Google and Moto almost made a truly standout Android phone
To put it bluntly, Motorola has never created a true flagship ubersmartphone on the level of the Samsung Galaxy S4 and HTC One.
But the company aims to change that with the Moto X. The $199
smartphone is Motorola's first handset fully developed under the
auspices of its corporate parent (and Android godfather), Google. And it'll be available on most major U.S. carriers when it hits stores later in August.
Make no mistake; the Moto X isn't a fire-breathing mobile monster
that will blow away the competitors in a spec sheet battle -- the screen
isn't cutting-edge, and there's no expandable storage. Storage is the
phone's biggest weakness: with just 16GB in the $199 model (the 32GB
Moto costs $50 more) and no SD card slot for adding more, it's got an
uphill battle on the value scale versus the HTC One (32GB by default)
and Galaxy S4 (expansion slot onboard).
Storage qualms notwithstanding, though, the X is a nimble, compact
handset with advanced capabilities that targets ordinary phone users.
The Moto X boasts many of the same features that Motorola's new trio of
Verizon Droids flaunt -- especially always-on Google Now voice control
-- plus a few slick extras. Better yet, they're all crammed into a
highly customizable design built for maximum comfort. This is a scrappy
smartphone with enough going for it to bring the fight to the big boys.
In the US, Motorola launched a novel concept called Moto Maker, which allows you to customise the look of your phone.
It
is quite possible to get a white fronted, pink backed Moto X with blue
buttons and a custom engraving too. Unfortunately, Moto Maker hasn't
found its way to the UK - although it is tipped to arrive in March 2014.
This
bold gamble does not appear to has paid dividends for Motorola with the
Moto X, evidenced by its numerous price drops in the US.
Considering
the track record, it's a little bit of a surprise that Motorola is
bringing the Moto X in at a relatively high recommended retail price
point of £389.
Considering the price of the better-specified and larger screened Nexus 5 is just £299, you have to wonder if this makes sense.
The pricing of the Moto X on contract puts it in a similar category to the HTC One Mini and Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini, not quite the lofty comparisons that Motorola would want us to be making.
Pricing
is not the only issue for the Moto X: it simply does not have high-end
specs any more. The beating heart of the phone is essentially a 1.7GHz
dual-core Snapdragon S4 Pro chipset backed by 2GB of RAM.
Compared
to today's quad-core 2.3GHz Snapdragon 800 rival, this is a little
lacking, and definitely puts it in the mid-range, at least on paper.
A
2200mAh battery is sealed inside the body and there is no microSD
expansion so the standard 16GB model - what you get for the £389
recommended asking price – will have to do. Motorola has not said
whether it will bring the 32GB model to the UK.
The
basic layout of the Moto X is highly conventional, with a microUSB port
at the bottom, power and volume rocker buttons on the right and a
standard 3.5mm headphone jack up top.
Talking of those buttons,
they are really well sited. Lots of phones have their buttons in
terribly inaccessible positions or just out of natural reach. Motorola
has got this right on the Moto X, and made buttons that are responsive
to use.
What is less usual is the SIM tray on the left side of the phone which holds the rarely used nano-sized SIM.
Given that the only other mainstream phones using a nano SIM today are the iPhone 5S and 5C, that might give you a clue as to which type of user Motorola is targeting here.
In
the UK the Motorola Moto X is currently available in the white I had to
review and black. I prefer the Moto X in black though, as the white
highlights the major flaw in the industrial design that Motorola has
employed.
There is a visible seam round the sides of the Moto X
and the white plastic used to frame the screen is of a different shade
to the white back. The white bezels around the screen, which sit behind
glass, are of a third shade, making the front look a little messy.
Overall
though, this is a very well designed and constructed phone and
definitely has a premium enough feel to justify its price - even if
there are some concerns about what is on the inside.
The Moto X
blends into the background quite nicely most of the time, and the screen
takes up the vast majority of the front, which is a great achievement.
