Pixel 4a Review: More than the camera... By NothingButTech

I feel like so many people are saying that this phone is only about its camera, like its flagship level camera, and I'm here to tell you. I think that they're wrong, while this phone definitely focuses on its camera. There are two other major areas that I would say are like equally focused on, and I think that they're getting a little under covered and underappreciated, so I'm gonna definitely start at the review talking about those two things, and then we'll hit the camera, but to hold you over until then, I'm going to go get a cold brew and this next sequence is going to be filmed on the Pixel 4a, because it does have a pretty good camera all right. Let's do it all right that actually looked pretty decent. It did take a solid amount of work and post to make it look like that, but nevertheless it came from this film and that's pretty cool. Also, I don't think I said it yet welcome I'm Jaclyn if you're new here um, I started out this video saying that this one was about three main things which leads to the natural question of what is it not about, and the answer to that it is not about its build or performance or its extras, and that doesn't mean that those things are bad, but that definitely wasn't the focus.

However, the build is pretty great. It's not like your standard, metal and glass sandwich, but it embraces the fact that it's plastic, and I love it for that. It feels really cozy in the hand if that makes sense, and I also think that it looks super sleek and the size is also like really comfortable. So I've been testing out. So many big phones lately that, even though this phone is like a pretty decent size, it feels very compact to me and I kind of like it.

It's really easy to one hand throw in my pocket etc. and the screen size is still decent at 5.8 inches. It's also a 1080p OLED display. That's solid, it's 60 hertz, but let me remind you that the iPhone 11 Pro is also 60 hertz and there are some issues with performance and stuff that I'm going to address later, but I just want to make clear. I do not think it's because of the 60 hertz and the rest of the build is great.

It has a headphone jack up top and a stereo speaker system. So there has been a ton of speculation about if this phone has stereo speakers or if it's a mono speaker, it is stereo, I confirm with Google, so it uses the one down firing speaker and then the earpiece to create this stereo system, which a lot of other phones do, and it's great I listen to a ton of music on my phone without an external speaker, so it really needs to be good and google definitely delivered it's loud. There is some instrument separation, and it has like this nice colorful punch to it and I binge the whole thing in one day: it's like an hour and a half, it's so good. I learned so many things from that course, and then you have something secondary going on. That's like enticing keeps the attention in that video.

It was the fact that I kept changing angles. I did seven different April angles, so I'm pretty impressed with it, especially for the price, which leads me into the price. So I think we should address it right now, because it will be a framing factor for a lot of this video, and it will add some context, so the price is 349 and that pricing is definitely very intentional, not only to undercut the OnePlus word and the iPhone SE 2, but also just to appear differently to the consumer. So there was this like consumer psychology study a while ago. That was saying that, like the nine is like a charm number, because 349 feels really different to a consumer than 350, and it also means that google can market this and be like our phone's under 350, even though it's only one dollar under, so that feels like a smart move on Google's part, and I just want to note here that you can get over three Pixel 4a's for the price of one note, 20 ultra.

So keep that in mind, as I criticize this phone, because there definitely are flaws with it, as you can probably imagine, but for 349 dollars. It's packing a lot as we get into those criticisms, let's just close the loop on the display first, so the display is pretty good. It has pretty decent angles as well. Sometimes I noticed that the off axis viewing angles aren't incredible in comparison to other flagships, but when I'm looking directly at the display, especially it's great and brightness, feels pretty good as well, but it doesn't always feel like the fastest phone, and you can't really blame this on 60hz, because there are other 60hz displays that are great, and we've had them for years. It feels like this is much more processor based, so this has the snapdragon 730g, which is a predecessor processor, to the one that the OnePlus word has, and it shows so.

