Pixel 9 – Why I got one

Yeah I got the new Pixel 9 base edition, no pro, this is after owning a Pixel 6 Pro, 5a and 2 XL in that order. Before that it was an iPhone 6s jailbroken and a Samsung Galaxy S4 w/ a custom ROM, but them cucked by having a TouchJizz one due to the boot locker.

Basically me whining about “upgrading”

Main reasons why I “downgraded” was that I didn’t want a bigger phone anymore, the smol size to fit in my pocket and hand was a priority. Additionally I didn’t need a third camera lens, the 3rd camera wasn’t a big deal w/ the 6 Pro and I currently am shooting a Nikon Z9 or Zfc… For a moment I was considering getting a Moment case/lens for a phone but nahhh, if I had a basic 1 camera maybe.

The iPhone 15 looked to be promising, but Apple is so shit. USB-C speeds/charging limited on the base machine, so upgrade to the “Pro” to get all the base features fucking all phones/computers/tablets that have USB-C come with? ha. I had bought an iPad Pro 6th generation in 2024, like months before the 7th gen came out LOL. So that is my Apple ecosystem fix, but I haven’t really been using it, nor have I been using the 1st gen MacBook 12 from 2015, maybe I’ll get back into it if I nab an iMac of some sort of MBA M3-4.

My Previous Phones & Nostalgia

• Some flip phone w/ a rotating selfie/front camera – 2006?
• LG enV2 or enV3 in 2009, 2010 or 2011?
• Some slider phone maybe
  • I forget, I just remember my ex GF breaking my phone because we were dramatic and I dunno if its after the enV or before x3
• Samsung Galaxy S4 in 2013
  • I dropped & cracked the screen and Asurion gave me a cuckbootlocked one
• Apple iPhone 6s
  • Jailbroke that bish, godtier for a good while
  • S4 got lost bc it was in my car NYE 2015/16, which got stolen….
• Google Pixel 2 XL on October 2017
  • Pixelbook to go along w/ it around December 🙂
  • Cracked the 2XL and did a botch job replacing the screen
• Pixel 3a in late 2020?
  • Bought this Mofo used :D, twas like $130 or sumshii
• Pixel 6 Pro on October 2021
  • Returned the Pixel 2XL for that Verizon credit
  • Cracked the screen and did a crap job replacing it
  • Fingerprint reader on the screen stopped working
  • dead black pixels around the punch out camera
• Pixel 9
  • Might turn in the Pixel 3a for that $$ off payment plan
  • Keeping the 6 Pro because muh WebMs and movies

First off, I have to say, I wish we still had a physical keyboard on a phone. Voice to text is a good solution to not using a number pad, but memorization of the button presses you had to do to text is a LOT better than trying to text with a touchscreen or even swiping. I am saying this is the reason why there are more car crashes now. Yes more people are using phones, but damn… people dunno how to pay attention, and those who had their number pads memorized, did not get one word wrong when texting while driving! Can’t say the same with touchscreens or voice to text not knowing what you said!

Now the enV2 or enV3, had that shid in burgundy, was badass to type on. Less button presses because it had a mini keyboard. I’d probably rock w/ that T-Mobile Sidekick or Moto RAZR if I had the money to afford one… Anyways, those were awesome, and served me pretty good til I built my first computer in 2011 and eventually bought and fixed my first ThinkPad X61 Tablet in 2012. I was the “techie” with the laptop that was like an iPad as well in the HD (San Bernardino High Desert community). Always took it to my Starbucks job and a lot of people never seen that 2007 technology around. I mean the iPhone really didn’t take off until the 3G came out in 2008 and people started to replace their Blackberry or other slide/flip phone with them.

I wanted to get a smart phone, and I wanted to have my own phone number away from my parents plan. Instagram was the killer app on the iPhone when release in 2010, friends of mine who had that app and posted a photo on myspace was amazing. We still had shitty point and shoot digital cameras that didn’t do much, I was meh on Photoshop CS2, everyone had a pirated version of it as it was standard w/ Kazaa, Limewire or BearShare power users. Those with cool MySpace profiles (or GaiaOnline if MapleStory wasn’t enough or out of reach) had a template, or knew how to “code” with simple HTML skills, JavaScript and those wonders with flash… it was a different time compared to the staleness we have now. I mean, I am stuck with this WordPress, if I knew how to do something more complex, I would, but I’ve seen plenty of fansites, Shrines and community websites just get lost and forgotten over time.

