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Kellen

It’s not often that you get to merge personal passions into a professional life, but that’s what Kellen did when he launched Droid Life in 2009. After working years of unsatisfying jobs in the medical and property management fields, he took a risk to try and create an online community while playing with the coolest gadgets on the planet each day, a risk that has turned out to be incredibly rewarding. Outside of Droid Life, Kellen is your typical Portlander who drinks way too much good beer, complains often about the Trail Blazers, and can be found out on the streets for a run, rain or shine.

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170 Comments

  • I’m interested, but I won’t pay a dime until I get more info on the Pixel phone that was rumored.

  • ill compare these with the next edge and one of them will be my next phone next year…not that i really need a new phone next year but after 2 years i feel why the f not spend 700 for a new phone…………..

  • Better exercise your hands to “cup” that bottom firing speaker. Shouldn’t it be standard by now to have front facing stereo speakers? Do they make surround sound home systems that face the speaker away or down from the user? Derp!

  • I’m putting off my purchase of a new phone until these are out. I still hope they would have the ability to add a Micro SD card for more space.

  • Man I’m not really seeing the point of these phones that there’s a lot of phones that have better or the same specs as those listed and if this doesn’t come out until October then I don’t know why anybody would buy this phone

    • Maybe it’s the same arrangement as htc 10, bottom speaker for bass, and a front facing for treble, in the earpiece.

  • Rumored spec’s don’t seem all that impressive. Hopefully you’re off base and something more attractive will catch my attention.

    Waterproof? Wireless quick charging?

      • Not to disqus like a rod but I know what it’s missing and the specs in this article ain’t too special, know what I mean?

  • OMG that battery and fingerprint reader. Is that you, old LG??? Im literally jumping for joy.

  • Sad about no dual speakers and no 64 GB model (unless the 128 is priced like a 64). Otherwise, this sounds awesome to me. I would like a phone a tad smaller than my 6P, at it sounds like this might fit that description.

  • personally it’s going to come down to bezel size. if they are 6p sized bezels i may just sit it out.

  • So disappointed that the bigger model won’t be premium like the Nexus 6P. Guess I’ll be waiting for the google made phone later this year rather than getting a nexus this time around. Not worth the trouble to upgrade if I’m getting a phone that’s not going to be improving anything. Smaller screen, bottom firing speakers, better processor probably won’t even be noticeable at this point. Unless this phone is absolutely, unmatchably gorgeous there’s no way I’m getting sailfish.

  • I prognosticate that Google and Apple will finally merge in the next 3-5 year making the first “G-apple” phone. It seemed self evident given the technology trajectory lead them to producing essentially the same devices.

    • If that means long software support, and no bloatware/carrier customization, I’m all for it.

  • Garbage! 2 consecutive years of diminishing screen sizes and also no Qi since 2014. No microSD slot either but that was to be expected (but a Nexus with a microSD slot would be a huge & easy way to get some new converts). Google is just coasting on their hardware at this point…

    This year has been one Android disappointment after another. The LG V10 successor is our last remaining hope!

  • bottom mounted speaker, 5.5″ screen… So the Nexus 6 is sitll better. Got it thanks

  • I would’ve prefered if they made the smaller one 4.8″ and the bigger one 5.8″

  • Hate it. Shrinking the screen 2 years in a row. If the Note 7 is unlocked it’ll get my money if this is true.

  • Lmaooo 5.5? Yeah Google you can keep that. No way I’m going smaller. Looks like I’ll keep my Nexus 6(shamu for you haters) awhile longer. Hopefully the pixel phone doesn’t bitch out or I’ll just wait for Ara. So disappointed.

  • Love my N6P but too big for me. May be getting the ‘Sailfish’. But I’ll wait for sure a couple of months in case the Pixel phone rumor comes true.

  • 2 front facing speakers are a must! Would be shocked it htc can deliver a good camera experience. Dual sim cards would be nice!

