Back to S7

[Jtshurtleff]

I know. I know. These posts are always awful. Full of people bashing the phone that is the topic of the forum, saying why they hated it and blah blah blah. This one is different though so please, read on.

I am returning my Pixel and picking up a S7 Edge once again. Why? Well for starters I switched from Verizon back to AT&T because Verizon was awful in my area. 2 bars or less everywhere, no service at my work which is the worst part and less than 1mbps downloads almost everywhere I went. I know the Pixel is unlocked and I could easily use it on AT&T but I got a hell of a deal on the S7E. So why am I switching despite the Pixels obvious advantages in speed, processing power, perceived camera advantages and unlimited photo storage. Two reasons mostly but one maybe reason as well.

1) The S7E is water resistant and the Pixel is not as much. This is a big deal to me with a daughter who likes to ruin things with water. I like the peace of mind and sadly the Pixel didn't offer it.

2) The Pixel camera was, to me, a huge disappointment. The video camera was not good, the pictures I took were always blurry which I had not seen in a high end phone camera in years, and I had the dreaded halo in a ton of shots. The S7 camera has yet to let me down.

3ish) I have the Gear S3 and love the functionality of it in conjunction with a Samsung phone. I can also upgrade to the S8 fairly easily so that's a plus as well.

The Pixel was a fantastic phone. I screamed through every task I gave it, never stuttered, and in general had no issues besides the above personal issues and the speaker crackling on loud. I know some of you will disagree or pretty much hate this post but I wanted to share my experience for those of you considering switching.

 

[UtahRoadie]

There is a reason they make more than one type of phone, there is more than one type of person. S7E is a good phone, no reason for hate because it fits your needs better than the Pixel

 

[Jtshurtleff]

There is a reason they make more than one type of phone, there is more than one type of person. S7E is a good phone, no reason for hate because it fits your needs better than the Pixel

My sentiments exactly. The Pixel was an awesome phone, just not for me.

 

[anon(10092459)]

Hope you have better luck with your S7E!!

 

[popkurn611]

My sentiments exactly. The Pixel was an awesome phone, just not for me.

I too am going back to my S7 edge that I had stuck in the drawer once I go my pixel. Fantastic device, but the video camera quality was the deal breaker for me. It is not good indoors and my S7 edge takes amazing HD video. I too have a toddler and the water resistance is a nice feature to have.

 

[Rumblee1]

I know. I know. These posts are always awful. Full of people bashing the phone that is the topic of the forum, saying why they hated it and blah blah blah. This one is different though so please, read on.

I am returning my Pixel and picking up a S7 Edge once again. Why? Well for starters I switched from Verizon back to AT&T because Verizon was awful in my area. 2 bars or less everywhere, no service at my work which is the worst part and less than 1mbps downloads almost everywhere I went. I know the Pixel is unlocked and I could easily use it on AT&T but I got a hell of a deal on the S7E. So why am I switching despite the Pixels obvious advantages in speed, processing power, perceived camera advantages and unlimited photo storage. Two reasons mostly but one maybe reason as well.

1) The S7E is water resistant and the Pixel is not as much. This is a big deal to me with a daughter who likes to ruin things with water. I like the peace of mind and sadly the Pixel didn't offer it.

2) The Pixel camera was, to me, a huge disappointment. The video camera was not good, the pictures I took were always blurry which I had not seen in a high end phone camera in years, and I had the dreaded halo in a ton of shots. The S7 camera has yet to let me down.

3ish) I have the Gear S3 and love the functionality of it in conjunction with a Samsung phone. I can also upgrade to the S8 fairly easily so that's a plus as well.

The Pixel was a fantastic phone. I screamed through every task I gave it, never stuttered, and in general had no issues besides the above personal issues and the speaker crackling on loud. I know some of you will disagree or pretty much hate this post but I wanted to share my experience for those of you considering switching.

I couldn't agree with you more. The S7 edge has it all over pixel. And I've got both. There's simply nothing that pixel offers that the S7 edge doesn't. The edge actually, as you stated, offers so much more and it does it beautifully not in a 3 year old iPhone look. But I still have 1 i like better. Because I'm an avid audiofile,and listen to music hours a day, I went with the ZTE axon 7 for its audio prowess. It wasn't till I owned it that I realized how close to the S7 edge it is. At only $349.00, its a steal. By the way, I've had many issues with my pixel. Including volume rocker failure (that I was able to fix but wasn't easy), and now my camera will not focus. It just keeps trying to. Mind you, this is a phone, always in a case, and rarely used.

