on topic, as an avid user of MightyText (text from PC via wifi or cell data), my Nexus 5 battery woes are no more. Trimming txt usage off the screen on time has given me the battery life I required most days. I think this review neglected to mention the battery life savings available with this MotoConnect feature
Sadly Google crippled KitKat's SMS APIs so badly that MightyText cannot mark messages sent (as far as I can tell) or even show MMSes in the stream of messages you send and receive.
Hopefully Google will take note and fix this, instead of forcing us to rely on per-device features ("bloatware?") to fix their problem.
Seems to be a nice phone, but when you look at consumer based rankings (such as http://www.topreport.org/phones/ for example) it is nowhere to be found within the top.
Back to topic: The Moto X 2 is a fantastic phone, that's for sure, and the only other phone that can compete with it is the HTC One M8. /Marco from http://www.consumertop.com/best-phone-guide/
They don't have a review device yet. Or aren't allowed to release the review until a certain date.
So they spam all these crappy "there's swiftkey in ios now", "swiftkey works ok in ios" and "we found a leaked benchmark but we think it might be true" articles (aka clickbait articles).
We all know that nobody is allowed to release a review of an Apple product until the ghost of Steve Jobs has had a chance to convince the reviewer that there's something groundbreaking about a phone that's following all the same trends as the rest of the smartphone field (bigger display, less power draw from a smaller, more efficient SoC, and more room for a larger battery). And he has yet to convince me that a smartphone is worth Apple's price without expandable memory.
You don't know anything about iPhones. Most Android devices don't have expandable memory. The latest iPhones goes to 128GB of fast and reliable contagious memory. Google does not want Android phones to have expandable memory because they know it sucks. Why did you post if you don't know anything?
No phone has expandable memory that I know off, you can't just put a couple of sticks of DDR3 in a phone. Some Android phones have a memory card slot, that's it.
I just wanted to inform you that as blatantly nonsensical as your claims are, and as bad as the products you defend are for many use cases... it's not possible to get cooties from iPhones.
That is so not true. I have no idea where you get your info from.. The device is not even out for testing yet. That's the real reason. Not the shit android fanboy info you just spat out. Jesus.. That's a new low... Also, remember that you started this when it wasn't even called for. And no, I'm not an apple fanboy in case you get the idea to reply with that juvenile nonsense. Writing this from my Moto G!
Seriously no cares that you are 'first'. Even if you are being sarcastic, which is how your comment reads, it still doesn't matter, and no-one still cares....and yes I took the time to write this, but only because I am generally annoyed at this current trend of idiots who still think commenting 'first' is actually col, and to gloat about, as if it really matters........
Then there's the slight slight possibility that you made the comment just to annoy others, which for that I can see the valid logic. :)
He wasn't gloating about it, he was just sharing his happiness. From his tone, it sounds like he respects AT a lot and it was a pleasant surprise for him to be the first one to comment. It is not like, he just wrote "First!!!".
Oh no way, me too I have a dream of marrying someone "first" poster in AT article. If you are a guy and is OK to have a sex change operation, then we can talk business later.
Since many people are not familiar with metric measurements in the U.S.; why not give them in inches? This means nothing to me: 140.8 x 72.4 x 3.8-9.9 mm!
Do you know how stupid your comment sounds ? Just because you don't use the metric system, you can at least take 5 seconds and search the conversion formula or even use google to convert it for you.
Their are 196 counties in the world and 193 of them officially use the metric system. Its taught in first grade of most of these countries.
Not sure but wasn't the Metric Conversion Act a direct response to some initial action made by Woodrow Wilson? At least that is what I was taught in grade school in the 70's. What is really irksome is that despite there being a massive campaign by school systems to make the date where we were actually getting a handle on the metric conversion at the time... Because all the "grown ups" at the time were waving their hands and running around like chickens yelling "it's useless!" "it's useless!" the whole program died an unfair death even though we were learning and understanding the world in metric just fine!
( now that I am 50 and forgot how to look at the world in units of 10 it is officially useless! )
Yeah, the resistance by "grown ups" to the Metric system was, and continues to be, pretty ridiculous. I mean, units of 10? However will I conceptualize that?!?! It's not like it equals the count of my fingers, or my numerical system is based on that or anything!
Actually, it was back in 1866 that Congress passed a law requiring businesses and government to convert to metric as soon as possible, and to begin teaching it in schools. Unfortunately, no one paid attention.
My fellow Americans: 1 inch = approximately 25mm. But really does it matter? The numbers are just so you can compare it to other phones so as long as all the reviews use a consistent unit of measure, why does it matter? Just saying. If it does matter to you, wip our your calculator.
Wow. I was born and raised in America and even I am astonished by this comment. Seriously, we are not the only ones reading these articles, plus, metric is clearly better than our randomly generated units of measurement.
If you give someones height as 5 feet 2 inch it is even worse. 1 feet = 30.48cm, 1 inch = 2.54cm 5x30.48cm=152.4cm + 2x2.54cm=5.08cm 152.4cm+5.08cm=157.48cm So that is 157.48cm or 1.5748m. I get that you grew up with the imperial system but the metric system is so much easier to use and it is the default for science.
For the most part I would agree that measurements should be given in inches. However, almost all manufacturing is done in metric and if I needed otherwise I would just use a conversion app on my smartphone. And for all the hater comments I'll await your cries the very next article that posts specs in inches. I know there are some foreign readers, but this is an American website so don't get too distraught when that happens. You can use that very same conversion app to convert inches to metric.
I always respect AT audience as knowledgeable people. But this is the exception. Trust me on this one sir, the metric system is far superior. If you don't get it, this means there are some implications you are not aware of. This could be you are not strong in maths or science? Here is a simple test, do you know by heart each increment of the wrenches or drill bits sizes when measure in inches? With metric it goes by 1, 2, 3, ... even a 3 years old kid can know it without learning.
inches will always be superior for size estimation. it's impossible to visualize how many centimeters a phone is by looking at it, because the count always exceeds 5. Inches, eh about 5, maybe 6. What, 13 centimeters? how am I supposed to visually divide the phone into 15 rows like I do with 5 inches? Just doesn't work, and won't ever. I, for one, think our socialist commie europeans can suck a fat 5" one.
Oh please, you don't know what you are talking about. You are blissfully happy to know that 1GB = 1000 MB, and you would scream in despair if you were told that a smartphone capacity has a 3/8 Giga inch bytes. When you start doing engineering calculation using feet, inch and pound you will understand what I meant.
I still think Motorola made the mistake of not realizing that the market wanted a BETTER Moto X, not a BIGGER one. If they had kept it at 4.7" and used a high quality display at 720p, we would have a very unique and incredible ergonomic phone that is high-spec'd with awesome battery life. My fingers are still crossed for a Moto X Compact that can deliver this because as of right now the Sony Xperia Z3 Compact is the true successor to the Moto X IMO.
Or at the very least, they should have kept the Moto G the same size or bumped it to no further than 4.7". I think this is the only high end phone that doesn't have a SD slot. A removable battery is also a must as batteries are considered consumables. Like selling printers with sealed ink/toner cartridges. Madness!
The Z1f outsold the iPhone in Japan and it's seemingly only getting more premium AND more durable at the same time with the Z3c... though I like the Z1f/c's sides a bit more than the Z3c's.
+1,000,000 I would have really liked Moto to have gone head to head with the new iPhone staying at [a more compact] 4.7" with a much better sRGB calibrated display, a tested and quality 8mp camera with ois, a decent headphone amp (more important than stereo speakers, imo) with at least decent headphones, an included turbo charger, and something amazing like shell cordovan leather (vs delicate current options) that would [theoretically] only get better with the level of use our phones get...I think with small changes like that, it could have easily unseated the iP6 as a "premium device with attention to detail"...
I was pretty disappointed to see the new Moto X go to the larger screen size. I think Apple nailed it with different devices at 4.7" and 5.5". I wish Moto had kept the X at 4.7" and just upgraded the internals, maybe done the metal band thing, and introduced a new larger phone as a separate model.
Maybe they don't have the internal resources to do two models, so they had to compromise and release a phone that's too big for one hand but not big enough to compete with the Note or iPhone 6+. That seems like a really poor choice to me, if so.
I'm with you but my guess is they simply settled on making it directly in between both sides of the argument... which makes sense. I guess. Also, Apple's 4.7" is fairly different than Moto's 4.7", if it's Nexus 5 like dimensions (but thin, with rounded edges) are anything to go by. Moto's was perfect, IMO. I'm glad the curvature is seemingly here to stay.
wonderfully put. also, if they wanted to be part of the 5-inch crowd so bad, why not just make it 5 inches? why go for 5.2?
they should just have stayed at 4.7", that was a big part of what made the x stand out in the first place. a more efficient SoC, bigger battery, better camera and maybe, just maybe, even an sd slot and they would've been good for another year.
but as nice as the new x looks, now we have yet another phablet sized phone with mediocre runtime and mediocre camera.