A more thoughtful design
Under the thumb of Verizon's macho Droid brand for years, Motorola's
smartphone industrial design has been well, industrial. Ever since the
original Droid device hit the scene, Motorola has cranked out flagship
machines sporting sharp angles, Kevlar coatings, and hard metallic
trims.
To be fair, that's not a bad thing; those devices have been very
popular. Plus the company's upcoming Droid mobile machines are less
stark than their predecessors, featuring smoother curves and no metallic
highlights. All three devices, though, the Droid Mini, the Droid Ultra,
and the Droid Maxx, keep the traditionally aggressive red or sober
black color scheme that's in keeping with Verizon's intimidating robotic
franchise.
The Moto X, however, pushes this history aside and attempts to turn
an all-new page and gain broader appeal. Instead of harshly chiseled
lines, the Moto X is sculpted with softly rounded curves. The phone's
back is gently rounded for a more comfortable grip. It's an approach
many hardware makers are taking these days, including HTC with its One
and One Mini. The Galaxy S4 handset is also similarly contoured,
but unlike Samsung's slippery, smudge-prone runaway hit, the Moto X has a
textured soft-touch finish.
Motorola takes this contoured design a step further, shaping the back
of the Moto X with left and right edges that slope at a sharper angle
than the middle of the device. Motorola claims that this careful molding
fits your hand better than a simpler uniform arc. The handset even uses
a specially formed battery (2,200mAh, embedded) to match the Moto X's
unique curvature. I
have to admit that when I picked up Motorola's latest creation, it felt
pretty damn good, its rounded frame fitting my fingers and palm like a
glove. While I experience a similar reaction when I grip the HTC One,
the Moto X's contours and solid chassis exude just as much quality and
luxury to me. I also like how the phone's soft-touch backing wicks away
moisture and fingerprints and has an almost metallic rigidity.
These colors don't run
A huge part of the Moto X's design story is its made-in-America (or at
least designed-and-assembled-in) moniker. As Motorola has explained
earlier, it will design, engineer, and construct all Moto X units in the
United States; Fort Worth, Texas, to be precise.
Consumers will have a choice of two basic colors to choose from when
purchasing a new Moto X handset, white and black. Motorola, however,
will offer buyers the option to personalize their phones with custom
hues, patterns, and engravings crafted to order at Motorola's new Texas
factory.
These
tweaking options, done through the Moto Maker online studio, include
two front colors, 18 on the back, and seven accents. Motorola claims
that this variety allows for thousands of permutations. There will even
be custom wallpaper designs and cases to gussy up your device with. And
thanks to the plant's Fort Worth location, shoppers who order the gadget
can expect it to hit their doorstep within four days. Be advised that
Moto Maker will be available for AT&T versions of the Moto X
exclusively, at least at first.
Screen
In many respects the Moto X's display is a step down compared with what
you get from the latest crop of premium smartphones. Competing devices
such as the Sony Xperia Z, HTC One, and Samsung Galaxy S4 all have screens of
4.7 inches or larger. These gadgets also flaunt displays with full-HD
resolutions (1,920x1,080 pixels), translating into massive views that
still manage to offer high pixel densities.
By contrast the Moto X's 4.7-inch 720p (1,280 by 720 pixels) OLED
screen, while no doubt large, doesn't serve up quite the same level of
sharpness as HTC's and Samsung's mobile hot rods. I must stress, though,
that unless you've had bionic eye implants or carry a jeweler's loupe, you probably won't pick
up on any lack of detail. Additionally, the Moto X's OLED screen
technology produces vivid colors, deep blacks, and wide viewing angles.
Of course a display's impact isn't based on just resolution,
brightness, and color quality. Case in point: the Moto X's screen has an
extremely thin bezel that lovingly hugs the front edges of the handset.
Similar to those found on last year's Droid Razr M and the company's newly announced Droids, this helps the Moto X's display appear larger than life and command your attention.
