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Anyone considering swapping s3 for a Nexus 4???

A

aldo82

Well-Known Member
I haven't looked at the second hand prices for an S3 but given the great price of the Nexus 4 in the UK I'm thinking it would be possible to get one without losing much financially and I'm kind of tempted. Sure it doesn't have removable storage or battery which are both negatives I feel. But as a newbie to Android (after many years in the Apple world) I keep reading about how its best to experience vanilla android so is anyone else considering the switch or is the S3 still better?

If you use a 3rd party launcher (I use Nova Prime) is Touchwiz really that intrusive compared to stock android? I realise most of the bells and whistles on the S3 (motion features) I actually have switched off to save battery life so maybe I wouldn't miss the S3...?? My two biggest gripes with the S3 are screen visibility in sunlight and the physical home button / capacitive button layout. The nexus 4 clearly imporves on the button front and the screen most likely will be a little better so it has me tempted

How do people think they compare?
 
Honestly the Nexus 4 and S3 are pretty similar performance wise.

The Nexus 4 of course will not have any physical buttons on the phone while the S3 has the 1.

I feel like the upgrade wouldn't be worth it at all. And who uses a stock launcher nowadays anyhow, i used the stock for my Nexus device for awhile but have also switched to Nova Prime because i think it's way better, a lot more customizable.
 
Let me give you a keynote.

First

LG nexus 4 costs more than a SIII.
It has a much more powerful processor and RAM, which gives you in no way to trade.

Also,
TouchWiz wins AOSP UI.
AOSP only gives you the original feeling of Android while TouchWiz is a modded User Interface of AOSP.
The features that you said, did not make much battery difference at all.

Finally, SIII wins the upper hand as it has many custom ROMs to install, which means custom firmwares. You can even get the Original android taste and even LG UI 3.0 or sense UI. So THINK TWICE ;)
 
No external storage card slots? Complete joke.....

That's a big reason why a big number plumped for the S3 above the other high quality phones competing with it....
 
Exactly. The One X for example...

Although, Nexus devices have never had an sdcard slot have they?
 
The Nexus 4 is not an option for me. It puts me in a position that I would not like to be in. I would have to stream everything, so that would kill Att for me. 8gb is waaay to small. 16gb would be a tight fit. I have a 16gb sg3 and I caught a memory low after I downloaded a couple of tv show episodes and Movie from google play. I would love to believe that we are ever connected, but all I have to do is take a subway or a plane or go on a road trip (with spotty service) and that's gone.

Day to day I could squeeze by, but I do travel and that's when i listen to music and watch tv the most.... and that's when 3g/4g streaming won't cut it.
 
Strictly speaking, there's not much to compare. The S3 simply by having and SD slot wins by far. We are not ready to completely rely on cloud storage, and having SD cards slot to get more space for our needs is a must. I hardly use my Nexus just for that reason, it's a great phone but, meh... you got what I mean.

Vanilla experience is good, you have a pure Android phone and frequent updates, again, for what? Since I have the S3, looking back to any previous phone I had gets me thinking of how "less-featured" the others were. Samsung did a great job with the S3, and that is also the reason I don't go for any custom ROMs such as CyanogenMod, AOKP, etc. They are all great ROMs, but you feel the lack of certain features.
 
Agreed. This whole push to stream most content doesn't work for me. I want lots of on-phone storage. 16GB + an SD card is what I'd like at a minimum.
 
Digital Controller said:
Honestly the Nexus 4 and S3 are pretty similar performance wise.
Click to expand...

The Nexus 4 is allot faster, so that's not true, however it's likely based on the interface alone most wouldnt see much difference.

The problem with the Nexus 4 is storage, Google have got to stop this.

8GB with no sdcard, somebody should be fired.
 
Shocky said:
The Nexus 4 is allot faster, so that's not true, however it's likely based on the interface alone most wouldnt see much difference.
Click to expand...

Actually GS3 still seems to do well against Optimus G (almost the same hardware as Nexus 4) on this GSMarena comparison review. I think it's remarkable for the phone released 5 months ago. The only part Optimus G clearly wins is GPU benchmarks.