Agreed. It's not a coincidence that Apple went with 4.7" for the iPhone 6. It's probably the perfect display size for a smartphone at the moment, provided the bezels are very slim. As an owner of the Galaxy S4, I feel it is just a tiny bit too big to hold and use comfortably with one hand.
I truly hope the trend swings around soon and manufacturers realise that there is a good market for slightly smaller, high performance phones. In Japan I had the pleasure of trying the Sharp Aquos XX Mini (4.5") and it was pretty amazing (battery life at such a small size w/ 1080p screen is questionable though) and would've bought it if it had had support for 3G/LTE in my country.
I'd say it has a very good, but not top of the line screen. A passable camera. And okay battery life (bettery than many of last years phones), but again not top of the line for today's flagships. So your characterizations are unfair, I think.
The Moto X does have a beautiful design, arguably one of the best out there, on a Par with the HTC One M8. It also has the active display, always on voice commands, and the hand gestures, which sound like they are very well developed features that add convenience (unlike the gimmicky heartrate crap on other phones).
It has basically stock Android, without a bunch of bloat software, which many people like. And this will also make it easy for it to get very quick updates to new version of the OS (all of Motorola's additions are downloadable as apps and do not require Motorola to spend a lot of time updating its skin, etc., for a new version of Android).
It also as a super sophisticated antenna design, as explained in the AnandTech preview of the phone a couple weeks ago. That ought to make it industry leading, if you know, you use your phone to connect to a network.
And it has a once of a kind four microphone noise cancellation solution. This is extremely unusual. The best noise cancellation chip out their (from Audience) has a three microphone option, but don't know of anyone who has even implemented that (if so it's very rare). Two microphones is the norm. So four microphones is exception. Unfortunately, AnandTech did not test it like they used to do. But it could make for incredible call clarity in noisy settings.
So the Moto X is certainly not necessarily for everyone. There are arguments to be made for other phones. But I think it holds it own, offers useable features, rather than gimmicks, and has a lower price than other flagships. It's a prefectly good choice. Other phones have their own shortcomings.
Man, that's sad to see all these regressions. I love my Moto X, could easily deal with the increased size and love to see the performance, but that battery life is simply embarassing. Worse than last years version? That's simply not acceptable. Worse screen in some respects and a camera that's somewhat better, but not really good doesn't help. I really was very close to ordering the new Moto X, but it seems I will have to wait at least until the new Nexus device, maybe even longer. Or - god forbid - think about an iPhone.
In this day and age, regression sells! I have no idea how but putting taking useful features away somehow generates more sales. It's also another chance to (re)introduce groundbreaking and amazing features at a later date!
I think these days, if you are a phone manufacturer, all you have to do is make the screen bigger and you can take a massive dump on anything else. Better still, if you are a monitor manufacturer, just stick an LTE chip to one of your monitors and sell it as the best phone ever.
Not to be a smart ass; well yeah I am going to be.
Why in the world does someone want to invest money in a company that gets pass around like some prostitute on Saturday night? Who's turn is it this year, IBM was it?
The company doesn't communicate anything to the consumers, they horribly screwed a ton of customers on new phones telling them they are NOT upgrading the android OS on the phones. The list can go on with them.
Hrm, no T-Mobile LTE band 12... which is the newly acquired 700mhz VZW band I believe? Though, almost moot given how disappointing the battery life is.
Based on the table infor provided FCC-ID =IHDT56QA1, it has support for WCDMA in AWS [850, 900, AWS, 1900, 2100] as well as Band 4 LTE. [2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 17, 29]
Those are TMO US bands. So what prevents us from using the phone on TMobile??
There have been multiple articles on the tech press regarding Brian Klug also being hired by Apple. Recent "wish I could comment" tweets post-iPhone release seem to support this.
I still his Twitter account is still active, his hobby site hasn't seen many updates but it never did. I miss his insights, always found it very on point, but Joshua is doing a good job...
Tho I'm now wondering what his preferred Android UI is (Sense?), since he made a comment along the lines of "AOSP isn't my preferred Android UI" in this article.
I actually meant I'm wondering what Joshua's logged l preferred UI is, since he made that comment I alluded to in this review. I think Brian had a preference for cleaner Nexus/Moto devices, tho Sense's value seems to ebb and flow in between Sense/AOSP releases.
"While the actual ROM itself seems to have some stability issues such as reboots, app crashes, and other oddness, the functionality is fantastic." its the need to make comments like this that caused me to switch to apple after 4 years of being apart of the droid collective...I will not be assimilated !
i'm actually surprised that this statement is not elaborated on some more. you should be able to expect a new flagship phone to work without random reboots and "other oddness" in 2014, even on android.
So I also wish there was more elaboration on this. Is it typical for the ROMs to get updated as they fix bugs? If so, that would mean older phone revisions would need patches to replace ROM code, taking up RAM. How is this handled in the smartphone world?
ROM is kind of a misnomer nowadays since it's actually stored in flash. Though one could argue that it's software enforced ROM since most phones with locked bootloaders / no root desn't allow writes to system.
One thing worth mentioning though might be the Moto Maker customisation options (which we're even getting in the UK!). Some of the premium leather/wood options definitely make the phone stand-out from competition (in a classy way, I might add).
And once you get over oh la la nonsense you will wonder why you can't buy a more powerful aftermarket battery and why 1080p video recording is a chocolate teapot of a feature without an SD slot.
It will be too late by then as you would have parted with your cash and voted for this trend to continue with your wallet. These nice things are only there to distract you from the planned obsolescence.
A small point... is it correct that only the *Sprint* version will have all the bands for full T-Mo operation when their version of 700mhz (Band 12) finally rolls out? I see Band 17 (due to be rolled into 12 at some point) listed on the GSM/Pure, and though perhaps a baseband update could enable 12, I know better than to expect that without an official announcement.
Should full-price T-Mo buyers really be getting Sprint's X instead?
There's a lot of confusion out there about this. Also, given that Motorola tweeted a few days ago that there would be no Moto X for Sprint, it's not clear if model XT1092 actually exists or will ever be released.
As far as I can see, only in this AnandTech review and a post at Android Central is there any mention of an XT1092 model. Also, on the Motorola site the XT1095 and XT1097 are not listed has supporting identical bands, as shown here at AnandTech. The XT1095 (Pure Edition) is show dropping a few of the LTE bands--which makes no sense to make a separate model that all it does is disable a couple bands.
Anyway, if the XT1092 does ever come to exist, as you note, it would be the best for T-Mobile because it supports LTE band 12 (700 Mhz)--which is just bizarre, given that the Pure Edition is being currently sold as the model for T-Mobile.
There's a thread in the Motorola forums where a company representative says they are aware of the confusion and looking into what is the deal with the bands on these phones, but no clarification has come yet.
Is there any thought that if the battery testing methodology ignores differences in devices due to the job scheduling setup and cell signal/wifi reception, that it is not giving the full picture? I'm sure the people at Motorola who worked on the antenna tuning are disappointed that you specifically exclude this from your tests.
It seems like the LG G2 is a near-identical device with advantages over Moto in battery & camera. LG should just push their new UI skin out to that phone and keep selling it.
They made a G3 Mini or whatever that's basically a G2 rehash... Probably has a smaller battery tho, I forget.
Problem with taking into account a job scheduler, varying signal conditions, etc is that it makes it near impossible to create a repeatable test with consistent results.
They could add ADDITIONAL tests like: battery life with borderline signal strength or battery life with a consistent sync job... But that would add to their already long battery of tests.
Plus where do you draw the parameters for tests like that (same signal strength for all phones or same scenario with varying low signal strength), and how do you keep it consistent (cell towers have varying loads, get upgraded, etc).
I suppose they could use that signal analyzer with the Faraday box Brian had for a while but I dunno if that could simulate a data traffic load.
No love for the xperia z/z1/z2/z3 cameras at all?? I was under the impression that they were among the best of the best cameras to be had in smartphones especially for android phones
Some glaring omissions from this review: -Battery Life Talk Time (this has traditionally been a strong point for Motorola - does this continue?) -Sound Quality (from built speaker and headphone jack) -Bluetooth compatibility and performance (audio quality and issues connecting to devices) -Call Quality (speakerphone and earpiece quality) -Microphone quality (this phone is supposed to have an array of 4 mics.. how well does the noise cancellation work? Can people on the other end hear you clearly?)
Seems like all the aspects of this phone being used as a, well, phone, have been ignored. Usually Motorola is tops in this department. I'd like to know if that continues to be true for this device or if it's just another "Me Too!" device like this review implies.