Core components
Motorola calls the engine that propels the new Moto X its X8 Mobile
Computing System, the same electronics under the hood of its new Droids.
Claimed to include eight distinct processing cores, the system sure
sounds impressive. When you break it all down, though, the X8
essentially is really just a souped-up 1.7GHz dual-core Qualcomm S4 Pro
processor paired with quad-core Adreno 320 graphics.
To bring the core count up to eight, Motorola also throws in two
additional low-power processing centers, one for contextual computing
and another for analyzing spoken language. OK, so this may help the Moto
X's total "core" tally reach the magic number, but I'm sure I'm not
alone in crying foul.
When I think of numerous CPU cores, I envision multiple electronic
brains of equal power and speed working in unison to tackle every
smartphone task. Since not all of the X8's cores are created equal and
they are relegated to specific tasks (all but two outside of general
number-crunching), the Moto X is no true octa-core phone in my book.
That said, its power is nothing to sneeze at, either. The question
remains how it'll compare with handsets with faster quad-core Snapdragon
600 chips. Hopefully the Moto X's 2GB allotment of RAM will keep the
performance gap from being too great.
Software and interface
Given that the Moto X was born of the union between Motorola and Google,
I was surprised to learn that it doesn't come with the freshest flavor
of Android Jelly Bean (version 4.3). Rather, the phone runs Android
4.2.2 Jelly Bean. That said, Motorola has teamed up with Google to add
plenty of neat tricks, the most notable of which is contextual
computing, which the company refers to as "Touchless Control."
That's really a fancy way of saying that the phone runs a low-power
microphone in the background with an ear continually trained on your
voice. Just as with the new Motorola Droid Mini, Ultra, and Maxx, speaking a magic phrase at your Moto X tells the device to fire up the Google Now information app.
In the Moto X's case, to begin you say, "OK, Google Now." From there
you can ask a number of questions to find your current location, the
weather, sports scores, and the answers to other queries. You can also
tell the Moto X to set up reminders in your calendar, and initiate
calls, texts, and e-mails a la Siri -- except you don't have to press a
button.
Aside from these slick voice capabilities, the Moto X's interface
essentially remains the same as stock Jelly Bean. The five home screens,
application tray, and widgets are pretty much identical to what you'd
see on Google-approved machines such as the LG Nexus 4 and the Google Play Editions of the HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4.
There are some slight yet important differences, though. The Moto X
will softly pulse important notifications and alerts on the screen, even
when asleep, as they occur. Motorola says this will help users conserve
battery life since the phone won't have to power up the display each
time the notification light flashes. Holding your finger on the center
of the screen (and notification) causes the Moto X to display additional
details for the alert. Dragging your finger upward takes you directly
to the corresponding message if you decide more action is required.
Pure Android?
Almost uniquely amongst the Android
manufacturers, Motorola has taken a very simple approach to the software
on the Moto X. What we have here is essentially stock Android 4.4.2 KitKat with just a few Motorola enhancements.
The changes are almost entirely positive, and Motorola has clearly thought about how people use their phone on a daily basis.
To
a great extent, these changes are possible due to the unique hardware
customisations Motorola undertook when designing the Moto X.
While the basic chipset is a Snapdragon S4 Pro-derived dual-core design, Motorola has added two contextual processing units.
One
of these is for natural language processing and the always listening
feature of Touchless Control and the other allows the Moto X to use all
its sensors to understand when the phone is out of your pocket, for
instance to show Active Notifications as well as to enable the camera
flick gesture.
Touchless
Control is Motorola's name for one of the most interesting features on
the Moto X. Even with the screen off, the phone is listening and waiting
for you to say "OK Google Now" - at which point the screen will light
up and you can tell it to perform various actions including sending a
message, making a call and providing directions through Google Maps.
