Google Nexus 4
Probably everyone knows this problem: You have just tweaked the touch screen and five minutes later you would like once again to reach for the microfiber cloth. Cleaning the Nexus 4 is twice the effort because the back is just as susceptible to fingerprints than the front.
Different building materials give an impression of high quality. The smartphone can be tweaked slightly with moderate force but largely resists pressure. Our test model had a feature point . A rattling noise was heard inside when we shook it . The noise is produced by the image of the camera stabilizer and is quite normal .
The case is only available in black and its size has been changed insignificantly . With a length of 133.9 mm , it is slightly shorter than the Galaxy Nexus ( 135.5 mm). However , it is thicker , wider and heavier. The Nexus 4 has a width of 68.7 mm ( difference : 1.9 mm) , a thickness of 9.1 mm ( difference : 0.2 mm) and weighs more than 4 grams of precursor . The Nexus range follows the trend of current smartphone to increase the display size . The manufacturer LG successfully installs a screen of 0.05 inch larger because of slightly larger dimensions .
connectivity
Nexus 4 monitors the implementation of the interface of the Samsung Galaxy S3 . The phone copy exactly the arrangement port Galaxy S3 regarding the power button , headphone jack and volume rocker . Nothing stands in the way of entertainment media on a big screen with the right cable. More information about this can be found here. Besides its use as a multimedia interface , micro- USB port has two other important functions. It can be used as a removable disk when linked to a computer or to recharge the battery via the modular magazine. As with all iPhones, the 2100 mAh battery is not removable and can not be repaired by an authorized technician. As mentioned in our review of the Nexus 10 , Google does not want to " complicate the user experience " for the user and fails a microSD card for memory expansion as well . Since this is also true for the Nexus 4, the potential buyer must carefully consider how much capacity is required before ordering the product.
Our test device has a flash memory of 16 GB (net : 12.92 GB usable). There is also a model with 8GB of memory available in the store reading .
Right: power button
Left : Volume rocker
Top : 3.5mm
Bottom: Microphone and Micro USB Port
software
There is no need to worry about updates . This is not a significant advantage when the hardware and software from the same developer. But as the device becomes more , its ability to operate new iterations of vanilla Android becomes lower and lower until new update make the device unusable. Latest flagship Google is powered by the Android operating system 4.2.1 Jelly Bean . Unnecessary bloatware will not annoy the user and he / she can take pleasure in a very thin and powerful operating system. Shortly after the release of version 4.4, there was a minor update to squash some bugs in the operating system . The latest version 4.4 includes some new features . One of them is called " Photo Sphere" and can take 360 ° panoramic pictures . This feature is very intuitive and using it works immediately with remarkable results. The navigation bar has always been an integral part of Android and is essential for the system. To further increase the usefulness , subtle and indefinable facelift was given to the user interface. Now it is possible to have other widgets in the upper right corner when the message bar is open. " Daydream " can be used when the device is connected to a charger or docking station . This function is easier explained with the word " screensaver " . The current time , a slideshow or other content slide on the screen dimmed when the corresponding parameter is selected in advance.
GPS connection
The Nexus 4 has a wide range of communication modules . The high-end device even has a LTE chip that neither LG nor Google specifies . This chip is disabled and can not be used ( in Germany ) . 42 HSPA + module is installed to ensure sufficient speeds for browsing the Internet . This is a theoretical speed of 42.2 megabits per second downstream in the UMTS network possible . Of course, features such as NFC ( Near Field Communication ), Bluetooth 3.0 and GPS are a must. According to the specifications , the main Wi -Fi module supports 802.11 b / g / n standards. However, a reader has highlighted the ability of the 5 GHz by 802.11 standard. We have often noticed that the Wi- Fi module had problems to reconnect to an access already identified during the trial period item . This can only be remedied by disabling and re-enabling the Wi- Fi module manually. We have not had any problems with other access during our testing points.The GPS module installed connects in seconds inside standing next to a window. The accuracy of the outside and increases in " line of sight " . We have not checked the connection unexpected interruptions in our test scenario .
Cameras and multimedia
On behalf of Google, LG installs two camera modules in the Nexus 4. The main camera along with a flash on the back and has a resolution of 8 megapixels. The front camera can be used as a webcam for video calls via Skype. It has a fairly low resolution of 1.3 megapixels. Both cameras can record videos in Full HD quality . The front camera provides a resolution of 720p ( 1280 x 720 pixels) and the primary camera records in 1080p (1920 x1080 pixels). Small sensor camera principal meets with details a little fuzzy in moderate indoor light. Many cameras have great difficulty reproducing objects unenlightened . This often results in the sound of heavy picture. The 8 megapixel sensor has a decent picture , although the overall representation is much darker than the reference camera . Like most cameras on the front panel , the image quality is not targeted to take snapshots . The main camera takes good pictures outdoors. Emphasis is decent and the difference in brightness decreases relative to the reference camera .
