I’m a Wear OS watch user, the stock Wear OS kind. The watch I’ve been using is still the LG Watch Sports, and I’ve had it for over two years now — I even replaced the battery. Its battery life is honestly fine, but I’m still not happy with it, for three reasons: You can’t swap the strap. I’ve been stuck with the default rubber one, which feels pretty dumb. Once it cracks there’s no fixing it — you can only go buy knockoff parts. Nobody’s in charge of system updates. Google says LG handles it, LG says Google handles it, and the two of them just kick it back and forth. By 2020 that legendary Wear OS H still hadn’t shown up. It’s way too bulky, and the SoC isn’t new either, so it stutters sometimes. So I couldn’t take it anymore and wanted to switch. Right around then Xiaomi announced its watch — big battery, decent RAM, plenty of features — and I got tempted.

A while back I bought a discounted Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 tablet on eBay to replace my Mi Pad 4 and 360 N7. Its job is watching videos and gaming, plus whatever else comes up. The reasons were simple, just three: The Mi Pad 4 has a “screen gets hot and touch stops responding” problem, so it can’t game The 360 phone games fine but the screen is harsh on the eyes, and the system is basically abandoned after launch Neither of them supports stereo sound for videos — both are single-speaker Don’t ask why I didn’t get an iPad. I don’t use Apple, so Samsung was the only option — it’s the highest-performance Android tablet out there right now. Eventually I searched Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 on eBay and found a US V version with a 4G module, model T837V. Got it for just over 3000 yuan. I’ve used it for almost a month now, so I can share my impressions.

My previous phone was a Sony Xperia Z Premium. I used it for over a year, close to two years, and Sony recently said it would push out Google’s Android Pie OTA update to that phone too—every version except the Hong Kong one got it. But in the end I decided to replace it, with Google’s flagship phone released this year, the Google Pixel 3 XL. Plenty of people aren’t optimistic about Google’s new flagship—its specs are behind, it looks ugly, and it isn’t exactly cheap either. After using it for a while since it arrived, it really does have quite a few problems, but I’m still fairly satisfied, so I’ll briefly go over my first impressions.

I was thinking about buying a phone to play games on lately. I’d been using a Xiaomi Mi Pad 4, and it’s not like it can’t run games, but that screen aspect ratio cuts off part of my view. When I play a turret-type mid-lane mage I just can’t keep track of everything, so I figured maybe I should just get a phone. At first I had my sights set on the Xiaomi Mi Max (first gen), since its specs are good enough, the screen is big enough, and the battery is ridiculous—it’s basically a handheld console. The second and third generations don’t even bear mentioning; the performance actually went backwards, even with bigger batteries and better build quality. But the Mi Max is obviously not something you can buy new. I found only eBay had them, so I went looking, and after digging around I couldn’t find a single one I was happy with. Ones in good condition were priced absurdly, and the reasonably priced ones were all crippled units. Then I thought I’d check out LeEco phones or Gree phones—hah, Gree phones are even more expensive, and LeEco phones are complete garbage… While I was hesitating, my good buddy, the Guo Degang of the medical world, a.k.a. Duan Ye, answered my prayers: “Master Li, there’s a Smartisan Nut Pro here that Luo Yonghao sold to idiots. Wanna take a look?” “If it’s sold to idiots, then how do you have one, Duan Ye? Don’t tell me…” “Cut the crap. Do you want it or not?” “Yes yes yes…” So I took the Nut Pro off Duan Ye’s hands and began my testing journey.

Picked up a Xiaomi Pad 4 recently. Feels like it’s the most worthwhile Android tablet you can buy right now.

A while back I picked up a piece of junk off Taobao, from the seller I always buy from. It’s an ASUS Z10 tablet. Junk, probably, but in surprisingly good condition.

The reason I bought this is still the Pixel C breaking…… Lenovo P8 screen was too stupid, sold it, so I chose a dedicated tablet for gaming, and after looking around, I picked the Nvidia Shield K1. First off, this thing is cheap enough — on Xianyu you can get a 99-new-in-box one for 900 yuan. However, what I got was 99 new with a controller.

My Pixel C’s screen shattered. I figured I’d find someone to repair it—maybe Google US could do a mail-in fix. So I contacted Google US support directly, went back and forth for ages, and they said it’s out of warranty, told me to find a technician in China Mainland myself. I said I don’t have the screen component, and they said “neither do we.” Fuck. What now? Guess I’ll buy a new one… Except there are basically no Android flagship tablets anymore! So in the end I bought this… Lenovo P8

Black Domain on Android is an app that kills rogue apps, aiming for “an Android experience just like iOS.” That’s a bit different from Greenify — Greenify feels more academic, while Black Domain is more practical. I paid for both. In the end I went with Black Domain. Black Domain works without root too. You just have to turn on USB debugging and type a command to start one of its processes. Calling it a hassle is fair, and calling it convenient is fair — basically, every time your phone reboots, you have to find a computer to activate it… So the author of Black Domain had an idea: make a “Black Domain Activator.” It’s a collaboration with some gamepad adapter, but using it is fine anyway, and it’s cheap.

I’d been using the Moto 360 2nd, but it had been nearly two years, so I figured it was time for a change. Then the LG Watch Sports came out, and I saw you couldn’t swap the strap, so I didn’t buy it. Half a year went by and there was still nothing I liked. I figured, fine, if I can’t change the strap, then I just won’t change it… When I went to order the LG Watch Sports on Google Play, the titanium version was out of stock, of course. Then one night I refreshed out of boredom and there it was. Ordered it right away, and it turned out I’d picked the wrong payment method and paid $16 extra in shipping, even though the Google Play Store page said free shipping. I was worried it’d sell out so I didn’t look closely. The next day I saw the extra charge and asked Google for a refund. They said no… So I said, fine, I’ll return it and order again. They said it had been more than two hours, so no returns… I’ve got a few choice words for them that I’ll keep to myself. So I chalked it up as a lesson learned. The surprise was that when it arrived via a forwarding service, there was no customs duty… I looked, and the customs declaration listed the thing as an “electronic watch.” Clever. I wonder if next time I forward a phone they could write “cordless telephone”…