Before using it, you must train the phone to understand your voice, and once that is done, in theory, it only responds to you.
I
found it works very reliably, and is a lot better than expected. I had
very few false positives where you would find the phone ready to accept a
voice command even though you hadn't asked it to do anything.
Active
Notifications makes use of one of the great properties of an AMOLED
screen, the ability to light up just part of the screen without having
to power the entire display.
When
a notification comes in, if the screen is off, the Moto X will flash up
on the screen the app icon that the notification came from.
This
icon breathes, with the screen going on and then off and then on again
over a period of a few seconds. It is a very low-power way of showing on
screen notifications.
Perhaps the best part of Active
Notifications is that the Moto X will also monitor a motion sensor in
the phone, and if it senses you picking the device up off the table, the
screen comes on so you can unlock it.
It uses the light sensor
to know when you take the phone out of your pocket and does the same
thing. All this means I has hardly ever had to use the power button to
switch the phone on, it is on and ready for me like magic.
The
other main trick that the Moto X performs is when using the Motorola
Assist app, it can sense when you are driving and start to read out your
text messages. I found this to be fairly reliable but a significant
battery drain. Nonetheless, another useful addition from Motorola.
Interface and Performance
There were some thoughts that the first Motorola phone produced in
conjunction with Google would go on to become a Nexus device. While it
is not a Nexus in name, in many ways it is like a Nexus device.
Here in the UK, the Moto X arrives with Android 4.4.2 and, beyond the exclusive Nexus 5 launcher, it looks identical - at least at first.
The
status bar has the same white icons but is also the first place where
something different – and slightly annoying – is found.
Your
mobile network's identifier is shown top left of the screen all the
time, taking up some of the space normally available for notifications.
Being
a stock device, the monochrome Android theme is ever-present, and the
gentle gradients that can be found in screens such as the settings are
there as well. Unfortunately the screen on the Moto X can display a
little banding spoiling the effect very slightly when compared with a
Nexus 5.
The standard back, home and task switch buttons are
exactly where you would expect at the bottom of the screen and the
immersive mode introduced in KitKat works just as well here to remove those buttons when an app is setup to do so. On
the home screen, the attractive color fades from the top and bottom of
the display really frame the interface nicely and make Android appear
much classier.
As
the new launcher introduced with the Nexus 5 is not part of the Android
4.4.2 build on the Moto X, the older app drawer is present with its
second tab for widgets.
Google Now is available by swiping up from
the home button just as you would expect and the task switching screen
is the standard Android affair. The quick settings introduced in Android
4.2 are of course present on the Moto X in their usual place on the
flip side of the notification drawer.
Motorola has added a number of items to the settings, each reflecting one of the additions that you will find on the Moto X.
There
are settings for the aforementioned Touchless Control and Active
Display but also for Motorola Connect, which is a service that connects
to a Chrome desktop browser plugin and allows you to receive
notifications and send text messages. This is a useful addition, but
there are other apps in the Play Store that do the same thing. Inside
the security settings, there is a particularly interesting feature,
trusted Bluetooth devices. In essence, if you pair a Bluetooth device
with the Moto X and then choose to secure your phone with a PIN or a
pattern lock, whenever the chosen Bluetooth device is in range, your
phone remains unlocked. Move out of range, and it is secured once more.
Motorola
has also included a lost phone feature, something that Google has been
doing for a while now with Android Device Manager. I don't understand
why Motorola felt the need to duplicate this feature, but thankfully it
is the only feature that is a duplicate on top of stock Android and is
simple to turn off.
It is well worth make sure you are using one or other of these lost phone security features, just in case!
The
performance of the Moto X is stunning. In Geekbench 3, it scored 681 on
the single core test and 1281 in the multi-core, but that only tells
part of the story.
Motorola has done a fantastic job optimizing
the software on the Moto X to make it lag free, fast and a complete
pleasure to use. Apps open immediately and multi-tasking is a pleasure,
no doubt helped by the 2GB of RAM on board.
