Motorola launches £89 smartphone, wants to 'end the feature phone' - Polidicks

[img]http://imgkk.com/i/lglw.jpg[/img] [url]http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/may/13/motorola-moto-e-android-smartphone[/url] [quote]Motorola launched yet another low-price smartphone on Tuesday, going head to head with lesser known Chinese and South Korean manufacturers with its £89 Moto E handset. The device is aimed squarely at first-time smartphone buyers, who might ordinarily have bought a feature phone, getting the basics of a decent Android phone at an affordable price. Charlie Tritschler, senior vice-president of products at Motorola, told the Guardian: “We are on a mission to end the feature phone. We believe at this point there is enough capability in what we can create in terms of smartphone level that it’s time to say goodbye to feature phones.” The 3G Moto E runs the latest version of Google’s Android software and has a 4.3in display, a 5-megapixel camera and all-day battery life. It also has 4GB of built in storage and a microSD card slot for adding up to 32GB more space for movies, music and photos, as well as 1GB of RAM – typically double that of most other phones under £100. Motorola hopes that the Moto E can continue the momentum that its last budget offering, the popular Moto G, has built in the UK, Europe and developing markets like India. The Moto G was launched in November last year costing £135 in the UK, but was frequently available for under £100 from mobile phone networks on pre-paid plans.[/quote]

That spec is actually not bad, very good for the price.

The biggest drawback of the Moto G was the lack of an SD card slot, so I can definitely see more people buying the Moto G LTE. Considering it myself, really.

It's very good that Motorola is creating low-end smartphones that have actually good hardware. The low-end market has been flooded by Samsung's endless hordes of devices that are twice as expensive yet have half as much power

Decent phone, basically a Lumia 521 with Android instead of windows and 512Mb more RAM, though the 521 can be upgraded with 64Gb of storage and is still $50 cheaper

When's this 4G version meant to be launching?

just make a fuckin not shit droid thanks motorola [highlight](User was banned for this post ("shitposting" - Gurant))[/highlight]

[QUOTE=markg06;44796741]When's this 4G version meant to be launching?[/QUOTE] I think the 4g version is just the Moto G which will also include a microSD slot!!! [url]http://androidandme.com/2014/05/news/motorola-adds-lte-to-updated-moto-g-4g/[/url]

Seems like a slightly worse alternative to the 520. Though I guess a lot of people might prefer this because of android.

How valuable will cheap smartphones be if data plans still cost a fucking arm and leg? The reason most people get feature phones is because its cheaper just for calls and texts

[QUOTE=AJ10017;44796917]How valuable will cheap smartphones be if data plans still cost a fucking arm and leg? The reason most people get feature phones is because its cheaper just for calls and texts[/QUOTE] It's less bad in Europe, a data flat is maybe 5€ more than a phone or SMS flat. (Roughly 15€ in Germany, but without phone flat then.) They can still be useful without though, since you can use a lot of apps (including navigation) offline.

How does this compare to Moto G? I've been planning to get one.

[QUOTE=AJ10017;44796917]How valuable will cheap smartphones be if data plans still cost a fucking arm and leg? The reason most people get feature phones is because its cheaper just for calls and texts[/QUOTE] $20 for unlimited data, texts, and calls.

[QUOTE=Haxxer;44796958]How does this compare to Moto G? I've been planning to get one.[/QUOTE] The Moto G is definitely better value for money considering it's has a quad core CPU, flash and a front facing camera.

[QUOTE=ijyt;44796960]$20 for unlimited data, texts, and calls.[/QUOTE] Sadly its not like that over here in the US...

Seems a little pointless when for about £20 more you can get twice as much from a Moto G.

4 GB internal storage is not acceptable, even for a phone this price. I'm sure people would rather pay an extra £10 or so for 16 GB of storage.

[QUOTE=Noss;44797148]4 GB internal storage is not acceptable, even for a phone this price. I'm sure people would rather pay an extra £10 or so for 16 GB of storage.[/QUOTE] The Lumia 520 is available for £60-70 and comes with 8GB storage. 16GB is considered 'premium' I would think, given how more expensive handsets start with that amount of storage. I wonder what the experience is like on this compared to low end windows phones. I read that kit kat improved android on low end hardware quite a bit.

[QUOTE=MisterM;44797179]The Lumia 520 is available for £60-70 and comes with 8GB storage. 16GB is considered 'premium' I would think, given how more expensive handsets start with that amount of storage. I wonder what the experience is like on this compared to low end windows phones. I read that kit kat improved android on low end hardware quite a bit.[/QUOTE] 8GB is still somewhat better. Many apps refuse to work when you migrate them to SD, so it really limits what you can actually do with the phone. The fact that 16GB is considered premium in the mobile market is also a disgusting abuse, and I hope the EU start cracking down on the insanely inflated prices of storage.

