Pixel 3 is EOL anyways as of October 2021. No more software updates and no security patch. Makes sense the hardware is EOL as well.
Meanwhile an iPhone SE from 2016 can upgrade to the latest iOS. It just works.
Meanwhile an iPhone SE from 2016 can upgrade to the latest iOS. It just works.
I'm sure, being Google, they've done all sorts of data analysis and cost-benefit and shown that it's a small group that keep phones that long and that people don't care that much about the support period... but it's just another seemingly penny-pinching situation from them that I think hurts their brand more than it could possibly be saving.
I like my 3a a lot, and bought it cheap later in its lifecycle, and it's a little galling to check and see that the support "guarantee" only goes up to next May, and the security timeframe is the same! If they stick to that schedule I'll have only basically their dead minimum of 18 months of support from when they stopped selling a device, or close to it. Is there really that much upside to these cutoffs?
If anything, they should be using the Pixel line as a cudgel (or let's be nicer, example) to encourage longer support timeframes from other Android manufacturers.
No more official updates from the vendor. It does not make sense that hardware should die when aftermarket ROMs are perfectly serviceable.
Which is especially good considering no decent phones in that size have come out since!
Edit: I'm downvoted to zero, but there really aren't any. Try this custom search on GSMArena: https://www.gsmarena.com/search.php3?nYearMin=2016&nHeightMa...
Sorry, excuse me while I go burst my sides from laughter. Apple does battery replacements for more than a (entry-level, admittedly) new phone costs. And that new phone includes a battery. ;)
Moreover, Apple refuses to do battery repairs if your phone has other problems, even if those problems have absolutely no relation to the battery, like... a cracked screen. (I'm not kidding, but hey, props to them for actually being honest[1] for a change. That's a refreshing surprise.) Personally, I know very few people with Apple phones over a year or two old who don't have a cracked screen.
[1] https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/battery-powe...
Replacing the battery with a smashed screen is almost impossible without also replacing the screen because you need to use a suction cap to pull the screen off. If it is smashed you need to scrape off all the chunks which removed what is left of the screen. These days the glass on the iPhone is much stronger than it once was so I don’t know anyone with a cracked screen.
If you asked the average user if they would rather that their phone crash, or have the top speed capped. They would all rather it did not crash.
Of course this should have been more visible to notify the user to get a battery replacement. Which it now is and there is a full battery health page. It was also never really secret or lied about. There was a mention in the change logs that no one reads.
Certainly the average user would choose "no crash _and_ not get slower", conveniently ignoring the either-or nature of the question. (Maybe "get less battery life out of a single charge" if they are trying to come up with an alternative.)
No. If you asked the average user if they would rather their phone have the speed decreased, or have a slightly thicker battery (and thus phone), they would all rather it be slightly thicker.
Yes.
The big problem was the deception, not the slowing. If they wanted to remove the speed difference between new and old phones, they'd have to slow them all down.
And especially because you can get a new battery, I find updates getting cut off so soon with android to be significantly worse than anything apple does.
And you can't get a new battery, by the way. Apple's batteries are not designed to be replaced, remember?
If they made the turbo a bit less aggressive, so slowdowns happened on fewer phones, and made it say "your battery is failing so the phone can't reach peak speed reliably", it wouldn't have been a big problem.
Batteries can only put out so many watts as they age, and apple didn't cause that to spite people into having to buy new products.
> And you can't get a new battery, by the way. Apple's batteries are not designed to be replaced, remember?
I see that as a separate issue.
Please don't say things like this here. That part of your comment is inappropriate and incendiary, and contributes at best nothing and at worst drama to this discussion.
This particular bit of your comment does not contribute to the problem under discussion, to the potential solutions or work in progress, or to any other related concern. It is not tangentially-related to Android problems or to Pixel problems. It does no benefit to the post topic, "Pixels bricking unexpectedly", to start a flamewar about iPhones.
HN does not benefit from conversational arson directed at some random Android device post, that has nothing to do with how you feel about Apple versus Android. There are enough fires on HN as it is. If you feel very strongly that we should consider and discuss your views about the relative hardware warranty times of iPhone versus Pixel, then write a blog post and submit it to HN.
Sincerely, another HN reader.