Yeah, I'm also disappointed not to see a review of the one of a kind four microphone noise cancellation. In the past, AnandTech is the only site that reviewed noise cancellation. Now no one does.
Lol, what does it matter to you whether it's in the article? It's not there and you already know it's not there. And you know it's very close to Google's AOSP stuff and Google got rid of microSD support forever ago.
looks like Josh will be headed to Apple soon too. In fact the entire site will be purchased and rebranded to Appletech. Android reviews will continue but every phone with features similar to iPhones (lack of SD card slot, sealed batteries, etc.) will be praised
Google's Nexus Initiative is not AOSP... far from it. Unless you consider dropping a stock browser for Google Chrome and a stock SMS app for Google Hangouts to be "open source" in the least... nope. Google is removing open-source options from Nexus.
True AOSP is returning SD capability; the backlash Google experienced with the release of KitKat was apparently disastrous enough to reschedule all their crippled functionality on Android Lemon.
Good job at not trying to ignore the negatives or spin them into positives. You should factor in the price in your conclusions even if many might not care about price.
Josh, could you explain Auto-boost? Under what conditions is it activated? Can it be activated manually or only automatically via a minimum ambient light senor reading? Thanks!
the worst review i have ever read, now spec-sheet days are gone.. I want practical results. Everyone hated the 1st Gen Moto X, but the tweaks motorola did to that everyone became a Fan. I can bet after what motorola did with with S4 dual core processor.. so called X8 computing the new X won't let that reputation down I want a smartphone that is good practically.. not on PAPER. Infact some tasks are accomplished faster on MOTO E than S5. And most importantly first learn how to write a review. It's not essay competition. 10 Pages still.. outcome nothing.
"The latter seems to be true all of the time though, as so far with this strategy Motorola has been one of the first to release new Android OS updates."
This has certainly not been my experience. 4.4.3 came out in early June, and 4.4.4 two weeks later. My Moto-X never got 4.4.3, and didn't get 4.4.4 until August. This is my first Android, though, so maybe 6 weeks is considered a short wait.
one thing that I can't understand, is why on Anandtech Iphone has such good battery life when ALL PEOPLE OF THE WORLD can demonstrate that iPhone battery life sucks... in all tests iPhone 5/5s are very near to LG G2 (at worst a 30% lower), that in real life have at least the double of the battery of iPhones....
while I wouldn't go so far as to say that iPhone battery life 'sucks' I share your surprise at how well it does in AT's laboratory testing vs. real life experience, where, in my experience, it is little better than the current gen Moto X.
It looks like the benchmarks are targetting select functions while shutting down all other background processes. So they are not reflective of your real life experience. So for example the contextual services on moto x might be eating up much less battery overall than something similar on an iphone. But if you shut down both of those, i phone battery will seem like a giant.
That's not true. It doesn't suck. It's not as good as the best devices out there, but it's better than most. I tend to get a full day out of my 5, and I usually use it fairly often.
There's a lot of anti Apple prejudice on this site from posters. It's really sad.
So motorola decided to give consumes the worst of both worlds. Thicker to allow for changing the backplate, but somehow not allowing changing the battery. To make matters worse they epoxied in a poor battery. So the result is a $500 disposable phone, with poor battery life, and you get to throw it away when the $15 battery dies.
honestly I feel like this review was pretty harsh. The camera isn't horrible, the AMOLED screen enables extensive black background screen on, the battery life is good enough, the phone has great software...so why so much hate?
It's basically a result of how polarization works, grab a cheap camera lens polarizer and play with it a little. I think phones usually prioritize portrait use, which generally makes sense, but sucks for looking at navigation (in landscape) with polarized sunglasses.
Thank you for yet another detailed review and for saving me money and time. As a previous owner of first-gen Moto X it's pretty disappointing to see that new Moto X is barely better in some aspects, and in some it is actually a regression. Most importantly, it still has horrible battery life and mediocre camera. As much as I love "Active Display" I'm afraid I will have to look at other flagships, with better battery life and better cameras.
I am wondering why the CPU and GPU benchmarks don't show the original Moto X, specially since its dual core was exhaustively analysed in the original review.
As an owner of the original X I was really looking forward to this one, just wished two things, a much improved camera and a great display, that's it. But both of them are below par and par with the competition.
> While this would be risky in terms of engineering, RCBC seems to give the benefits of clear pixels without the drawbacks that come with RGBC, although it's hard to tell whether this is really true without a shipping implementation.
I knew this from last year when reading about Aptina's previous-gen RCBC sensor. It was obviously better than Omnision's RGBC. Motorola should've gone with Aptina for the rear camera, too, and market ClearPixel more heavily.
Interesting, I didn't realize Motorola made their own version of Glance. Anyway, seems like a good phone overall. Not exceptional in any one area maybe, but seems all-around solid and it's quite a bit cheaper than the big boy flagships.
The only thing that really sucks is the lack of an SD card slot.
Was the test model perhaps a dud? Reviews on other sites have been much more favorable to screen properties, performance, and battery life. In addition, the glitches a rebooting were not mentioned in any other review. Just curious about that.
As someone who genuinely finds the moto x to be an absolutely amazing software and hardware integrated phone, I'm very happy with this newest generation x. I'm not crazy about a phone with amazing ergonomics getting bigger but I suppose it's inevitable now these days. If the Samsung didn't have a push button home button I think I'd get that. But as it is this is probably my next after my moto x now.
I wonder if the capacitive controller could also be for the Moto logo on the back. I have a 2014 X with me here, and the M button is substantial, it really feels like there's supposed to be another function to it.
Am I the only one that noticed the HTC E8 in some of the charts? Does that mean there's an upcoming review?!? How I'd love for that to get NAM bands...
This is a bechmark review. Nowhere in quality as compared to the last year moto x review. Anyone can run benchmark and post the results. And i find it a bit hard to believe that samsung galaxy s5 running with the same soc will give better performance than a stock android phone in real life. Which leads me to think that tests here are working on individual components. Like shutting down everything else and running a browser. You dont do that in real life. So thats not a fair assessment. Battery life also turns out different in real life where there are multiple resources vying for the battery. Nowhere that assessment. This review seems tilted to me. New apple networking of the website trying to kill the most eligible competition? Its possible.
Killing background stuff is the only way to make results easily repeatable tho, and Samsung bakes in a lot of optimisation despite the bloat they also shovel in.
I still think 1080p on a 5" screen is a dumb waste. This phone should be shipping with no less than 3GB RAM (every flagship should by now) and there's no excuse for any flagship android phone not to have a microSD card slot. Also, why didn't they go with Snapdragon 805? I know the difference isn't that big a deal right now, but Amazon's 8.9" tablet is already using it.
Yeah the RAM and the CPU aren't that big of a deal to me, but if you're going to delete the mSD slot then your base model should be 32GB with a 64GB version as the upgrade.
I agree. These days 16 Gb is a joke (which works out to more like 10 or 11 GB, once you account for the space the system takes up). These are multimedia devices. Once you start taking photos and video, downloading music and podcasts, doing some backups with Titanium or whatever, 16 GB really doesn't cut it. I struggle with this all the time on my Nexus 4.
And they always want you to use the cloud as the solution to this problem. Seriously? Obviously they cannot possibly be ignorant about people having data caps on their plans. Not everyone can afford an unlimited plan. Or maybe this is just their way of colluding with the carriers to push people into more expensive plans. Anyway, the could is not a serious solution for a technology that has inherent network bandwidth issues.
And security issues, which then reveal underlying issues with privacy, exhibitionism and respect. Not to mention the question of reliable access. And could it even be that data over radio is consuming more power than data over few or costly internal memory, respectively neglected external memory?
Unlike Amazon, they're actually trying to make money off the hardware, hah. And I'm sure the cooling solutions for something of a tablet-sized form factor is much easier to tackle than on a smartphone.
1080p on a 5.2 inch screen still results in a visible difference over 720p. 1440p, not so much.
Kudos to Motorola for the impressive engineering that went into the metal-band-as-antenna. I like that about Motorola, that they put time and effort into things that users may not immediately notice, but should definitely improve the everyday quality of the experience of using a phone for its primary use - to make calls. But....
.... the metal band ruins the design, compared to X Gen 1, sadly. Screen-plate aside, the casing now seems to consist of 3 parts rather than 2. I loved the slopey, curviness of the first gen, and the way that the backplate curved round the sides, and met the front plate in the middle. That unity of design is gone now, and this second gen looks a bit awkward imo. The front and back of the phones don't match that well anymore. There was a lovely overall unity in aesthetic to the first Gen, which has been broken on the 2nd.
I also agree with the commenters that it is too big. Just like the S5, G3, and One M8 are all too big. For my very average sized male hands, the Gen One's ergonomics were perfect.
