Week in Reviews: iOS 7, Motorola Droid Maxx, Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus and more

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Motorola Droid Ultra Specs vs.The Competition: How It Compares

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Motorola Droid RAZR M 4G LTE Outed, Could Be Announced Sept. 5

 

The Motorola Droid RAZR HD might not be the only belle at the big ball Verizon and Motorola have planned for September 5th. It may not even be the only RAZR! Engadget’s moles have dug up pictures and details of a Motorola phone going by the tongue-twisting name of Droid RAZR M 4G LTE, which looks an awful lot like the Droid RAZR we already know (and love).

The biggest change appears to lie at the heart of the phone. Assuming Engadget’s sources are correct, the Droid RAZR M 4G LTE uses a dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor, which should be superior to the 1.2GHz dual-core TI OMAP found in the original Droid RAZR.

Other than boosting the front camera from 1.3MP to 3MP, the rest of the specs pretty much fall in line with the original, with 1GB of RAM, an 8-MP rear camera, Android 4.0 and a 4.3-inch 960 x 540 Super AMOLED Advanced display protected by a layer of Gorilla Glass 2. The internal storage gets a bump down to 8GB (from 16GB in the RAZR), but there’s a microSD slot to dull that pain. Global GSM /UMTS/HSPA+ and NFC support round out the specs. And yes, there’s Kevlar aplenty.

The Droid RAZR HD is rumored to match most of those specs — including the dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor — but will supposedly swap out the qHD display for a slightly larger 4.5-inch screen with a true 1080p resolution.

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$109 Upgrade Kit Lets You Convert Your Droid RAZR to a RAZR Maxx

If you were one of those poor, and presumably frustrated, souls who bought a Motorola Droid RAZR only to have the Droid RAZR Maxx hit store shelves as few weeks later, you’re in luck. The folks over at Android Central came upon a conversion kit, available through Cellphone Repair Shop, that gives the components needed to remove their RAZR’s battery and replace it with a RAZR Maxx battery.

The kit, which will run you $109, includes everything you need to make the battery swap, including the RAZR Maxx’s 3300 mAh battery, adhesive tape, a back panel with Sim Card and SDcard door covers and a back battery housing cover frame. The conversion isn’t for the faint of heart, though. The RAZR has an internal battery, meaning that opening the housing will more than likely void your phone’ warranty, so less tech savvy users may want to steer clear.

For those of you willing to take the risk, know that, if performed properly, the rewards will be well worth it. During our LAPTOP Battery test, the Droid RAZR was able to squeeze out a measly 4 hours and 48 minutes of battery life while surfing the web over 4G with the display’s brightness set to 40 pecent. That’s nearly an hour less than the category average of 5 hours and 46 minutes.

The RAZR Maxx on the other hand, absolutely crushed our battery test. It’s 3,300 mAh battery lasted an incredible 8 hours and 25 minutes during the LAPTOP Battery test, a record for a 4G smartphone. To give you some perspective on that, the next longest lasting 4G smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S II (T-Mobile) lasted 7 hours and 38 minutes. That’s nearly 50 minutes less battery life than the RAZR Maxx!

via Android Central

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Smartphone Madness Game 6: Motorola Droid 4 vs. LG Optimus 4X HD. Voting Ends 3/20 at 9 a.m. EST

Your your favorite basketball team may be out of the running, and that bracket might be ruined. But, this bracket is one you actually have a say in. Saturday morning the Motorola Droid RAZR Maxx went down hard against the Nokia Lumia 900. Today game pits the Motorola Droid 4 against the LG Optimus 4X HD. Which will win is totally up to your votes in the poll below. Let’s meet the competitors.

The Editors’ Choice-winning Motorola Droid 4 offers a best-in-class physical keyboard. It also boasts smooth overall performance and fast 4G LTE speeds on Verizon Wireless’ network. Devotees to this 4th generation Droid will be rooting for its loud speaker, smooth video calling abilities and innovative trick-shot software such as Smart Actions, which runs scheduled tasks or changes system settings based on conditions you set; and Motocast, a service that lets you stream or copy files from your PC as long as its connected to the Web.

By contrast, the rookie LG Optimus 4X HD is largely unknown. We got our scouting report on this smartphone at Mobile World Congress earlier this year. Its announcement marked the first unveiling of a handset powered by Nvidia’s quad-core Tegra 3 CPU. We know it will offer a brilliant 1280 x 720-pixel IPS display. At 8.9mm it’s incredibly slim. However, the company hasn’t used thinness as an excuse to skimp on battery life as it has included a 2,150 mAH battery on board. Running on Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, the LG Optimus 4X HD also sports 16MB of internal memory, 1GB of RAM, an 8-MP back-facing camera and a 1.3-MP front facer. There’s no word yet on availability, but we believe it offers 4G LTE coverage.

