Moto E (2nd Gen) with LTE: Hands on and first impressions
The original Moto E was already a killer budget phone, but with all technology, there is always room for improvement. Motorola unveiled the all new Moto E for 2015 yesterday, which provides a bigger display, a quad-core processor, and LTE. At a cost of $149, it’s hard to imagine how Motorola is doing it. It even has Android 5.0.2 Lollipop, which you won’t find on too many phones.
Look for our full review very soon, but for now, hit the break for our quick hands on and first impressions.
Click here to view the embedded video.
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Motorola to bring Moto 360 to Moto Maker
Coming in March, Motorola will allow consumers to design the Moto 360 to their liking in the Moto Maker store. Moto Maker is currently used for purchasers of the Moto X to design the smartphone exactly to their tastes and desires, but soon the circular smartwatch will appear alongside it.
There was a recent spat between Apple’s Jony Ives and Motorola’s president, Rick Osterloh, with regard to the Moto Maker. Ives felt that by giving consumers choice, it allowed Motorola to forego responsibility in design quality. Obviously, Osterloh disagreed, and with this news that the Moto 360 will join the Moto X in the Moto Maker, Motorola appears to be flipping the bird to the naysayers.
The options prospective buyers might find in the Moto Maker for the smartwatch will deal with the band, the watch casing, and the choice of what watch face the buyer wants to see when they first turn on the device. Additionally, Motorola says that there’ll be some new watch faces to choose from.
The watch casing will come in silver, champagne gold, or black. The band’s varieties include two different sizes of leather or metal, which probably have different color options in each category.
In an interview with Wired, Motorola’s director of design for wearables, Dickon Isaacs, had the following to say about the new addition to Moto Maker:
“We clearly believe in the power of choice, as a brand. And this is really empowering. To be able to design your own watch—it’s not an analog watch, it’s a highly sophisticated device of the future. To be able to do that at this level, we just think it’s going to be incredibly liberating.”
So if you’ve been hesitant to buy a Moto 360, or if the styles currently available just didn’t appeal to you, you might want to revisit the smartwatch here in March.
Source: Wired
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Motorola will let you customize your next smartwatch
Motorola’s philosophy is that if you can’t customize it, it probably isn’t worth buying, which is why Moto Maker will soon let you tailor the Moto 360 to your individual taste. In an interview with Wired, the company’s Dickon Isaacs said that the option to pick a case color, band material and size were always planned for the smartwatch, but had to be postponed for time reasons.
When Moto Maker is relaunched in March, users will be able to pick the color of their watch as well as the size and material of the strap. The case will be sold in a choice of black, silver or champagne gold, while the straps come in two sizes in leather or metal. In addition, users will also be able to pick one of 11 watch faces to appear as the default — although you’ll still be able to change this at your whim, naturally.
Filed under: Wearables, Google, Lenovo
Source: Wired
Motorola’s Turbo Charger is coming soon to the UK for £24.99
Remember when charging our smartphones was the only way of ensuring that we had a full battery to start the day with? Those days are getting further and further behind us thanks to Qualcomm’s Quick Charge 2.0 technology. A great example of this is Motorola’s Turbo Charger that is listed as coming soon to the UK with a £24.99 price tag. The charger can deliver up to 6 hours of battery life in just 15 mins if you have a compatible handset such as the Droid Turbo, Nexus 6 or HTC One M8.
The Turbo Charger is optimised for Motorola phones, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t use it if you own a phone made by a different brand. To get the most out of the charger though, your handset should be powered by at least the Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 processor with Quick Charge 2.0 enabled. If your phone has a different CPU the device will instead receive a lower voltage, resulting in slower charging. The Motorola Charger is believed to become available in mid-March.
Source: Motorola
Via: AndroidCentral
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Android 5.0.2 Lollipop rolling out for AT&T Motorola Moto X (2nd Gen)
Those of you that have been patiently waiting for Android 5.0.2 Lollipop to grace your AT&T branded Motorola Moto X 2nd Gen can finally start furiously hitting the update button. According to the devices page with Motorola the update is rolling out to customers. AT&T doesn’t have their page updated yet to reflect the push, but […]
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AT&T Moto X (2nd Generation) receiving Lollipop OTA now
If you’re on an AT&T plan and own a 2014-edition Motorola Moto X, you’ll be happy to know that Lollipop is rolling out now in an over-the-air (OTA) update. This update will bring your current version of Android to 5.0.2.
Motorola recommends that your device has at least a 50% charge and is connected to WiFi.
If you want to know what you can expect to see in your Android update, check out the source link below for Motorola’s synopsis of Lollipop.
Source: Motorola
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Second generation Moto E comes with 4G LTE and a quad-core processor
It turns out that the rumors were spot on, Motorola’s new handset is indeed a 4G LTE version of its popular Moto E smartphone, but that isn’t the only improvement made to Motorola’s low cost offering.
As well as faster data speeds in a budget package, the second generation Moto E moves up from a dual-core to 1.2GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 processing package. Internal memory has also been improved from 4GB to 8GB and the display is now also a tad larger at 4.5-inches, rather than 4.3-inches. However, the display’s resolution remains the same at 960 x 540 (qHD) resolution.
