SGSII vs Galaxy Nexus

[ijcy]

After reading the review i must qoute you here:
"So throughout my extensive testing I went from wanting a Nexus to being glad I opted for the S II LTE instead"

I too am glad i chose the GSII over waiting for the GN.
Thanks for confirming my stand.

[Steve Punter]

After reading the review i must qoute you here:
"So throughout my extensive testing I went from wanting a Nexus to being glad I opted for the S II LTE instead"

I too am glad i chose the GSII over waiting for the GN.
Thanks for confirming my stand.

One of the reasons I began testing phones was to find out FIRST HAND what different models had to offer. No matter how much you trust the opinion of another person's opinion, the only one who can say with any certainty which phone is right for you, IS YOU. I find that all reviews (regardless of what they are for) take you only part of the way there. Unfortunately for the average Joe, getting to compare different Smartphones side-by-side before they make the decision to buy is next to impossible (or at the very least, way too problematic).

Of course I believe that my reviews are as accurate as possible, but I'd be kidding myself if I didn't believe they weren't biased. No matter how unbiased we try to be, we can never escape the reality that EVERYTHING we think is colored by our personal worldview.

So when it comes to the Galaxy Nexus vs the Samsung Galaxy S II battle, I don't honestly believe there is a clear winner, even though I PERSONALLY have decided that the S II LTE is a better phone than the Nexus in my WORLDVIEW. The conclusions section at the end of my reviews is without a doubt the most biased part, in that I reserve it for pure opinion, rather than factual observations.

[howard]

The same was true when I tested the speed using the Primus web page (http://speedtest.primus.ca), but in the browser the Nexus lost BIG TIME when it came to latency. Using the Primus web page the ping times on the Nexus were generally twice as long as they were on the S2 LTE.

I brought both phones into the room where the router was located and I held them right up to the router for the best possible signal. Under these conditions they both performed equally as far as transfer rate was concerned (both pulled off 19.5 Mbps, compared favorably to 21.0 Mbps on my hard-wired laptop). However, the Nexus continued to perform poorly when it came to latency (~50 ms vs ~25 ms).

Steve, which WiFi router do you own?

[Steve Punter]

Linksys WRT54G, 8th edition with the Broadcom chipset.

Besides, if the router was at fault here, then the ping times would have been affected in both the Speedtest.net app as well as on the Primus web page, but it wasn't. The Speedtest.net app returns good ping times on the Nexus that were the same as on my S II LTE (approximately 25 milliseconds).

The point is that while the S II LTE achieves 25 millisecond ping times in BOTH the Speedtest.net app and on the Primus web page, the Nexus does not. It achieves only 50 to 55 milliseconds on the Primus page.

In addition, an extra 25 to 30 milliseconds of latency was observed in the Nexus browser (over that of Speedtest.net) when testing through the HSPA network. There was no difference in the latency of Speedtest.net or the browser on the S II LTE when tested on WiFi, HSPA, or LTE.

[howard]

Steve, can you download a ping test application (I grabbed 'ping') and try pinging your router? What kind of results do you get?

[Steve Punter]

I downloaded the PING app from the Android Market (as you suggested) and I had it perform 10 consecutive pings of my router (at 192.168.2.1). The results were as follows:

Minimum: 2.319 ms
Average: 3.354 ms
Maximum: 7.630 ms
MDev: 1.609 ms

[howard]

Do you still have the galaxy nexus?

[Steve Punter]

No, I handed it off to Howard Chu last night. He said that he was going to contact you, so I'm guessing that he didn't.

As for the results I posted in the previous message, they were apparently a fluke. After running the test numerous other times it seems that the average ping is roughly 15 ms. That makes sense, because my computer always get 10 ms ping times on speed tests, while the phone usually gets around 25 ms (10 + 15).

[howard]

I just did numerous runs on a Galaxy Nexus and got similar results - 15ms. I also ran the test on a few other Android phones and noticed similar results.

[Steve Punter]

I didn't have a problem with the Nexus and its ping times. In the Speedtest.net app it could pull off the same ping times as the Galaxy S2 LTE. The problem was in the browser, where the ping times were at least 25 ms worse than the S2 in its browser, or in the Speedtest.net app.

Sent from my SGH-I727R using Tapatalk

[HC - NO "i"]

Steve,

I have called the fellow HC right after talking to you. I am wondering if the Speedtest.net Android app may have any significant difference in behaviour if ad-block measure is in placed...

[Steve Punter]

Well, I have Ad Block on my S2 LTE and I DID NOT have it on the Nexus. Besides, Ad Block isn't as complicated as you might think. All it does is populate the HOSTS file with a list of known ad sites, which are then redirected to the local host. Now whenever an app tries to access one of these known ad sites it ends up connecting to the local host where it doesn't find what it's looking for. Since there is no change in the behavior of the browser (or any other app accessing the TCP/IP stack), it is unlikely this has any impact on the results.

[antonylewar]

In the design aspect the nexus is larger when compared to SII. However there isn't any difference in the width of the devices.

[supermanx5]

I have had both phones and am sort of torn between the two. Right now I use the GNex as my primary because of ICS (and the great screen), however overall I feel like the SGS2 was a bit smoother and had a better camera. I wrote an article comparing the two in depth for those of you who are interested. Can't post links yet but its on the site in my sig.

[acupoftea159]

Galaxy S2 for me. .

should create a poll.