So are you team Motorola or team LG? Vote now to show your school colors. The poll will only be open until Saturday, March 17th at 9 a.m. EST. Then check back on Monday, March 19th at 10 a.m. EST to vote in Game 7, when the HTC One X competes against the BlackBerry Bold 9900.

And visit again when the winner of this competition faces a fierce foe in the Nokia Lumia 710 on Friday, March 23 at 10:00 a.m. EST.

 

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Smartphone Madness 2012 Game 5: Nokia Lumia 900 vs. Motorola Droid RAZR Maxx. Voting Ends 3/17 at 9 a.m. EST

Who needs college basketball when there are smartphones to root (for)? Yesterday we watched the Pantech Burst go down against the Editors’ Choice-winning Samsung Galaxy Nexus. Today we settle in for an epic battle between Windows Phone and Android as the Nokia Lumia 900 goes up against the Motorola Droid RAZR Maxx. Determining the winner is up to you, and your votes (see the poll below).

The Nokia Lumia 900 is a wildcard, in that its an unknown. Expected to arrive on AT&T’s 4G LTE network, we have high hopes for Nokia’s new flagship Windows Phone. We like it so much we named it the best smartphone of CES 2012. Although the 4.3-inch screen is somewhat large, it’s more than manageable. Around back of this solid unibody design(available in cyan and black) is an 8-MP camera with Carl Zeiss optics, which fired shots quickly. Its secret weapon might just be the bundled free Nokia Drive GPS app.

On the other end of the court is the longest-lasting smartphone around. The Motorola Droid RAZR Maxx certainly has the endurance to go the distance, but does it have the support of the crowd? Verizon Wireless’s huge user base and its blazing-fast 4G LTE network doesn’t hurt. Neither does the Super AMOLED display, dual-core processor and 8-MP camera. But this Android handset’s real strength is in the endurance. On our tests, thanks to its 3,300 mAh battery, the Maxx lasted an epic 8 hours and 25 minutes, which is a couple hours longer than even its nearest competitor.

Voting will remain open until 9 a.m. EST on Saturday, March 17, so don’t wait to chime in. Then, check back on Monday, March 19 at 10 a.m. EST to vote in Game 6 when the Motorola Droid 4 takes on the LG Optimus 4X HD.

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Motorola Droid 4 Review: Snappy Performance and a Great Keyboard

Packing a slide-out QWERTY keyboard and what was (at the time) the most recent version of Android, the original Motorola Droid stood for everything the iPhone wasn't. But Motorola’s interest in QWERTY Android phones has slackened with each new model. The Motorola Droid 4 ($200 with a two-year contract on Verizon; price as of February 13, 2012) is the latest keyboard-toting phone in the Droid series. Unfortunately, this model lacks the excitement that the original Droid sparked: A blurry screen and a poor camera overshadow the phone's excellent keyboard and zippy processor.

Design

The Droid 4 has the same angular design as the Droid Razr. At 2.75 by 4.98 by 0.50 inches, the phone should fit comfortably in most hands and pockets. Like most Android phones, the Droid 4 comes with two cameras: a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera, and an 8-megapixel camera on the back. Aside from the slide-out full-QWERTY keyboard, buttons on the Droid 4 are limited to a volume rocker and a power button. Though I found the QWERTY keyboard extremely comfortable to use, I disliked the loose power button and the overly stiff volume rocker. The sliding mechanism, which initially felt rigid, seemed to improve as I used the phone. You can remove the back cover on the Droid 4, with the aid of an included plastic tool. If you lose the tool (which is small), you can use a paperclip to remove the back. But once you get the cover off, you won't find much that you can do. The battery is not user-removable, and the SIM and MicroSD card slots can be difficult to get to.

The tool used to remove the backing on the Droid 4As I mentioned, the QWERTY keyboard was a joy to use. Even with my pudgy thumbs, I could accurately and quickly type out long email and text messages. In contrast to the keys on the Droid 3, the keys on the Droid 4 have a slight bump on their surface and they're spaced out a tad more. This makes typing a lot more comfortable, though I still prefer the keyboard on the T-Mobile MyTouch Slide 4G.

The Droid 4 ships with a 4-inch, 960-by-540 (qHD) display. Like the ones on the Droid 3 and the Droid Bionic, it's a PenTile display--and it has many of the same problems that we encountered on earlier PenTile-equipped Motorola phones. Individual pixels were visible to the naked eye, we noted a considerable amount of ghosting during scrolling, and visuals overall were not very sharp. In short, it's disappointing to see Motorola go back to using PenTile screens after phones like the Razr and the Atrix 2 had abandoned them in favor of cleaner-looking LCD displays.

