Google Nexus 6, Android Lollipop & YouTube Music Key Review

The Google Nexus line is one grand Google experiment; a product to showcase the best of what Google and Android can offer. The Nexus One, Nexus S, Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 4 and Nexus 5, manufactured in nexus with various OEMs like HTC, Samsung and LG, have all been flagship yet inexpensive Android smartphones, but the Nexus 6 from Google and Motorola is not a smartphone. It's a phablet. A premium gadget that comes with the newest and the most colourful and playful version of Android yet: Lollipop aka Android 5.0.

Smartphones have evolved a lot. We now use our phones not just to place calls but also in a myriad number of other ways so as to satisfy our communication and entertainment needs. In short they have become a one-stop destination, a virtual personal assistant, an intimate personal item that we carry around all the time. Unfortunately a smaller screen meant you will have to take out your tablet (or even worse your personal computer) if any real productive work had to be taken care of. A phablet still doesn't obviate this problem, but it wouldn't look clumsy or awkward either if you want to get some serious work done. Phablets have indeed come a long way since Samsung announced the first Galaxy Note in 2011, and now even Apple has a phablet, the iPhone 6 Plus. But how comfortable are they in daily use?

The Nexus 6 is a phablet and a huge phablet at that. So yes, it does get a bit uncomfortable and unwieldy at times, especially when you want to do something with one hand. Design-wise, it is basically a blown-up version of this year's Moto X with the same curved back, but with a smaller dimple and a huge "nexus" logo slapped underneath it. In my day-to-day use, the performance is generally buttery smooth and the battery life is quite good given the mammoth 5.96-inch display. The photo quality too is acceptable, though not as great as the iPhone 5s which was my previous daily driver.

But this review would be sort of incomplete without me talking about Lollipop. Android has had multiple design overhauls since its humble beginnings, and Android 5.0, based on a concept called Material Design, shows the mobile operating system in an altogether fresh light. In addition to bringing in a bucket-load of new features (support for 64-bit CPUs, a more efficient Android Runtime replacing Dalvik virtual machine among others), Android's latest redesign is vibrant, colourful and freaking gorgeous, something of a dramatic departure from the vanilla interfaces that we have seen so far. It's as if Google made a concentrated effort to bring about a cohesive and consistent user interface across the board. And that'a good thing.

The navigation bar inconsistencies in Lollipop, clockwise from top: Calendar, Docs,
Drive, Earth, Gmail, Hangouts, Keep, YouTube, Play Store, Photos, Google Now,
Newsstand, News & Weather and Maps

Lollipop is not however without its share of nitpicks:

• The inconsistent navigation drawer is a major turn-off, with Calendar, Drive apps (Drive, Docs, Sheets and Slides), Play Store apps (Play Books, Games, Movies & TV, Music, Newsstand and Play Store), Photos and the rest (Google Earth, Gmail, Keep, Maps, News & Weather and Google Now) each following a separate design principle. A Play Store update released a couple of days back adds the full-height navigation drawer though.
• Hangouts and YouTube are yet to be updated to the new Material Design - YouTube's Material Design update is already rolling out now and Hangouts too may get one soon going by Android Police's exclusive early look. Thank God for small mercies!
• A redundant Email app icon - Ever since Gmail app was updated with support for handling multiple accounts, including Yahoo! and Outlook accounts, the other AOSP Email app has been rendered useless, stating "Email has moved. The Gmail app now lets you view all of your email accounts" when you tap the Email app icon.
• Repeated "Unfortunately Cloud Print has stopped" crash message despite turning off Cloud Print from Settings - This can be fixed by going to Settings > Apps > Cloud Print on the All tab, and clearing the data.
• A built-in file manager - Google acquired productivity suite maker QuickOffice not long back and although most of its features have been ported onto Docs/Sheets/Slides (QuickOffice apps for Android and iOS were discontinued as of June this year), the file managing capabilities have gone AWOL!
• Lack of a fine-tuned permissions manager and a system-wide dictionary a la Apple iOS: I have used both of these features so much on my erstwhile iPhone 5s that I can't imagine Google is not incorporating them into its operating system.

On the whole, Nexus 6 may be a deal-breaker if you feel the size is way too big or if removable battery and expandable storage is your thing, but make no mistake. Once you start using it, it's hard not to get impressed by the device, and with Android Lollipop on board, it only sweetens the deal.

Is YouTube Music Key the way to listen to music?

Ad-free YouTube!

Let's admit it. YouTube is by far the best place to listen to music. Name any song, you are sure to find it on YouTube. Sadly this comes at the cost of having to put up with random ads, at not being able to 'legally' download your favourite videos for offline playback (this feature is currently available for free as part of its Android One initiative in India, Indonesia and Philippines) and the most important of all, be able to play the videos in the background on your mobile devices as you switch to other apps. YouTube Music Key, the new music subscription service from Google, is precisely here to help you with all of that.

You might ask, why create another music subscription service when Google already has Google Play Music All Access (available only in select countries). As if anticipating this very question, the search giant has made it clear that if you sign up for Music Key, you get a Google Play All Access subscription included. And if you're already an All Access subscriber, you get Music Key for no additional fee. With a music-only subscription service now bundled alongside an ad-free YouTube, this is one compelling offer that's too good to pass up for a monthly US$ 9.99.

In my own daily use over the last couple of weeks, all of this ad-free experience works flawlessly, especially the background listening on my phone. And if I switch to the recently introduced Music section in YouTube (both app and website), it even highlights my recent Google Play Music activity, making it all the more easier to locate my favourite songs. In fact, I have begun to use YouTube so extensively that I have even forgotten there used to exist something called ads on the popular video-sharing service. You might, too.