Gadgetory

hi this is Brian Bennett for cnet.com and today we're taking a first look at the Motorola Atrix HD this latest handset in Motorola's Atrix line launches July 15th on ATT for an attractive price of $99.99 if you're an Android and Motorola fan you may do a double-take when you first see the Atrix HD that's because this handsome phone looks very similar to the Motorola Droid Razr right down to its curved top-heavy hump around back and Kevlar coating that resists scratches available in colors of white shown here and titanium the Atrix HD definitely feels well crafted but a bit plasticky and not as premium as the more metallic Motorola Droid Razr phones on Verizon the Atrix HD is pretty thin too at just a third of an inch thick at its trim aspyn despite being svelte this phone features a big bold and bright 4.5 inch LCD screen with a 720 HD resolution Motorola also says the display uses something called HD color boost which I suspect is a form of image processing and possibly a special filter designed to pump up colors and contrast just above the screen is a VGA front-facing camera you'll find modern software on the Atrix HD the device runs Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich gussied up by Motorola's interface while Motorola doesn't call the UI the old motoblur or refer to it at all in fact it still feels blur like to me I do dig this funky widget on the home screen that combines clock weather plus battery and memory status in one slick interactive graphic the phone is pushed along by a fast 1.5 gigahertz dual-core Snapdragon s4 processor backed up by one gigabyte of RAM as a result Atrix HD feels quick nimble and responsive also nice is an 8 megapixel camera on back with LED flash which also shoots 1080p HD quality video the camera snaps pictures quickly and boasts a ton of features settings and shooting modes it also lets you take pictures while the camera is the Atrix HD also connects to 18 T's fast 4G LTE data network which I've been very impressed with at least in New York anyways on top our ports for micro USB and HDMI along with a headphone jack the right side holds a tiny power button and small volume rocker located on the left is a flap covering slots for micro sim and micro SD cards around back is an 8 megapixel camera with LED flash and that Kevlar surface which I can't stop touching for some reason keep in mind the Atrix HD uses a 1700 milliamp battery which is not removable so you won't be able to swap out the battery yourself for a fresh one if it runs dry or fails completely also compared to the massive 3300 milliamp battery in the Droid RAZR MAXX I can't imagine the Atrix HD to provide anywhere near the maxes runtime I'm Brian Bennett and this has been a first look at the Motorola Atrix HD be sure to check out our full review at cnet.com