- 07-06-2010, 11:06 AM #1
The Droid X is Motorola's next Android 2.1 superphone. It will be available from Verizon on July 15th for $199 after $100 rebate.
Here's an overview of the Droid X's main features:
- Android 2.1 (2.2 coming soon)
- 1GHz Texas Instruments OMAP3630 processor
- 512mb RAM
- 8gb of internal storage (for applications, contacts and setting data), 16gb class 4 microSD card installed - expandable to 32gb
- 4.3-inch WVGA (854 x 480 - 228 pixels per inch)
- 8mp camera w/ auto focus & dual LED flash
- 720p HD video capture, HD playback via HDMI or DLNA
- Wi-fi 802.11 b/g/n/i
- Mobile hotspot (up to 5 devices connected)
- FM Radio
- 3.5mm headphone jack
Unboxing
Motorola chose to not give the Droid X a flashy box. In fact, it's only a inch bigger in width than the phone! The box is colored and styled the same as the original Droid. It comes only with a charger/USB cable and a quick start guide. I would've liked to see an HDMI cable here, but I'm sure they didn't include one to cut on costs.
Cosmetics
The Droid X is large! 2.6 x 5.0 x 0.4 inches to be exact. This is almost a half inch taller (0.45"), a quarter inch wider and 0.15 thinner (in its thinnest area) than the original Droid. The screen is more than a half inch bigger (0.6"). It's a little big lighter than the original too, but not by much.
Pic shows actual size for most screen resolutions
Next to the original Droid:
The back is rubberized like the original, and maintains the sliding battery cover. The cover will not easily pop off due to the hump in the back. The external speaker is located bottom middle:
The 8mp camera:
It also maintains a boxy appearance, but adds a sliding hump to the back to allow the rest of the phone to be thinner and house the camera electronics:
Original Droid left - Droid X right
On the left you'll find the charger (microUSB) and HDMI 1.4 (Type D) ports. On the far left you can see the added cutout for a lanyard.
On the top you'll see the centered power/lock putton and the 3.5mm headphone jack:
The right side integrates the volume and red camera buttons. They look and feel better than the original Droid equivalents.
One thing that Motorola didn't improve is the way you have to remove the microSD card. Again, it's stuck beside the battery, which requires its removal to get the microSD card out:
The Droid X has actual navigation buttons below the touch screen. I thought maybe ordering these standard Android icons was a manufacturer specific thing, but they are in a different order than on the original Droid (besides the search button being far right). I have no idea why they don't just pick an order and stick with it. Regardless, if you're coming from another android device, I'm sure you're brain will remember the order of the buttons in no time.
Screen
The 4.3 inch 480 x 854 screen is currently the largest screen on the market! It's larger than the iPhone 4's 3.5 inch screen, although not a higher resolution. Can you tell the difference in resolution between the two phones? Probably not.
An Imagination Technologies PowerVR SGX530 powers the Droid X's massive screen.
The screen is capacitive, as most newer superphones are. Multitouch is built into the screen and actually helps with keyboard typing which I'll elaborate a bit on below.
Keyboard
Since the screen is so large, it makes the on-screen keyboard a breeze to use. The keys are spaced farther apart than on the original Droid. Motorola and Verizon wanted people to know that the keyboard is easy to use. As they put it, the phone includes a "spacious, virtual full-touch keyboard".
Multitouch assists with the easy to use keyboard too. You'll notice that you can touch two keys at a time quickly in succession, something the stock Android keyboard does not do.
Motorola has also included Swype, the keyboard that allows you to "type" by dragging one finger between letters. The Swype keyboard was first introduced on the WM 6.5 Samsung Omnia II and is an awesome way to type!
Next to the original Droid's stock Android keyboard:
I found typing on the Droid X to be a breeze. Coming from someone who uses a hardware keyboard daily, that's saying a lot.
Software
Motorola did some minimal things to Android that really come a long way in the overall scheme of things. They aren't using moto Blur, and I'm glad. It is kind of cool and all, and it's nice to backup and sync things to your Blur account, but this is much better. You don't need that backup when you have everything in Google anyway.
