Google’s Hiroshi Lockheimer, David Burke, Krishna Kumar and Sandeep Waraich are currently live for a reddit Ask-Me-Anything (AMA) to discuss the new Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P. The conversation has only just begun, but we wanted to start putting together the highlights of the event for those who can’t keep up with each answer and for those who miss it completely.
AMAs like these always offer up extra information about naming, specs, and specific choices in design or features that you may not see/hear during a presentation or in a press release. For example, we already found out the reason for the “X” and “P” in the names of each phone and know that they are working with T-Mobile to get band 12 LTE ready for launch.
Below, we’ve done our best to put together the answers the team has provided. (We’ll continue to update as well.)
- Display in the Nexus 6P: “It has a Samsung WQHD AMOLED panel. We have spent a lot of time tuning the white-point and color gamut for these panels – hope you will enjoy the accuracy of the display.”
- Type of storage in each phone: “Both 6P and 5X use eMMC 5.0.”
- Not US 3.1: “Nope! Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P supports USB 2.0”
- Why only 2GB RAM in the Nexus 5X: “We like to think we’re striking a strong balance between premium features/experiences and affordability.”
- Why no wireless (Qi) charging: “We added Qi wireless charging starting with N4 because plugging in USB micro B was such a hassle! (Which way is up!?) With this year’s Nexii, we support USB Type-C which has a reversible connector so there’s no more guessing. AND it charges incredibly swiftly: 1% to 100% in 97 mins on the 6P for example (the first ~45 mins of charging is especially fast). Meanwhile, wireless charging adds z (thickness). So, ease of plugging in + fast charging + optimizing for thinness made us double down on Type-C instead of wireless!”
- 16GB option for the Nexus 5X: “The idea here was to strike a balance between premium features/experiences and affordability.”
- Same cameras in each phone?: “Yes. Both devices have the same camera – a 12.3MP camera, with a large 1.55um pixels, which works great in all conditions – especially low light. And both have LDAF for fast auto-focus.”
- More on cameras: “Yea, same sensor (IMX377) and F/2.0 optics. But 6P has more CPU/GPU horsepower so has a few additional features like 240fps slomo (vs 120fps on 5X), Smartburst, and EIS.”
- Why partner with LG and Huawei?: “5X: We wanted to bring the LG-Google band back together. So many N5 fans, we couldn’t possibly disappoint! 6P: Always nice to work with new players — we have a history of working with a bunch of folks: HTC, Motorola, Samsung, Asus and now Huawei!”
- On naming: “X for the core of the Nexus brand (plus it sounds cool!), P for premium.”
- T-Mobile band 12: “We’re hard at work with T-Mo to get Band 12 on Nexus devices by ship date.”
- Security with fingerprint scanners: “Fingerprint features are securely encrypted on the device, and processed in the secure Trustzone protected area of memory. The Android 6.0 fingerprint APIs do not provide any access to the fingerprint material to apps. Fingerprint features never leave the device and are not shared with Google (so for example if you setup a new phone, you need to re-enroll your fingers). If your phone is ever lost or stolen you can easily find, lock, and erase your phone using Android Device Manager.”
- NFC coil locations: “On 6P the NFC coil sits just above the Nexus Imprint fps is exposed behind the camera coverglass (which is GG4 BTW). On Nexus 5X, the coil is wrapped around the back camera. And we have tested it rigorously for payments experience and it works great! And for peer-to-peer and reader mode too BTW.”
- Making up for no OIS: “We’ve done a bunch of things to provide image stabilization: 1. The Nexus 6P/5X has a large 1.55um pixel camera and the amount of motion blur due to hand-shake is lower , when you have large pixels. 2. We have a feature we call “lucky shot” internally. When you take a picture, behind the scenes, we select the best of 3 bursts of images. 3. When you use video, we have optic-flow-based image stabilization. 4. When you use SmartBurst, we select the best image from the burst (for example a shot with eyes open).”
Via: reddit
This post was last modified on October 1, 2015 12:00 pm