First of all, I want to comment that I came from HTC Thunderbolt. Before that, I used D1 and DX.
I have seen many reviews and comments about the performance of GN during the last two days, and wanted to comment my personal opinion on them.
1. Low Signal Strength: Yes, this seems to exist. I still have three more Thunderbolt in my family and was able to compare signal strength of my GN with others. There is obvious signal strength difference between my GN (averaging between 90 and 105dBm) and my other Thunderbolts (averaging between 80 and 90dBm), at the same location, same time. Signal bars are also one or two bars lower, but as most of you are aware, I really don't care for the number of bars. Speedtest results also shows not much difference. At the same time, same location, same server, difference of the speed was negligible. Of course, test results were variable and I don't think we can simply rely on this.
=> Ok. It DOES SEEM LIKE THE SIGNAL STRENGTH IS WEAKER. Am I going to be worried about it? Maybe. Will this be a deal breaker? Not for me. I experienced the exact same problem when I started using my Thunderbolt. Thunderbolt also didn't have a decent signal strength and reliability to lock on 4G at its earlier baseband (a.k.a. radio software). There have been many upgrades of its baseband so far, and it seem a lot more reliable now. I believe that, though radio itself is hardware property and any hardware fault (if there is any) may limit its improvement, I am confident that there will be some improvement of signal strength in the future on my GN. Plus, I still don't have any problem locking on my 4G, browsing internet, downloading audio/video at this moment.
2. Poor battery life: Unlike many others on the foum, I am not worried about this battery life at all. Maybe because I came from my Thunderbolt, I guess. If you came from D1, D2, DX, or other 3G phones to GN, please consider that 4G drains battery almost as twice as it used to with 3G. When using 4G, being at the fringe area especially guzzle your juice. Also, screen is another factor. 1280x720 resolution will surely eat up more juice than 840x480, from GPU and AMOLED itself. Also, in AMOLED, brighter colored screen consume significant amount than darker colored screen (not just brightness itself, but also colors).
=>Considering these two factors (4G & resolution), I already expected that 1800mAh would show pretty much the same usage time as my previous Thunderbolt. I was right. My GN is showing exactly the same usage time as I expected. This can be variable depending on your usage habit, though. Try to turn off data while sleep mode. There are many ways to do that (Ex: Juice Defender, etc). Try to stay with Wifi when available. Try to use darker colored background. Try to use automatic brightness function. Good habit will probably improve your time almost twice. At least, it did in my case. There is possibility that this battery life also may improve in the future with update from Google. How much? Unfortunately, it is not much as some other member mentioned previously. But, considering that this is a newly announced machine, I surely expect some improvement in the nearest future.
3. Screen: I see many members complaining about the screen of GN. Though it took a while for me with mine, I am totally fine with the screen of my GN. Many of complaints I heard so far were the nature of AMOLED display (Ex: blue hue). Of course, Each display may be different and there might be some units with out of average characteristics. Some units may have extra bluish than others. Some units may have stronger vertical/horizontal lines showing up at the darkest brightness.
=>If you feel that your unit is out of ordinary screen, I suggest you try getting a replacement. If you think the replacement unit or other people's GN also looks the same, you might want to go with a different model with IPS display. AMOLED may not be a good fit for you. For me, this is my first experience with AMOLED. I felt a little bit of weirdness at the beginning. However, I am getting used to it now. I don't seem to have any out of ordinary characteristics on my GN's display, fortunately.
4. Speaker Volume: Fortunately, I couldn't experience this with my GN at all. Comparing with my three other Thunderbolts, Speaker volume of my GN is just about the same. However, since many other members were complaining about it, it seems like some units have weaker speaker than expected by their owners. I admit that the default ringtone and notification tone of GN sounds a little bit soft, though. After changing it to my own ringtones, I have not experienced any issue so far. Plus, I believe that an app called "Volume+" does the trick for those who are experiencing troubles.
=> If the Volume+ makes the speaker louder, it also means that the software update could do that, too. So, I will see how it goes with the 4.0.3 update. Also, let me remind you (if you came from D1 or DX), D1 and DX have relatively louder speaker than any other android phones I have experienced so far.
As stated above, all four of currently discussed issues didn't stop me from keeping my GN. I personally experience some other issues, such as US file transfer problem and Bluetooth audio streaming trouble, both of which were solved on the same day of my GN purchase.
Let me remind you once again that this is purely my personal experience and opinion. Since every phone is different, there will be people who are experiencing these issues heavier than others. I believe I am at the lucky side of people. Those who are experiencing issue obviously deserve to complain about them. I just wanted to give those people a little bit of heads up about what they could possibly get about their GNs, and what they could expect about their GNs in the future. I also wanted to remind people that some of their complaints were the nature of some technologies applied to this phone model. For those, maybe you had better get used to it. What if you can't? No biggie. You can always simply walk away from your choice and get a differnt phone, such as Rezound or RAZR, by January 15, 2012.
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