Sensors at the top on the front, especially on white model, look messy. Could they not all have been put behind one, long translucent black strip, along with the speaker grille, or something like that? Or tidied up a bit better?
I think Motorola would've been better sticking to the compact, ergonomically wonderful design of Gen 1, but with improvements to the internals (camera, SoC, colour accuracy, battery life). They'd have a great performing phone that fits better in the hand than all their rivals, for a lower cost than their rivals.
And then it would make sense to have a 5.5inch-ish size 'phablet' too, big screen, big tricks, etc. They'd be competing just above and just below the S5 and I'd say they'd rip chunks out of the market that way.
It looks like the Gen 1 is gonna go down as a classic, flawed and all as it was.
I agree with your remark on the Moto X 2014! It much bigger then the Moto X which is great feeling and the right size for me small hands. But I am surprise Motorola went to a much larger size too! Motorola should of made the Moto X 2014 the same size; and they have the Moto G - 5" for anyone wanting a larger model. That would have been perfect decision. I going to the Apple store and looking at the 4.7" iPhone 6!
@Harry_Wild, the new iPhone 6 (5.44 x 2.64in) is just marginally smaller than the Moto X 2014 (5.54 x 2.85)! So, if you believe that the new Moto X is too big for you, probably the new iPhone 6 will be so!
I will wait to see the new Moto X 2014 in person before deciding them. Thanks for the reply! Since the Moto X seems to be the same shape as the upcoming Nexus X; then I glad that it close the old 4.7" Moto X. A shopping we will go! LOL!
I don't know, to me the original Moto X had a cheap plastic feel to it despite the nice sculptured back. It was a far cry for the higher quality feel of the polycarbonate material in some of the Nokia phones. I think the new design has a much higher quality feel to it, though the large size does affect how it fits in one's hand a bit.
Guys, is MOTO X 2nd gen OTG compatible ? I asked MOTO customer care agent, he said It is not compatible. So when i questioned him that MOTO X 1st gen had it (saw XDA forums) he further added that Motorola cannot guarantee it!
OTG compatibility is the only thing stopping me from buying this phone as in INDIA you get only 16GB version.
A little off topic... but how come galaxy s5 top most performance benchmarks by quite a margin when it has snapdragon 801 too? And why does its T-mobile version doesn't?
The new moto X seems very good, much better than the ever-so-lagging-behind new iPhone. The question is though, can Motorola match up to HTC in consumer satisfaction? Motorola hasn't quite managed to do it so far (source: http://www.consumertop.com/best-phone-guide/), but this one seems very promising!
IOS lockscreen notifications light up the screen for a short "glance time" without any handwaving. And yes, they murder stock Android, although L is supposed to remedy this?
"It's hard to really explain because on the surface it seems rather mundane but after using Moto Display it's clear just how much time it saves. The glance time is just right to view notifications and the hand wave/approach action is effortless compared to pressing a home button or tapping the display."
The iphones don't need a separate low power CPU for the lockscreen notifications because they display *once*, then it goes dark until you manually pick up the phone.
In the chance that you're not there to see the phone go off, Moto's implementation is superior.
But when you compare Moto X (2nd Gen) with Honor 6 you can see the difference that what Honor 6 is offering at such a reasonable price. You can see the difference here: http://wp.me/p5cjTD-c
I posted a comment soon after publication, essentially saying something along the lines of "tiny non-removeable battery, no SD card, poor camera, oh well, I suppose it is a patriotic buy for Americans". This has vanished. Are the forums being censored now for un-American remarks or something?
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AppleCrappleHater2 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
A dream comes true, finally, the first time in my life being the first to post a comment on a newly published article on AT.tipoo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Get better dreams, lol. No one likes "first" comments.NeatOman - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Leave the guy alone, no one likes a bully... Well, unless its funny... But! Only sometimes were I can't help it laugh :)soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
I'm happy to hear he was so happy.on topic, as an avid user of MightyText (text from PC via wifi or cell data), my Nexus 5 battery woes are no more. Trimming txt usage off the screen on time has given me the battery life I required most days. I think this review neglected to mention the battery life savings available with this MotoConnect feature
CanvasExtractor - Wednesday, October 15, 2014 - link
Sadly Google crippled KitKat's SMS APIs so badly that MightyText cannot mark messages sent (as far as I can tell) or even show MMSes in the stream of messages you send and receive.Hopefully Google will take note and fix this, instead of forcing us to rely on per-device features ("bloatware?") to fix their problem.
craighamilton - Saturday, December 6, 2014 - link
Seems to be a nice phone, but when you look at consumer based rankings (such as http://www.topreport.org/phones/ for example) it is nowhere to be found within the top.n13L5 - Saturday, September 20, 2014 - link
Too bad being from Greedle, it lacks a Micro SD card...I'd just buy it for the ultra cool bamboo otherwise!
marcokatz - Friday, September 26, 2014 - link
Back to topic: The Moto X 2 is a fantastic phone, that's for sure, and the only other phone that can compete with it is the HTC One M8. /Marco from http://www.consumertop.com/best-phone-guide/Mayuyu - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
BTW, is there going to be a iPhone review? Or has the Apple fans on staff left and there isn't anyone interested in doing iPhone coverage?Alexey291 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
They don't have a review device yet. Or aren't allowed to release the review until a certain date.So they spam all these crappy "there's swiftkey in ios now", "swiftkey works ok in ios" and "we found a leaked benchmark but we think it might be true" articles (aka clickbait articles).
knightspawn1138 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
We all know that nobody is allowed to release a review of an Apple product until the ghost of Steve Jobs has had a chance to convince the reviewer that there's something groundbreaking about a phone that's following all the same trends as the rest of the smartphone field (bigger display, less power draw from a smaller, more efficient SoC, and more room for a larger battery). And he has yet to convince me that a smartphone is worth Apple's price without expandable memory.darwinosx - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
You don't know anything about iPhones.Most Android devices don't have expandable memory.
The latest iPhones goes to 128GB of fast and reliable contagious memory.
Google does not want Android phones to have expandable memory because they know it sucks.
Why did you post if you don't know anything?
sprockkets - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Speak for yourself apple troll. All you ever do is troll any article dealing with Android.GFY.
Kenneth2011 - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
I don't think I want any contagious memory, reliable or otherwise... My own is quite enough, thank you.probedb - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
No phone has expandable memory that I know off, you can't just put a couple of sticks of DDR3 in a phone. Some Android phones have a memory card slot, that's it.lypanov - Thursday, September 25, 2014 - link
I just wanted to inform you that as blatantly nonsensical as your claims are, and as bad as the products you defend are for many use cases... it's not possible to get cooties from iPhones.alex2 - Friday, September 19, 2014 - link
That is so not true. I have no idea where you get your info from.. The device is not even out for testing yet. That's the real reason. Not the shit android fanboy info you just spat out. Jesus.. That's a new low... Also, remember that you started this when it wasn't even called for. And no, I'm not an apple fanboy in case you get the idea to reply with that juvenile nonsense. Writing this from my Moto G!DeciusStrabo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Anand surely could have hooked up his old site with a few phones...Review embargo for pre-release phones all the sites Apple likes have gotten has been lifted today.
ruggia - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
it's quite rare for Anandtech to release mobile reviews at the day of embargo lift (including this one)good things take time. it always has.
dsraa - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Seriously no cares that you are 'first'. Even if you are being sarcastic, which is how your comment reads, it still doesn't matter, and no-one still cares....and yes I took the time to write this, but only because I am generally annoyed at this current trend of idiots who still think commenting 'first' is actually col, and to gloat about, as if it really matters........Then there's the slight slight possibility that you made the comment just to annoy others, which for that I can see the valid logic. :)
adityarjun - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
He wasn't gloating about it, he was just sharing his happiness. From his tone, it sounds like he respects AT a lot and it was a pleasant surprise for him to be the first one to comment.It is not like, he just wrote "First!!!".
rituraj - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
You sir, have earned my sincere respect[email protected] - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
lol gratz!Peroxyde - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Oh no way, me too I have a dream of marrying someone "first" poster in AT article. If you are a guy and is OK to have a sex change operation, then we can talk business later.batongxue - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Those FCC stuff on the bottom. Yikesadityarjun - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Yup, that part looks really bad!!Harry_Wild - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Since many people are not familiar with metric measurements in the U.S.; why not give them in inches? This means nothing to me: 140.8 x 72.4 x 3.8-9.9 mm!JetSter735180 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Do you know how stupid your comment sounds ? Just because you don't use the metric system, you can at least take 5 seconds and search the conversion formula or even use google to convert it for you.Their are 196 counties in the world and 193 of them officially use the metric system. Its taught in first grade of most of these countries.
Kristian Vättö - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
And just FYI, even Motorola only lists the measurements in metric on their US site:https://www.motorola.com/us/motomaker?pid=FLEXR2#m...
