Samsung Galaxy Nexus or Galaxy SII?

[InexpensiveGamer]

I am also voting for the SGS II. I had SGS before and I never looked back to any other phone. My personal opinion because everyone gives a damn. Go SGS II or wait for III

[Prag]

My upgrade isn't until April, but I'm very seriously considering the Note. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBhEiiMd3qU

That video sort of squashed any concerns I had over the size, and the battery life seems ridiculous for the amazing screen.

If I had to go with one of the two you listed right this minute - SII.

[Gheld]

the camera on the s2 is 8mp and the one on the nexus is 5mp (yes the quality of the pictures on the s2 is amazing).

"Megapixels" is about the worst method for judging a camera these days. 5 megapixels is more than adequate for printing a 5x7 photo, Capturing an 8 megapixel photo is generally useless because you are going to end up scaling it down before posting it on any blog/facebook/printing it, etc.

A 5 megapixel camera will still give you a ridiculous image output, (roughly 2500x2000) and if you are posting it online chances are you are going to scale it down to about 25-50% of the original image size.

Colour accuracy, lens distortion, shutter time, switch-on to shutter time, low light performance, flash interference, etc are far better benchmarks.

http://hemorrdroids.net/samsung-gala...2-camera-test/

So given this, the 8 megapixel image size on the S2 actually compounds its shortcomings.

The only place where a higher image size might be advantageous in this case is when using the digital zoom, but given that you are likely going to be scaling down the image you are better off just taking a large image and cropping.

EDIT:
But honestly, if you are taking a serious photo where all of these things matter, you are better off with a proper camera.
EDIT2:

I made the decision not to get the Galaxy Nexus and went ahead and got the S2. Greatest phone I've ever had. Great camera (better than GN's), good processor, fast, has SD card support (GN doesnt) and yeah, the screen is great and I've rooted it and played around with it and had a lot of fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzE4I...eature=related

[rockefeller]

I made the decision not to get the Galaxy Nexus and went ahead and got the S2. Greatest phone I've ever had. Great camera (better than GN's), good processor, fast, has SD card support (GN doesnt) and yeah, the screen is great and I've rooted it and played around with it and had a lot of fun.

[Kyocere]

Whats about HTC Sensation XE or XL? Much better than any Samsung phone.

I recently switched from an HTC Inspire to the Galaxy s II Skyrocket (AT&T). The battery life alone was worth the switch, myself along with every friend I know that has or currently owns an HTC complains about battery life. I charge my S II much less frequently then I did my inspire, with more usage.

The S II and the Nexus are pretty comparable phones. My friend has a Nexus and hates ICS, but that is personal taste. You won't notice much of a difference between 4.5 inches and 4.65 and you wont notice the resolution difference very much either. Go with whichever carrier has better server in your area. Both phones run on 4g LTE so both are capable of amazing 4g speeds.

[Bikiniwax]

Not sure why Samsung put such a crappy camera in the Nexus when compared to the GSII.

[BicycleMafioso]

Not sure why Samsung put such a crappy camera in the Nexus when compared to the GSII.

Define crappy. The snappier shutter time makes it far more worthwile for what it's for.

The resolution of which it can take pictures alone is not really a good way to meassure camera-quality.

[Keller]

Define crappy. The snappier shutter time makes it far more worthwile for what it's for.

The resolution of which it can take pictures alone is not really a good way to meassure camera-quality.

I'm pretty sure that's a software feature.

[BicycleMafioso]

I'm pretty sure that's a software feature.

Shutter-speed? No. I'm pretty sure all the disappointed people not getting that feature in 4.0 are disappointed.

[Gheld]

Define crappy. The snappier shutter time makes it far more worthwile for what it's for.

The resolution of which it can take pictures alone is not really a good way to meassure camera-quality.

It's truly sad how the world of casual photography has become so dumbed down. I see all these featureless point and shoots with "10 Megapixel" and I just do a facepalm. The average image size people upload cell phone pics as is like 1 megapixel. Clearly there's no getting through to people about it.

[Asera]

"Megapixels" is about the worst method for judging a camera these days. 5 megapixels is more than adequate for printing a 5x7 photo, Capturing an 8 megapixel photo is generally useless because you are going to end up scaling it down before posting it on any blog/facebook/printing it, etc.

A 5 megapixel camera will still give you a ridiculous image output, (roughly 2500x2000) and if you are posting it online chances are you are going to scale it down to about 25-50% of the original image size.

Colour accuracy, lens distortion, shutter time, switch-on to shutter time, low light performance, flash interference, etc are far better benchmarks.

http://hemorrdroids.net/samsung-gala...2-camera-test/

So given this, the 8 megapixel image size on the S2 actually compounds its shortcomings.

The only place where a higher image size might be advantageous in this case is when using the digital zoom, but given that you are likely going to be scaling down the image you are better off just taking a large image and cropping.

EDIT:
But honestly, if you are taking a serious photo where all of these things matter, you are better off with a proper camera.
EDIT2:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzE4I...eature=related

I can attest to this, me and a friend compared shots between my Nexus and her SGS2. They looked more or less the same between phones, the difference however was more apparent on a computer screen.

