Motorola Droid X full Review

The Motorola Droid X for Verizon is the latest in the Droid series and definitely the best yet. It has a 4.3″ screen that’s the largest available now and even if they get larger you probably can’t get anything bigger in your pocket. It’s resolution is 854 x 480, so even though it shares the same screen size as the Evo 4G the Droid X has a slightly larger screen. The perfect 16:9 ration also makes for great movie viewing in HD. Here’s a quick list of the hardware specs:

• Processor: TI OMAP3630 1GHz
• Screen: 4.3″ capacitive multitouch LCD display 854×480 resolution
• 8 megapixel autofocus camera with dual LED flash
• weight: 155g
• 802.11 b/g/n wifi + bluetooth 2.1+EDR
• microUSB 2.0 + microHDMI
• GPS/A-GPS
• accelerometer, compass, proximity/light sensor
• microSD slot (up to 32GB) 16GB included
• 8GB internal memory
• OS: Android 2.1 (will be upgraded to 2.2)

As you can see this thing is a beast, and the 1GHz OMAP3630 processor is blazingly fast. Playing games, running apps and surfing the web on this thing is faster than anything before it, and is very enjoyable on the large screen. The screen is the same standard LCD as the original Droid, but with more pixels of course and remains one of the best and brightest available.

On the sides of the X you have the volume up/down rocker, microUSB, micro HDMI and bright red camera button.


If you thought the screen on the Evo 4G was big, you haven’t seen anything yet. Here’s a shot of the two:

It’s actually hard to hold this thing in one hand and touch the whole screen with your thumb. If you have small hands, or are a girl, you probably don’t want the Droid X. If you have large hands and want the fastest phone ever made with the largest screen, then you have to get the Droid X.
Gaming is excellent on the X with the 3-axis accelerometers and large screen. It comes preloaded wiht a Need for Speed trial but you can get many more from the Android Market built in.

The X runs Android 2.1 with a Motoblur skin that has social networking integrated into it as well. Once you sign into your facebook account it integrates your friends into your contact list including profile pic and numbers. This is pretty useful but can also be disabled if you want a nice clean contact list of only numbers that you actually need.
Android 2.1 includes 7 home screens that can be customized with widgets or apps, and the 2.2 update will add more functionality including full support for flash 10.1 which will be nice. In combination with the HDMI out this should allow for fullscreen streaming from HULU and the like.
One disappointing thing is the included Blockbuster app. It allows you to download movies to the phone (only over wifi) and then doesn’t let you watch them on a larger tv through the HDMI out. It’s basically a waste of space. The other included apps are nice though, such as Google maps with turn by turn navigation and the likes. The turn-by-turn also works very well and my GPS got a lock in less than 30 seconds every time. It works great with the optional car dock, which I’ll have a review up for also.
Call quality was great and I still haven’t lost 3G coverage (though I haven’t travelled with it very far). The great sound quality is due to the 3 microphones on the phone, one on the front and 2 on the back to aid in noise cancellation as well as directional audio when filming video.
The 8MP camera is great and the dual LED flash is very bright, almost comparable to a standard flash when less than 10 feet. After a picture is taken there is a built-in mini photoshop program that allows you to edit the photo’s contrast, color saturation, etc and add effects like black and white or color filters. The camera uses a manual shutter (one of the only that does) which allows for very fast picture taking and great quality.

Here’s a sample photo taken with the camera at 6MP with all settings on automatic.

click for larger

As you can see the image is very sharp and I would say it’s one of the best smartphone cameras that I’ve used.

The software keyboard is massive and features multitouch which allows for very fast typing, but if you want the fastest way to type you’ll want to use Swype which is also included. Here’s a little video of typing with swype:

After you’ve used it for a couple of days you’ll never go back to normal typing. There’s also a microphone key on the keyboard which lets you just speak the words to input, a great feature to use while driving.
A 16GB microSD card is preinstalled in the phone when you get it, but can be upgraded to 32Gb. Internal storage is 8GB.

The battery life for the DroidX is what you would expect for something with a 4.3″ screen and 1GHz processor, not great. With heavy use you won’t see much over 4.5 hours, but with light use you’ll make it a full day with no problem.
Basically the DroidX is the biggest, fastest and best phone you can get (in my opinion). A smaller phone might suit your needs better, such as the Droid Incredible, but for me the X is the only way to go. It’s available exclusively from Verizon for $199 with a 2 year agreement.