Back when I was in High School, I discovered the internet in 2002 thanks to my school library. I found Mark Simmon’s Gundam website and it was the greatest thing after finding anime and my love for Gundam Wing. From there I found MAHQ net and man… the lore is out there, but uhm anyways, I have this meh website. Where was I at about MySpace? Oh yeah Instagram, after awhile it became released with Android. I was still a ThinkPad newb, and gotten interest in Linux when I had bought an X61s ThinkPad, because dualbooting was annoying (mSATA wasn’t available in ThinkPads until the T400, but at the time it was way expensive and I was having fun with IBM era machines). Anyways, Android seemed to be the way, as I was shilled by 4chan to believe ThinkPads are better than MacBooks (I mean they still are).

So I got my S4 and maybe after a month I did the dive and rooted my phone to install a custom ROM. I used AOSP and man, that thing was amazing, I forgot what game I played, but it loaded wayyy faster, the batterylife was better and the customization was sooo much more. After like a year, I dropped my phone after posting like 3 women crush Wednesdays. I was switching my phone case to the arm band I used when I used to go run/jog. I had a weird contraption with earbuds, I forget what I was using, maybe KOSS PortaPros but I may have been using the Sony MDR-V6 as well. it was something… LOL, I stopped using my SanDisk Clip or Sansa player. I forget how I listened to music on the Samsung S4… maybe di.fm, or was it an early version of Google music? I just remember listening to Death Grips and The Smiths lmao on that phone when in my hometown. Anyways, when I got my phone replaced from Asurion, I wasn’t able to root and use a custom ROM like I used to. Because of Samsung’s bootlocker, key or whatever the fuck it was. I wasn’t able to use a non-TouchWiz ROM, I had to use a TouchJizz compatible thing, and well it wasn’t as fast as AOSP, but it was decent. Still had piggfat and bullshit apps from Samsung/Verizon that would lag that thing every so often.

Apple iPhone 6s

It was time to change. I moved from the HD to San Diego, and I had a gigantic culture shock in 2014. I still live here, and love the city… I’m from a small town (not small to my Michigan GF of 100 people in hers but w/e), but just everything out here is amazing. I was able to transfer to another Starbucks store and I was working in the Gaslamp in Downtown. It was fun as hell, I wanted a change, the S4 was a good change but I slowly kept on dying inside by not having my OTP girlfriend anymore so I wanted to switch to iPhone. At this time I did change my number, because I was afraid of her (I destroyed a lot of my personality and hobbies bc it reminded me of her) and didn’t want her to contact me… She ended up w/ a guy I hella hated and years later I found out he was a complete POS and I could have… I’m not gonna go into that, I mean, she chose to not ask anything from me or for help.

I was fixing laptops and computers from my posted ads on craigslist, and my god, did people pay so much better in San Diego vs San Bernardino. A $20 job in my hometown (with fucking up to 1 hour travel), this was an easy $30 job w/ a tip (which was the first time I’ve come across) and it was a 30 min drive in heavy traffic AND the client’s were cool with that!!!! Anywho, when I got a coldcall about an eWaste / electronic recycling job… I went in and did everything to get it. Hahahaha I remember going in with my ThinkPad S70 (X300) and trying to be so cool, when everyone else had a MacBook. It didn’t matter, it was legit like… idk, I felt like I wasn’t going to be taken seriously, bc of my main laptop. But anyways it didn’t matter bc I got the job and then from there learned much more of OSX. Really it all depended how you fix shit and my boss was cool with me working for free tinkering after hours on the equipment I got.