Although this phone is six gigabytes of ram, I do find slow down. It feels like it's a beat behind a lot of the time, not as much as when I'm in an application, but when I'm moving amongst them uh or when I'm taking a photo like. Sometimes it just feels a little off, and it definitely does not ruin the smartphone experience like when I'm actually in a game or an application. This phone feels pretty good, but I'm more worried about how it's going to fare over time. Like I'm cautious about that, because a lot of times with pixel phones, we get like this deterioration, where it gets slower and slower over time and less and less reliable, and only time will tell that.

So I don't know right now, but the processor definitely isn't the best, but what it doesn't have in speed. It makes up for, and software reliable provider check three years of guaranteed, updates check no skin and looks pretty clean check. Smart features that are pixel exclusive check. It's kind of packing software is one of those two things that I was discussing in the beginning of the video. I think that a lot of people forget that software is one of the main reasons why people get the pixel devices for its software and its security benefits, and there are a ton of them when you get a pixel call screen is one of them, and it's awesome for people like me, and maybe even like you do you get super stressed out when you see a phone call from a number that you don't recognize, and then you answer the phone call without trying to give anything away about yourself like hello, because I do- and it's always super embarrassing when I then know the person, and they're like why'd.

You answer like that. So call screen means that the Google Assistant will vet it beforehand. That's awesome. Super amped about it there's also live captions throughout the device, which is amazing and transcription, has gotten better on the phone, and it's still local, which for privacy concerns is great, also the now playing feature which isn't really that useful during Ovid, because I'm obviously not going to like a coffee shop where I'm going to hear a song playing but postcode with the fact that it's always recognizing music is great, and I haven't noticed any of these features. Taking a major hit on the battery.

The battery is a 3140 million power battery which doesn't sound excellent on paper, but because this phone has a really tame processor and a 1080p 60hz display, it's perfect, I'm getting all day battery life on this phone, which I'm super happy to say and that simplistic, but super useful software that I was talking about. It carries over to the camera app as well. So if you've been watching this video, and you're thinking like get to the camera here, I am getting to it, hoping I'm going to exceed your expectations right now, like this camera did mine uh. The photos are great they're, very pixel-esque, like contrast sharp, and they rely a ton on post-processing per usual, so sometimes in the viewfinder, especially in low light or nighttime. They'll look awful, like they'll be grainy, and I'm like ugh like is it going to pull through, and it almost always does? Google has like magical computational photography, and I'm so impressed with it, and video has also gotten better this year.

It's not as impressive as the photos are from this phone. It does have limited other modes so like the resolution and the frame rate is limited in comparison to other phones on the rear and front camera. But again you got to consider the price, and there is also some grain and noise and stuff and video that I don't get on other phones in the same environment, but it's definitely better than past years, and I hope that google continues to improve video and not just focus on photo, because I feel like they've kind of nailed the photo game in a lot of ways. I actually did a lot of shots on this phone and the note 20 ultra and a lot of the time the Pixel 4a was able to kind of keep up with the note 20 ultra, which is insane even for zoom. This phone only has one camera, so it lacks a lot of lens diversity.

It's not nearly as good as the zoom on the note 20 ultra, but for only having one lens. It is pretty good and that's because Google takes multiple shots and kind of puts them together to get like the sharpest zoom. So I was able to get like decent usable shots at closer, like maybe two to five times zoom, which is impressive. Obviously, it can't compete with the ultra ride because it just doesn't have it and that's an area where we see lens diversity, kind of like screw over this phone a little, but the camera honestly is like so impressive on the whole, like. I just actually did a camera comparison between this and the note 20 ultra I'll leave it here.

If you want to check it out, I was so impressed with this, and I think that it's more than just the camera, like the software and the three years of guaranteed updates, means that this phone is a solid package, and it's definitely worth your attention. If you're thinking about buying it- and you understand that it won't be the fastest phone on the market, I would say: go for it. I hope you enjoyed this video if you did definitely leave a like and subscribe I'll catch you in the next one. Thank you so much for watching, really appreciate you and your time. Bye.

Source : NothingButTech