Front: 1.3 MP
Back : 8 MP
Photo Sphere
Almost all smartphones now has an 8 megapixel sensor . To stand out from the mass , Google installs a useful option in the latest version of Android. "Photo Sphere" allows you to take pictures in a 360 ° rotated by aligning multiple frames . The result surprised us and impressed at the same time . Great pictures it were possible immediately and it was easy however to make such a session panorama with a DSLR camera. It feels like you're standing in the middle of a room and you can see all angles of the object when viewing the 360 ° panorama in the standard Android gallery .accessories
We have become accustomed to the fact that manufacturing still has not overwhelm us with a lot of accessories . This assumption was confirmed as the included accessories are very rare. In addition to the smartphone, we found a modular power supply and a quick start guide in the box. Unfortunately , Google does not even include a helmet to his bestseller . However, it is also questionable whether the client may require that, given a price of ($ 249) for the 16 GB version .
Google touts the Nexus 4 with the ability to charge the device without charge leads . Carpet optional inductive charging where the smartphone is placed is required for this. A third Compatible charger is available
Control input devices
Keyboard in portrait mode
The capacitive touchscreen is capable of recognizing the entry of ten fingers . All touch is implemented quickly and accurately. The device is also facing all kinds of touch gestures . The default Android keyboard preinstalled. With its large 4.7-inch display , touch keys are of adequate size to ensure accurate typing . The keyboard often covers small screens about 50% in landscape mode. This is not the case in the Nexus 4. The Galaxy S3 and iPhone 5 still rely on a physical home button. The Nexus range now omits this button and only uses the touch control on the screen. The three touch buttons "back ", " Home " and " Menu" rotate with the screen 90 degrees in landscape mode. This also means that about 5 mm of the screen are always "lost" . We believe that the concept of competition , such as the Samsung Galaxy range , makes more sense. The main navigation buttons are outside the touchscreen.display
A resolution of 1280 x 768 pixels in a 4.7-inch screen is pretty good. There are other screens that have high pixel density , but we do not hold the device against a disadvantage (iPhone 5: 326 dpi). The screen of the Nexus 4 impresses with rich color reproduction . The average brightness of 275.3 cd / m² is not the most brilliant and could have been better . HTC 8X ( 293.8 cd / m²) achieved slightly better rate , but it can not be compared to the glossy screen of the iPhone 5 ( 486.8 cd / m²). The illumination of 93 % leads to a homogeneous brightness distribution which allows it to hide the fact that the brightness level is not high enough. The differences are not visible to the human eye . We recorded a black value of 0.24 cd / m² using the Gossen Mavo monitor. This results in a very high contrast of 1179:1 .
Distribution of brightness
The device would benefit from greater light outside because the screen is highly reflective . High Contrast alongside the relatively average brightness is able to minimize the effect of reflections and allows you to view the content on the screen in difficult situations to some extent .Viewing angles : Google Nexus 4
This part of our study is systematically shorter and shorter due to the in- plane-switching (IPS) . The LCD screen in the Google Nexus 4 is very stable when it comes to viewing angles. Contrast and color fidelity are maintained at larger angles.
Our test device has a good to very good color accuracy. Red and magenta presented the greatest differences , but remained in the range when measured with a DeltaE 2000 about 5.
performance
Google Nexus 4 comes with a range of interesting hardware features . LG and Google have agreed the latest high-performance components . SoC ( system on chip ) is a Snapdragon S4 Pro APQ8064 model number . It is built using 28nm technology and work in accordance with the ARMv7 instruction set. The quad-core has a clock frequency of 1.5 GHz and 2MB L2 level cache. One of the most innovative features is certainly the RAM generously sized . Competing models rarely have 2GB of RAM. The graphics unit is also well equipped . The Adreno 320 GPU provides enough power for multimedia applications.
The list of hardware specifications shows that the device is powerful enough , at least on paper . There is sufficient reference to test the prowess of the material on the Android platform unlike Windows Phone 8 platform. Nexus 4 performance is satisfactory when it was tested . In a direct comparison with the iPhone offered up to 5 frames per second at least GLBenchmark 2.5. Competitors Samsung and HTC have also been defeated in AnTuTu Benchmark v2. Headlights from other manufacturers have obtained lower scores by 30% on average. Surprisingly, the Asus Padfone 2 achieved much higher scores in this reference and the Linpack benchmark , although the same SoC is installed. In a comparison of smartphone, the Nexus 4 manages its way to the top of the list in synthetic benchmarks.
Mobile devices are more and higher screen resolution . Thus, using the smartphone as a media player would be the thing to do. However, the higher the resolution the more work the SoC has to do when playing video in Full HD . Many smartphones low performance do not achieve more than 25 frames per second. We used the trailers of films of James Bond: Skyfall and Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon in full HD quality for the test. The material has sufficient capacity to make everything easily.
