Google has a good track record of not being able to keep its unreleased phones secret for long. The Pixel 9 series isn’t an exception in this regard. Previously, we had detailed images of the upcoming phones, and now, the Tensor G4 benchmark results are out. As per the benchmarks, the new SoC won’t ...
I miss the Nexus concept. There were some whiffs, but then wins like the Nexus 6. Having a vendor juggle was always fascinating, and they mostly used good modems.
Performance matters. The tensor chipsets throttle heavily because they have bad thermals and they cannot sustain their performance after just 3 minutes of mild to heavy use. After 10 minutes they perform worse than midrange snapdragon processors. It would be different if pixels were cheap. But, unfortunately they are not. Making this alongside connectivity issues a sore point for pixels.
The thermals between the different Tensors are not the same. The G3 is made on a smaller manufacturing node and it's significantly more power efficient in daily use.
The a-series are priced at the mid range and they also use the same chipsets as the more expensive Pixels.
When I was talking about thermals I was primarily speaking about the tensor G3. The previous generations are way worse.
As for A series being priced midrange. In my country it costs Rs52999($635) for the base 8/128gb model. I can get the top 16/256gb variant of the oneplus 12R with the much superior Snapdragon 8 gen 2 for Rs45999($551). There are also other options like the Poco X6 pro, motorola edge 50 pro, and the Realme GT 6T which cost significantly less.
Unless, pixels start approaching the price point of other smartphones. Its a no go to pay the google price just for software and camera alone.
Well in that case the Pixels are simply overpriced there and there's definitely more hardware to be had in the ones you mentioned.
On a separate note, the Snapdragon based devices simply don't compare in security update support. That's the primary reason I've been putting up with the first gen Tensor. All of the first gen Pixels in use will be secure till the end of 2026. And the 8/8a series till 2030/31.
Samsung s24 series promise 7 years of OS and security updates just the same as pixel 8 smartphones. Fairphone also promises up to 8 years of security updates and at least 5 os updates until 2031.
Samsung uses a mix of snapdragon and exynos. Fairphone uses an usual but enterprise grade midrange snapdragon processor. So, 7 years of updates do happen with snapdragon. Just depends on the manufacturer and the contract they have with Qualcomm.
This is new development with Qualcomm's chipsets and they've historically been extremely reluctant to sign contracts for long update support so I'm skeptical till proven otherwise. They've always been a super profit maximizing company and they've typically been the king of the hill for Android and still are for modems, so they have all the incentives to not sign such agreements or not honor them. We don't know how strong these are. I'd be super happy to be proven wrong. I've worked (and still do) on the embedded side with devices built on QC chipsets and Qualcomm behave today as they did a decade ago.
I'm pretty sure they're just treading water this year, and focusing on their in-house design for the Tensor G5 in 2025. Hopefully it doesn't break Graphene support.
I'll tell you a secret it well always be the next one. Has been that way forever with Google hardware. Don't know why people still think they well do something magical at this point.