Fergy - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I thought the USA officially converted to metric about a hundred years ago. It is just that people are so stubborn that they won't use it.coder543 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Nope.Flunk - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
That's right, it's only been 39 nears since the "Metric Conversion Act" of 1975. Not 100 years.theuglyman0war - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Not sure but wasn't the Metric Conversion Act a direct response to some initial action made by Woodrow Wilson? At least that is what I was taught in grade school in the 70's.What is really irksome is that despite there being a massive campaign by school systems to make the date where we were actually getting a handle on the metric conversion at the time...
Because all the "grown ups" at the time were waving their hands and running around like chickens yelling "it's useless!" "it's useless!" the whole program died an unfair death even though we were learning and understanding the world in metric just fine!
( now that I am 50 and forgot how to look at the world in units of 10 it is officially useless! )
keithzg - Monday, September 22, 2014 - link
Yeah, the resistance by "grown ups" to the Metric system was, and continues to be, pretty ridiculous. I mean, units of 10? However will I conceptualize that?!?! It's not like it equals the count of my fingers, or my numerical system is based on that or anything!melgross - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Actually, it was back in 1866 that Congress passed a law requiring businesses and government to convert to metric as soon as possible, and to begin teaching it in schools. Unfortunately, no one paid attention.usernametaken76 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
What size screen does your phone have again?soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
ouchhhhhhh heheRatman6161 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
My fellow Americans: 1 inch = approximately 25mm. But really does it matter? The numbers are just so you can compare it to other phones so as long as all the reviews use a consistent unit of measure, why does it matter? Just saying. If it does matter to you, wip our your calculator.Arkive - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Wow. I was born and raised in America and even I am astonished by this comment. Seriously, we are not the only ones reading these articles, plus, metric is clearly better than our randomly generated units of measurement.Fergy - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
If you give someones height as 5 feet 2 inch it is even worse.1 feet = 30.48cm, 1 inch = 2.54cm
5x30.48cm=152.4cm + 2x2.54cm=5.08cm
152.4cm+5.08cm=157.48cm
So that is 157.48cm or 1.5748m. I get that you grew up with the imperial system but the metric system is so much easier to use and it is the default for science.
bigboxes - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
For the most part I would agree that measurements should be given in inches. However, almost all manufacturing is done in metric and if I needed otherwise I would just use a conversion app on my smartphone. And for all the hater comments I'll await your cries the very next article that posts specs in inches. I know there are some foreign readers, but this is an American website so don't get too distraught when that happens. You can use that very same conversion app to convert inches to metric.Peroxyde - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I always respect AT audience as knowledgeable people. But this is the exception. Trust me on this one sir, the metric system is far superior. If you don't get it, this means there are some implications you are not aware of. This could be you are not strong in maths or science? Here is a simple test, do you know by heart each increment of the wrenches or drill bits sizes when measure in inches? With metric it goes by 1, 2, 3, ... even a 3 years old kid can know it without learning.nivedita - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Um, the US makes drill bits in fractions of an inch. You sound like a 3 yr old who just learned how to count yourself, you know.soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
inches will always be superior for size estimation. it's impossible to visualize how many centimeters a phone is by looking at it, because the count always exceeds 5. Inches, eh about 5, maybe 6. What, 13 centimeters? how am I supposed to visually divide the phone into 15 rows like I do with 5 inches? Just doesn't work, and won't ever. I, for one, think our socialist commie europeans can suck a fat 5" one.Peroxyde - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Oh please, you don't know what you are talking about. You are blissfully happy to know that 1GB = 1000 MB, and you would scream in despair if you were told that a smartphone capacity has a 3/8 Giga inch bytes. When you start doing engineering calculation using feet, inch and pound you will understand what I meant.soccerballtux - Saturday, September 20, 2014 - link
I prefer mils myselftechxx - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I still think Motorola made the mistake of not realizing that the market wanted a BETTER Moto X, not a BIGGER one. If they had kept it at 4.7" and used a high quality display at 720p, we would have a very unique and incredible ergonomic phone that is high-spec'd with awesome battery life. My fingers are still crossed for a Moto X Compact that can deliver this because as of right now the Sony Xperia Z3 Compact is the true successor to the Moto X IMO.semo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Or at the very least, they should have kept the Moto G the same size or bumped it to no further than 4.7". I think this is the only high end phone that doesn't have a SD slot. A removable battery is also a must as batteries are considered consumables. Like selling printers with sealed ink/toner cartridges. Madness!chrone - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
+1. We want high performance 4.7" device.flyingpants1 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
It's called the Samsung Galaxy Alpha.Endda - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
and the Sony Xperia Z3 CompactNBMTX - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
The Z1f outsold the iPhone in Japan and it's seemingly only getting more premium AND more durable at the same time with the Z3c... though I like the Z1f/c's sides a bit more than the Z3c's.piroroadkill - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Alpha is a PoS compared with Z3 Compact.NBMTX - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
+1,000,000I would have really liked Moto to have gone head to head with the new iPhone staying at [a more compact] 4.7" with a much better sRGB calibrated display, a tested and quality 8mp camera with ois, a decent headphone amp (more important than stereo speakers, imo) with at least decent headphones, an included turbo charger, and something amazing like shell cordovan leather (vs delicate current options) that would [theoretically] only get better with the level of use our phones get...I think with small changes like that, it could have easily unseated the iP6 as a "premium device with attention to detail"...
wffurr - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I was pretty disappointed to see the new Moto X go to the larger screen size. I think Apple nailed it with different devices at 4.7" and 5.5". I wish Moto had kept the X at 4.7" and just upgraded the internals, maybe done the metal band thing, and introduced a new larger phone as a separate model.Maybe they don't have the internal resources to do two models, so they had to compromise and release a phone that's too big for one hand but not big enough to compete with the Note or iPhone 6+. That seems like a really poor choice to me, if so.
NBMTX - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
I'm with you but my guess is they simply settled on making it directly in between both sides of the argument... which makes sense. I guess.Also, Apple's 4.7" is fairly different than Moto's 4.7", if it's Nexus 5 like dimensions (but thin, with rounded edges) are anything to go by. Moto's was perfect, IMO. I'm glad the curvature is seemingly here to stay.
fokka - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
wonderfully put. also, if they wanted to be part of the 5-inch crowd so bad, why not just make it 5 inches? why go for 5.2?they should just have stayed at 4.7", that was a big part of what made the x stand out in the first place. a more efficient SoC, bigger battery, better camera and maybe, just maybe, even an sd slot and they would've been good for another year.
but as nice as the new x looks, now we have yet another phablet sized phone with mediocre runtime and mediocre camera.
soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
having the Nexus 5, I think it's just a bit too small, but every 5.2" phone I use, I feel is perfect. 5.5" too big, but not 5.2.kasakka - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Agreed. It's not a coincidence that Apple went with 4.7" for the iPhone 6. It's probably the perfect display size for a smartphone at the moment, provided the bezels are very slim. As an owner of the Galaxy S4, I feel it is just a tiny bit too big to hold and use comfortably with one hand.I truly hope the trend swings around soon and manufacturers realise that there is a good market for slightly smaller, high performance phones. In Japan I had the pleasure of trying the Sharp Aquos XX Mini (4.5") and it was pretty amazing (battery life at such a small size w/ 1080p screen is questionable though) and would've bought it if it had had support for 3G/LTE in my country.
soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
I am not the only one that thinks 5.2" is the sweet spot and wishes my Nexus 5 had a 5.2" screen.cknobman - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Hmmm.........Crap screen
Crap battery life
Crap camera
Why should anyone buy this again?
piroroadkill - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
They won't.There were reasons to buy Moto X, but this new version is pointless, it's huge and worse than the alternatives.
soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
I don't understand what the hate is. I still think it's a great phone.gg555 - Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - link
I'd say it has a very good, but not top of the line screen. A passable camera. And okay battery life (bettery than many of last years phones), but again not top of the line for today's flagships. So your characterizations are unfair, I think.The Moto X does have a beautiful design, arguably one of the best out there, on a Par with the HTC One M8. It also has the active display, always on voice commands, and the hand gestures, which sound like they are very well developed features that add convenience (unlike the gimmicky heartrate crap on other phones).
It has basically stock Android, without a bunch of bloat software, which many people like. And this will also make it easy for it to get very quick updates to new version of the OS (all of Motorola's additions are downloadable as apps and do not require Motorola to spend a lot of time updating its skin, etc., for a new version of Android).
It also as a super sophisticated antenna design, as explained in the AnandTech preview of the phone a couple weeks ago. That ought to make it industry leading, if you know, you use your phone to connect to a network.
