30 Days of Nexus 5: The Bad

Part Two: Nexus 5 Problems

In this post, we are going over some of the issues that Nexus 5 users have reported, some of whcih we’ve previously told you about, some we haven’t. This is the second of three posts in which we’ll detail the Nexus 5 after 30 days on the market.

The first post, Nexus 5: the Good, talked about some of the awesomeness that is the Nexus 5. Our next post in the 30 Days series will detail the Ugly…

Nexus 5 Wi-Fi Issues

A number of users have reported that they have yet to be able to connect to Wi-Fi, or they are able to connect, but the Wi-Fi drops out automatically.

Nexus 5 Unboxing

Nexus 5 Unboxing by Punk17er

According to the workarounds some people have posted, we’ve been led to believe that this is another out of the box issue. Apparently, you can fix this by toggling the switch, or by rebooting the phone. If this doesn’t work, we suggest exchanging it for another.

Nexus 5 Camera Issues

While the Camera does in fact appear on the Nexus 5: The Good post, it’s actually only good for those who have received the Kit-Kat 4.4.1 update, which is why we’ll start with the camera here.

If you don’t yet have the Kit-Kat update, you’re probably experiencing a lot of issues with the camera and it could be better (typical of Android cameras). Some issues have included:

  • Blurry shots despite the optical image stabilizer
  • Bad low light performance
  • Washed out colors
  • Severely lacking contrast
  • Takes way too long to focus.

While initially many experts and Nexus 5 users thought that these issues were either hardware related, or their own camera taking issues, this in fact was not the case.

Nexus 5 White

Nexus 5 White by Yuxuan.fishy.Wang

As we know now, most of these issues with the camera are caused by faulty camera software that came courtesy of Kit-Kat 4.4, but since the update to 4.4.1, things have gotten better. You can read about the better camera here, but to recap, it’s got better and faster focus, more vibrant colors, not too blurry photos, and better contrast.

Nexus 5 Audio Issues: Unfortunately for Nexus 5, there are two audio issues. The first we told you about was the wired headset audio issue. Essentially, many Nexus 5 users are having problems plugging wired headsets into the smartphone. The issue is that sometimes the jack connects right and sometimes it doesn’t – mostly, though, it doesn’t.

This sent a number of users into panic, and many returned their phones in exchange for new ones, but even most of the new Nexus 5s had the same problems. The other solution is to use a wireless headset. Either way, problem solved. Read about the Nexus 5 audio issue here.

Compounding the headset audio issue was the speaker issue, in which users are having a difficult time talking on the phone at all. Well, nexus 5 owners can hear the person they are talking to, but the recipient of the Nexus 5 call cannot hear the user. Apparently, there’s a lot of static and the volume is way too low. We covered this audio issue here.

Nexus 5 Dead Pixel Issue: Of course, we can’t forget about the dead pixels that a large number of Nexus 5 owners have reported.

Dead Pixel Checker App

Dead Pixel Checker App on Google Play

While Google is making good on this issue, and affected users are able to return their devices to for an exchange the fact that dead pixels are showing up out of the box doesn’t bode well – especially considering some of the display issues people have had. Read more about the dead pixels here.

We can’t forget about the phone being vulnerable to SMS based DDOS attacks, either, which we covered here.

Have you had any issues with the Nexus 5? Let us know in the comments below!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

4 + ten =