Action can do this? I’ll have to check it out, because that’s the feature from Nova I can’t live without. My whole home screen has been built around it for years.

Well, I mean it kind of is a solution. It’s a cloud backup solution. OneDrive doesn’t just keep a single version of your file, there’s versioning, retention policies, etc.

Cloud makes a lot of sense for businesses with small IT staff and a lot of users because while it’s not fully in your control, it comes with all the things being discussed here “out of the box” and scales infinitely.

For self hosters there’s some fun and power in doing everything yourself, but even then adding cloud as part of your backup (if done securely) is usually a pretty good idea.

Seems the consensus is Pixel here, but let me just say as an Android user since the very first Android phone, Samsung has a lot more of the original Android spirit in it now than Google does.

I had an original Dream, then a Galaxy S, then different Nexus and Pixel devices until my current S23. I preferred Google phones because they didn’t have bloat, got faster updates, and always pioneered Android.

However, in recent years Google has focused on assistants, AI, and other fluff software services, while actively locking down Android and regressing. I finally said enough when I was running out of space on my Pixel phone and trying to export my hugely bloated Signal history. I didn’t have enough free space on the phone for the backup, and the backup needed to be made locally. I tried to use a thumb drive but found out that in 20fing24 Google only supported FAT32 and thus I hit the 4GB file size limit. I just couldn’t get over how much of a non issue this would have been in the past with SD cards and proper file system support.

When I moved to Samsung I saw that it wasn’t as ugly or candy colored as days of old, and with a custom launcher on it I actually liked it better because the menu and settings didn’t have that ugly big button look that Google came up with. I disabled all the dumb Samsung apps I wouldn’t use, and gave it a shot. I was shocked at how many little quality of life things Samsung put overtop of stock Android. Things where clearly they saw a need and Google wasn’t trying, so they did it themselves. Custom notifications, proper secure folder/sandbox, DeX (which I dock at my workstation at lunch and is awesome!), being able to cast my screen to not only Chromecast but Miracast as well, the list goes on.

So while Samsung is not perfect, I still don’t have a MicroSD card or a headphone jack, I feel they are not as restrictive as Google and embody more of that original Android spirit of improving the OS and adding features. Google has lost it’s way and is turning Android more into iOS every day. If you don’t care about any of this and just want a decent phone, either will do. But the only way I think I would get a Pixel now is if I wanted to put GrapheneOS on it.

Anyway, thanks for coming to my TedTalk.

You don’t have any idea what you’re talking about.

Look, I see what you’re getting at, high end GPU improvements have slowed to a trickle and they just keep charging more. You’re not wrong that the business has changed and NVIDIA and AMD are squeezing.

However that is NOT what is happening with the Steam Deck. This is a simple engineering limitation. You cannot have a super powerful GPU in the form factor of the SD due to size, cooling, and power constraints. They can’t just magic these limitations away or throw money at it. To get what you want would not only cost more, but the SD would be twice the size if not more, sound like a jet engine, and have a 15 minute battery life.

The Steam Deck is still king to me due to it’s controller setup. Nothing comes close to the versatility. But I do agree with you, if OP is a console player and only cares about thumb sticks then there are better options.