Here's some things you get with the Droid X over the stock Android OS:
- Updated home screen with dedicated call and contact buttons
- 6 additional home screens with a chooser which appears at the bottom in place of the call and contact buttons
- Home screens are pre-loaded with social network, weather, media, calendar, favorites, and news widgets
- Better keyboard & Swipe keyboard
- Added unlock password feature in addition to the pattern lock
- Updated contact view with more information, linked profiles swipe-able recent communication & update panes
- Improved texting interface
The weather and wi-fi, bluetooth, and airplane toggle
The media widget
The texting interface
Phone dialer
One thing I found redundant; To get social networks to sync with the contacts and home screen you 'add an account'. So, if you add your Facebook account it will sync your contacts with your Facebook contacts, which is cool. However, you still don't have the Android Facebook application, so you have to download it from the Market if you want the applications other Facebook functionality.
In some cases, like Twitter, there's really no reason to use the included Twitter widget over the Twitter Android application, unless you want duplication tweets from all your followers.
I should note that Adobe Flash player will not be available until Android 2.2 is released, which apparently is coming soon.
Browser
Browsing web pages on the Droid X is a easy and fast. Pinch zoom, the fast download speeds of Verizon and the fast processor all contribute to a wonderful browsing experience. Everything is super smooth and you won't be disappointed.
Performance & Battery
The 1GHz Texas Instruments OMAP3630 processor really performs! The Droid X is significantly faster than the original Droid and seems at least a little bit faster than the Droid Incredible which runs the 1GHz Snapdragon processor. Opening applications is swift, and menu's are instant. This alone will make you giggle with excitement.
The Droid X's battery is rated at 1540 mAh. The original Droid has a 1400 mAh battery. This larger battery is needed for the Droid X because of its fast processor and large screen. The phone is rated at a talk time 480 minutes, and standby time 220 hours. Talk time is 1.6 hours more than the original Droid and 50 hours less standby time.
I was able to use the phone all day without needing to charge it. You'll probably need to plug it in every night if you use the phone heavily all day. Now if you're using the hotspot feature of the phone, this will likely require a recharge within a couple hours of constant use. The same goes for using any application that uses GPS. You could save some battery life if you keep the screen dimmer than normal and turn off bluetooth, GPS, and wi-fi when not in use.
Camera
I'm really glad Motorola changed some things with the camera. The camera is 8 megapixels (3266x2450 or 11"x17"), and has autofocus, touch to focus, dual LED flash, face detection, a 1/1000 second capable shutter (for taking fast action pics), a 4x digital zoom, and panormaic capture. The picture menu, accessed by touching the screen, allows you to choose between different scenes, like outdoor, and night to get the best picture. There's also an effects and flash menu. The volume keys are the zoom in and out.
For video we have 720p resolution (1280x720) at 24 frames per second, 30 fps in D1 (720x480), 3 microphones for directional audio and noise cancellation, and MPEG4 or WMA v10. The video menu allows you to switch between different "scenes", like "outdoor" or "narrative" which use different microphone combinations, as well as effects and a feature to turn the LEDs on as a camera light.
This camera performs! Not only is it faster than the original Droid, the pictures and video it takes are far better and cleaner. The interface is much better and makes far more sense to use. However, I did notice one weird thing. The flash icon doesn't seem to change depending on what you have the flash set to like the scenes icon does.
Here's a pic of the original Droid taken with the Droid X camera on the highest resolution. (cropped to 800 pixels wide)
Conclusion
I don't expect that Motorola is going to sell as many of these phones as they did with the original Droid, simply because there are more Android phones out there now then there were in late 2009. Before the original Droid, Verizon didn't even have an Android device. Now they have five to fit consumers individual needs and tastes.
