Gadgetory

motox is what android was always supposed to be inexpensive hardware good design and clean fast software but the Moto X has also always been the worst of Android bad cameras and mediocre battery life now there's a new Moto X it's called the pure edition or style in some countries it's cheap at $399 and it works on every carrier in the US and Motorola says that this time the camera is amazing is this the Moto X that finally lives up to its promises the Moto X pure edition looks a lot like last year's Moto X just bigger as the same curved shape same metal frame same front-facing speakers and same customisable design like the walnut wood back and our review unit the only noticeable difference is the rear camera housing which feels more like a change for the sake of changing something rather than having any real purpose but where the new Moto X is different is in its size it's now a big phone with a 5.7 inch display but it doesn't feel as big as it looks like the Galaxy Note 5 the X pure is a big phone that gives you a giant display but doesn't feel totally unwieldy to use and actually fits in my pants pocket it feels significantly smaller than the Nexus 6 despite having nearly as large of a display the size of the display is about the only thing the exterior has in common with the note 5 however the X is a well-built phone but it doesn't feel nearly as premium as the note and it becomes readily apparent which is the more expensive device when you pick them up the 5.7 inch quad HD display on the X is not only bigger than before it's also got a lot more resolution it's also an LCD instead of an AMOLED panel and the colors and blacks aren't quite as impressive as it used to be it's by no means a bad screen but it's still far from eye-popping or class-leading the exterior has an upgraded processor in the form of Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 paired with three gigabytes of RAM it's a powerful chip but it's not quite top-of-the-line and though there aren't really any performance issues of note with the X it doesn't feel as snappy fast as other high-end Android phones this year it's perfectly fine for the vast majority of people but if you want the best of the best this isn't it that can also be said for Motorola's new 21 megapixel camera it's far better than the mediocre cameras on prior moto phones but despite Motorola's claim it's not the best in the field it takes perfectly adequate pictures and good lighting though it has a tendency to make them overly sharpened and aggressively digital and appearance in low lighting the ex-missus focused more than the LG g4 or galaxy note 5 and the images exhibit softness and a good amount of noise reduction you also shouldn't bother with a new LED flash on the front camera which produce unnatural lighting and put spots my eyes a bright light shining 2 feet away from your eyes is exactly as terrible as it sounds battery life has also been a pain point for the Moto X line in the past but the new X is 3000 milliamp hour battery strong enough to get me through a busy day without issue I'd love for it to last even longer especially given the size of the XP or addition but it's better than it used to be and par for the course at this point the X doesn't have wireless charging but it does have quick charging can rapidly refuel using Motorola's included charger Motorola's approach to software hasn't changed here and the new X's version of android 5.1 lollipop is about as close to what google intended as one can get outside of the nexus line the few pre-installed apps that do come with the phone consists of Motorola's helpers there's moto display assist motion and voice controls and a migrated app to help move things over from your old phone and since Motorola is only selling this direct and through a handful of retailers there won't be any carrier apps on it regardless of which SIM you put inside of it the Moto X pure may be the top of Motorola's range but the reality is that it's a really good mid-range phone with an attractive but appropriate mid-range price it's not really a flagship whatever that actually means at this point and it's not as good as an iPhone 6 plus or Galaxy Note 5 but to do better than the Moto X you have to be willing to spend a lot more money and it's not clear that investment is worth it for most people to just get a slightly better camera and maybe slightly better feeling device as it turns out in 2015 a really good mid-range smartphone is also a really good overall smartphone and the Moto X pure Edition is a best mid-range smartphone you can get