With so many Google Android smartphones flooding the market at the moment, it's becoming increasingly difficult to pick between the various models.
For many, the difference between the brands is often marginal, save for models such as Sony Ericsson's Xperia Play (the “PlayStation Phone”), which specifically targets the hardcore gamer niche.
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The Nexus S doesn't target any niche in particular but is highly suited to tech-savvy users who want super-fast web browsing, a solid camera and a clean user-interface uncluttered by telco or vendor apps.
It is the second Google-branded phone, following on from the Nexus One that was launched in January last year to show off Google's Android platform but never made it in significant quantities to Australia.
Manufactured by Samsung, the Nexus S is similar to the highly regarded Galaxy S but, instead of a custom Samsung user interface (UI) overlay, offers a pure Android experience. I much prefer this but it comes down to personal preference.
It is the first Android phone to hit Australia that runs Android version 2.3 (Gingerbread), which offers an updated UI, significantly improved on-screen keyboard and better power and application management than the previous version (Froyo).
The Nexus S is also the first phone on the market to include a near-field communication (NFC) chip, meaning it will support upcoming applications that allow people to, for instance, swipe their phone in order to pay for goods in a shop.
It's a pretty useless feature for now as NFC is very much in the trial phase in Australia at the moment. Earlier this month, Visa launched a trial of NFC technology in partnership with 20,000 retail stores; participants can pay by swiping an iPhone hooked up to an accessory that adds NFC support.
With the Nexus S all of the NFC smarts are built into the phone itself but I ended up turning the feature off as it kept picking up the electronic tags on my work security pass and cards in my wallet.
The Nexus S has a gorgeous 4-inch Super AMOLED display that is great for viewing video and web pages but while it supports common file formats like MP3 audio and MP4 video, it won't play DivX or XviD files out-of-the-box, which is a disappointment.
That said, although many basic users won't be aware of this, I'm told the Rockplayer app – found on the Android Market - adds playback support for a range of media files including DivX, XviD and AVI.
Files can be stored on the 16GB of built-in space but there's no microSD slot for further expansion. This was annoying as it was more difficult to port over the content from my previous phone.
There is also no HDMI connectivity for connecting the phone up to a TV display.
As you'd expect from a Google-branded phone, the Nexus S offers the speediest web browsing experience I've seen on a smartphone. The browser supports Adobe Flash, but it is both a blessing and a curse as pages that are loaded with Flash ads are often choppy to navigate.
There are five available home screens for users to customise with their widgets and apps. The phone doesn't come pre-loaded with reams of widgets and wallpapers like some other HTC and Samsung Android phones I've used but all of these are easily accessible in the Android market.
The phone is light at 129g grams (the iPhone 4 is 137 grams) and fits really nicely in the hand. I'm a fan of the clean, rounded design and the look of the phone but the plastic bezel doesn't offer the premium metallic feel of other devices like the iPhone 4 and HTC Desire HD.
One of my biggest gripes with earlier Android phones is that they offer poor cameras, especially compared with the stellar camera on the iPhone 4.
But this is a non-issue with the Nexus S, which offers a front-facing camera for video chat and a 5-megapixel rear camera that produces almost as good still shots as the iPhone 4. Video recording is passable but not HD like on other devices.
The battery will easily get you through the day on a single charge and part of the way into the following day, depending on how heavy a user you are. I'm more than satisfied with this after being disappointed with the HTC Desire HD, which often struggled to make it through half a day with auto-sync turned on.
There's much to love about the raw speed and clean design of the Nexus S and, save for a few missing features like a microSD slot, it is one of the better Android phones on the market today for power users.
For many, the difference between the brands is often marginal, save for models such as Sony Ericsson's Xperia Play (the “PlayStation Phone”), which specifically targets the hardcore gamer niche.
Advertisement: Story continues below
The Nexus S doesn't target any niche in particular but is highly suited to tech-savvy users who want super-fast web browsing, a solid camera and a clean user-interface uncluttered by telco or vendor apps.
It is the second Google-branded phone, following on from the Nexus One that was launched in January last year to show off Google's Android platform but never made it in significant quantities to Australia.
Manufactured by Samsung, the Nexus S is similar to the highly regarded Galaxy S but, instead of a custom Samsung user interface (UI) overlay, offers a pure Android experience. I much prefer this but it comes down to personal preference.
It is the first Android phone to hit Australia that runs Android version 2.3 (Gingerbread), which offers an updated UI, significantly improved on-screen keyboard and better power and application management than the previous version (Froyo).
The Nexus S is also the first phone on the market to include a near-field communication (NFC) chip, meaning it will support upcoming applications that allow people to, for instance, swipe their phone in order to pay for goods in a shop.
It's a pretty useless feature for now as NFC is very much in the trial phase in Australia at the moment. Earlier this month, Visa launched a trial of NFC technology in partnership with 20,000 retail stores; participants can pay by swiping an iPhone hooked up to an accessory that adds NFC support.
With the Nexus S all of the NFC smarts are built into the phone itself but I ended up turning the feature off as it kept picking up the electronic tags on my work security pass and cards in my wallet.
The Nexus S has a gorgeous 4-inch Super AMOLED display that is great for viewing video and web pages but while it supports common file formats like MP3 audio and MP4 video, it won't play DivX or XviD files out-of-the-box, which is a disappointment.
That said, although many basic users won't be aware of this, I'm told the Rockplayer app – found on the Android Market - adds playback support for a range of media files including DivX, XviD and AVI.
Files can be stored on the 16GB of built-in space but there's no microSD slot for further expansion. This was annoying as it was more difficult to port over the content from my previous phone.
There is also no HDMI connectivity for connecting the phone up to a TV display.
As you'd expect from a Google-branded phone, the Nexus S offers the speediest web browsing experience I've seen on a smartphone. The browser supports Adobe Flash, but it is both a blessing and a curse as pages that are loaded with Flash ads are often choppy to navigate.
There are five available home screens for users to customise with their widgets and apps. The phone doesn't come pre-loaded with reams of widgets and wallpapers like some other HTC and Samsung Android phones I've used but all of these are easily accessible in the Android market.
The phone is light at 129g grams (the iPhone 4 is 137 grams) and fits really nicely in the hand. I'm a fan of the clean, rounded design and the look of the phone but the plastic bezel doesn't offer the premium metallic feel of other devices like the iPhone 4 and HTC Desire HD.
One of my biggest gripes with earlier Android phones is that they offer poor cameras, especially compared with the stellar camera on the iPhone 4.
But this is a non-issue with the Nexus S, which offers a front-facing camera for video chat and a 5-megapixel rear camera that produces almost as good still shots as the iPhone 4. Video recording is passable but not HD like on other devices.
The battery will easily get you through the day on a single charge and part of the way into the following day, depending on how heavy a user you are. I'm more than satisfied with this after being disappointed with the HTC Desire HD, which often struggled to make it through half a day with auto-sync turned on.
There's much to love about the raw speed and clean design of the Nexus S and, save for a few missing features like a microSD slot, it is one of the better Android phones on the market today for power users.
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