 

[anon(41073)]

Interesting thread. I was considering going with Pixel being that my S7E battery life just went to ish.

 

[Almeuit]

Enjoy your S7!

 

[bnice]

It's your right to buy the phone that best fit your needs, with that said the pixel camera is great.

 

[popkurn611]

Interesting thread. I was considering going with Pixel being that my S7E battery life just went to ish.

This is the one thing keeping me from selling my pixel, and that's battery life. The s7 edge battery life has gone so downhill. I can't get through a whole day and it is really aggravating because other than that I'd be totally set with the s7 edge as my daily driver. I keep going back and forth activating each one for a week's time and can't decide what to do.

 

[o4liberty]

Have my son my 7 plus still using my edge just ordered a pixel from Google today.

 

[mmcclure0453]

I have the S7E and the Pixel. The S7E and the plethora of cases I have for it are all going on eBay and/or Swappa to be sold today.

The S7E WAS my favorite Android phone until the Pixel came along. The Pixel just tromps all over my S7E in so many areas - for me.

I have never had a phone with the same battery life that the Pixel has. Never had a better camera. And definitely never had a smoother Android experience than I get with the Pixel. This phone just blows all previous experiences with Android away. Being a previous (and current part time) iOS user, the Pixel has been as smooth on Android as my iPhone 6s is on iOS.

That being said, that has been my experience. Each person has to get the phone that works best for them. S7E is a great phone but it's a step down from the Pixel, in my opinion. And I do get the water resistant concern too. I've raised 4 kids and have grand kids that are 6, 3, and 1. They don't ask me if my phone is waterproof before launching a water balloon at me... I just have to be watchful and remove the phone if a "battle" begins. Never had any water damaged phone and I have been caught off guard in the last 25 years with kids.

Enjoy your Sammy. It's a good phone.

 

[fragologist]

I've been using Samsung 4 four years. On 12/28 I got my pixel XL. I would have been a note 7 user if not for the fiasco. I was going to do the s7e myself but went with the pixel. The issue I have with Sammy is that they allow too much carrier interference and extremely long wait times on updates. My note 4 that I had for two years had only two major updates, which for me, is unacceptable. Not to mention the last update for my note 4 nearly made the phone unusable. I like Samsung when the product works but waiting 6 to 7 months for an update to fix what the last update broke is not worth it. I hope you enjoy your phone and you have a better experience than I did.

 

[popkurn611]

I've been using Samsung 4 four years. On 12/28 I got my pixel XL. I would have been a note 7 user if not for the fiasco. I was going to do the s7e myself but went with the pixel. The issue I have with Sammy is that they allow too much carrier interference and extremely long wait times on updates. My note 4 that I had for two years had only two major updates, which for me, is unacceptable. Not to mention the last update for my note 4 nearly made the phone unusable. I like Samsung when the product works but waiting 6 to 7 months for an update to fix what the last update broke is not worth it. I hope you enjoy your phone and you have a better experience than I did.

I have the S7E and the Pixel. The S7E and the plethora of cases I have for it are all going on eBay and/or Swappa to be sold today.

The S7E WAS my favorite Android phone until the Pixel came along. The Pixel just tromps all over my S7E in so many areas - for me.

I have never had a phone with the same battery life that the Pixel has. Never had a better camera. And definitely never had a smoother Android experience than I get with the Pixel. This phone just blows all previous experiences with Android away. Being a previous (and current part time) iOS user, the Pixel has been as smooth on Android as my iPhone 6s is on iOS.

That being said, that has been my experience. Each person has to get the phone that works best for them. S7E is a great phone but it's a step down from the Pixel, in my opinion. And I do get the water resistant concern too. I've raised 4 kids and have grand kids that are 6, 3, and 1. They don't ask me if my phone is waterproof before launching a water balloon at me... I just have to be watchful and remove the phone if a "battle" begins. Never had any water damaged phone and I have been caught off guard in the last 25 years with kids.