When developing the
Moto X, a premium was clearly placed on performance and having
particularly fast storage helps it. Motorola was the first Android
manufacturer to use a new file system optimised for the type of activity
typically found on a smartphone. This has paid off, the Moto X's
performance is great.
Controls
Above the display is where the earpiece, the front-facing camera, as
well as the ambient light and proximity sensors reside. A mouthpiece
sits alone below the screen.
The view above and below the display of the Moto X
The nano-SIM tray is located on the left of the handset. The volume rocker and the power/lock key are located on the right side.
The left and right of the Moto X
The 3.5mm audio jack is located in the middle of the Moto X's top.
One of two dedicated noise-cancelling microphones is sitting by its
side. The USB port sits alone at the bottom.
A look at the top and bottom of the device
The F/2.4 lens of the 10MP ClearPixel camera is flanked by a
loudspeaker on the back of the Moto X. The single-LED flash sits below
it. A Motorola logo, small AT&T globe, and the second
noise-cancelling microphone complete the picture.
The back of the Moto X
The Moto X features a 2200mAh battery. It has been custom-shaped to
take full advantage of the space inside the device, so it is said to
deliver 31% more capacity than a conventional battery. That's what the
press materials say anyway - given the over 10mm of thickness and its
non-user-accessible nature, the battery capacity certainly isn't all
that impressive.
Motorola didn't offer any specific numbers for the battery
performance. The product managers did however, specify that the goal
with the device was to make it through full 24 hours of use without
breaking a sweat.
We put the Moto X through our traditional battery test. The device
achieved an endurance rating of 39. This means that the Moto will make
well beyond the intended 24 hours if used for an hour each of telephony,
web browsing, and video playback daily.
As the Moto X posted far from great endurance rating, we ran one more
test for the device with Active Notifications and Touchless Control
turned off. With the new setup, the Moto X posted a slightly better
endurance rating of 44.
Considering the relatively small endurance gain, we would recommend
that you leave the Active Notifications and Touchless Control on. Both
features add substantially to the Moto X’s appeal, they don’t deserve to
be left without a tick in the settings menu.
You can see the full battery performance breakdown of the Moto X in our dedicated post over here.
Handling
The Moto X could very well be the best-handling Android smartphone in
its display size category. Motorola has spent a great deal of research
on the anatomy of the human palm before they came up with the curved
back shape of the Moto X. The end result is a device which feels natural
and reassuring to hold.
Handling the Moto X
Furthermore, thanks to the almost complete lack of side bezels, the
Moto X can be handled with one hand by everyone with at least
averagely-sized hands. This one achievement is arguably one of the most
impressive feats of design on the entire device.
Overall, the Moto X deserves nothing but high marks for build quality
and ergonomics. We'd be taking a couple of points off the design score
due to the lack of expandable storage and non-user-accessible battery,
but it still remains pretty good.
The Moto Maker studio should allow even the most pretentious users to
have the phone "their way" (as long as their way is AT&T, of
course).
Camera What follows are our first impressions of the camera quality of the Moto X; we'll continue to update as we shoot more photos.
Apparently Motorola has finally taken camera capabilities seriously.
Imaging has been an ongoing weakness of the company's handsets, but it's
clear the Moto X is intended to address this deficiency. Motorola says
its new device, equipped with a 10-megapixel "Clear Pixel" RGBC sensor
and LED flash, can snap pictures with speed, and can grab 75 percent
more light than competing smartphone cameras. That results in lower
shutter times and clearer images under dark conditions.
After taking it for a few spins, I can certainly say I'm pleasantly
surprised by the Moto X's camera, which is nimble enough to snap photos
of my restless toddlers without missing a beat. The vaunted imaging
system also appears to take the dim lighting of my cavelike apartment in
stride.