  • These specs look great. SIZE IS RIGHT… no bigger, and HTC Build Quality. I think I’ll be a happy man come Nexus Season.

    • Yep, I’m looking forward to 5.5 inch screen size vs the 6P. Hope the bezels aren’t ginormous; I imagine they won’t be as big if it doesn’t have front-facing speakers.

  • Looks like I will have to keep my Nexus 6 for yet another year, got to have the front facing speakers. Bummer! The Nexus 6 is still working just fine so I can wait.

  • Any chance there is a larger version. (S)ailfish 5″, (M)arlin 5.5″, (L)ionfish 5.7″+ ?

  • Yeah I’ll skip this one and wait for the “silver program” phone from google in december. My 6p is alright for now.

  • “Google could just go with a Snapdragon 820, which is a quad-core 64-bit
    processor, or they could use something that has yet-to-be-announced by
    Qualcomm.”

    Yeah, cause that’s totally within Google’s normal SOP… The 6P was the last major device to launch with the 810; I highly doubt they’ll put anything newer than the 820 in their 2016 Nexus. That’s how they keep the prices so low: release devices with end-of-shelflife processors.

      • The Nexus 6 (Shamu) launched in late October 2014, while the SnapDragon 805 that powers it was announced in November 2013 and used in numerous devices throughout 2014, ending with the Nexus 6. The other phones to receive the 805 include: Samsung Galaxy S5 (announced in Feb 2014 and released in April 2014), the Note 4 (announced in Sep2014, released in Oct 2014)

        The Nexus 5 (Hammerhead) came with the SnapDragon 800, a processor revealed to the public on 8 Jan, 2013. This one might be an unfair judgement because it didn’t start to appear in most phones until Summer, but the Nexus 5 lost to all of them. The phone itself was launched on 31 Oct, 2013. The Sony Xperia Z Ultra was made available in July, The Galaxy Note 3 was released in September, The Galaxy S4 had a few versions which featured the SD 800, all of them launched before the Nexus 5.

        I would go on, but it actually takes a good bit of effort to go back and find the dates and exact details. In some cases, it’s definitely close, especially when that year’s Nexus manufacturer also made their own flagship with the same device (The LG G3 – or the G2, can’t remember – was their personal equivalent to the Nexus 5 and released at almost the same time with the same processor). In most cases, however, Nexus devices end up last on the list of devices to receive Qualcomm’s latest processors.

        My main point is that there’s no way Google/HTC will launch their Nexus with anything better than the 820, unless Qualcomm is keeping their activities very close-hold and only letting Google/HTC know anything about their next processor. There’s just no way in hell that Qualcomm is going to work so closely and be so secretive about their newest processor just to provide a chip for the Nexus (Nexus’s just don’t sell well enough for Qualcomm to consider it).

        If the HTC Nexus launches anytime in 2016, it’s going to probably include the SnapDragon 820.

        • All of that is why I put the ‘I think’ part in there. Thanks for the research.

          • No worries, I hope you don’t think my response was dick-ish. Was just providing the clarifying answer. 😉

          • Nah. Your post had me thinking for twenty minutes on my history with the phones. Was glad you did it. I had a bunch more typed, back to the galaxy and the n4, and their socs, in relation to pricing. But I got a phone call. In a nutshell, I wholeheartedly agree with your original comment.

        • Good post & all good points. The G2 was the sibling of the Nexus 5, released in Oct 2013 IIRC.

        • I know I’m late here, but really? where are you getting this information from? The SnapDragon 805 was not in the Galaxy S5, it had the 801. The only other big phones to have the 805 were the Droid Turbo and the Note 4, both released in the fall if 2014. It was a very new chip when it showed up in the Nexus 6.

          The 800 didn’t start showing up until the fall of 2013 so it was a new chip when it arrived in the Nexus 5. Yes the Note 3 came out a month before it, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t new. The S4 that came out earlier in the year had a SnapDragon 600 chipset, so it hadn’t been out at that point.

