• il y a 18 heures
Transcription
00:00Hey what is up guys, MKBHD here. This is the Pixel 4 XL. This is one of the phones I was
00:14looking forward to the most this entire year for 2019 for a couple of reasons. And so now
00:19I've been using it daily since its unveiling. This is my honest review. So let's just start
00:24with the way it looks. I honestly think it's a pretty decent looking phone. It's lowkey
00:29really clean. There's almost no markings along the back just the Google G at the bottom.
00:34Matte black aluminum rails as part of the design all the way around the phone. Speaker
00:38slots at the bottom lined up with the USB type C port. And the colored power button
00:42of course on every version. And the whole back of the phone on two of the colors is
00:46this soft touch matte finish which does a great job of not showing fingerprints. It
00:51doesn't seem to scratch very easily at all. So of the three colors available I'm gonna
00:55say this white this panda version is the best one. That power button is pretty sweet.
00:59Then I'm gonna say oh so orange is in second place. Not so great power button but at least
01:04it's matte. And then that jet black weirdly very glossy version is in third place. Fun
01:11fact though since the rails are still matte black you can slap a matte black dbrand skin
01:15on the back of any of these phones and you just created the matte black everything phone
01:20Google should have made in the first place. So link to that below and of course shout
01:23out to dbrand for sponsoring this video. The pixel square camera bump is again annoyingly
01:29a little bit raised but I don't find this as drastic as say Apple's larger double raised
01:35triple camera bump but more on the cameras later. So yeah you know what generally it's
01:39grown on me pretty decent looking phone. I was though let a little bit down by the not
01:44super clicky buttons just the volume ones mainly. But on the other hand something a
01:48lot of people have missed that's good to know. The phone is now IP68 water resistant.
01:53It still has the squeeze sensitivity for the assistant and it still has stereo speakers.
01:58So they're not front facing pair like they were last year but they are still a good sounding
02:02solid pair with the slots at the bottom and the earpiece speaker combined. The worst part
02:08about the way this phone looks is the front. The part you look at most of the time. I'm
02:13not a fan of the forehead. It has a smaller chin at the bottom than before but yeah that
02:17big forehead I don't like it. I'm still kind of barely getting used to it. And overall
02:22the reason for the forehead doesn't really have me convinced. So there's a cluster of
02:27new sensors up here in the top including the selfie camera then also infrared projector
02:32receiver and radar which is new in any smartphone. And this new sensor suite up here is good
02:37for two things. The fastest face unlock in any smartphone and some gestures. Okay maybe
02:43it makes me a little not forward thinking but I still like fingerprint sensors and
02:48this phone has none of that. The face unlock is the only biometric unlock this phone has
02:53and I find myself missing a fingerprint sensor. And the rate of improvement for fingerprint
02:57sensors under the glass has been pretty good. So that move was not my favorite. Pixel 4
03:03uses a radar sensor to essentially project a little bubble around the phone to see when
03:07things are near it, when things are in the bubble, when they enter it, exit it, etc.
03:12So when you reach for your phone basically your hand enters the bubble and it starts
03:16firing up the infrared and face unlock sensors early so by the time you pick the phone up
03:21it's already reading your face and logging you in. And it's incredibly fast over and
03:26over again. It's super impressive. Possibly too fast. This kind of reminds me of the OnePlus
03:316 and other phones that would just do face unlock with just the RGB cameras so they'd
03:35be insanely fast. They would just see anything that looks like you and just unlock as soon
03:40as you glance at it. So this isn't that. It's still infrared so it still can't be fooled
03:44by a photo or video of you. It still works in the dark and things like that so it's
03:49got advantages but it's still a little bit wild. I find myself just unlocking this phone
03:53left and right all the time. Anytime I even just look at it. Sometimes I pick up the phone
03:57just to move it across my desk and I'll just glance at the time and it unlocks the phone.
04:01It also doesn't require your attention so it will unlock with your eyes closed. That's
04:08a bit of a weird security quirk. And it actually even tells you it'll do this in the settings.
04:12When you turn this on it says looking at the phone can unlock it when you don't intend
04:17it to. And your device can be unlocked by someone even if it's held up to your face.