That being said, don't take this as the SGS2's camera is junk, because it's not. You have to look pretty hard to see the difference most times. The biggest advantage is definitely the shutter speed, and fluidity of Android4's camera app.

[Linkedblade]

Did OP ever mention his or her service provider?

---------- Post added 2012-02-22 at 10:13 AM ----------

Seems thst OP is Australian, I don't know too much about the services there. However I do know that you need to be careful about which version of the gs2 you get because some are made for 4g wiimax and others for 4g lte.

[Amity]

Did OP ever mention his or her service provider?

---------- Post added 2012-02-22 at 10:13 AM ----------

Seems thst OP is Australian, I don't know too much about the services there. However I do know that you need to be careful about which version of the gs2 you get because some are made for 4g wiimax and others for 4g lte.

Yeah i'm from Australia, i'll be going telstra as my service provider

From what I've been told, telstra needs the phone to support quad band gsm 850, and that's what this phone does support, aswell as a few others like optus etc.

Person that told me this is someone who has actually bought the galaxy nexus off the same ebayer

[invizible]

owning a galaxy s2 since august. almost all my friends have bought it meanwhile

great phone. great camera (pic & video). smooth ui
have to say that i never used a stock rom. i'm running only custom roms from day 1 on ( litening rom with speedmod kernel / cyanogen mod )
battery life is also ok. between 2 and 5 days. of course depending on what you're doing.

can't wait that the cyanogen dev's finish their ics rom - had a cyanogen ics rom installed 2 or 3 weeks ago. looked great. but the camera crashed when you switched from picture to video and the google sync for the contacts didn't work, so i had no contacts on my phone and so i had to flash back to litening

[Amity]

owning a galaxy s2 since august. almost all my friends have bought it meanwhile

great phone. great camera (pic & video). smooth ui
have to say that i never used a stock rom. i'm running only custom roms from day 1 on ( litening rom with speedmod kernel / cyanogen mod )
battery life is also ok. between 2 and 5 days. of course depending on what you're doing.

can't wait that the cyanogen dev's finish their ics rom - had a cyanogen ics rom installed 2 or 3 weeks ago. looked great. but the camera crashed when you switched from picture to video and the google sync for the contacts didn't work, so i had no contacts on my phone and so i had to flash back to litening

by roms do you mean like skins sort of? my mate has this phone and he was showing me all windows 7 n all that and referred them to 'skins'
And ICS is supposed to be fully released to S2 users on the 1st of March isn't it?

[invizible]

roms are not just skins (of course, they're skinned different than stock roms often. on the one i use, every icon is blue instead of red / green / orange etc)
they are full android images that have been modified by some guys.
EDIT: i should mention that when you flash a custom rom you will lose your warranty.
google released the ics dev kit around november as i remember, so they could take this and build their own rom.

don't know if 4.0 for galaxy is really released on march 1st. they officially released 2.3.6. just a few weeks ago. would be great when they'd release it soon

[Asera]

Yeah i'm from Australia, i'll be going telstra as my service provider

Any HSPA phone on Bell, Telus or Rogers in Canada should work on Telstra. With SIM unlocking of course.

[Amity]

roms are not just skins (of course, they're skinned different than stock roms often. on the one i use, every icon is blue instead of red / green / orange etc)
they are full android images that have been modified by some guys.
EDIT: i should mention that when you flash a custom rom you will lose your warranty.
google released the ics dev kit around november as i remember, so they could take this and build their own rom.

don't know if 4.0 for galaxy is really released on march 1st. they officially released 2.3.6. just a few weeks ago. would be great when they'd release it soon

sorry for the late reply, but when my mate changed his interface to windows 7 it was from a $1.00 app? how would that void the warranty?

[Djinni]

sorry for the late reply, but when my mate changed his interface to windows 7 it was from a $1.00 app? how would that void the warranty?

Sounds like that is a theme/skin... which will not void your warranty, this is part of the normal, regular expected operation of the phone.
Changing the software the Phone uses to boot up, (the Operating System) however is not regarded as part of the users expected day to day operation of the phone. This will in most cases void your warranty. As there is a good chance the phone will stop working after the new operating system is installed.

Basically... anything that can be reverted/changed back via the "Restore to Factory Default" option in the Software that CAME on the phone is generally considered to be "normal operation" and will not void your warranty.

[Amity]

Sounds like that is a theme/skin... which will not void your warranty, this is part of the normal, regular expected operation of the phone.
Changing the software the Phone uses to boot up, (the Operating System) however is not regarded as part of the users expected day to day operation of the phone. This will in most cases void your warranty. As there is a good chance the phone will stop working after the new operating system is installed.

Basically... anything that can be reverted/changed back via the "Restore to Factory Default" option in the Software that CAME on the phone is generally considered to be "normal operation" and will not void your warranty.

Okay cool, thanks for that. Right now i'm just looking around for any more possible better deals on the S2 as it's pointless ordering anything on a Saturday hah