This year has been stellar for smartphones, and customers are now spoiled for choice, but it’s not done yet, and Motorola is getting in what what appears to be the last new release of the year.
That release is a product announced earlier in the year by Motorola, which itself returned to Australia this year after an almost two year absence from the industry.
The new phone is the Motorola X, or rather the Motorola X for 2014, because while Australians saw the X when Motorola found its way back into the country earlier in the year, that model was technically the 2013 Motorola X, albeit a delayed 2013 X.
Announced in September, the new X is the 2014 X, and this model screams that year, 2014, with the inclusion of a Full HD 5.2 inch display, Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor clocked at 2.5GHz, 2GB RAM, 4G LTE connectivity, WiFi, Bluetooth,13 megapixel rear camera with 4K video capture, and 16GB storage, though no microSD, a surprise exclusion that should probably be there.
But if you’re not bothered by memory that won’t be moved (or upgraded), you’ll be intrigued by the body, with options for plastic or wood, and that last one is real wood: yes, you can get a proper wood back for a smartphone, leaving a very different impression to the plastics and metals phones are commonly built with.
Google’s Android of course runs here, arriving with 4.4.4 “KitKat” out of the box, though we suspect this will be like other Motorola versions of Android, running mostly a stock version of Google’s operating system but with some minor changes that sit on top, meaning updates should come fairly quickly.
Likewise, it will also include changes to the screen to show you notifications without drawing a lot of power from the battery, as well as an always listening voice system so you can talk to your phone rather than press a button to switch it on.
Pricing for the Motorola X (Moto X 2014) sits at $749 RRP for the plastic resin body, while the inclusion of wood adds another $40 and brings the cost up to $789. Availability for the handset is December 15, likely making it the last smartphone release of the year, unless Google gets its act together and gets the Nexus 6 into stores promptly.