Performance

The Droid 4 comes with a 1.2-GHz dual-core TI OMAP processor--the same processor found in the Droid Razr and the Droid Razr Maxx. Overall, the phone was extremely responsive to my input and handled everything I threw its way. Even graphics-intensive games, such as Dead Space and Osmos, ran without any stuttering or slowdowns.

I got excellent reception on the phone here in San Francisco, with the Droid 4 reporting between 4 and 5 bars of Verizon LTE service in most places. The phone didn't do an especially good job of filtering out background noise during my test call, but the person I was talking to reported being able to hear me loud and clear. Call quality was even on my end, and the earpiece level was loud enough at its default setting that I could easily hear whomever I was speaking to at the time.

Using the FCC-approved Ookla Speed Test app, I obtained download speeds of 11.29 megabits per second and upload speeds of 12.63 mbps while on LTE. These numbers are similar to what we've seen on other Verizon LTE phones, though your speeds may vary depending on where you live.

We're still awaiting the results of our official PCWorld labs battery test, but in my informal hands-on use, I got a full day of activity out of the Droid 4 while checking my email, browsing the Web, playing a level or two on Dead Space, and fielding calls.

Software

Running Android 2.3.5 (Gingerbread) along with Motorola's custom overlay, the Droid 4 will seem familiar to anyone who has used a Motorola Android phone in the past three months. This version of Motorola's user interface is the same one that ships on the Droid Razr and the Droid Razr Maxx. Like them, the Droid 4 provides access to useful software such as MotoCast (which works with a desktop client of the same name, and gives you access to the media on your computer while on the go) and Smart Actions (which lets you program your phone to automate tasks such as silencing your ringer when you get to work or turning off GPS while you're at home).

The Droid 4 has its fair share of bloatware, too. Apps like Let's Golf 2 and Slacker come preinstalled, and you can't remove them without rooting the phone first. Thankfully you can hide individual apps so that they don't show up in your app drawer; but it's still annoying to anyone who doesn't want them on the phone in the first place.

Entertainment

With its 4-inch display and dual-core processor, the Droid 4 is great for playing games and HD movies. Games, as I mentioned earlier, run smoothly with few dips in frame-rate. The 720p video file I played on the Droid 4 worked fine, but it didn't look all that great on the problematic PenTile screen. The Droid 4's LTE connectivity makes it great for streaming music and video, but keep an eye on your data usage so you don't accidentally exceed your allotted limit. The Droid 4's built-in speakers sometimes sound a bit tinny. I recommend using your own headphones whenever possible. The Droid 4 doesn't ship with a MicroSD card, but it does supply 8GB of onboard storage that you can use for apps, music, and movies.

Camera

Click to zoom.Sad to say, the camera on the Droid 4 does not impress. Images captured outdoors looked well lit, but they had oversaturated colors and weren't particularly sharp. Pictures taken indoors had a slight graininess to them and made skin tones appear gray and sickly. The front-facing camera was slightly better, though you are better off using it for video calling with apps like Skype or Tango. The Droid 4 captures videos in 720p by default, but you can adjust its settings to record in 1080p. The Droid 4 did an admirable job of picking up audio, but footage recorded in 720p didn't match the best-quality videos we've seen from a mobile device. Instead, videos looked slightly fuzzy, and indoor shots again had a grayish tint. Recording in 1080p solved some of these problems, but it also produced an undesirable jelly-like effect whenever I moved the phone. The Droid 4 is well suited for outdoor videos and photos, but you won't want to use it to commemorate any important moments.

Bottom Line

The Droid 4 has one of the best keyboards I've ever used on a mobile phone. It delivered excellent performance in games, and its call quality was even and clear. But the Droid 4's blurry display may deter some potential buyers. Why Motorola decided to revert to using PenTile displays is beyond me, but I hope that this is the last time we encounter one on a higher-end Motorola product. If you purchased a Droid 3 back in July of last year, the Droid 4 will feel like an incremental upgrade. The inclusion of LTE is nice, but the poor camera and the inability to remove the battery mean that you won't be missing much if you stick with the Droid 3. Verizon customers who can't stand typing on a touchscreen should love the Droid 4. For everyone else, though, a Droid Razr Maxx provides a similar experience with much better battery life, a better display, and a slimmer profile.

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Motorola Droid 4 To Land on Verizon February 10 for $199

We first saw the Motorola Droid 4 at CES at the beginning of this year and were delighted by its springy, edge-lit keyboard, so we’re quite excited about the announcement that comes to us this morning, care of Verizon Wireless: The Motorola Droid 4 will be available this Friday, February 10 for $199.99 on a two-year contract.