And it has a once of a kind four microphone noise cancellation solution. This is extremely unusual. The best noise cancellation chip out their (from Audience) has a three microphone option, but don't know of anyone who has even implemented that (if so it's very rare). Two microphones is the norm. So four microphones is exception. Unfortunately, AnandTech did not test it like they used to do. But it could make for incredible call clarity in noisy settings.
So the Moto X is certainly not necessarily for everyone. There are arguments to be made for other phones. But I think it holds it own, offers useable features, rather than gimmicks, and has a lower price than other flagships. It's a prefectly good choice. Other phones have their own shortcomings.
DeciusStrabo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Man, that's sad to see all these regressions. I love my Moto X, could easily deal with the increased size and love to see the performance, but that battery life is simply embarassing. Worse than last years version? That's simply not acceptable. Worse screen in some respects and a camera that's somewhat better, but not really good doesn't help.I really was very close to ordering the new Moto X, but it seems I will have to wait at least until the new Nexus device, maybe even longer. Or - god forbid - think about an iPhone.
semo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
In this day and age, regression sells! I have no idea how but putting taking useful features away somehow generates more sales. It's also another chance to (re)introduce groundbreaking and amazing features at a later date!I think these days, if you are a phone manufacturer, all you have to do is make the screen bigger and you can take a massive dump on anything else. Better still, if you are a monitor manufacturer, just stick an LTE chip to one of your monitors and sell it as the best phone ever.
MrGutts - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Not to be a smart ass; well yeah I am going to be.Why in the world does someone want to invest money in a company that gets pass around like some prostitute on Saturday night? Who's turn is it this year, IBM was it?
The company doesn't communicate anything to the consumers, they horribly screwed a ton of customers on new phones telling them they are NOT upgrading the android OS on the phones. The list can go on with them.
DeciusStrabo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Which phones don't get an update by Motorola?soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
The Atrix4G was marketed as the worlds most powerful phone, and never made it past Gingerbread even with its 1GB RAM and dual core processor.I still hate them for it
randomlinh - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Hrm, no T-Mobile LTE band 12... which is the newly acquired 700mhz VZW band I believe? Though, almost moot given how disappointing the battery life is.mikelward - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Wow, well spotted.Yet another disappointment.
Gunbuster - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Perhaps there will be a T-Mo specific version? Still that segments it and killls the chances for finding a hot deal.I just wish there was an option to do WiFi calling on non T-Mo branded handsets...
jk1 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
can't change the battery and poor battery life, no slot for an sd card for media - this phone doesn't even make my list of phones to consider.rocketbuddha - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Yeah. Very disappointing. They seemed to willingly snatched Defeat from the jaws of Victory.No SD card expandability
Piss poor battery
No T-Mo LTE bands
Moto's ideal market would be ideally a no-contract carrier likeT-Mo or any of the MVNOs.
rocketbuddha - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Wierd.Based on the table infor provided FCC-ID =IHDT56QA1, it has support for
WCDMA in AWS [850, 900, AWS, 1900, 2100]
as well as Band 4 LTE. [2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 17, 29]
Those are TMO US bands. So what prevents us from using the phone on TMobile??
greyhulk - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
A little off-topic, but does anyone know what happened to Brian Klug? Does he do anything for Anandtech anymore?notposting - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
He went to Apple.bigboxes - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
It sounds like the commercial, "He went to Jarrod's!" But yes, Brian and Anand went to work for Apple.fokka - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
and they didn't mention it even once, not even in his long and heartfelt goodbye letter did anand say what is what.Xinn3r - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
AFAIK only Anand went to Apple.Brian is continuing Grad study, this is from what I've read on other comments.
BGQ-qbf-tqf-n6n - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
There have been multiple articles on the tech press regarding Brian Klug also being hired by Apple. Recent "wish I could comment" tweets post-iPhone release seem to support this.melgross - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
No, he went to apple about a year ago.Impulses - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I still his Twitter account is still active, his hobby site hasn't seen many updates but it never did. I miss his insights, always found it very on point, but Joshua is doing a good job...Tho I'm now wondering what his preferred Android UI is (Sense?), since he made a comment along the lines of "AOSP isn't my preferred Android UI" in this article.
soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
+1 he really left us hanging. what does he like? what should I?Impulses - Monday, September 22, 2014 - link
I actually meant I'm wondering what Joshua's logged l preferred UI is, since he made that comment I alluded to in this review. I think Brian had a preference for cleaner Nexus/Moto devices, tho Sense's value seems to ebb and flow in between Sense/AOSP releases.svan1971 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
"While the actual ROM itself seems to have some stability issues such as reboots, app crashes, and other oddness, the functionality is fantastic." its the need to make comments like this that caused me to switch to apple after 4 years of being apart of the droid collective...I will not be assimilated !fokka - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
i'm actually surprised that this statement is not elaborated on some more. you should be able to expect a new flagship phone to work without random reboots and "other oddness" in 2014, even on android.hansmuff - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
So I also wish there was more elaboration on this.Is it typical for the ROMs to get updated as they fix bugs? If so, that would mean older phone revisions would need patches to replace ROM code, taking up RAM.
How is this handled in the smartphone world?
Zoomer - Monday, September 22, 2014 - link
ROM is kind of a misnomer nowadays since it's actually stored in flash. Though one could argue that it's software enforced ROM since most phones with locked bootloaders / no root desn't allow writes to system.JoshHo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I'm reluctant to make any final judgments on the stability of software as I was told to expect a launch day OTA.Jon Tseng - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Nice write-up on the semi content.One thing worth mentioning though might be the Moto Maker customisation options (which we're even getting in the UK!). Some of the premium leather/wood options definitely make the phone stand-out from competition (in a classy way, I might add).
semo - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
And once you get over oh la la nonsense you will wonder why you can't buy a more powerful aftermarket battery and why 1080p video recording is a chocolate teapot of a feature without an SD slot.It will be too late by then as you would have parted with your cash and voted for this trend to continue with your wallet. These nice things are only there to distract you from the planned obsolescence.
T1beriu - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I think the contrast graph is missing.JoshHo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Infinite contrast would break the graph. :)s44 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
A small point... is it correct that only the *Sprint* version will have all the bands for full T-Mo operation when their version of 700mhz (Band 12) finally rolls out? I see Band 17 (due to be rolled into 12 at some point) listed on the GSM/Pure, and though perhaps a baseband update could enable 12, I know better than to expect that without an official announcement.Should full-price T-Mo buyers really be getting Sprint's X instead?
gg555 - Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - link
There's a lot of confusion out there about this. Also, given that Motorola tweeted a few days ago that there would be no Moto X for Sprint, it's not clear if model XT1092 actually exists or will ever be released.As far as I can see, only in this AnandTech review and a post at Android Central is there any mention of an XT1092 model. Also, on the Motorola site the XT1095 and XT1097 are not listed has supporting identical bands, as shown here at AnandTech. The XT1095 (Pure Edition) is show dropping a few of the LTE bands--which makes no sense to make a separate model that all it does is disable a couple bands.
Anyway, if the XT1092 does ever come to exist, as you note, it would be the best for T-Mobile because it supports LTE band 12 (700 Mhz)--which is just bizarre, given that the Pure Edition is being currently sold as the model for T-Mobile.
There's a thread in the Motorola forums where a company representative says they are aware of the confusion and looking into what is the deal with the bands on these phones, but no clarification has come yet.
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/d766a5d90a?page=...
djw39 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Is there any thought that if the battery testing methodology ignores differences in devices due to the job scheduling setup and cell signal/wifi reception, that it is not giving the full picture? I'm sure the people at Motorola who worked on the antenna tuning are disappointed that you specifically exclude this from your tests.It seems like the LG G2 is a near-identical device with advantages over Moto in battery & camera. LG should just push their new UI skin out to that phone and keep selling it.
Impulses - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
They made a G3 Mini or whatever that's basically a G2 rehash... Probably has a smaller battery tho, I forget.Problem with taking into account a job scheduler, varying signal conditions, etc is that it makes it near impossible to create a repeatable test with consistent results.
They could add ADDITIONAL tests like: battery life with borderline signal strength or battery life with a consistent sync job... But that would add to their already long battery of tests.
Plus where do you draw the parameters for tests like that (same signal strength for all phones or same scenario with varying low signal strength), and how do you keep it consistent (cell towers have varying loads, get upgraded, etc).
I suppose they could use that signal analyzer with the Faraday box Brian had for a while but I dunno if that could simulate a data traffic load.
leoblaze9 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
No love for the xperia z/z1/z2/z3 cameras at all??I was under the impression that they were among the best of the best cameras to be had in smartphones especially for android phones
adityarjun - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
@Joshua Ho - A request: if possible please do the battery tests again once Android L is out for this phone.cwolf78 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Some glaring omissions from this review:-Battery Life Talk Time (this has traditionally been a strong point for Motorola - does this continue?)
