £339. Fortunately I spied it sim free on the Carphone Warehouse for £299.99 so cancelled my order with Google Play and bought it there instead.
The phone arrived last week and already being familiar with Marshmallow (from using it on the Nexus 5) I felt right at home using it. The camera is much more powerful at 12MP and the difference in low light photos really does show in comparison to the Nexus 5. The phone seems to be pretty responsive with no noticeable slowdown. The fingerprint scanner seemed very gimmicky to me but it is starting to grow on my now and I have adopted it to unlock my phone. What I would like to have seen from google is a way to unlock some of their apps directly with a designated fingerprint such as using one of my fingers to move from the lock screen to messaging or another for the phone. The double tap feature on the power button to launch the camera is brilliant so no more fumbling to open the camera app and missing the opportunity. It also reverts back to the lock screen so it’s quite nice that it maintains the security.
The biggest change is the operating system itself and Android 6.0 (codenamed Marshmallow) offers some great changes to app security. It’s always unnerving when you download an app from the Google Play store that it wants access to a lot of your personal data when you feel it shouldn’t need it. Now you can go in to the app settings and select which features the app will have access to and this alone is worth getting Marshmallow on your device.
The front facing speakers are also a nice surprise but they still suffer at the high and low ends. There is a notification light cleverly hidden in the speaker cover on the bottom of the phone which is a nice touch but it is disabled by default so you will need to turn it on in settings.
There are quite a lot of features and I haven’t really gone in to detail on them as I am just playing around with it at the moment but I certainly think it is a worthy successor to the Nexus 5. Any Nexus diehard like me should definitely find it appealing even though the hardware specs may not be at their peak in comparison to other phones on the market. For me the hardware coupled with the newest Android release makes a really enjoyable user experience.