When we reviewed Google’s Nexus 5 early last month, we didn’t mince words. In fact, we called it the only smartphone Android fans should care about this holiday season. But what about Apple fans? Should they care about it as well? There’s a lot to like about the Nexus 5 and with a price tag starting at just $349 off contract, it’s a shockingly good value — perhaps the best there is for the time being. It’s a deal that looks so good, self-professed “eternal Apple fanboy” Seamus Condron couldn’t help but give it a shot.
Writing at PC Mag, Condron explained that he has been an iPhone user since 2008 when Apple released the iPhone 3G and over that span of time, no other handset has been appealing enough to lure him away from the Apple camp. With the Nexus 5, however, that changed.
The price was initially what interested Condron. He explained that with his iPhone on contract at that point, he was spending $100 a month for cell phone service. With the $350 Nexus 5, he could have an unlocked smartphone and take advantage of T-Mobile’s $30 monthly plan, which BGR recently called the best service plan in the country for smartphone users. It’s very light on voice minutes but coupled with a simple app and Google Voice, users can get unlimited VoIP calling for free as well.
So Condron took the leap.
Things started off well enough and he noted that Google Now really impressed him at first. But the shine wore off after just a few hours, when Condron began to find various areas where his new Nexus 5 fell short of his old iPhone 5. Among his chief complaints were the lack of a physical home button; the larger display, which at first he wanted but then found to be too large once he began using the phone; the quality of the display, which he wrote does not measure up to the iPhone 5 despite its better resolution; and the overall design of the user interface, which he found to be lacking compared to iOS 7.
“While I concede that 24 hours is not enough time to get completely comfortable with software you’ve never used before, I’ve been around software long enough to know what types of user experiences make me happy,” Condron wrote. “iOS still has my heart.”
Condrone’s full coverage can be read by following the link in our source section below.