-Sound Quality (from built speaker and headphone jack)
-Bluetooth compatibility and performance (audio quality and issues connecting to devices)
-Call Quality (speakerphone and earpiece quality)
-Microphone quality (this phone is supposed to have an array of 4 mics.. how well does the noise cancellation work? Can people on the other end hear you clearly?)
Seems like all the aspects of this phone being used as a, well, phone, have been ignored. Usually Motorola is tops in this department. I'd like to know if that continues to be true for this device or if it's just another "Me Too!" device like this review implies.
gg555 - Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - link
Yeah, I'm also disappointed not to see a review of the one of a kind four microphone noise cancellation. In the past, AnandTech is the only site that reviewed noise cancellation. Now no one does.Aqua1ung - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
801? Tsk, tsk, tsk...apertotes - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
10 page review. No mention at all about the lack of microSD. Bye, Anandtech. I've had enough.TheMan876 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Lol, what does it matter to you whether it's in the article? It's not there and you already know it's not there. And you know it's very close to Google's AOSP stuff and Google got rid of microSD support forever ago.hansmuff - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I don't understand this. I thought the 2014 Moto G has Micro-SD and 4.4.4? Is the Moto G not as close to AOSP?TheMan876 - Friday, September 19, 2014 - link
Well, my face is red. I don't pay attention to low end devices. Had no idea.CanvasExtractor - Wednesday, October 15, 2014 - link
Is the Moto G a low-end device to you?soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
looks like Josh will be headed to Apple soon too. In fact the entire site will be purchased and rebranded to Appletech. Android reviews will continue but every phone with features similar to iPhones (lack of SD card slot, sealed batteries, etc.) will be praisedCanvasExtractor - Wednesday, October 15, 2014 - link
Google's Nexus Initiative is not AOSP... far from it. Unless you consider dropping a stock browser for Google Chrome and a stock SMS app for Google Hangouts to be "open source" in the least... nope. Google is removing open-source options from Nexus.True AOSP is returning SD capability; the backlash Google experienced with the release of KitKat was apparently disastrous enough to reschedule all their crippled functionality on Android Lemon.
semo - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Anandtech also hate upgraded aftermarket batteries (by giving their support to sealed batteries in phones)jjj - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Good job at not trying to ignore the negatives or spin them into positives.You should factor in the price in your conclusions even if many might not care about price.
Wishing4more - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Josh, could you explain Auto-boost? Under what conditions is it activated? Can it be activated manually or only automatically via a minimum ambient light senor reading? Thanks!JoshHo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
It's activated if auto brightness is on and the reading for the ambient light sensor is high enough.Wishing4more - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Does it significantly improve outdoor visibility? That was one of my biggest issues with the original X.JoshHo - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
It should be noticeably better.sjohnam - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
the worst review i have ever read, now spec-sheet days are gone.. I want practical results. Everyone hated the 1st Gen Moto X, but the tweaks motorola did to that everyone became a Fan. I can bet after what motorola did with with S4 dual core processor.. so called X8 computing the new X won't let that reputation down I want a smartphone that is good practically.. not on PAPER. Infact some tasks are accomplished faster on MOTO E than S5. And most importantly first learn how to write a review. It's not essay competition. 10 Pages still.. outcome nothing.pateras - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
"The latter seems to be true all of the time though, as so far with this strategy Motorola has been one of the first to release new Android OS updates."This has certainly not been my experience. 4.4.3 came out in early June, and 4.4.4 two weeks later. My Moto-X never got 4.4.3, and didn't get 4.4.4 until August. This is my first Android, though, so maybe 6 weeks is considered a short wait.
aman.agx - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
It depends on which network you are on. Verizon is usually the last to provide the updates. People on at&t or tmobile got it in two weeks.aman.agx - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Also you were still the fastest to get it on your network i bet.Dirty_Punk - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
one thing that I can't understand, is why on Anandtech Iphone has such good battery life when ALL PEOPLE OF THE WORLD can demonstrate that iPhone battery life sucks... in all tests iPhone 5/5s are very near to LG G2 (at worst a 30% lower), that in real life have at least the double of the battery of iPhones....oscarnyc - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
while I wouldn't go so far as to say that iPhone battery life 'sucks' I share your surprise at how well it does in AT's laboratory testing vs. real life experience, where, in my experience, it is little better than the current gen Moto X.aman.agx - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
It looks like the benchmarks are targetting select functions while shutting down all other background processes. So they are not reflective of your real life experience. So for example the contextual services on moto x might be eating up much less battery overall than something similar on an iphone. But if you shut down both of those, i phone battery will seem like a giant.melgross - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
That's not true. It doesn't suck. It's not as good as the best devices out there, but it's better than most. I tend to get a full day out of my 5, and I usually use it fairly often.There's a lot of anti Apple prejudice on this site from posters. It's really sad.
spikebike - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
So motorola decided to give consumes the worst of both worlds. Thicker to allow for changing the backplate, but somehow not allowing changing the battery. To make matters worse they epoxied in a poor battery. So the result is a $500 disposable phone, with poor battery life, and you get to throw it away when the $15 battery dies.soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
honestly I feel like this review was pretty harsh. The camera isn't horrible, the AMOLED screen enables extensive black background screen on, the battery life is good enough, the phone has great software...so why so much hate?lostleaf - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Josh, can you comment on whether the display is viewable with polarized sunglasses in both portrait and landscape? Also does this phone have aptx?soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
good call, I've noticed this on my phones lately. What's up with that?Impulses - Monday, September 22, 2014 - link
It's basically a result of how polarization works, grab a cheap camera lens polarizer and play with it a little. I think phones usually prioritize portrait use, which generally makes sense, but sucks for looking at navigation (in landscape) with polarized sunglasses.Alex J. - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Thank you for yet another detailed review and for saving me money and time. As a previous owner of first-gen Moto X it's pretty disappointing to see that new Moto X is barely better in some aspects, and in some it is actually a regression. Most importantly, it still has horrible battery life and mediocre camera. As much as I love "Active Display" I'm afraid I will have to look at other flagships, with better battery life and better cameras.masimilianzo - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
so basically we have to wait for the Note 4 gen display and a new stacked battery in order to have a truly compelling Moto X (hardware wise)olivaw - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I am wondering why the CPU and GPU benchmarks don't show the original Moto X, specially since its dual core was exhaustively analysed in the original review.ithehappy - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
As an owner of the original X I was really looking forward to this one, just wished two things, a much improved camera and a great display, that's it. But both of them are below par and par with the competition.Looking elsewhere.......
Krysto - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
> While this would be risky in terms of engineering, RCBC seems to give the benefits of clear pixels without the drawbacks that come with RGBC, although it's hard to tell whether this is really true without a shipping implementation.I knew this from last year when reading about Aptina's previous-gen RCBC sensor. It was obviously better than Omnision's RGBC. Motorola should've gone with Aptina for the rear camera, too, and market ClearPixel more heavily.
Alexvrb - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Interesting, I didn't realize Motorola made their own version of Glance. Anyway, seems like a good phone overall. Not exceptional in any one area maybe, but seems all-around solid and it's quite a bit cheaper than the big boy flagships.The only thing that really sucks is the lack of an SD card slot.
drew80 - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
Was the test model perhaps a dud? Reviews on other sites have been much more favorable to screen properties, performance, and battery life. In addition, the glitches a rebooting were not mentioned in any other review. Just curious about that.2disbetter - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
As someone who genuinely finds the moto x to be an absolutely amazing software and hardware integrated phone, I'm very happy with this newest generation x. I'm not crazy about a phone with amazing ergonomics getting bigger but I suppose it's inevitable now these days. If the Samsung didn't have a push button home button I think I'd get that. But as it is this is probably my next after my moto x now.soccerballtux - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
me tooerikiksaz - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
I wonder if the capacitive controller could also be for the Moto logo on the back. I have a 2014 X with me here, and the M button is substantial, it really feels like there's supposed to be another function to it.JoshHo - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
The Moto logo on the back has nothing electronic in it, judging by teardowns.darwinosx - Wednesday, September 17, 2014 - link
This MotoX won't be remembered by anyone.The iPhone 6 makes it a nonstarter.
2kfire - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Am I the only one that noticed the HTC E8 in some of the charts? Does that mean there's an upcoming review?!? How I'd love for that to get NAM bands...aman.agx - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
This is a bechmark review. Nowhere in quality as compared to the last year moto x review. Anyone can run benchmark and post the results.And i find it a bit hard to believe that samsung galaxy s5 running with the same soc will give better performance than a stock android phone in real life. Which leads me to think that tests here are working on individual components. Like shutting down everything else and running a browser. You dont do that in real life. So thats not a fair assessment.
Battery life also turns out different in real life where there are multiple resources vying for the battery. Nowhere that assessment.
This review seems tilted to me. New apple networking of the website trying to kill the most eligible competition? Its possible.
