We're back! Brian and I recorded this one just after the holidays last week. Despite there not being a lot going on release wise, we had a bunch to talk about. Brian gave us updates on his experience with the Lumia 920, Droid DNA and Samsung's Galaxy Camera. I talk a bit about what the future holds for driving smartphone costs down, and we both talked about Nintendo's Wii U.

The AnandTech Podcast - Episode 11
featuring Anand Shimpi & Brian Klug

iTunes
RSS - mp3m4a
Direct Links - mp3m4a

Total Time: 1 hour 48 minutes

Outline - hh:mm

Nokia Lumia 920 - 00:00
Wireless Charging - 00:08
The Lumia 920 vs. Windows Phone 8X - 00:10
Verizon's Droid DNA - 00:21
Driving Smartphone Costs Down - 00:31
Paul Otellini's Early Retirement - 00:44
Samsung Galaxy Camera - 00:53
Google Nexus 4 LTE - 01:09
Inside the Nintendo Wii U - 01:20
Black Magic Intensity Pro - 01:33
Apple iPad 4 - 01:35

As always, comments are welcome and appreciated. 

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  • usopen65667268 - Friday, November 30, 2012 - link

    Best podcast in the business by a mile! You guys are informative, humorous, nerdy, and above all else incredibly professional. I wish I could join a team like yours and contribute to what I believe is the Industry Standard in Technology. Keep up the great work and if you feel like you are getting buried and could use some help in whatever capacity possible, I would love such a gracious opportunity!
  • jessicahutchins - Monday, December 3, 2012 - link

    Alexis. although Barry`s comment is great, on monday I got a great new Lotus Carlton after having earned $4364 this last four weeks and a little over 10/k lass month. this is definitely the most financially rewarding Ive ever done. I started this nine months/ago and pretty much immediately started bringing in at least $75... p/h. I went to this website.. http://goo.gl/KVBmO
  • Cibafsa - Friday, November 30, 2012 - link

    Love the podcasts, always makes my week. Keep it up.
    Hope Brian caught the big kudos he got from the Engadget team on their Mobile podcast.
  • BellaLohan - Sunday, December 2, 2012 - link

    my co-worker's mother makes $78 an hour on the computer. She has been fired for 9 months but last month her pay was $14159 just working on the computer for a few hours. (Click on menu Home more information)
    http://goo.gl/961Xn
  • dishayu - Friday, November 30, 2012 - link

    Refering to the discussion around 25 min mark. I know this is a bit of a personal rant, but I absolutely can not and will not do without a physical keyboard. I was very very late on the smartphone bandwagon because there were no phones which had decent specs and a keyboard. I eventually bought a Xperia (not mini) Pro which i'm using still. Touchscreens are never and will never be as precise and nice-to-use as a physical keyboard. Although, I'm inclined to buy a Nexus 4 now because the nerd in me has a hard time resisting a knockout specsheet like that but i know i will hate using it because it has no keyboard. I wish someone comes out with a top shelf phone with a nice chunky keyboard and i would buy it in a heartbeat.

    I think of myself as a bit of an oldschool guy. I never even use my a laptop if i have access to a desktop. I don't like laptop keyboards, they're almost as bad as touchscreens. I NEED the chunky mechanical keys on my BWU to feel good using my computer.
  • s44 - Sunday, December 2, 2012 - link

    Try typing on a Note 2. It's ridiculously easy.
  • ssj3gohan - Monday, December 3, 2012 - link

    well, Im coming from a Milestone and finally made the switch to the Note (1) and while I agree the divide isnt that great (and I am a hardcore physical keyboard lover), a virtual keyboard still doesnt have the feel you need to do touch typing. It is still necessary to look where you are touching your phone. If nowadays there were a European phone with HTC Dream-quality keyboard and decent specs I would go for it. Otherwise the huge Note screen gives ample room for a confortable thumb-type keyboard.
  • teiglin - Friday, November 30, 2012 - link

    I'm not usually a podcast person, but I love listening to you guys. Thanks!

    Just want to toss in my 2c about one of Brian's becoming-ever-more-famous rants. While talking about the Droid DNA (and not ranting about the name, surprisingly), he mentioned the industry trend away from removable batteries and microSD slots. I agree mostly with what was said, but I had two points I wanted to make. First, on the battery thing, the issue for me with replaceable battery packs isn't swapping out the battery for a fully-charged one midday--this is a pain and not many people do this (though my brother is one of those people). However, lazy charging practices can easily damage batteries' longevity, and being able to replace that battery you know is only running at 70-80% of its new capacity with a $20 trip to Amazon is much more palatable than either voiding your warranty or trying to get a service center to replace it. As you say, between car chargers, microUSB battery packs, and simply bumming a cable/outlet somewhere (how many others have seen someone standing in the corner of a Starbucks with a plugged-in phone?), this isn't such a big deal. Having more ubiquitous inductive charging will also lessen the burden.

    On the other side, my impetus for a microSD in a phone isn't to change it out; it's to avoid paying $100 to get another $5 of cheap NAND cells in my phone. It is really pathetic that HTC released a 16GB-only device with otherwise purely top-of-the-line components. I currently get by okay with my tegra3 One X (which is 32GB and no microSD), but was always more comfortable with my previous 16GB+64GB microSD--that level of storage means not having to worry about app install sizes while also allowing enough room for the media or nandroids I want to keep on my phone. Cloud is nice but with data running ~$10/GB on American carriers, streaming everything all the time is just not realistic. Of course, that situation makes a Nexus 4 on a magenta prepaid plan look pretty attractive, but I digress.

    I realize 16GB is enough for many or even most people, but even my 63 year old mother has over 15GB of music on her phone as well as a few TV shows; she's fine with the 16GB+32GB microSD, and probably would be okay--if pushing it--on 32GB internal, but nonexpandable 16GB should be treated today as the embarassment it is. My point is that *high storage requirements are not unique to power users*. I'd perhaps be more forgiving if they had quality NAND cells with decent controllers, but as long as OEMs are using junk eMMC, they might as well load it up. I thought HTC was moving in the right direction with the One X+'s 64GB-only flavor, but the DNA proves that was the exception rather than the rule, I guess.

    Didn't really expect to rant this much. Did anyone read this whole thing? Thanks!
  • Peanutsrevenge - Friday, November 30, 2012 - link

    Read it and fully agree.

    While I DO carry around a spare battery with me (notoriously poor battery life phone, HTC Sensation), I don't see that as the point, rather the short overall life of current battery tech.

    Same with Storage, although I do enjoy the option to carry around A LOT of data on seperate microSD cards, I realise few others do this.

    What I don't understand is the current trend to ignore a not insignificant portion of the market, who will pay more than your average Joe for these features.
  • iacoa - Friday, November 30, 2012 - link

    SD slots take space so I don't care too much. But if phone makers are going to remove them then NAND shouldn't be so expensive. If I was Hynix, Samsung, or Micron I would extremely jealous of the margins smartphone makers are making off of NAND, especially Apple. 64 GB for $200? That costs $64 at most. Apple probably gets the best pricing so it costs even less.

    $200. For that much money you can get 256 GB SSD.

    Like Anand and Brian said smartphones will get cheaper. It will be interesting to see how Apple will react, but I don't think they'll be able to make sky high profits without losing market share.

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