Pixelated!
December 14, 2016
For the last three years, give or take, I've been rocking a Nexus 5. It wasn't necessarily a high end smartphone, but it smartphoned nonetheless. It could make and/or take telephone calls, send and/or receive text messages, be used to browse the Internets, and could perform other sundry tasks as needed. I liked my Nexus 5. But, as it turns out, Google is no longer supporting the Nexus 5 with software or security updates.
I could live without that, because a) most operating system upgrades these days offer incremental enhancements at best, and b) I have my web browser locked down so hard that I can barely use it, much less anyone else trying to 'hax' it. But alas, as the effects of time took their toll, the Nexus 5 began to malfunction. Its battery was holding a charge less, it kept 'losing' its SIM card, and then there's that chemical burn on the thing.
So I found myself in the sudden market for a new smartphone. I was considering the purchase of a Priv ™, one of those Blackberry ® Android ® smartphones with the physical keyboard (!), but one needs to purchase one of those all at once. Thus, as it turns out, the best usage of the Internets to buy a new, unlocked smartphone was to order up one of those new-fangled Pixels - they have the option of a payment plan.
Which is good, as much as new smartphones cost these days.
I wound up with the black, five inch model, because a) the five and a half inch models were all sold out, b) anything more than five inches is a bit too much for my tastes anyway (insert various jokes here, at your leisure), and c) they only had the black models in stock. I guess people wanted the white to emulate the look of an i-Thing, or the blue one simply because it's apparently novel these days. Or something!
But on top of that, we have armored my Pixel with a tempered glass screen cover, and a Denny-resistant case to keep it running for as long as is possible. I would say the Pixel is now Denny-proof, but I know better. I am a special kind of clumsy, and I leave a wake of dead and dying objects in my wake wherever I go, whether or not I actually used them. Or if they're even mine. I'm a pain in the neck that way, you know.
Ultimately, I enjoy the new device. It actually can go a few days on a charge if I'm not browsing the Internets all day at work, or running my personal wi-fi network to utilize my laptop without allowing the workplace wi-fi to eavesdrop and/or intrude upon my datas. Oh yeah, it's also got a pretty nice pair of cameras. I guess since so many people make use of the 'selfie lens', they've gotten a bit better in the last few years.
As you can see here. Much less grainy, isn't it?