Indoors the phone took clear images of our studio still life, with
both crisp detail and proper exposure. Colors looked accurate as well
but I did run into one annoyance: the tight field of vision. Because the
Moto X's field of view was noticeably small, it was difficult to
capture the entire still-life scene in the frame.
Outdoors, the Moto X performed
admirably as well. I saw plenty of detail and vibrant colors evident in
flowers, leaves, and the clothing of strolling pedestrians.
The camera app, called Quick Capture, has been revamped to be
cleaner and more efficient. With it, the Moto X will go from pocket to
image capture in under 3 seconds. Just grab the phone and twist it twice
in your hand horizontally, and the camera launches without your
pressing a button.
I found that the feature works as advertised and I was able to jump
to the X's camera app in a flash. The double wrist-twist gesture was
also very intuitive and I mastered the procedure after just a few
attempts.
If you're used to tweaking resolution settings yourself, though, you
might go mad trying to find a way to adjust them (I almost did). Save
yourself from a wild goose chase because the Moto X doesn't let you
toggle image size. Instead it always captures pictures and video at
maximum pixel count.
Other than that, using the camera is dead simple and enjoyable. Just
touch any part of the screen to snap a picture. Tapping the camcorder
icon in the top right starts recording video, while hitting the camera
symbol below it switches between front and back lenses. Likewise,
touching the display while shooting video nabs still shots.
Camera settings such as HDR mode, flash, slow motion, and panorama
are hidden in a circular dial on the left side of the screen. Swiping
your finger from left to right brings this wheel into view. Dragging
from right to left handily slides open the gallery.
All this means there's a minimum of clutter obscuring the camera view, a
user interface goal Motorola takes pains to point out.
Key features
Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE; quad-band UMTS/HSPA support
Qualcomm MSM8960 Snapdragon Pro chipset with dual-core 1.7GHz Krait CPU; Adreno 320 GPU;
10 MP autofocus ClearPixel camera with LED flash
1080p video recording @ 30fps with HDR, continuous autofocus and stereo sound
2 MP front-facing camera with 1080p video recording
Wi-Fi b/g/n/ac; Wi-Fi Hotspot
GPS with A-GPS; GLONASS
16/32GB of built-in storage; 2GB of RAM
microUSB port with USB host
Bluetooth v4.0 LE
Standard 3.5 mm audio jack
Dual-microphone noise cancellation
Touchless Control, Active Notifications
Ambient light; accelerometer; proximity sensor
Active noise cancellation with dedicated mic
Superb handling and overall ergonomics
Moto Maker user customization program
50GB of free Google Drive storage
2,200mAh battery
Main disadvantages
More expensive than more powerful competitors
Non-expandable memory
Non user-accessible battery
Moto Maker is exclusive to AT&T at launch
No FM Radio
The GoodThe Motorola Moto X
squeezes a speedy camera and futuristic voice command capabilities into
a well-crafted design that hits the sweet spot between screen size and
comfort. The phone has great battery life and is available in an endless
variety of customized designs.
The BadWith no
expandable storage, space could get tight, especially on the 16GB base
model. The screen isn't as big and sharp as those on some competing
handsets.
The Bottom LineWhile
in screen quality and storage capacity it lags behind rival
superphones, the Moto X's superbly compact and comfortable design,
whiz-bang voice controls, and long battery life make it a worthy Android
contender.
There were some thoughts that the first Motorola phone produced in
conjunction with Google would go on to become a Nexus device. While it
is not a Nexus in name, in many ways it is like a Nexus device. 
On
the home screen, the attractive color fades from the top and bottom of
the display really frame the interface nicely and make Android appear
much classier.
Inside
the security settings, there is a particularly interesting feature,
trusted Bluetooth devices. In essence, if you pair a Bluetooth device
with the Moto X and then choose to secure your phone with a PIN or a
pattern lock, whenever the chosen Bluetooth device is in range, your
phone remains unlocked. Move out of range, and it is secured once more.
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