Games
GTA III
This is similar to the range of games in PlayStore . We did not find any 3D games that have been a problem for the Nexus 4. For example , GTA III did not even push the device to high temperatures that we found in the "Temperature" section of this review . 2D games such as Angry Birds popular will of course run correctly.sound Quality
The speech quality is based on test calls in several different environments . The called party can hear us well in all situations and collected our conversations and was clearly intelligible . The maximum volume is large enough to make calls from the place of a passenger car . We were also pleased with the performance of the hands-free equipment installed and sufficient volume.temperature
The smartphone passively cooled reached a maximum temperature of 43.2 degrees Celsius in the region of the upper center of the screen at full GPU and CPU load. This is a temperature difference of nearly 11 degrees to the lower left part of the apparatus . However, we never managed to push the Nexus 4 temperatures at the rates indicated because the material was never pushed with loads of normal work, except in the case of simulation of full load. Maximum temperature of inactivity smartphone was 37.9 degrees Celsius and remained so when they are used for the occasion surfing the Internet , make calls and no compute-intensive tasks are performed. Temperatures never rose to a level that concerns us or not operating the device in our tests. Maximum temperature of the feed was 37.9 degrees Celsius , which is also within an acceptable range .
Update: Temperatures inactivity Nexus 4 are highly dependent on background tasks . Temperatures reach levels of inactivity over after the initial configuration of the smartphone. After that 27-31 ° C was usually measured values without load.
Speakers
Single speaker of the unit to listen to music is on the back. Unfortunately , the sound quality was poor. The sound is very tinny and bland about 60 % of the maximum volume. He neglects practically lower notes. The sound becomes uncomfortable when the volume is increased to very high levels . Because the back of the camera is slim and stylish speaker is completely covered when the Nexus 4 is placed on a flat surface . This reduces the maximum volume and the sound becomes distorted.Energy management
consumption
To extend the time between battery recharges , it is advisable to maintain low power consumption and do not use power hungry applications . The Nexus 4 is satisfied with 0.7 to 1.4 watts in standby mode. The screen must be manually set to its minimum brightness and wireless modules must be disabled to achieve a fuel consumption of just 0.7 watts. Consumption is twice as high as 1.4 watts time when the maximum brightness is used and the Wi- Fi module is enabled. We must note that the SoC was not fully charged , so that programs supercomputing did not run in the foreground. Mounted power consumption to 3.9 watts when the quad-core is loaded using the conventional method of testing Android app stability. Consumption reached a maximum of 6.5 watts when we added simulated load GPU. The Samsung Galaxy S3 consumes a maximum of 3.4 watts and the iPhone is satisfied with just 2.9 watts.
consumption
Off / Standby 0.1 / 0.1 Watt
Idle 0.7 / 1.1 / 1.4 watts
Load 3.9 / 6.5 Watt
Key : min: , med : , max : Voltcraft VC 940
autonomy
The non- removable battery lasted 2 hours and 36 minutes before having to be recharged in the scenario of maximum load with a consumption of 6.5 watts. Despite its low energy consumption, the iPhone 5 does not last as long ( 2 hours and 2 minutes). The drive test is closer to reality. The brightness is set manually to 150 cd / m² , Wi- Fi module has been enabled and a script continuously open websites . We found a range of 7 hours and 20 minutes in this scenario. The Nexus 4 was easily beaten by other devices. Although the Galaxy S3 also features a lithium ion battery mAh 2100 , it lasts an hour longer without charging cord . Both smartphones are, however, defeated by the giant endurance, iPhone 5. It sets a very high standard with nearly 16 hours of battery life in the test drive .Battery
Idle ( without WLAN , min brightness )11h 55min
WiFi Surf
7h 20min
Load ( maximum brightness )
2h 36min
verdict
Recommendation to buy for the Nexus 4 Google
Google has yet to officially present a product after the acquisition of Motorola. But he did a great job when leveraging the capabilities of manufacturing of other companies. Both the Google Nexus 10 and Nexus 7 delivered decent performance for the price they were offered. The construction of the Nexus 4 is convincing and we love the design, despite its solid black color. WXGA (1280 x 768 pixels) IPS screen brightness average of 275.3 cd / m² is much lower than the retina display of the iPhone 5. Just easily see outside content. All modules and interfaces common wireless are available outside the microSD slot card failed . The battery can also be recharged via an induction charger available as an option . The user multimedia eager not to worry about the performance hiccups . Or playback Full HD video or 3D games sophisticated push the SoC and 2GB of RAM for limits. The quality of the main camera also presented decent results in our tests and "Photo Sphere" innovative software option wins a bonus point. The battery life is significantly lower than its competitors . Both the Galaxy S3 and iPhone 5 do a better job . We can only hope that the battery life will be increased by a policy of excellent software update from Google.
Google Nexus 4 (manufactured by LG ) is a promising device . The premium smartphone misses the "Very Good " Reviewed by a hair. Problems with the connection to an existing Wi -Fi network are boring and hopefully be removed by a software update . We find not only the hardware but also the compelling price. Such a high-end smartphone merged with updates guaranteed the latest Android version for $ 249 16GB.
