We've reviewed a lot of devices here. More phones than I can remember. A whole bunch of tablets. But things got a little weird in the fall of 2014 with the release of the Motorola Nexus 6 and the Nexus 9 tablet. And the source of that weirdness was Android 5.x Lollipop. Or, more specifically, the initial builds of it — especially on the NVIDIA Tegra K1-powered Nexus 9. And to be fair, not everyone saw the same software problems we experienced. But for us, the Nexus 9 would essentially become unusable a couple weeks or so (if that long) following a fresh install. Here's how I put things after three months with the Nexus 9: The one telling thing about software on the Nexus 9 is just how poorly things start to run after a bit. We've talked about bugs. We've talked about encryption — which in Lollipop is turned on by default — taking longer to write to memory. I don't care what the reason is. It's simply unacceptable and is the sole reason why I can't recommend the Nexus 9. Reboots offer a temporary reprieve. But it doesn't take long before it can take six seconds or more between tapping on a notification and the corresponding application finally opening. You get used to it. You learn to grit your teeth and just wait. But it's not a good experience, at all. That was from late January 2015. We're now in the summer months and we've got Android 5.1.1 (build LMY47X) on the Nexus 9. And things are much better. Verizon is offering the Pixel 4a for just $10/mo on new Unlimited lines Nexus 9 hardware, 8 months in

First, though, let's revisit the tablet itself. The Nexus 9 sports an 8.9-inch display — OK, 9 inches — with a 4:3 aspect ratio. That's a deal-breaker for some of us here, but I wasn't one of them. And while I very much enjoyed the smaller size and 16:9 aspect ratio of both Nexus 7 tablets, I quickly adjusted to the N9. I've watched movies and TV shows. Countless hours of YouTube. I've read books. I've played games. The Nexus 9 has always been pretty comfortable to hold, and I've either gotten used to the CPU heat I mentioned in my three-month look, or it's been helped some by software tweaks. And as I also mentioned in January, the air gap I had in my early unit wasn't ever a big deal — and indeed it appears to have been minimized in later hardware runs. I'm using the foldable "Nexus 9 Cover" on the Nexus 9. It's a $39 magnetic cover that only protects the display — and that means much of the tablet has been left exposed as it's been left bouncing around in my gear bag. After six months of abuse in this fashion I can say it's held up pretty well. I've got a few cosmetic issues — mostly with a protective plastic coating coming off the matte finish, and a few dings in other places — but nothing I wouldn't call expected wear and tear after this much time. Certainly none of it affects the operation of the tablet. (And after further inspection one trouble spot is at the micro USB port. Here's to hoping the next Nexus tablet is sporting the new reversible USB-C standard.)