Ummm yeah I got the iPhone 6s and that shit was nice as fuck. So stupid, but the Apple superiority is a thing. However I was able to jail break that phone, and like… I was above other fuckers who had that phone. Like I was able to listen to YouTube w/ the fucking screen, off AND didn’t have to deal with ads. It was a different time, YouTube eventually had a plan where they offered that, but I didn’t need it LMAO. Sorta like when MicroSoft had made their YouTube app and gave you the ability to have no ads LOL. I still rocked the S4 on the side for Android specific things, oh I was playing Ayakashi Ghost Guild til it ceased…

The iPhone 6s was cool, but coming across a Nexus phone at the eWaste job and tablet. I really liked the thing, we had used it for taking pics and listing on our eBay store. it was really neat and reliable. I heard about the Pixel but didn’t go for it, this was after having the Pixel 2013 laptop that I bought used, and finding a fucking spectacular deal on the Pixel 2015 laptop… they sold it as whatever the model/serial number was posted on the bottom, CB-002 or whatever it was. I got it for like $300, and then sold it for like $900, which at the time was selling for $950! I got about $500-600 after eBay fees and price I payed.

I really liked ChromeOS and how it worked. Yeah I got out of using LXLE on my ThinkPad X61 tablet and… I think I had gotten the T430s w/ the FHD IPS mod too? 2015/16 was the time I started to make dankpads and being the price guide for laptops, and I was heavy using Google Chrome & Sheets for it a lot. man… having your bookmarks available on all your devices was such a fuckign nice feature. idk if I could resume browsing on the iPhone 6s from my Google logged in devices on my computers…

Pixel 2 XL

The Google Pixel 2 XL was meant to go up against the iPhone 8 Plus, and iPhone X… I saw the 2XL as the better of all worlds, and didn’t want to go with the Galaxy S9+ beause of the TouchJizz. Yeah the Google phone would be cucked with no custom roms or whatever, but I wanted the stock Android and well, it’s the device made specifically by Google so it would get the best software? Actually no, but man did I love the cameras on this thing.

I had gotten a job being a process server, and I swear Google was boosting my picture posts on Google Maps because it was a pixel device. I loved that I had unlimited storage w/ the maximum resolution this camera took a pic with. I loved using the Google Photos cloud feature. I shilled this with all my friends and family who could get it. It was a one stop solution to backing up photos with ease! At the time I really liked the big screen, yeah my iPhone 6s was nice and small and yeah, the Pixel 2 XL was much less “fixable” than the iPhone or S4… but all of the companies were going this way. The 2XL was amazing for me to use, when I was doing my process server job and watching videos with it, way easier than using my laptops at the time.

yeah and I had gotten the Pixel book. The instant hotspot feature like never worked, and took awhile to get it running… like it was just faster turning on hotspot on your phone and then flipping the Pixel book open. It would be a hit or miss if the Pixel book would connect to my phone and get “instant internet” working. With that said, the integration was nice, but the Pixel book slowly gotten rid of compatibility with Android apps. No longer did I Have a nice 12″ laptop to work with my apps anymore, they wont work! It was super lame, and so I would “need” a stand alone tablet to make its need. Its one of the reasons why I got the iPad, but I’ve yet to have its own keyboard case thing, tho I do have that Logitech Bluetooth Pop keyboard… don’t use it tho.

Pixel 6 Pro & Nikon Gear

I got hella shilled on the 6 Pro, paid to get the max storage w/ 512GB, it was overkill. Plus the screen had that dreaded pink/redness tint that other phones did not. It’s brightness sucked ass too, couldn’t see shit outside. The base Pixel 9 had 1800 nits of brightness, the 9 Pro is 2000 or 2200, whatever. However I didn’t know I was getting a 1080p screen, and no, YouTube is so stupid. like I want the settings to have 1080p “premium”, but I can’t it always does auto bullshit so I get shit on with 360p. For a few times I’ve had higher quality on the 6 Pro, it will put 4K video on it, and it will fucking stutter all the fucking time. Stupid, this is the most advanced phone at the time and it cannot fucking deal with the playback? DO NOT fucking offer it. Oh and yeah a few times I got the stupid “phone too hot” shit on my 6 Pro, AFTER updating the OS. So ass. ANd yeah the battery life started to go down after OS upgrades, just like Apple 🙂