04:21Even if your eyes are closed. And potentially could be unlocked by someone who just looks
04:25a lot like you. These are things that could potentially be fixed or improved with a software
04:29update and Google's been pretty good about software updates. But as of right now they're
04:33just pretty annoying. My solution is turn off the skip lock screen option. So if I
04:37do accidentally unlock it at least it won't be awake for a while. It just sits on the
04:41lock screen and then it'll go back to sleep. But yeah I mean that's what I think I mean
04:44when I say I would have liked a fingerprint reader option. It's a little safer. We're
04:49a little more used to it and it just sort of works when we need it and doesn't when
04:52we don't. So that's face unlock. But then these sensors also enable a couple very specific
04:56gestures. So anytime you're in a situation you can wave over your phone and use the
05:01gesture. The status bar sort of lights up. It starts glowing and that means it's ready.
05:07So those situations are alarm clocks, timers, media controls and a Pikachu live wallpaper.
05:15And there are no instructions like really built into Android. There's none in the Android
05:2010 setup for example. Nothing really tells you what's going on when you first get that
05:24glowing bar. You just kind of have to know. So when an alarm or a timer is going off as
05:29your hand enters that radar bubble it quiets the alarm and then you can dismiss it by
05:34tapping or swiping away over the phone. That for me was my favorite. It worked really well.
05:39I can sleep with my phone on this pixel stand next to the bed and when the alarm goes off
05:44I just reach for it and it's already quieting down.
05:50The other thing that was less consistent for me is music apps. So if you're in Spotify
05:54or Google Play Music or any supported app where that glowing bar starts showing up
05:59you can swipe forward and swipe back through previous and next tracks. And yeah that's
06:07it. Just forward and backwards. When I first tried this at the event I was getting a success
06:11rate of like 10%. I'm not even exaggerating. Like it was pretty abysmal. Now with some
06:17troubleshooting and practice and some tips from Twitter I'd say I'm up to like a 70%
06:24swipe success rate. Maybe 75. So it's less of like a big arm movement although that
06:29sometimes does work. But it's more of like a casual swipe. Not too close to the phone.
06:34Like right around where that radar bubble might be. I think the real problem is it doesn't
06:39show you or tell you how to do it better. The Made by Google Twitter account they tweeted
06:43at me saying you can go to the Pixel Tips app which is pre-installed on the Pixel.
06:48Click save time and then click try it. And then there you will find a demo if you want
06:53to practice it. But even then there isn't actually, I tried it, there isn't actually
06:57any feedback. It's just letting you practice. So all of that being said I'm still not going
07:03to use these. It sort of falls in that same gimmick bucket as the G8's weird hover hand
07:09swiping action. If it told me how to do it better maybe I'd be more into it. But yeah
07:14not going to use these. If there's anything to love about the front of this phone it's
07:18the new display. Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL have made the jump to smooth, high-res, high
07:24refresh rate 90Hz displays. My favorite trend in smartphones of the past year or so. It's
07:29difficult to show you exactly how much better that looks. Obviously I keep saying on camera
07:33because this is a 30fps video. You know the correct frame rate. But in person it makes
07:37a huge difference. And every time a new phone comes out with a 90Hz or higher display I
07:42can see a serious difference versus 60Hz. It comes with some trade-offs though. It's
07:47not the brightest display. Sometimes daytime visibility is pretty weak unfortunately. So
07:52I'm keeping this phone at max brightness often. And high refresh rate also requires more power.
07:58So you're going to see a hit on battery life. Now initially I was, we're all concerned about
08:03the battery life on Pixel 4. Knowing it has a high refresh rate. And then the XL having
08:07a 3700mAh battery. And the smaller Pixel 4 having a 2800mAh battery. It's one of the
08:14smallest I've seen in a phone in a while. But impressively these phones have had for
08:21me okay battery life. But there's a big reason for that. I was briefly messaging Dave2D.
08:26He's testing the smaller Pixel 4. And he said he's getting around 5 hours of screen on time.
08:32Which if I take his word for it, that's actually pretty impressive. For me I've been getting
08:37around 5 hours on this XL on 90Hz. Which, you know, that's C+. Which is a lot better
08:45than the F I thought it could be. Turns out the reason this phone has been able to get
08:49even okay battery life is because it ratchets down to 60Hz constantly. All the time. It's
08:56supposed to be smart about it. So it says when you turn on smooth display that it'll
09:00turn back down to 60Hz when you're not looking at it or you're not using it much. And then
09:05ratchet it back up to 90 when you're swiping or you see animations and stuff. But I found
09:09often it just stays at 60Hz for extended periods of time for no apparent reason. It almost
09:14seemed like it was defaulting to 60Hz most of the time and then sometimes bumping up
09:19to 90Hz for scrolling and some other things. I started to not like it. I started to find
09:24that this phone felt significantly choppier like any other 60Hz phone than say the OnePlus
09:307 Pro which seems like it's almost always at 90Hz. So I was like okay this isn't great.