The Droid 4 is run by a 1.2-GHz processor and features an 8-MP camera with 1080p video capture and 16 GB of internal memory, expandable via microSD. Unfortunately, keyboard-lovers are left behind the technology curve again when it comes to display technology. In a world where many of today’s top phones have 1280 x 720 displays with gorgeous colors and wide viewing angles, this slider sports a standard, 4-inch qHD (540×960 pixel) screen. It also has narrower viewing angles — but viewed straight on, the display is decent enough.

To target business users, the Droid 4 comes equipped with mirror mode support using HDMI output, and boasts compatibility with Motorola’s Lapdock accessories to let you turn your smartphone into a full notebook (for a price). Like the Droid RAZR and RAZR Maxx, the Droid 4 comes with Smart Actions software (which lets you conserve the device’s juice) and MotoCast (for streaming content from your PC to your smartphone).

This is no Droid RAZR with a keyboard, but it does fill in the void where Motorola has disappointed in the past. The Droid 3 didn’t let you access Verizon’s 4G LTE network; this phone does. The Samsung Stratosphere was supposedly the answer to that problem, but that phone had a slow-moving single core CPU and only an 800 x 480 screen.

With its dual-core CPU and qHD screen, the Droid 4 promises to be the most powerful keyboarded phone on the market. We’ll let you know if this is indeed the case when we get our mitts on the product and review it.

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Max out Your Droid Maxx: How to Get 10+ Hours of Battery on 4G

The Droid RAZR Maxx from Motorola is already the longest-lasting 4G smartphone currently on the market by a wide margin, enduring 8 hours and 25 minutes on the LAPTOP Battery Test (continous surfing over 4G at 40 percent brightness). However, by implementing our top 10 battery saving tips for Android phones, we were able to extend that time to a whopping 10 hours and 8 minutes of speedy 4G LTE goodness.

Follow these steps to Maxx out your Droid RAZR Maxx.

Dim the Display - Our Android battery saving tips call for dimming the display to 30 percent, but we felt that the RAZR Maxx’s screen was still perfectly legible at 0-percent brightness. The lower your screen brightness, the better your battery life will be so try it at 0 percent and see if it looks acceptable to you. 
Turn off Wi-Fi  - If you’re at home or the office, connecting your Maxx to the network via 802.11n will save juice. However, if you’re not near an available router, your Wi-Fi radio can significantly drain your phone’s battery so disabling it is a great way to extend your phone’s battery life. We always disable the Wi-Fi when running our own battery test, however, so this tip didn’t factor into the RAZR Maxx’s new score.Turn off Location Services - The Maxx’s GPS radio gulps battery, routinely pinging satellites to get your current location. Just as bad, location-based services like Foursquare that have auto check-in enabled will ping the Internet with your location, another use of  your power-hungry 4G connection.  Turn off Background Data - Any time your phone checks your email, syncs your calendar, or automatically grabs Facebook updates, it’s calling out to the Internet which means that it’s taxing the 4G radio. To really save power, turn off background data in the Android control panel.Switch from 4G to 3G - The RAZR Maxx’s 3G CDMA radio uses a lot less power than its 4G LTE counterpart so, if you’re willing to trade speed for battery life, you can disable 4G in the Wireless and Networks section of the control panel. We first ran the battery test with 4G enabled, to see how long the phone would last with all of the tips implemented but still using Verizon’s 4G LTE network. Afterwards we ran it again using only 3G — with over an hour of additional endurance.Disable Haptic Feedback - That little motor which causes the phone to vibrate when you touch its keyboard or buttons uses a fair amount of juice. Turn it off  in the Sound section of the control panel.Set a Shorter Screen Timeout - Although we suggest shortening your screen timeout time to just 30 seconds, on the LAPTOP battery test we see how how long the phone will last if the screen never times out. We were impressed that the RAZR Maxx lasted more than 10 hours with the screen on the entire time.Use a Plain Black Background - Smartphones using AMOLED displays consume more power than LCD displays when displaying bright colors, particularly white. Switch the RAZR Maxx to an all-black wallpaper to save power.Shut Down Instant Messaging - Nothing sucks juice like Google Talk and other IM programs which have to maintain an active Internet connection all day long, even if you aren’t talking to anyone.Disable Automatic Updates for Widgets - To keep widgets like Weather and News Feed from constantly searching for the latest data, remove them entirely from the RAZR Maxx’s home screens. 

After implementing all of the battery saving tips (save disabling 4G and setting the screen timeout to 30 seconds), the RAZR Maxx achieved that epic 10 hours and 8 minutes of battery life , which was 4 and a half hours longer than the category average (5:39), and more than 3 hours longer than the second longest-lasting 4G phone, the Samsung Droid Charge (6:42). When we ran the test again using only 3G connectivity, and the Maxx lasted a jaw-dropping 11 hours and 30 minutes — almost 6 hours longer than the average smartphone!

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