The camera lens is another thing, for the Pixel 6 Pro, all the camera lenses/sensors were a let down. The wide angle is terrible at night, it has a lot of noise in the dark. The main camera is better, but the special “telephoto” zoom, is shown as a 2x vs the “regular” 1x sensor. to me this is a total waste, no way will that 48MP sensor will need a fucking nother one at 2x, if that telezoom sensor was at 4x then yeah, i’d see a reason for it. But I doubt phones will ever had that sort of thing, I think we don’t get long ass zooms because of the hand movement/trembling you’d get at farther distance, users wont like it. I mean honestly I didn’t see anything much different when it comes to the pictures, I took a shittown with my 2XL when I was a process server in 2019-21. I uploaded most of the photos to Google Maps (would take pics of professional buildinds, restaurants and mostly showing the front door or menu if they were not posted on the app).

And then there’s the Nikon camera gear that I got. Currently I have a Nikon Z9, and Zfc for my YouTube videos (that I haven’t really used) and photography. Previously I had a D7200 and D3300 DSLRs, but the mirrorless are a fuckton smaller, last longer and the Z9 has a wireless photo transfer ability (the Zfc doesn’t fucking work on my 6 Pro lol). Sold my D7200 and gave the D3300 to my cousin. For the most part, my cellphone when taking photos (or video) is for food pics or when I’m travelling light, so there’s no reason for me to get the “telephoto” lens on the pro phones. My 6 Pro came with a 10MP selfie cam, so does the base 9 do too, the Pro has a better sensor, but taking a selfie is godawful when it comes to the angle you are in. There’s no reason for it, other than for it to be posted on Instagram or Snapchat, which itself will get downsized when uploaded. Cool Marques Brownlee is doing videos/podcasts on just smartphones, I dont need the best phone if I’m gonna do one.

SO how is the Pixel 9?

Of all the colors, I got it with Pink and I got a Kate Spade (RIP) flower case to go with it. So far it’s been working great, the battery life is pretty good. 12GB RAM, and 128GB storage. Yeah 256GB is “better” which is what I initially got on my 2 XL, but I am keeping my Pixel 6 Pro, and I’ll probably replace the screen when it gets to around the $90 mark or when it breaks a gain. Mostly I just have webm’s saved from 4chan boards, maybe I’ll use the Pixel 6 Pro for strictly on storage video. In all reality, I don’t NEED more than 256GB on my phone, nor do I probably need 128GB, I’d probably get away with 80GB or so. I may have some downloaded movies, but I will have that on my 6 Pro, and on the 5a, I may use it as a security camera, or even Pi-Hole to get rid of ads at my parent’s or my home.

Whats surprising of the Pixel 9, is how much it fucking weighs. 7.41 ounces, which is more than Samsung S24 Ultra that my girlfriend has (I’m still gay for my fans x3) and more than the 2XL and Pixel 6 Pro. Maybe it’s the metal case? the phone is thicker, which I don’t think is an issue at all, I won’t have to worry that my ass will bend it like an iPhone. The screen is nice and I really don’t mind the rounded edges. The phone has a “taller” or longer aspect ratio than 16:9, so video it is… idk what you call letter box on the sides, but that’s not even an issue at all to me.

LMAO the default settings for sending a voice to text was stupid when it came to messaging. Legit it fucking stayed on after sending the message. Nah fuck off, Im only using voice to text bc I don’t want to type. I want to listen to my music, or video i’m watching. had to turn that annoying ass shit off, and there was some other AI Gemini shit that got annoying. My main gripe is that the Gemini/AI shit is bothersome and cumbersome. Like its option isn’t just on the side or some shit, its thrown out at your face. It’s like going from XP to Vista and seeing those fuckng widgets on the desktop preloaded from the factory and all the damn popups for your services… ugh

Other than that, the UI seems to be OK. YouTube hasn’t really glitched much, I’d get a few pauses intermittently on one session, but it went away when I relaunched the app. I stream music off Di.FM and pay for no ads, that app works pretty good still, there was one time I had to force end the app because it didn’t load any music. Previously on the Pixel 2 XL (maybe the 6 pro, I don’t think so), it would play music randomly, like after a phone call or out of nowhere. So far I haven’t had any problems and the app works great.

