Another year, another family of Droids for Verizon has been unveiled. But this time, things are a bit different. This isn’t just a mere refresh w/ updated specs. Motorola has more pep in their step. The company has returned w/ something to prove in my opinion. They wanted to show that they still have what it takes to be a competitor in the Android market.
They are still innovating as the 2013 Droid family offers more than just a Kevlar build and great software. It is now armed w/ new features that gives them an edge against every other device. I have put them to the test as I prepared to share my findings with you all.
*Note: we haven’t handled or reviewed the Moto X when this review was published.*
“(The Ultra) has one the better 720p displays we’ve seen that hasn’t come from HTC.”
Display
In the visual department a 5inch edge-to-edge, 720p Super AMOLED omits everything you see. And before you groan, let me tell you this. It is one of the better 720p displays we’ve seen that hasn’t come from HTC. Motorola made sure not to utilize the Pentile technology behind their displays this time around and it shows. It will be a little harder to spot the pixels on this one. When using Motorola’s Active Display (more on that in the Software section) and you see the the time along with your most recent notification, you will see they made the right decision.
Performance/Battery Life
When crafting the new Droids, Motorola decided to get a bit creative. Instead simply throwing a popular CPU inside, they wanted make sure it could handle everything consumers could throw at it. Enter the X8 Mobile Computing System w/ 8-cores in total coupled w/ 2GB of RAM. A 1.7GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 Pro, quad-core GPU, and two low-cores for voice & gesture commands (Moto’s Touchless Controls). It powers through anything I could throw at it and then some without missing a step or even stutter. You won’t even notice it isn’t quad-core CPU.
Motorola has proven that specs on paper mean nothing – but in a good way.
Underneath the back plate lies a non-removable 2130 mAh battery w/ a suggested 24-hour battery life that I can agree to. Light usage can easily get you that and a bit more. I got over 23 hours when I first began using it. Even w/ the battery testing, I was still managed to get 9-12 hours on a daily basis (from 8AM-2AM). That’s with talking to the wife for above two hours, 4-6 hours of streaming music via Google Music All Access, heavy Twitter usage, handling moderate email, average YouTube streaming – Monday through Friday daily. No real surprise as Motorola never has a problem in the battery department.
Cameras
Moto finally decided to fix one of the few problems they had w/ their devices for the last few years: the camera. They upgraded to a new RGB Clear Pixel f/2.4 10MP camera lens. This new shooter is said to perform better in low-light environments and that it does. Their rear shooter is reminiscent of HTC’s Ultrapixel – but more of a mixed bag. With appropriate lighting, you will get great photos but in dark or not well-lit situations that when things can get weird. Sometimes you can get great low-light photos while other times you will get over-processed noise in your photos. Hopefully a software update can fix this.
You can view more of our sample photos here.
The Quick Capture feature allows you to open you the camera app from being locked by simply twisting you wrist twice. From there you can just tap anywhere on the screen to take a picture of start recording video after the auto-focus kicks in. This works pretty good but you have to twist it a certain way in order to achieve success.
Clear Pixel offers mixed results but still an improvement for Motorola devices nonetheless.
The front-facing shooter is a 2MP lens that offers 1080p quality video in your usual grainy quality. The actual video quality on the Ultra is pretty good though – good frames rates at 60 fps. The optics also offer HDR mode and a new Slo-Mo feature that allows you to record your desired video in slow-motion. It’s a cool feature that works pretty good. All-in-all, this is still better than Moto’s previous optics.
Motorola made sure to keep their version of Android as close to stock as possible. The Ultra is running Android 4.2.2 to be exact. Minus a few tidbits they added on. Like the Circle Widgets are still present but adds a two new tricks and have been renamed the Droid Command Center. Everything remains the same except you can minimize it to just one circle and the new Droid Zap feature that can be accessed from the main circle w/ the time & date by swiping it to turn it over.
The new Droid Zap feature acts like a touchless version of the Galaxy’s S4 S-Beam. Droid Zap allows you to share photos + media w/ other Droids by swiping up w/ three fingers to ‘push’ it to other members of the 2013 Droid family within 1,000 feet. However, other non-Droids can access this feature by downloading the Droid Zap app from the Google Play Store right now.
Next up on the new treats is the Active Display. This is a new way to view your notifications without having to unlock your device. It allows you to simply just tap on the icon of your incoming notification to view the message. This is a wonderful and welcome new take on viewing notifications on Android. The only minor issue is that you can only preview one alert at a time. Wishful thinking leaves me with hopes of allowing to view more with a software update. Working with the AMOLED display, the Active Display only lights up the the part of the screen with the notification on it. Everything that is Black is off. Thus saving on battery power in the process. This is yet another example of Motorola’s innovation.
Moving on to Touchless Control is Motorola’s new take on a voice-activated Google Now feature that can be used in any state of the device (locked/asleep or in the middle of an app) as the device is always-listening. To get started, you simply record yourself saying: “Ok, Google Now” as it must be said within the same way (voice tone + pitch) as recorded to work. You can use it to make calls, send text messages, set reminders, create calendar events, set alarms, get directions, play movies + music, ask questions, & search Google all by simply using your voice. And it surprisingly does all of them quite well. Who knew Motorola could make the best form of voice recognition? Though its only as fast as your reception, it could be a bit faster. Still killing the competition in that department.
And lastly, Motorola Assist is more like the evolution of Moto’s Smart Actions (which many manufacturers emulated). Minus the automated controls (Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, automatic music playback, etc.) and developed to focus more on Sleeping, Driving, & Meetings. The device knows when you are driving to read text messages or know who’s calling by dictating the message or who’s calling. You can set up an automated Quick Reply as well to let whoever is texting you that you are driving and will text them back. Assist also can go silent or auto respond when when you are in meetings and when you are sleeping to not be disturbed. Along w/ Touchless Control, these are impressive enough for me.
“This is one of the best Verizon Droid experiences since the Droid X2.”
At first glance, everything about the Ultra may seem a bit gimmicky but they are more useful features than on the Galaxy S4. Motorola has definitely put some thought into what the next-generation Droids should perform like. I have to say that this is one of the best Verizon Droid experiences since the Droid X2. Despite how you may feel about the fingerprint magnet that is the glossy, laminated Kevlar fiber unibody hardware, it’s all about the features and the experience. While I wasn’t completely turned off by the design some may have wanted something a bit less industrial but that’s a matter of preference.
This is a really tough question to answer. On one hand Motorola released on the best performing Droids in quite some time. On the other hand, they also put out the Moto X which is essential the same device with a better designed body. Both devices for the same price and both are on Verizon. The answer would be which device you prefer body-wise.