          Qualcomm has already announced the 821, 823, 825, 828, and 830. It is very possible one of those could end up in the Nexus. Particularly the 821 or 823. They should definitely be available in time.

          • The S5 Plus and S5 LTE-A both used the SnapDragon 805. The LTE-A was announced in June…

            My point was that the chips themselves hit market MUCH earlier than Google includes them in any Nexus devices. This is even evidenced by your refute: The SnapDragon 805 was released to market in November of 2013…

            You’re correct on the SnapDragon 800, but it still wasn’t led by the Nexus. The point I was making is that Google doesn’t launch the Nexus phones with a processor that’s never been anywhere else. The only other devices likely to launch between now and the Nexus are the Galaxy Note and maybe LG’s upgrade to the V10 (the V10 launched in Oct). I guess the short answer is: “We’ll see.”

    • It is to me in the form of a smaller screen. If these are accurate, now I can get a 6P powered equivalent that’s not pushing tablet size.

  • So basically, the only improvements over the 6P are an updated processor and 1 more GB of RAM? All while taking away a speaker!?!?!

    This better have USB 3.1 instead of the 2.0 on the Nexus 6p

    • They may still have 2 speakers, but they’ll be on the bottom which can get covered up depending on how you hold it. It’s one of the things I don’t like on my Nexus 7 2013. They put both speakers on the back on opposite sides. So when you watch a video on landscape mode, you’ll most likely cover them up unless you’re remembering not to.

      Speaking as someone who installed sound systems for a living, speakers are most always pointed at the listeners. You can get some off axis sound from them, but the quality of the sound would depend on their off axis response, which is usually not as good as them pointed at the listener. For certain, there will be a reduction in volume.

  • I’ve had every Nexus except the second one but this year, I’m really considering trying out the Note line.

    • I don’t know if your going to be able to tolerate TouchWiz after being spoiled with Nexii. Note and S7 hardware is sweet looking but that skin and bloat….ugh…

  • The possibility of there being an iPhone like approach to both Nexus and them being from HTC sounds awesome! It would be great to not have to choose between lower and higher specs 🙂

    • I am hoping may be part of Google’s preemptive plan to sell their supposed phone…the heads walked into a board room and said, we need to release a Nexus ahead of our phone, but it can’t be better than our phone…so who can we have build a Nexus that will screw it up enough that our phone will be better…?
      I got it, HTC!

    • I think people at google are laughing out loud at this new iphone rumor. Wondering why in the world the current nexus phones aren’t capable of competing with the iphone.

  • Looks like I will have to remain hopeful that Google’s “Not a Nexus, Nexus” will be my next phone.

  • Damn. Was really hoping for a 5.7″ or larger screen and front facing speakers.

        • Could have a small budget phone for calls/text and hotspot, then a huge tablet for all other purposes and to Google Voice/Hangouts people while on WiFi. Can have the gigantic screen you desire and 95% of the functionality as a smartphone.

    • Yup same here. I don’t know why they keep going smaller. 5.5 is not even a phablet these days. Damn looks like I’m keeping my Nexus 6. Hopefully the rumored pixel phone doesn’t bitch out on screen size.

  • I’d started to get used to the idea of the smaller screen size of this year’s Nexus flagship. I’ll even give it to those that say that a more efficient processor on the smaller screen *might* equate to better battery life, despite no increase in battery capacity. But a bottom firing speaker, after two straight years of dual front stereo speakers? Gamers, enjoy playing your games when your hand covers this speaker in landscape mode…

  • Not interested in a HTC Nexus at all. And with the Note series going to a Edge type display, there simply isn’t anything out there that I am interested in.

  • First time in a long time I have almost no interest in a nexus phone… I’d take the 6p over either of these options.