The Droid X is a wonderful phone with just about every feature that you could possibly want right now. The only reason you have to get another Android phone would be if you want to save some money, or you don't like how big it is. If that's the case then you have the original Motorola Droid or HTC Droid Incredible (may be hard to come by) to choose from. The HTC Eris is being phased out and the Devour was, well, a year late and dated from the start. Of course you could also wait for the Droid 2, which would be the option if you really really want a new slide out keyboard.
View the Droid Forums
Motorola Droid X Manual
http://cellphoneforums.net/motorola-...ps-tricks.html
› See More: Motorola Droid X ReviewLast edited by tavenger5; 07-23-2010 at 09:20 AM.
John
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- 07-06-2010, 03:41 PM #2Phone Expert
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
I like the phone and might of purchased it if the Incredible didn't come along. I do like the LED's for video recording, the Incredible does allow it yet, talk of it happing with the next update, LED's are use for flash only and i covered one with black electric tape because of too much light on close-ups.
The appearance is ok... not crazy about the back design and the front is ok, i like the DROID front appearance better. It looks like a nice size even though its bigger than the DROID and Incredible, i don't know if its an issue, i'll have to hold it in my hand, i'll see when it arrives at Verizon, but the screen looks like its just big enough.
I don't like the removal of the battery to extract the SD-Card, i like access to the Card without breaking down and powering it off, but if the transfer of files/videos/photos is easy with Bluetooth then its no big deal.
I wish all these smart-phones would start putting a slide lock switch that LOCKS the phone in the sleep mode (option) so you don't accidental hit buttons (top/side) activating the screen.
i told a friend of mine about this phone a month ago since the Incredible became hard to come by and backed ordered... as of now... he may want this phone since it also doesn't have a QWERT keyboard.
- 07-07-2010, 06:49 AM #3
Re: Motorola Droid X Review
This might be my next phone. I like that this one doesn't have touch sensitive buttons because these wont work on winter when your fingers are cold. Overall look is fine but that bend might feel strange when it's in the pocket.
- 07-08-2010, 03:12 PM #4
Re: Motorola Droid X Review
gotta love the droid... I have an iphone but may Ill change it... Any ways I got a solar charger at greenhome.com that works with any cellphone so it does not matter if I change my phone because my charger will work perfectly with any of them
also shipping was free... and the charger was only $75
YOU CAN HELP THE WORLD AND STILL GET YOUR FAVORITE GADGETS!!!
- 07-08-2010, 06:35 PM #5Phone Expert
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- 07-09-2010, 03:23 AM #6Member
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
Yesterday I found a phone identical to this in my balcony and I have no idea whose can it be.... I'm a little afraid, this is really odd...
- 07-11-2010, 11:51 PM #7Super Moderator
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
Something I'm sad to see is that this phone does not have the Global ability.
When the original DROID was released, we complained it didn't have the Global Ability...and Motorola has a year or more to perfect that...and....still no global in the next one? Unless of course there's a SIM Card slot I'm not seeing.
Also, when you visit the Verizon Wireless website, it says it has the hotspot ability, which is cool. THEN it says that it only works with a hotspot data plan. Does that mean you gotta pay an additional fee (on top of the already high $29.99 data plan)?
- 07-16-2010, 11:46 AM #8Junior Member
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
hmnmm, I like the htc better
- 07-16-2010, 11:04 PM #9Junior Member
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
Bad to the bone
- 07-19-2010, 08:28 PM #10
Re: Motorola Droid X Review
Nice i like this!
- 07-23-2010, 10:33 PM #11Junior Member
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
phone is way too big for me
- 07-25-2010, 06:22 AM #12Junior Member
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
Thank you
---------- Post added at 12:22 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:22 PM ----------
Thanks
- 07-31-2010, 09:40 PM #13Junior Member
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Re: Motorola Droid X Review
i want one
- 08-06-2010, 02:29 PM #14
Re: Motorola Droid X Review
This looks amazing!
---------- Post added at 04:29 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:28 PM ----------
Does anyone know what the monthly service fee of the Android smartphones is?
- 08-06-2010, 06:09 PM #15
Re: Motorola Droid X Review
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