The Nexus 6 Review
by Brandon Chester on November 12, 2014 1:00 PM ESTWiFi
With the Nexus 6 we see a WiFi solution that hasn't been seen before in a mobile device, Broadcom's BCM4356. Announced at CES earlier this year, BCM4356 is a 2x2 802.11ac part with Bluetooth 4.1 support allowing for improved co-existence between Bluetooth and LTE. For reference, the Nexus 5 shipped with BCM4339 which is a 1x1 802.11ac part. To test WiFi performance on the Nexus 6 we used Iperf and Apple's AirPort Extreme router to try and achieve maximum performance.
The WiFi performance in the Nexus 6 falls into line for what we expect from a 2x2 802.11ac device. While it's slightly slower than Samsung's Galaxy Note 4, it's still much faster than many other devices that are on the market today, and over 3x faster than the WiFi performance of the Nexus 5.
GNSS
Most devices now use the GNSS solution built into Qualcomm's modem. I was someone who suffered the broken GNSS on the original Galaxy S, and I'm thankful that we've come to a point where every smartphone is now able to competently achieve a quick and accurate GNSS lock. In Airplane mode with no assistance information the Nexus 6 was able to achieve a lock in just under 35 seconds with an additional 5 seconds to bring the accuracy to within 10 feet, although both these times will vary greatly depending on the surrounding environment and weather conditions. With assistance info locks take only a matter of seconds.
Misc
To test NAND performance on the Nexus 6 we attempted to use Androbench and Andebench, but both gave results that could not have been accurate and so we are unfortunately unable to test this aspect of the Nexus 6 at this time. Like the new Moto X, the Nexus 6 has Cypress Semiconductor’s CapSense controller. Given that the Nexus 6 has no capacitive buttons, this is likely performing the same impedance-matching antenna tuning as on the Moto X which uses the same type of antenna design. It also has two TFA9890 speaker amplifiers which allows both speakers to be driven at the same time as stereo speakers.
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Chaser - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
If battery life matters there are better choices besides both those phones.Shftup - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Hi, can you validate the build, etc:Android Version: 5.0
Build Number: LRX21I
Kernel Version: 3.10.40-gb2ab3cc
Thanks
Kensei - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Is the Nexus 6 meant to be the next version of the Nexus 5.... or will there be an update to the Nexus 5 down the road?meowmanjack - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Were you able to test wireless charging at all? I'm curious if Motorola included an alignment magnet near the coil so it plays nice with the Nexus 5's wireless charging pad.mpokwsths - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
I don't see NAND benchmarks. In all previous reviews they were present. Could it be because of the performance doubling that Lollipop brought (in all the Nexus devices) using the same Androbench app? When, in a previous review, I mentioned that, the answer I got was "it is probably a dev preview incompatibility". Now we have the final Lollipop release...mpokwsths - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Or maybe that performance if only under Lollipop accurate???To the readers that haven't heard anything about that:
http://www.anandtech.com/comments/8613/the-samsung...
Brandon Chester - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
If you read the Misc section you'll see that the results were inaccurate when I tried to test, as in they were insanely slow, not fast.p-zilla - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Brandon, this is almost definitely due to having disk encryption on. Can you encrypt a Nexus 5 and do a comparison?tipoo - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Look at the Ars Technica review. Storage performance isn't looking that hot, slower sequential reads probably are responsible for some of the slowness opening apps.Chaser - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Imagine all the people that pre-ordered this phone. I recently bought the Sony Xperia Z3. Amazing phone with unprecedented battery life. Mostly because Sony's designers made a smart move and didn't fall for the Quad HD hype bandwagon. It has a brilliantly bright and vivid display and in the tradition of Sony, absolutely outstanding audio quality that I can take in the shower with me if I choose :)