LG Optimus G v Samsung Galaxy S III: Beast wars - GSMArena.com
 
Sandroidfan said:
Actually GS3 still seems to do well against Optimus G (almost the same hardware as Nexus 4) on this GSMarena comparison review. I think it's remarkable for the phone released 5 months ago. The only part Optimus G clearly wins is GPU benchmarks.

LG Optimus G v Samsung Galaxy S III: Beast wars - GSMArena.com
Click to expand...


It gets destroyed in a few tests so I don't see how it's doing well.

Some of the lower scores are because LG suck at optimizing the software, their hardware is fine but when it comes to software they suck.

You also have to take into account some of these benchmarks are worthless.
 
sherlock5545 said:
Strictly speaking, there's not much to compare. The S3 simply by having and SD slot wins by far. We are not ready to completely rely on cloud storage, and having SD cards slot to get more space for our needs is a must. I hardly use my Nexus just for that reason, it's a great phone but, meh... you got what I mean.

Vanilla experience is good, you have a pure Android phone and frequent updates, again, for what? Since I have the S3, looking back to any previous phone I had gets me thinking of how "less-featured" the others were. Samsung did a great job with the S3, and that is also the reason I don't go for any custom ROMs such as CyanogenMod, AOKP, etc. They are all great ROMs, but you feel the lack of certain features.
Click to expand...

I agree 100% with all of that. I Was a huge advocate of AOSP until the S3.
 
Nicholaschw said:
Let me give you a keynote.

First

LG nexus 4 costs more than a SIII.
It has a much more powerful processor and RAM, which gives you in no way to trade.
Click to expand...

Well that's not true. Nexus 4 is several hundred pounds cheaper than an S3.

I'm selling my S3 for the N4 as soon as it is released. The whole JB update sucked. I'm still waiting. I've had a Nexus S and a Galaxy Nexus, I only went S3 for a spec upgrade which is equaled by the N4 now.
 
The only thing I dislike about TW is the launcher. The rest of it is actually good - the TW camera app, for instance, is way better than the stock camera app and has a ton of more options.

The launcher is very easy to replace, and Nova will give you the stock JB launcher experience.
 
jackdubl said:
Same here. It was AOSP, all the time, no matter what. Till the S3. Now I prefer S3's TW to the pure android experience.
Click to expand...
interesting some people feel this way. The manufacturers must add their own skin because they feel they are adding something and making it better for the user. If not why bother? Just put vanilla android on and compete with everyone else on hardware design. I think the carriers are improving and toning down their skins to the point of actually adding something to android (how it should be!). But having never used pure android the only way I'd know which I prefer is to get a Nexus to try it out. Might go for an N7 first and see how I like it. If I find myself longing for pure androuid all the time then an N4 after that.
 
aldo82 said:
interesting some people feel this way. The manufacturers must add their own skin because they feel they are adding something and making it better for the user. If not why bother? Just put vanilla android on and compete with everyone else on hardware design. I think the carriers are improving and toning down their skins to the point of actually adding something to android (how it should be!). But having never used pure android the only way I'd know which I prefer is to get a Nexus to try it out. Might go for an N7 first and see how I like it. If I find myself longing for pure androuid all the time then an N4 after that.
Click to expand...

Install Nova and use the Jellybean theme. That simulates vanilla android. Will save having to buy an N7 though they are great devices anyway.
 
czechplastik said:
Install Nova and use the Jellybean theme. That simulates vanilla android. Will save having to buy an N7 though they are great devices anyway.
Click to expand...
I already use Nova. I assume there must be more to pure android than just the launcher as touchwiz is always running even when you replace the launcher so perhaps it hogs resources etc that you just don't get if you run pure android?
 
aldo82 said:
I already use Nova. I assume there must be more to pure android than just the launcher as touchwiz is always running even when you replace the launcher so perhaps it hogs resources etc that you just don't get if you run pure android?
Click to expand...

N4 will be quicker, but noticeably? Perhaps but probably not much. I much prefer stock android, it's personal preference really.
 
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