  • too small and bottom firing speakers= fail. This phone should have been the smaller one

  • Looks good except the bottom-firing speakers…

    Are the speakers on the HTC 10 considered bottom-firing? Maybe this model is slightly based on the HTC 10.

  • No increase in battery size to really take advantage of the reduction in screen, and a bottom firing speaker? FAIL. Now I REALLY wish the Axon 7 was a Nexus. Smfh…

    • Making the screen smaller is taking advantage of the battery size. If they make the phone smaller (smaller screen→smaller phone→smaller battery), they’ll need to make up for the smaller area in which to fit the battery. That will mean a thicker device, and whenever they do that, people b&m about it. The 6p gets through a day, a smaller screen is easier on battery. While it won’t be much of an increase, at least it won’t be worse.

      • I mentioned your point in a separate comment. While I could deal with that, and the smaller screen, the speaker situation is still a no-go for me. Unless I’m proven to be a moron later in the year when reviews come out (which I’ll happily admit to), I’ll be sticking with the 6P I’ve got.

        • Yeah, I wasn’t speaking to that part. And I agree with you on this. The 6p is my first phone ffs, and it makes a difference over my previous devices. I’ve never owned an HTC with Boomsound, so I can’t say how much better that is than the speakers on the 6p. But given that HTC has apparently now dropped it after being the ones to start the trend, I think it’s a mistake on their part. I like being able to set my phone to play music and actually be able to hear it when I’m done odd jobs in the garage. Any bass they give you (how it is now on the HTC 10 with a small speaker on one end and a so called bass speaker on the bottom) is ridiculous.

          I’ve had my share of laptops with a “subwoofer” built in, and they weren’t worth the effort. If anything they make them sound worse. Of course I could say that about most any upgraded speakers on any laptop I’ve owned. I’ve had a Toshiba Qosmio with a built in 3″ sub, an Asus with Altec Lansing speakers, and currently have an HP with Beats, and none of them sound any better than the laptops with regular speakers. So I think HTC should’ve stuck with what worked. The original Boomsound was actually a selling point for them.

  • This is great news for those of us who want a top-spec’ed Nexus but don’t want Shamu in our pockets.

    • After you finish puberty and switch to adult sized pants, you’ll find that the N6 and 6P fit comfortably into pants pockets.

      • If I try, I can get an 8.4″ tablet in my (fitted) jeans pocket, doesn’t mean I want my phone that size.

      • So still rockin the JNCO jeans? Because I wear Levi’s and my 5.4 Turbo 2 sticks out the top of my back pocket.

        • Never put a phone in your back pocket!
          Front pocket
          Screen faces your leg
          Top down

          This way you dont sit on your phone, and when you pull it out of the pocket it is in your hand how you use it.

          • I have never sat on my phone. It is a simple thing to remember to pull phone from the pocket before sitting down. And I keep my keys in one front pocket, and my change in the other. Both are bad combinations with a phone if you want to keep it scratch free.

          • slim wallet + keys go in same front pocket, and phone goes in the other front empty pocket, ta-da, problem solved. unless of course you have a thick fat wallet.

          • So, to accommodate Your preference for where You think I should keep my phone, I should entirely change how I carry everything in my pockets? LOL Yeah, OK.

          • or as an alternative, you could try this: Keep your keys in one of your front pockets, and keep your change in the other side coin pocket (not the deep pocket, but that little coin pocket), this way, you can keep carrying everything how you do, and you have a free spot for your phone in your front pocket. just put your wallet in your back pocket or in the front with the keys, now you got 2 options.

          • This is why the headphone jack needs to be on the bottom of the phone!! When will OEM’s learn?? This is why I’m keeping my G4 instead of upgrading to the HTC 10.

          • I agree 100%, however I have upgraded from my G4 to the V10 to the S7 Edge to the S7…….. I need to stop buying phones…. maybe after the Note 7

        • I wear Levi’s and Express, and have no trouble fitting my phone in my jeans.

