The torrent of leaks is now officially a tsunami. The Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL are everywhere and there doesn’t seem to be anything Google can do to stop it. Now it seems that there is a store in Hong Kong who will sell you a Pixel 3 XL if you stump up the right amount of cash.
Richard Lai from Engadget has been able to head into a local store and borrow one of the Pixel 3 XL phones that they have for sale for a whopping HK$15,880 (AU$2875!!!). Of course he then did what any of us would at this stage, he unboxed it taking a heap of photos and a video. We have attached some pictures below but if you want a better look check out the video as well.
The packaging (and phone) is very reminiscent of last year’s Pixel 2 XL with the #teampixel hashtag on the back of the box and the front showing a picture of the rear of the phone. The phone itself looks basically the same from the rear but of course the front is differentiated by the controversial mega-notch. Richard placed the Pixel 3 XL side by side with the OnePlus 6 demonstrating the difference in sizes of the notch, the status bar and the bottom bezel.
Richard confirms that the model he has only has 4GB of RAM once again which is disappointing but you never know what Google may be able to do with that. Still present is the Active Edge for pressing to launch Google Assistant. Google’s implementation is a lot less functional than HTC’s but with root access it can most likely become super functional with dedicated apps. The front camera setup is dual 8MP setup with one of them being a super wide-angled secondary camera. That groufie will become much easier with this phone.
Interestingly, the one Richard purchased came with an AU plug — yep, that’s right, an AU plug. Google often ship their products to Australians from their Hong Kong warehouse which may be where this has originated from. If that is the case it points towards Google having orders ready to ship nearly immediately upon announcement.
All in all, even though we know all about the phone’s hardware surely Google will have some software surprises in store for us come Wednesday morning (AEDT). We will be covering the event live so be sure to check in for all the local flavour on Google’s announcements at their #MyByGoogle event in New York. If you are in Hong Kong and have a cool $2875AU to spare you can grab a Pixel 3 XL now.