Bluetooth Music

On Bluetooth audio, I have a Sony XB-43 speaker and JBL Pro Tour+, I have a pair of random MCXX BT device but I haven’t bothered setting it up yet (misplacement of my 2 different earbuds that support it). So far I haven’t really had any problems connecting to the devices. the Sony speaker connects far when I use it at my warehouse job that’s parts of the federal executive branch. And playback from the earbud has been about the same for the Pixel 6 Pro. I pre-ordered the Pixel Buds 2, idk if its the regular or Pro, but they will be shipping in September. I was drunk AF when I ordered them, and got like 100 bucks left in google store. NO you cannot use it for their AI or online storage, so thats lame. I pay about $3 or whatever for like 200GB of data. Really not needed, but I have it there for dankpads…. maybe I hsould get rid of it, and get some more storage from bluehost.

I really don’t need the extra power that the Pro offers compared to the base Pixel 9. First off, I don’t do fancy video editing if you’ve seen my YouTube vids, and I’m barely doing anything on TikTok or Instagram. I have no need to get a monopod or gyro stabilizer for video, I am the type of person to get a stand alone camera unit, like a DJI device. But even then, when it would come to editing… I wouldn’t want to edit on a phone screen, and that’s why I got the iPad Pro for. Me not using it is another story, and if I were to upgrade to the Pixel 9 Pro, I wouldn’t utilize all of it’s features.

Rant about cloud storage

But my online storage doesn’t matter, because when I’m the techie I get some bullshit like being asked to back up a friend or family member’s phone. Oh it needs to be backup NOW, because its IMMEDIATE and an EMERGENCY because there are PRICESS photos and PRICELESS moments, and because of these CHERISHED MEMORIES that hopefully will be saved, the only time SOME FUCKING MORON decides its time to BACK UP such important data, is when its FUCKING BROKEN. There’s no reason for me to have massive storage because the data will fucking go away if its lost or destroyed. I backup my photos and video on 5G (because I have an unlimited plan, hur durr, and have wifi at home uncapped if data is an issue).

Yeah, another reason why I don’t give a shit about phones now (or tech), is because I’m supposed to fix everything. Any advice I give? Ignore, go to best buy or Amazon and buy the dumbest bullshit out there. Legit my uncle dropped his phone in a pool and it ((((was broken)))). He took it too a shop and they said they couldn’t fix it. Like… Oh yeah go to a gas station THAT DOESNT FUCKING DO AUTO REPAIR and ask for a new engine swap… yup. fuck. I’m side tangenting right now.

Anyways, my new Pixel phone is nice. I’m too stuck in the Google EcoSystem, fuck Apple and fuck Microsoft and fuck Samsung 🙂

Oh fuck I forgot about Lenovo and their phones, they bought out Motorola? Nope, I love ThinkPads but that doesn’t mean I like the ThinkBook or ThinkPhone. Fuck that, there are those hardened phones out there, but I’m talking those clunky AF MFers. The Lenovo Fhab 3 or whatever had 3D camera or some shit, Google dropped the development on it. I wanted to buy that thing because of the “3D” market that was emerging in 2016… lmao glad I didn’t, there’s specific devices for 2K that can map a home.

So um yeah. I so far like my Pixel 9 phone. It’s a basic phone, don’t expect much from it, but the battery life and screen brightness is great. Hell I think its TOO bright when using nighttime mode and I swear the screen at the lowest brightness and highest “red” intensity, its still brighter than my 6 Pro. However the LCD is sooo much better than the 2Xl and 6 Pro I have, bright and fluid. Strangely I’ve been hitting the rotate button on the bottom left, because I have 3 button config, it pops out to the top left of the back button. This entire time I thought that rotate icon was just a loading icon lol. I would see it on my 6 Pro all the time, but I never touched it. I do like the fingerprint reader, it works WAYY better than the 6 Pro, tho I still iked the reader at the back of the phone case. No I don’t bother with the selfie camera unlock, at least I could curl my fingers if the cops take my phone, dunno about hiding my face if I’m handcuffed.