As for data connectivity, the handset will work on the following network bands:
- GSM/GPRS/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)
- UMTS/HSPA+ (850, 1700 (AWS), 1900 MHz)
- 4G LTE (2, 4, 5, 7, 12, 17)
For software, the new Moto E comes with Android 5.0 pre-installed, which mostly resembles a stock Android experience. Motorola has also seen it fit to make a few cosmetic changes to the handset, although the general appearance remains mostly the same. The phone now only has one silver bar for the earpiece, dropping the one at the microphone, and the microSD and SIM card slots can now be access by removing a side panel rather than the rear cover.
The second generation Moto E is listed on the Motorola website with a retail price of $149.99, but prices will apparently start from just $119.99, according to the video below. The handset is available in black or white color options.
I’ll leave you with Motorola’s promotional video for the new Moto E.
Motorola ‘Mystery Box’ revealed
Curious about what it was that Motorola wanted to send out to various members of the press? If you hadn’t figured it out by now, it’s related to the Moto E 2015 launching today.
We received our box earlier this morning and took a few pictures of what it was that we opened. In short, it’s like being invited to an actual press conference at the Motorola headquarters in Chicago. The inside resembles the layout; bricks, seating, and layout is pretty consistent with the real deal.
As part of the kit we received a lanyard and USB drive with images, press announcement, and reviewer’s kit. Additionally, the phone we have is white and the Motorola Bands we were sent are turquoise and raspberry. All in all, it’s a pretty nifty way of unveiling a new low-cost LTE experience.
Look for our review in the coming days!
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Moto E 2nd Gen makes its way to press in Motorola’s Mystery Box
Last week Motorola pushed out an email to select members of the press to let them know that a box would be on the way and set for delivery on the 25th of February. The delivery would coincide with an exciting announcement. The packages are arriving and inside a very well planned out home-built personal […]
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Moto E (2015) is a steal, here’s why
Motorola has announced a brand new Moto E today, that has all sorts of new goodies such as 4G LTE, a quad-core processor, and Android Lollipop. All for the price of $150. You may not fully understand, but this is not only a huge deal for the world of Android, but it’s a great deal for you. Let me explain why.
When Androids were first coming out in large numbers, part of what was attractive about them was the idea of having a smartphone for cheap. By 2010, you could an Android smartphone for free with a 2-year contract. However, people thought Androids were no good, because their only experience was with a phone that they had essentially spent no money on, comparing it to the $200 on-contract iPhone (that’s a whole other article I could write… but I digress). So when Motorola released the first Moto G at the end of 2013, where you could get a great Android experience for the same price as a budget phone off-contract, it was a pretty big deal. Then, to up the ante, Motorola released the Moto E at the beginning of last year. However, it didn’t quite receive the same positive reaction the first-gen Moto G did.
Fast forward to today, Motorola has announced a new Moto E:
- 4G LTE connectivity.
- 4.5-inch qHD (540×960) display
- 5-megapixel rear camera
- 8GB internal storage
- Android 5.0 Lollipop
- Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 processor, clocked at 1,2 GHz
- Adreno 306
- front-facing VGA camera
- 2390mAh battery
What’s more, you also get features like Moto Display and Quick Capture, and with the Moto E having Lollipop, you have the capability for always-on voice commands (through Google Search). I mean, some of these things are the same as my first-gen Moto X! This Moto E even has a bigger battery!
Let’s compare that to some other phones that cost around $150:
| Phone | Moto E (2015) | ASUS Zenfone 5 | Samsung Galaxy Core 2 | YU Yureka | BLU Studio Energy |
| Connectivity | 4G LTE | 4G (HSPA+) | 4G (HSPA) | 4G (HSPA+) | 4G (HSPA+) |
| Display | 4.5″ qHD (245 ppi) | 5″ HD (294 ppi) | 4.5″ WVGA (207 ppi) | 5.5″ HD (267 ppi) | 5″ HD (300 ppi) |
| Rear Camera | 5 MP | 8 MP | 5 MP | 13 MP | 8 MP |
| Storage | 8 GB | 8 GB | 4 GB | 16 GB | 8 GB |
| Android Version | 5.0 Lollipop | 4.4 KitKat | 4.4 KitKat | 4.4 KitKat | upgrade to 5.0 Lollipop |
| Processor | Snapdragon 410 (Quad-core) @ 1.2 GHz | Atom Z2580 (Dual-core) @ 2 GHz | Quad-core 1.2 GHz | Snapdragon 615 (Quad-core) @ 1.7 GHz | Quad-core 1.3 GHz |
| Battery | 2390 mAh | 2110 mAh | 2000 mAh | 2500 mAh | 5000 mAh |
| Price | $150 | $147 | ~$130 | ~$145 | $149 |
Obviously, each phone has their advantages and disadvantages. But here’s the point I’d like to make: two of those phones aren’t even available to the US. ASUS Zenfone probably won’t see Android 5.0 Lollipop until April, and that will probably be the last update from them. That leaves BLU, which certainly makes an impressive argument. But, you still don’t get a near-stock Android experience with Moto Display, which definitely makes your experience with a phone better. If you’re still not convinced, then you should know that Motorola has been making a great track record in updating their recent phones, so you can bet you’ll see at least one if not two major upgrades for the new Moto E.
All-in-all, the Moto E has the upper hand, and there is no better deal than this one. Great price, no-contract, excellent user experience, all in a phone that is close to Motorola’s flagship of 2013! You tell me what better deal there is.
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