Guest PaulOBrien Posted October 4, 2015 Report Share Posted October 4, 2015 More and more Android devices are featuring fingerprint readers now. Arguably popularised by the iPhone, fingerprint readers have actually been around for many years, but only now have they become reliable enough to genuinely become a mass market item. As we see phones with readers on the front, back and even the side... which works best? We've been finding out.For this article I've picked three of the best examples of their specific type of sensor. The Honor 7 has a rear-mounted sensor, the OnePlus 2 has a front mounted sensor and the Xperia Z5 has a side mounted sensor. The sensor in the Z5 is unique in this company in that it also functions as the power button (inevitable given its position). A number of devices with front mounted sensors also double up the sensor as a clickable button, but not on the OnePlus.All the devices are a 'touch' sensor rather than the old 'swipe' style sensor (such as that featured on the HTC One Max and Galaxy S5). There is a world of difference.The fingerprint sensor on the Honor 7 is very similar to that on the new Nexus devices, including the Nexus 6P, which is no surprise given both are made by Huawei. The Honor sensor is excellent - it's super fast, incredibly accurate, works with your finger placed in any direction and is in an intuitive place - it's where your forefinger will likely rest when holding the device naturally. The Honor 7 has some additional tricks up its sleeve, with assignable gestures on the sensor - for example, sweeping down will open the notification pane. Having the sensor on the back must surely have space benefits over a front mounted button, particularly when using on screen navigation buttons (as the Honor 7 does).The OnePlus 2 sensor has had a mix of rave reviews and disappointed users. We haven't managed to figure out why - it seems likely that some devices ship with more reliable sensors than others due to variation in the manufacturing process, but we haven't managed to prove this. Thankfully, the one on our device is very good indeed. It's reliable and doubles up as a capacitive button (if you have on screen buttons disabled). I do find the positioning on the front a bit awkward when, say, in the car and I need to quickly unlock the phone... something I find much easier on the Honor.The Z5 range offers the first devices to ship with a side mounted sensor. Other devices will be available in the future with this sensor (such as the Nextbit Robin). In terms of design efficiency, a side mounted sensor built into the power button is likely to be the best option - no extra space is needed on the front or back. It's also particularly intuitive - from a behavioural perspective, things don't work any differently to a regular power button other than you leave your finger on for a bit longer. Recognition is, again, very accurate and relatively quick. You might find when you use it for the first time that you need to register additional fingers... you probably power on your phone with digits you didn't even realise you used!So back to the original question then... which is best?Surprisingly, it's not even a close call for me. The Honor 7 is faster, more accurate, more intuitive and more useful than any other fingerprint sensor implementation I've seen on Android (and I've used basically every single fingerprint device there is). If it's an indicator of what the experience on the forthcoming Nexus' is to be like, then Google made a very good design decision indeed. It's so quick that often when I pull the phone out of my pocket, my finger brushes the sensor and by the time i'm looking at the screen, it's unlocked and ready to go.Given the choice of the 3 implementations, I think rear mounted is my favourite, followed by a side button, followed by the more conventional front sensor.If there's one limitation of fingerprint readers on all Android devices at the moment it's that with a few exceptions, they don't do that much other than unlocking the device and anything they do do, is quite proprietary to the device. We should see this change with the advent of Android 6.0 Marshmallow which includes proper fingerprint recognition APIs - good news.Do you agree? Do you own a phone with a fingerprint reader? Share your thoughts! View full item Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest lilHermit Posted October 4, 2015 Report Share Posted October 4, 2015 (edited) Front facing fingerprint sensor are very useful when your phone is mounted in a car dock, not sure how the rear sensors will work in this situation. Side mounted might not be the most comfortable depending on which side its mounted in relation to you. For example if you mount it to your left with the sensor being on the right!! Edited October 4, 2015 by lilHermit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest macbreakweeklyfan Posted October 4, 2015 Report Share Posted October 4, 2015 Ain't no "arguably" about it: until the iPhone 5S was announced with TouchID, not a single phone had a fingerprint sensor, and now they're all having a go at implementing them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest PaulOBrien Posted October 5, 2015 Report Share Posted October 5, 2015 Ain't no "arguably" about it: until the iPhone 5S was announced with TouchID, not a single phone had a fingerprint sensor, and now they're all having a go at implementing them.Wrong!iPhone 5s: announced September 2013Motorola Atrix: Announced January 2011P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest macbreakweeklyfan Posted October 5, 2015 Report Share Posted October 5, 2015 Wrong!iPhone 5s: announced September 2013Motorola Atrix: Announced January 2011POkay, that's true, but I was more thinking of a fingerprint sensor that was actually reliable, properly and VERY VERY securely integrated and implemented symbiotically with the OS, and which didn't require instructions to use. As with most smartphone features, once Apple have done it, everyone else seems to want to do it too, whilst fervently (and defensively, sometimes) denying that it was Apple whom spurned them to do so.I don't see the whole smartphone industry jumping to attention to copy something any other manufacturer implements, because it seems Apple does many, many years of intense hard graft to ensure that it's not just a "feature" thrown in to say it's there, it's done because they think it will benefit and enhance the user experience, which is what they excel at, many levels above most. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest PaulOBrien Posted October 5, 2015 Report Share Posted October 5, 2015 Hence the 'arguably'. P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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