09:35It's not my favorite implementation of 90Hz. It's smooth sometimes but it's almost like
09:40a tease that it switches back and forth so much. So I'm like digging around in developer
09:44options just to see if there's anything new. And there is. I found an option that I'd never
09:49seen before. It's called Force 90Hz. And it just keeps the display at 90Hz all the time
09:55no matter what's happening on the screen. Closer to what OnePlus does. And it's made
09:59a huge difference. Now it's always smooth. So I guess pro tip. If you're one of those
10:03people who's more of a power user and uses their phone all the time and wants to see
10:08that 90Hz happen, you can go in the developer settings, scroll down, find Force 90Hz and
10:13turn it on. It will obliterate your battery life. It's definitely even worse now. Closer
10:18to a D. It's not lasting all day. But at least it's smoother now. Anyway I also found that
10:25it has ambient EQ which is supposed to be auto adjusting the color temperature depending
10:29on the light around you. Kind of like Apple's True Tone on the iPhone. But I found it much
10:34more subtle so I just left it off. It's not nearly as dramatic. And overall it's just
10:39not the flashiest or most eye catching or dramatic display on any smartphone. It doesn't
10:44curve over the edges or anything. But it's 90Hz, it's 1440p, it's OLED and it's flat.
10:51So listen, we all know what the Pixel 4 is about. It's what the Pixel 3 was about. And
10:56it's what the Pixel 2 was about. It's the cameras. And we got some new cameras on the
11:00back of the Pixel 4. There's dual cameras back here. It's a 12MP primary camera and
11:05a new 16MP 2X telephoto camera. Um, okay. If you told me the Pixel 4 would have the
11:13first second camera of any Pixel phone and asked me what would be the most useless second
11:19camera they could put in the Pixel. Right behind like a black and white depth sensor
11:24or a time of flight camera, I would have put like a 2X telephoto lens. Just behind like
11:32an ultra wide clearly being way more fun or a 3 or a 5X telephoto or any of that other
11:37stuff. But that's what we got. We got 2X telephoto. But you know what? Specs are just one thing.
11:42I gotta actually use it in person. That's what I've been doing. Maybe it'll change my
11:47mind. Yeah, it didn't really change my mind. Typical photos from the Pixel 4 are very similar
11:53to Pixel 3. Great dynamic range. Great sharpness and detail. Very contrasty and punchy and
12:00dramatic. And biasing a little bit towards cooler tones typically if anything. But they're
12:05excellent photos. They've got this image processing pipeline and their HDR down to a science.
12:11And that didn't shock anyone thankfully. So that's good. And the improvements in the viewfinder
12:15are cool too. You now have real time approximation of the HDR effect you're going to get applied
12:20before you even snap the photo. So there's no guessing. You can pretty much just see
12:24what the final photo is gonna look like as you're taking it. Plus there's new sliders
12:27for exposure and shadow adjustment that can be really cool and you can mess with if you
12:32want. But then having a second lens should mean portrait photos are better now because
12:35you have two lenses and you can finally do depth data between them. I found that they're
12:41about the same. Matter of fact, some of the ones I took of Mac here look worse than any
12:45I ever took on the Pixel 3. Just look at that cutout failure. That's pretty terrible. Maybe
12:50I shouldn't depend on pet photos for my testing of portrait mode, but I'm not exactly convinced
12:55by that. But generally on photos of people, it's doing about the same job with that aggressive
12:58cutout. And then speaking of portrait mode, you actually can't do wide portrait photos
13:03anymore, which the Pixel 3 took some of the best wide portrait photos, but it gets even
13:08more double weird when you actually look into it. So Pixel 3 took some pretty great portraits
13:13with one wide camera, right? When you switch to portrait mode on the Pixel 4, it automatically
13:18zooms in, but not quite to 2X, to about 1.7 or 1.8X. But then it doesn't let you zoom
13:25out and take wide portrait photos like the iPhone does. But as I'm messing with this,
13:29I realized if I cover the telephoto camera while I'm in portrait mode, nothing happens.
