Tag Archives: nexus7

Nexus nirvana? Not quite!

thoughts

So after all my tribulations with Google over my Nexus7 a replacement arrived at 7.30am Friday morning. Luckily I was just heading out to work so was able to sign for it myself this time rather than risk the TNT neighbour lottery! After a quick check to make sure this one worked (yay!) I plugged it in to charge and demonstrating amazing will-power (for me) I left it behind and headed off to work.

That evening I skipped my usual Friday beers and headed straight home to have a much delayed play with my new toy. Only to discover it hadn’t charged. At all. A quick investigation and trying out the multitude of other micro-USB chargers I have laying about identified this latest problem as a dud charger shipped with the tablet. as it turns out the charger that came with my 1st Nexus was the only thing that did work so between the two of them I have ended up with one working product.

That wasn’t the only flaw though. Like alot of models mine has a slight problem with the way the screen and body meet – basically the left side of the screen is not flush with the body and feels like it needs to be ‘clicked’ back in. It isn’t really a problem as it doesn’t effect any functionality but it feels a bit shoddy. It is clear that there are some real QA problems at Nexus7 HQ!

Now onto the positives. I do love this little machine. The size and weight really do suit me. Even with my (still) ruined wrist it is comfortable to hold and the brightness & clarity of the screen is wonderful. The Kindle app is very smooth and while not as nice a reading experience as an e-ink reader it takes a solid silver medal. Not surprisingly the integration with Google products was extremely smooth and I admit I remain pretty locked-in to them. Google Reader in particular works really nicely in this format and will likely encourage me to get back to using it more and Google+ looks interesting enough in this format to convince me to use it at all ;)

This ‘naked’ version of Android 4.1 seems much quicker and smoother than any I have experience on a phone and after a couple of days worth of solid usage it hasn’t hiccuped once let alone crashed (unheard of with my other Android devices.)

I watched a couple of minutes of the movie shipped with it and it looked like decent quality – no idea what watching a full movie will do to the battery though – anymore that those 2 minutes would have caused me to scratch my own eyes out though (Transformers 2..really?)

Comixology looks good in this format as well – though the app could use some usability tweaks! The comics are still clearly optimised for the bigger iPad screens but I have a feeling this form factor is going to be the break through for digital comics.

All-in-all I think this is really close to being my perfect commuting device. It could do with a SIM card slot but for now tethering to my phone is fine and I have a mifi incoming. The two big problems remain the dreadful customer service and the lack of care and attention with the hardware. So close to being great but instead just OK.

Nexus7 nightmare

thoughts, , ,

I ordered my Nexus7 within minutes of them being available in the UK and was quite publicly counting the days til it showed up. I love a gadget and I’ve held off replacing my iPad v1 as I was keen to rely less on Apple for my toys and I liked the look of the size of the Nexus7. My Kindle turned out to be the perfect form factor for me out and about (I spend *alot* of time on public transport) so I was very excited about the Nexus7.

It was delivered on Wednesday afternoon – one of the earliest 16gb versions to get shipped from what I can tell. the first problem was it was delivered to a neighbor without even a card being left so I had no idea who had it. Luckily they had spotted me frantically ringing the bell of my upstairs flatmate so popped across the road with it (I’d have never guess it would have been with them!).

I then excitedly opened it up and was immediately impressed. It looked solid and attractive and the weight and dimensions were all that they promised. Then it wouldn’t switch on. I was disappointed but didn’t panic. I grabbed the charger from the box and plugged it in. Still nothing. I was a little worried now but decided to leave it charging for a while. An hour later and it was still dead as a Dodo. Now I was pissed off. I asked a few questions on Twitter but everyone else seemed to be doing fine and did a Google search but with such a new product there wasn’t much help.

So then at 7pm on Wednesday I emailed Google Play Devices support *AND* Google Wallet complaints. It is now 11am Saturday morning and I haven’t even had a human acknowledge either email.

I also found the Google Play customer service telephone number (which as I use a mobile costs me 14p in minute!). Since Thursday morning I have called NINE times for a minimum of 10 minutes each times without ever getting beyond the hold music.

To say the whole experience so far has been disappointing would be an understatement. I understand that a ‘dead on arrival’ piece of hardware is just bad luck but the simple fact is if this had been Amazon, Apple or even f**king Argos I’d have had better service.

I’m going out to play in this rare bit of sunshine now. I’m not going to try Google again til Monday as just thinking about it will spoil my mood!

***Update 23/7/2012 09.22****

Finally got through to someone at Google – was actually only about 10 or 15 minute wait this morning. However all the chap could do was pass my information on to another team who deal with returns/replacements and that is email only and likely to take another 24 hours. Still one step closer.