Calling / Data, Messaging, Browser

Calling / Data

Samsung'south Google Milky way Nexus for Verizon offers pretty reasonable audio quality during vox calls. Inbound audio is quite pleasant, and outbound audio is adequate. Every bit an LTE 4G equipped phone, the Milky way Nexus is capable of some extreme data speeds. When in stronger signal areas, 15Mbps downloads and 9 Mbps uploads were common. However, when signal forcefulness dropped, I plant that the Galaxy Nexus had a much harder time with information than other Verizon LTE devices that we sitting right next to it, such as the Motorola Droid Razr. When the signal is not then strong, the Galaxy Nexus can have problem maintaining a data connection, flip-flopping back and along between 3G and 4G, and sometimes simply getting stuck.

While I don't expect a firmware update to better the phone'south reception abilities, I do look that a time to come update could make it deport better with lower force signals. Verizon says a related update is in the works. In addition to 3G and 4G connectivity, the Milky way Nexus also support Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n and Bluetooth. The phone can also tether over USB or share its connectivity though its Wi-Fi hotspot mode support.

Messaging

Like whatsoever Android telephone, the Google Galaxy Nexus offers up a fine suite of messaging capabilities. The built-in Gmail and standard email apps, which were beefed up and polished as role of the Ice Cream Sandwich update, handle multiple accounts with ease. The new text messaging app is very nice to look at and functional as well. Instant Messaging is express to Google Talk out of the box, but there are plenty of tertiary political party solutions bachelor from the Android Market. Social networking apps volition also demand to exist found in the Android Market, as none come pre-installed. The new Twitter customer does integrate tweets with the contacts application, though, which is cool.

Apps / App Store

While application support for Android 3.x Honeycomb tablets was a real sore spot, smartphones running Android 4 don't seem to have any large hurdles to overcome. Almost all of the apps I tested performed exactly equally I expected, which speaks well for the Galaxy Nexus user when it comes to the other couple of hundred thousand apps offered in the Marketplace. Apart from a few Verizon-branded services like VZ Backup Assistant and My Verizon Mobile, you'll detect no real bloat on the Milky way Nexus; just a ton of pre-installed Google apps that now includes Google+ right out of the box. The core Android apps have all been refreshed every bit part of the Os update, and so you will find a new calendar, reckoner, and clock app - amongst others - on the Galaxy Nexus.

Browser

Ane of the core components of Android to become a major upgrade is the browser, which is now based upon the same browser found in Android 3.x Honeycomb. Similar Google's Chrome desktop browser, the Android 4 browser supports tabbed browsing and WebKit-based rendering extensions. While I approve of the new interface and discover the browser to exist stable and quite functional, information technology's not equally smooth as it should be.

Even with the phone's 1.2GHz dual-core processor, there's withal a slight lag when you start to pan or scroll complex pages (even with Adobe Wink back up disabled). Information technology's not a huge deal, and the browser is very smooth otherwise, but it is a minor lark that should not be in that location.

I as well find that the browser doesn't render pages quite every bit accurately equally the old browser did, in that it appears to shrink columns of text downwardly more than it often should, which tin can outcome in misplaced ads and such. Usability has taken a solid pace forward, for sure, but at the price of some accurateness it seems.