[QUOTE=ijyt;44796960]$20 for unlimited data, texts, and calls.[/QUOTE] I'm lucky. I have T-Mobile on my 521. $30 for 100 Minutes, Unlimited Texts, and 5Gb of Data which is throttled after the 5Gb. I don't talk much and it's great to use as an excuse to get off the phone I can up the bill to $35 for Unlimited Calls and texts, but get zero bandwidth. And the next step up is the same but with different levels of bandwidth. $50 for 250Mb, $60 for 2Gb, $70 for Unlimited Nobody likes to let you have Talk time AND Bandwidth without paying out the ass for it in the US. I have Wifi at home so I could do without the bandwidth, but it's nice to have. Besides, if I need to talk in a pinch after my 100 minutes, it's $0.10/minute, which is an extra hour worth of talking before it hits the next step in price anyway I see it as a pretty good deal overall. I got my unlocked contract free phone and can have about 18 months worth of service for the same price as an unlocked iPhone 5. And it certainly beats the Siemens phone with AT&T I had when I was in high school

[QUOTE=Killergam;44796690]That spec is actually not bad, very good for the price.[/QUOTE] Really? You can tell without them saying the CPU!

Can't wait to see ads of this thing going for $350 in-contract here. It'd be great if they actually went for developing markets instead of crowding up the catalog for people who can afford better handsets anyways

[QUOTE=Noss;44797148]4 GB internal storage is not acceptable, even for a phone this price. I'm sure people would rather pay an extra £10 or so for 16 GB of storage.[/QUOTE] It's hard to sell storage that small nowadays, Motorola is probably getting a good bulk deal by buying those chips, which lets them sink money into other things.

[QUOTE=Lf751;44797291]Really? You can tell without them saying the CPU![/QUOTE] Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 200 with 1.2GHz dual-core A7 CPU Adreno 302 400MHz single-core GPU [editline]13th May 2014[/editline] basically the same CPU as the Lumia 521. Slightly slower, actually

[QUOTE=latin_geek;44797298]Can't wait to see ads of this thing going for $350 in-contract here. It'd be great if they actually went for developing markets instead of crowding up the catalog for people who can afford better handsets anyways[/QUOTE] It's on sale in India for ₹7000 or about £70/$120

make a new droid so i can upgrade off my god damn droid 2

[QUOTE=TheTalon;44797241]I'm lucky. I have T-Mobile on my 521. $30 for 100 Minutes, Unlimited Texts, and 5Gb of Data which is throttled after the 5Gb. I don't talk much and it's great to use as an excuse to get off the phone I can up the bill to $35 for Unlimited Calls and texts, but get zero bandwidth. And the next step up is the same but with different levels of bandwidth. $50 for 250Mb, $60 for 2Gb, $70 for Unlimited Nobody likes to let you have Talk time AND Bandwidth without paying out the ass for it in the US. I have Wifi at home so I could do without the bandwidth, but it's nice to have. Besides, if I need to talk in a pinch after my 100 minutes, it's $0.10/minute, which is an extra hour worth of talking before it hits the next step in price anyway[/QUOTE] That is next to nothing what the rates are in Canada. With telus, for $35 (10% off if you bring your own phone) you get unlimited texting, 150 minutes of talk with unlimited evenings after 6pm and family calling. Meanwhile, 150Mb of data costs you an additional $15. To get 2Gb of data with unlimited talk and text with telus, you pay $90. There is also no option for unlimited data (there is no plan whatsoever with telus that has unlimited data). The closest, 10GB costs $145 a month.

[QUOTE=Noss;44797148]4 GB internal storage is not acceptable, even for a phone this price. I'm sure people would rather pay an extra £10 or so for 16 GB of storage.[/QUOTE] What's 32gb then?

[QUOTE=DOG-GY;44797797]make a new droid so i can upgrade off my god damn droid 2[/QUOTE] Droid MAXX? [url]http://www.motorola.com/us/consumers/shop-all-mobile-phones/Droid-Maxx/m-droid-maxx.html[/url] [IMG_thumb]http://www.wirelesscommunicationsc.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/DROID-MAXX.jpg[/IMG_thumb]

You honestly don't need much more than that. The average person thinks that having a 16 core cpu and 8gb of ram (Yes I know no phone has that, yet) for your phone is necessary if you want to view facebook. I got a Nexus 4 and even that is overkill with its 2gb of ram and quad core cpu. I listen to Spotify with my phone, beyond texting and calling sometimes that's it.