The Google Pixel 3 Review: The Ultimate Camera Test
by Andrei Frumusanu on November 2, 2018 11:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- camera
- Mobile
- Pixel
- Snapdragon 845
- Pixel 3
GPU Performance
GPU performance of the Pixel 3 should be relatively non-surprising for the most part – again we see the Snapdragon 845 at play and its Adreno 630 GPU should be performing excellently. This year the only real differences between devices was how vendors decided to set up their thermal throttling mechanisms and how the hardware itself is able to dissipate sufficient heat – as the SoC’s peak performance lies above the sustainable thermal envelope of a given device.
In the 3DMark Physics test, the Pixel 3 performs as expected in peak performance, however we see a more than usual decline is sustained performance compared to other Snapdragon 845 phones. Here it is possible Google has more strict thermal limits on the CPU.
The graphics results on 3DMark are more in line with other S845 devices, still the small Pixel 3 does end up slightly lower in performance. It’s notable that the Pixel 3 here ends up with a lower sustained performance score as the Pixel 2 family – showcasing the worst-case scenario for the SoC.
In the new Aztec benchmark, the new GPU architecture does help quite a bit in terms of differentiating itself from last year’s Pixels, however still the Pixel 3 ends up at the lower end of S845 phones in terms of the sustained performance.
Finally in Manhattan and T-Rex, the Pixel 3 ends up in the same ballpark range as last year’s Pixels – again a worst-case scenario for the new SoC.
Among Android devices the Pixel 3 doesn’t stand out too much from the competition, however is still going to be able to perform very well. One has to keep in mind GPU and gaming performance is very much tied to the hardware capabilities, and in this regard we’ll see major jumps with the next generation GPUs.
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Impulses - Saturday, November 3, 2018 - link
Bluetooth audio bandwidth has actually not increased since BT2.1+EDR AFAIK (half a decade ago), a lot of vendors trip over themselves to boast about the BT spec supported by the chip in their products but that's just all it is... The A2DP profile hasn't seen major changes and most of the bandwidth improvements in latter BT spec revisions were for BT LE and wearable devices that started off at a much lower floor (than A2DP over 2.1+EDR).The provisions for better 3rd party codecs like Sony's LDAC were even present in the BT spec all the way back then, that wasn't added in recent revisions, tho the codecs themselves have gotten better and now represent a decent improvement over stock SBC. I'm not knocking BT mind you, I think overall it's better implemented these days so there *has* been improvement in the user experience and SQ even if it's not due to spec revisions (and it's not).
I'm still not in favor of dropping the jack myself, but it's not a deal breaker for me. I use a BT adapter most of the time if I'm on the go (EarStudio ES100 right now) and have the dongle as a backup if that's out of battery. I have a pretty decent home setup tho and BT would absolutely be a bottleneck there, it still hasn't become totally transparent or enough for lossless the way the stereo BT profile is laid out AFAIK.
melgross - Sunday, November 4, 2018 - link
I can’t stand wired headphones for mobile devices. They’re more than annoying.serjrps - Friday, November 2, 2018 - link
Any plan to include the latest OnePlus camera updates in the review, maybe along with a OnePlus 6T review?HunterAMG - Friday, November 2, 2018 - link
Ah yes, the only review that matters.The only thing I disagree with, though, is with the quality of the included ear buds. They are not great for sure, but in my experience they are okay, and they match or surpass the apple ear pods' quality, which I was using before. I'm curious if you just happened to get a defective unit.
Andrei Frumusanu - Friday, November 2, 2018 - link
The Apple headphones are significantly better. I'll follow up with actual frequency response measurements of both.Andrei Frumusanu - Saturday, November 3, 2018 - link
Here's a very quick follow-up: https://twitter.com/andreif7/status/10586681768783...Rmrx8 - Saturday, November 3, 2018 - link
What's interesting to me is you now have ultra expensive phones that test your hearing and make a sound profile. Changing EQ to fit your profile and maximize your enjoyment of the music. Why would that be a thing if everyone heard all frequencies equally like a measuring device? You don't like them. That's fine. I like them and grab them more often than Apple's. I'll be the first to admit I'm older and my hearing is probably different from when I was a teenager. At the end of the day, it IS subjective for different people based upon age, ear shape, etc.Andrei Frumusanu - Monday, November 5, 2018 - link
> What's interesting to me is you now have ultra expensive phones that test your hearing and make a sound profile. Changing EQ to fit your profile and maximize your enjoyment of the music.The Pixels have no such option, the sound you get out of the box is what you're stuck with.
Rmrx8 - Saturday, November 3, 2018 - link
How old are you Andrei? It'll affect your subjective listening evaluations. I have no doubt google's buds will be inferior when scoped for frequencies. But a difference you can't hear is no difference. I find these less harsh in high frequencies than Apple EarPods, which I have used daily for over a year. I disagree strongly that Apples are "significantly better". They fall out of the ears too easily, and the earbud mic is too aggressive at staying off to avoid background noise. Then it cuts in and misses the first consonant of speaking. The Google mic stays "on" more and this the recorded sound is more even with less blasts of ambient hiss.Andrei Frumusanu - Monday, November 5, 2018 - link
> But a difference you can't hear is no difference.Let me be clear here, I did the FR after-the-fact of simply listening to them and comparing them to the buds from all other vendors. There's no point in arguing about subjective evaluation validity when comparing subjectively between units.