Impulses - Monday, September 22, 2014 - link
Killing background stuff is the only way to make results easily repeatable tho, and Samsung bakes in a lot of optimisation despite the bloat they also shovel in.Morawka - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
What app is that your using for GPS / GNSS accuracy? anyone?JoshHo - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
GPS Test by Chartcross.John Gordon - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Great in depth review, thank you.DeathBecomesMe - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
We've found the successor to the 2013 Moto x, and it is the iPhone 6johnny_boy - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
I still think 1080p on a 5" screen is a dumb waste. This phone should be shipping with no less than 3GB RAM (every flagship should by now) and there's no excuse for any flagship android phone not to have a microSD card slot. Also, why didn't they go with Snapdragon 805? I know the difference isn't that big a deal right now, but Amazon's 8.9" tablet is already using it.DeathBecomesMe - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
16gb and 32gb is idiotic. I have the 16 now and hover around 2 gigs free. Dear phone manufactures: most people don't have unlimited data anymore!!Alexvrb - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
Yeah the RAM and the CPU aren't that big of a deal to me, but if you're going to delete the mSD slot then your base model should be 32GB with a 64GB version as the upgrade.gg555 - Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - link
I agree. These days 16 Gb is a joke (which works out to more like 10 or 11 GB, once you account for the space the system takes up). These are multimedia devices. Once you start taking photos and video, downloading music and podcasts, doing some backups with Titanium or whatever, 16 GB really doesn't cut it. I struggle with this all the time on my Nexus 4.gg555 - Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - link
And they always want you to use the cloud as the solution to this problem. Seriously? Obviously they cannot possibly be ignorant about people having data caps on their plans. Not everyone can afford an unlimited plan. Or maybe this is just their way of colluding with the carriers to push people into more expensive plans. Anyway, the could is not a serious solution for a technology that has inherent network bandwidth issues.xaml - Saturday, September 27, 2014 - link
And security issues, which then reveal underlying issues with privacy, exhibitionism and respect. Not to mention the question of reliable access. And could it even be that data over radio is consuming more power than data over few or costly internal memory, respectively neglected external memory?erikiksaz - Tuesday, September 23, 2014 - link
Unlike Amazon, they're actually trying to make money off the hardware, hah. And I'm sure the cooling solutions for something of a tablet-sized form factor is much easier to tackle than on a smartphone.1080p on a 5.2 inch screen still results in a visible difference over 720p. 1440p, not so much.
bigstrudel - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
It's clearly the stock kernel which reduces battery runtimes on ALL nexus devices.julianocas - Thursday, September 18, 2014 - link
peGGi - Friday, September 19, 2014 - link
Kudos to Motorola for the impressive engineering that went into the metal-band-as-antenna. I like that about Motorola, that they put time and effort into things that users may not immediately notice, but should definitely improve the everyday quality of the experience of using a phone for its primary use - to make calls. But........ the metal band ruins the design, compared to X Gen 1, sadly. Screen-plate aside, the casing now seems to consist of 3 parts rather than 2. I loved the slopey, curviness of the first gen, and the way that the backplate curved round the sides, and met the front plate in the middle. That unity of design is gone now, and this second gen looks a bit awkward imo. The front and back of the phones don't match that well anymore. There was a lovely overall unity in aesthetic to the first Gen, which has been broken on the 2nd.
I also agree with the commenters that it is too big. Just like the S5, G3, and One M8 are all too big. For my very average sized male hands, the Gen One's ergonomics were perfect.
Sensors at the top on the front, especially on white model, look messy. Could they not all have been put behind one, long translucent black strip, along with the speaker grille, or something like that? Or tidied up a bit better?
I think Motorola would've been better sticking to the compact, ergonomically wonderful design of Gen 1, but with improvements to the internals (camera, SoC, colour accuracy, battery life). They'd have a great performing phone that fits better in the hand than all their rivals, for a lower cost than their rivals.
And then it would make sense to have a 5.5inch-ish size 'phablet' too, big screen, big tricks, etc. They'd be competing just above and just below the S5 and I'd say they'd rip chunks out of the market that way.
It looks like the Gen 1 is gonna go down as a classic, flawed and all as it was.
Harry_Wild - Friday, September 19, 2014 - link
I agree with your remark on the Moto X 2014! It much bigger then the Moto X which is great feeling and the right size for me small hands. But I am surprise Motorola went to a much larger size too! Motorola should of made the Moto X 2014 the same size; and they have the Moto G - 5" for anyone wanting a larger model. That would have been perfect decision. I going to the Apple store and looking at the 4.7" iPhone 6!dsouza - Friday, September 19, 2014 - link
@Harry_Wild, the new iPhone 6 (5.44 x 2.64in) is just marginally smaller than the Moto X 2014 (5.54 x 2.85)! So, if you believe that the new Moto X is too big for you, probably the new iPhone 6 will be so!Harry_Wild - Sunday, September 21, 2014 - link
I will wait to see the new Moto X 2014 in person before deciding them. Thanks for the reply! Since the Moto X seems to be the same shape as the upcoming Nexus X; then I glad that it close the old 4.7" Moto X. A shopping we will go! LOL!gg555 - Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - link
I don't know, to me the original Moto X had a cheap plastic feel to it despite the nice sculptured back. It was a far cry for the higher quality feel of the polycarbonate material in some of the Nokia phones. I think the new design has a much higher quality feel to it, though the large size does affect how it fits in one's hand a bit.grant3 - Saturday, September 20, 2014 - link
Does this phone support 3-button android headsets? (like samsung + HTC do)Monish - Saturday, September 20, 2014 - link
Guys, is MOTO X 2nd gen OTG compatible ? I asked MOTO customer care agent, he said It is not compatible. So when i questioned him that MOTO X 1st gen had it (saw XDA forums) he further added that Motorola cannot guarantee it!OTG compatibility is the only thing stopping me from buying this phone as in INDIA you get only 16GB version.
JoshHo - Saturday, September 20, 2014 - link
USB-OTG is fully functional.Monish - Sunday, September 21, 2014 - link
Did u test it Josh ? Sorry was asking but just double checking since customer care agent said otherwise.erikiksaz - Tuesday, September 23, 2014 - link
It works, at least for USB audio. Haven't tested it with storage.raghwendra123 - Saturday, September 20, 2014 - link
A little off topic... but how come galaxy s5 top most performance benchmarks by quite a margin when it has snapdragon 801 too? And why does its T-mobile version doesn't?raghwendra123 - Sunday, September 21, 2014 - link
I mean the the Basemark ones.EdCraft - Tuesday, September 23, 2014 - link
The new moto X seems very good, much better than the ever-so-lagging-behind new iPhone. The question is though, can Motorola match up to HTC in consumer satisfaction? Motorola hasn't quite managed to do it so far (source: http://www.consumertop.com/best-phone-guide/), but this one seems very promising!editorsorgtfo - Tuesday, September 23, 2014 - link
IOS lockscreen notifications light up the screen for a short "glance time" without any handwaving. And yes, they murder stock Android, although L is supposed to remedy this?"It's hard to really explain because on the surface it seems rather mundane but after using Moto Display it's clear just how much time it saves. The glance time is just right to view notifications and the hand wave/approach action is effortless compared to pressing a home button or tapping the display."
editorsorgtfo - Tuesday, September 23, 2014 - link
PS: IOS Lockscreen notifications don't need a separate low power cpu to preserver the battery, even without AMOLED.erikiksaz - Tuesday, September 23, 2014 - link
The iphones don't need a separate low power CPU for the lockscreen notifications because they display *once*, then it goes dark until you manually pick up the phone.In the chance that you're not there to see the phone go off, Moto's implementation is superior.
BillT2014 - Saturday, October 4, 2014 - link
It's a very interesting review but so badly written. 25% is just unnecessary padding. Do you guys think we have that much time to waste?ritwik - Tuesday, October 14, 2014 - link
But when you compare Moto X (2nd Gen) with Honor 6 you can see the difference that what Honor 6 is offering at such a reasonable price. You can see the difference here: http://wp.me/p5cjTD-critwik - Tuesday, October 14, 2014 - link
I still feel my Huawei's Honor 6 is much superior to this device at a much better ratebadcoder - Tuesday, October 14, 2014 - link
does headset comes along with new moto x 2014 box ...? or we should buy headset alone...badcoder - Tuesday, October 14, 2014 - link
And what is the output size of voltage from stock charger of new Moto x 2014.... ?Klug4Pres - Thursday, January 15, 2015 - link
My comment on this review has been deleted - why?I posted a comment soon after publication, essentially saying something along the lines of "tiny non-removeable battery, no SD card, poor camera, oh well, I suppose it is a patriotic buy for Americans". This has vanished. Are the forums being censored now for un-American remarks or something?