      • I, for one, disagree, because I do not wear JNCOs.

        Oh man, someone beat me to the JNCO comment. Too lazy to come up with something original, so I’m leaving it.

    • So no one is nervous about the quality of the product that HTC is going to put out? Didn’t the Interwebs highly criticize the last several HTC phones for one thing or another? Memory serves about the camera perhaps?

    • I like everything rumoured, except those bottom speakers….I kinda like the front stereo speakers…..

    • Yeah, I’m not sure what’s gong on here. HTC was the father of quality front stereo speakers too…

        • It’s a little different than the things you listed. More like AMOLED vs. IPS or front fingerprint scanner vs. rear. They just went with a bottom firing speaker. Some people like it, some hate it, others don’t care.

          • I don’t think you can “hate” front facing stereo speakers. But yea, there are at least two definite camps, “Love” and “Don’t care”, and I’m willing to bet that the latter is 90% of the general population. Hence the move away from them.

          • Agreed. No point in wasting money on engineering speakers into the front if most don’t care, especially since everyone who does care just ends up complaining about how big the bezels are anyway.

        • I would LOVE for a built in kickstand. I don’t want to run a huge thick case, but I also want a kick stand. A built in kick stand would be great. Heck even if Samsung did something like just put a hole in the back that the Note Stylus could pop into to provide a stand would be great.

        • If samsung were to do it, it would become a thing much more rapidly. Unfortunately, it was either a mega bezel HTC phone or a nexus/pure device that had them. None were popular to begin with,

      • HTC doesn’t know how to do front stereo speakers without a black bar and major bezels.

        • but they still kept the bezels and bar and took the speakers out of the equation. they just don’t know how to make an efficient front panel period.

    • Love my 6P still. Coming up on a year in a few months. Longest I’ve had a single phone

      • Nexus 6 is the longest I’ve had a phone. Size was weird at first but i love it now. Came from a 2013 moto x and that thing felt so pathetic after i was use to the 6.

    • I really don’t get why some people are so concerned about the placement of phone speakers. 99% of the time I want to listen to something from my phone I use Bluetooth or Cast. I always have a stereo headset handy and I have a couple different portable speakers for things like hotel room or backyard parties. The other 1% of the time might be for a speakerphone call or maybe a very rare Facebook video and then any speaker is fine.

      • If you want to show a friend a YouTube video, and actually want them to be able to hear it.

      • I play mobile games and watch a lot of short Youtube vids on my phone. I’m not going to use earphones or a BT speaker for that and front facing speakers make it that much more enjoyable. Plus what TC Infantino said; it’s much better for sharing media with friends as well for just a moment. I’m not going to dig out my BT speaker at work to show a coworker a short funny vid/song, which is almost a daily occurrence for me. I’ve gotten a lot of comments on the speakers on my M8 and 6P doing this as well, so I know I’m not the only one that appreciates them.

    • If it’s designed after the HTC 10, which it probably is, then the bottom speaker is for bass while the front ear speaker is for treble, which still technically makes it a front facing speaker, just adds better overall audio quality.

  • With as much innovation that has already occurred in the smartphone product category, it’s harder for me to justify day one purchases anymore. I’m probably gonna buy a 6p once they get heavily discounted.

    • same. I have the moto x pure edition right now and a lot of times it’s a laggy piece of garbage. I was going to buy the new nexus, but now I might just grab a discounted 6p.

        • Coming from an LG G3 which worked fine until it stopped reading my SIM card (hardware not software problem) and the only difference is I haven’t rooted/ROMed it. I’ve have this phone since launch and it’s unusuable at times. I probably need to see if a custom rom will fix it.

          • Mine has gotten to the same place, so I’m going to do a factory reset soon and see if it gets me back to the snappiness. Or I’ll just buy the new Nexus and hope someone on Swappa has the same last name as me and likes the engraving 😉

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