Enjoy your Sammy. It's a good phone.

Have you guys had any issues with the video quality on the pixel? It's the one thing that made me return to my S7 edge. I still have the pixel and can't pull the trigger to sell it yet BC I love the phone, just can't deal with such poor video recording quality. Indoor videos are noisy and not HD quality looking.

 

[DJM626]

I got to actually try out the video quality this morning after reading your posts. I did take some video inside my place today. In certain rooms I was very impressed with the quality. However when I moved into other rooms with basically the same lighting conditions I was seeing more noise then I would have liked to see. Some rooms were exceptional while other rooms where I took the vid was sub par and it even looked like another camera was being used in the rooms with poor quality. Did you shoot in 60FPS?

 

[mmcclure0453]

I haven't had a lot of experience with the video. So, I also tested the video camera after reading the negative comments about it.

I personally see nothing wrong with the video I shot in the house. I do see where the camera is adjusting the focus when I move but I don't see anything unacceptable. Video is very clear and I don't see a bunch of noise.

I will admit that I don't use the video function very often. I take more stills than anything else. So I can't make a judgement on the video based on 1 trial. Sorry. I hope you get yours worked out. Maybe someone on here that uses the video more can give some pointers. If there is a software issue I'm pretty confident we'll see a future fix by Google. If yours is hardware I hope you can get a replacement.

I do remember watching video reviews of the video capabilities on the Pixel before I purchased mine. It seemed to me that the Pixel ranked among one of the best in the video department. Not the best but held its own with the other top performers. I believe the comparison I watched was the Pixel vs S7E vs iPhone. There were a couple others in there too but their performance was not good.

 

[popkurn611]

I haven't had a lot of experience with the video. So, I also tested the video camera after reading the negative comments about it.

I personally see nothing wrong with the video I shot in the house. I do see where the camera is adjusting the focus when I move but I don't see anything unacceptable. Video is very clear and I don't see a bunch of noise.

I will admit that I don't use the video function very often. I take more stills than anything else. So I can't make a judgement on the video based on 1 trial. Sorry. I hope you get yours worked out. Maybe someone on here that uses the video more can give some pointers. If there is a software issue I'm pretty confident we'll see a future fix by Google. If yours is hardware I hope you can get a replacement.

I do remember watching video reviews of the video capabilities on the Pixel before I purchased mine. It seemed to me that the Pixel ranked among one of the best in the video department. Not the best but held its own with the other top performers. I believe the comparison I watched was the Pixel vs S7E vs iPhone. There were a couple others in there too but their performance was not good.

Yeah I mean it's not a hardware issue with my device, just don't think it's a very good video recorder, compared to my S7 edge. I took two videos simultaneously in the same room with my pixel and S7 edge and the noise level of the pixel was so predominant compared to the s7 video. For such a high priced phone the video quality isn't acceptable.

I shot in 60 fps with 1080p, and tried 4K @ 30 fps and neither make a difference. Outdoors the video quality is fine. Really disappointing since this is a big part of what I use my phone for and I reallllllyyyyy like the pixel for everything else.

 

[sulla1965]

I also went back to the s7 edge. The pixel is a great device if all you want is stock android and immediate updates. Otherwise the s7 edge just has more to offer. I use many of the features that come with samsung and was bored to tears with the Pixel. The s7 edge also has the better camera. The Pixel does take excellent photos, but the s7's are just a bit clearer and more color realistic. Video is no contest especially in the sound department. Not knocking the Pixel, but I also prefer the s7.

I also agree that this really shouldn't be a topic in the Pixel forum. IMO, in a war wars forum, yes, but not here.

 

[Frenzytom]

The Google Assistant is the main reason it beats out my S7E. I use it many times a day and it only will get better. The other reasons for not sticking with S7E is the slow OS updates, progressive UI lag, and curved screen phantom touches. The Note 7 was a great update to the S7E but we all knew what happened there.

 

[D13H4RD2L1V3]

I think people will understand your reasons, OP.

That's why multiple phones exist with different featuresets.

Sad to hear that the Pixel doesn't exactly meet your needs. That's fine. The S7 edge is also a darn good phone, and it's my personal favorite of 2016.