13:34It's still using the main camera for portrait mode photos. It's just using the second camera
13:40for depth approximation. So why does it zoom in? I have no answer for that. So basically
13:46the best thing about having a telephoto camera is for zoomed in photos. I don't take a lot
13:51of zoomed in photos, but I did notice them higher quality. So if you're someone who likes
13:54to go 6, 8X zoomed in, you'll appreciate the better super res zoom. There you go. Anyway,
14:00the question still is, is this the best camera in any smartphone? Because I think we can
14:05all agree Pixel 3 was top of the stack last year, but now the field is catching up, especially
14:10iPhone 11 Pro. So which is better? Okay, honestly, in daylight for most photos, I prefer Pixel
14:17photos. I definitely like that contrasty, punchy, detailed look. Same with wide angle selfies,
14:23punchy, detailed. I'm a fan. In lower light though, I actually start to prefer iPhone
14:28photos. And I know the Pixel just got astrophotography capabilities that are really cool. And night
14:33sight has always been great for well over a year now, but they get a little more dramatic
14:38and as a result, a little more noisy. And iPhone's new night mode and deep fusion, I
14:43think stay truer to life and as a result, better in quality. Fun fact, I actually did a collab
14:48that's live now with SuperSaf in one of his legendary side-by-side photo comparisons. So
14:53that's the best way to see the differences between the two. So you can see iPhone 11
14:56Pro versus Pixel 4 side-by-side in all their glory. I'll leave a link below to that. So
15:01is this the best camera in any smartphone? Sometimes. I'm going to say it's a toss-up
15:05depending on the scenario and that's not a cop-out. I gave my reasons. But if I could
15:10only pick one, which is a sort of a different question, I would pick iPhone 11 Pro because
15:15it's more versatile. It has the ultra wide and it absolutely crushes it in video. Like
15:20video is just not as much of a focus with the Pixel 4's camera anymore. No pun intended.
15:26It tops out at 4K 30fps, which Google tweeted is because it would basically take up too
15:31much storage, but then like you could have still enabled it in settings if you really
15:35cared, right? And that also doesn't explain why it doesn't have 24fps video, which would
15:40have been a cool addition. And it also tops out at 1080p from the front facing wide camera.
15:45So just generally, if you're in it for video, you shouldn't be looking at Pixel. You should
15:50be looking at iPhone 11 Pro. My Pixel versus iPhone camera graph is like this pair of
15:54lines where the middle is where most photos are taken most of the time. And that's where
15:59I prefer Pixel. But on the edges of photography like low light or ultra wide, then the iPhone
16:05does better. So there, hopefully that explanation makes sense. And then you can't forget Android
16:1010, which gets the special treatment on the Pixel since it's Google's baby. There are
16:14some good features here that add to how smart it is as a smartphone. You already heard about
16:20the radar bubble and the smart unlock features. They moved the text-to-speech offline local
16:24on the phone. So text-to-speech is way faster and way more consistent. I love that you can
16:31talk as fast as you want and it just works. And there's a new voice recorder app that
16:35takes advantage of that to live transcribe everything you say and then indexes that text
16:41to make it searchable. That's like an S Pen level feature. I personally probably won't
16:45use it too much, but I can see how people who use that would find it a really big deal.
16:49But yeah, the best part of the Pixel again is how refined Android is. If you want the
16:54latest version of Android, if you want to be first with updates, if you want the coolest
16:58edge features and the assistant and all that, this is the phone to get. So overall, many
17:04of the conclusions about Pixel 4 are of course about how disappointing it is, which I think
17:09is an easy conclusion to reach if you followed all the leaks and nothing really surprised
17:13you and there are things that are let down. I personally really enjoyed using Pixel because
17:17of the punchy, confident, excellent camera for still photos and the 90 Hertz display,
17:22which a lot of phones don't have yet. And of course the extra RAM, finally a smooth
17:27Pixel phone. But this isn't a phone I'm going to go around recommending to everyone. It
17:31still needs a bigger battery, still needs more storage, and it's just generally not
17:36complete for most people. So I guess if you're like me, which is in a tiny group of people
17:41who really like high refresh rate screens, of course value the camera and want the latest
17:47version of Android and these quick updates and things like that, and you're willing
17:50to overpay because we all know the Pixel is a bit overpriced for the storage you don't
17:54get, then sure, I recommend the Pixel. It's great for people like that. But for most people,
18:00I'm not going to end up recommending the Pixel 4, mainly because of the battery, but also
18:05because there are just better deals out there right now, including the cheaper iPhone 11.
18:12Weird to say, but it kind of hits the ear funny, but it's true. So there you have it,
18:15the Pixel 4, possibly a victim of the hype machine of being the most leaked phone of
18:21all time. I kind of wouldn't be surprised if it happens again next year, but either
18:26way, now you know what it's like to own it. And I'm curious, are you in this tiny group
18:30of people who would like this Pixel experience? Let me know. Either way, thanks for watching.
18:37Catch you guys in the next one. Peace.