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Credit to Author: Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols| Date: Wed, 27 Dec 2017 09:35:00 -0800<\/strong><\/p>\n It was that biannual time again when I must buy a new smartphone. My Samsung Galaxy 7\u2019s battery wasn\u2019t holding a charge like it used to, and it was getting a little slower and crankier. So I started looked at the new generation of smartphones. And, after considering both minor- and major-league smartphones such as the Samsung Galaxy 8<\/a>, iPhone 8<\/a> and iPhone X<\/a>, I got a Google Pixel 2<\/a>.<\/p>\n Why? Well, let me start with why I rejected the other big-name phones. First, the iPhones\u2019 software is trash. IOS 11 has had one bug after the other<\/a>. Then there\u2019s the fact that Apple deliberately and secretly slows down iPhones as their batteries age<\/a>. With tech friends like these, who needs enemies?<\/p>\n The iPhone X is also too large for my hands. If I wanted a tablet, I\u2019d buy one. I\u2019ve found the X to be really awkward. If you play basketball or piano, I\u2019m sure you can use it. I can\u2019t.<\/p>\n As for the Galaxy 8 family, I find it, like the iPhone X, to be too large to be comfortable. Then, there\u2019s Bixby<\/a>, Samsung\u2019s answer to Siri and Google Assistant. Let\u2019s just say that this answer failed in its first attempt and leave it at that.<\/p>\n The Pixel 2 has good ergonomics. That\u2019s a fancy way of saying that its 5.74-in.-by-2.74-in. size is comfortable. It has a fingerprint scanner in the back, which is easy to use. I pick it up, I\u2019m in. No sweat.<\/p>\n Its OLED, Gorilla Glass 6-in. diagonal screen with its 1,440-by-2,880-pixel display is a pleasure to view. The Pixel 2\u2019s cameras, 12.2 megapixels on the back and 8 megapixels on the front, are great and work remarkably well in low light. And that was before Google activated its Pixel Visual Core, a new dedicated camera-image processor.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been playing with Pixel Visual Core, and it improves my photos by giving them the HDR+<\/a> treatment. This makes any photos you might take with an app that uses Android\u2019s standard Camera API better by taking a bevy of quick shots and then combining the best of them into the photo you see. It sounds quirky, but the results are great photos with vibrant colors.<\/p>\n I am a lousy photographer, but even my shots turn out looking great.<\/p>\n To activate the Pixel Visual Core, you need to be running the latest version of Android: Android 8.1, Oreo<\/a>. Oh, and did I mention that as a Google flagship phone, my Pixel 2 came with Android 8 and it automatically updated to 8.1?<\/p>\n This, to me, is one of the Pixel 2\u2019s killer features. While other Android smartphones take forever and a day to get upgraded, the Pixel 2 gets the latest big updates and security fixes as soon as they\u2019re ready for prime time.<\/p>\n This is especially important for business phones. It\u2019s bad enough when a security bug mucks up your phone. It\u2019s an entirely different level of mess when your corporate mobile security is fouled up.<\/p>\n I can\u2019t recommend highly enough that when you upgrade your business phone, you should get a model that provides timely updates. You wouldn\u2019t let your servers or PCs run without security updates. Why would you do any less with your smartphones?<\/p>\n With endless Android security problems \u2014 what is this? Windows? \u2014 I want the newest, most secure operating system on my phone. And that\u2019s what I get with the Pixel 2.<\/p>\n Its other killer feature is the eSIM<\/a>. While the Pixel 2 also has a traditional SIM slot, you can use the embedded SIM (eSIM)<\/a> to switch carriers on the fly. Supporters of eSIM include AT&T, Verizon, Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom, Google Project Fi<\/a>, Telef\u00f3nica and T-Mobile. If you do a lot of business travel, especially international business travel, as I do, eSIM\u2019s remote provisioning lets you switch networks, which can save you a lot of money.<\/p>\n By the time I was finished looking at phones, I knew I had an easy call to make. The Pixel 2 is simply the best smartphone out there. At a list price starting at $599<\/a> and special deals for<\/a> hundreds less from Verizon<\/a>, I think you\u2019ll agree.<\/p>\n http:\/\/www.computerworld.com\/category\/security\/index.rss<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Credit to Author: Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols| Date: Wed, 27 Dec 2017 09:35:00 -0800<\/strong><\/p>\n It was that biannual time again when I must buy a new smartphone. My Samsung Galaxy 7\u2019s battery wasn\u2019t holding a charge like it used to, and it was getting a little slower and crankier. So I started looked at the new generation of smartphones. And, after considering both minor- and major-league smartphones such as the Samsung Galaxy 8<\/a>, iPhone 8<\/a> and iPhone X<\/a>, I got a Google Pixel 2<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n