Picked one up today (Canada)!

[Postoid]

Again, this phone does not seem to be aimed at a target group that hang out on forums. I would like to hope that future software updates may improve some of the autofocus issues and processing. I suspect 80% of the potential buyers use their cameras to post to FB or such and will never notice that it is not as good as a SG4 because they never owned a phone like that anyway.

Agree Strawdawg. A software update would certainly help correct the purple cast that is seen on most of the shots. Personally, I think the sharpness is there for the target group. What will help might be the setting for touch focus either on or off. The steadier you can keep the camera (even with image stabilization), the sharper the shot can be. Also the lens can get a tad gritty with lint and dust effecting overall sharpness.

 

[imthekingbk]

Awesome! Congrats.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[Paisley]

I tried the twisty camera thing today on the droids, that was pretty cool. Will come in very handy at the dog park.

the always ready was cool, except i was bored of it after like 2 minutes! .

Strangely, and i don't know if it was because it was in demo mode or what, i only had to say *either* "google now" or "ok google" to get it to work. So weird. (can't remember if i tried just "google") And not only did it work with my voice and i figured, must be in demo mode, but the person next to me it wouldn't respond to at all. lol.

 

[Strawdawg]

somewhere I read that the Ok Google Now was chosen to get a phrase that was hard to duplicate between various speakers in an attempt to prevent false triggering. Sounds like it can be triggered by other people at times but is pretty robust.

Google nor Motorola seems to have been very interested in cameras from what I have seen. I would like to think that would change but it may not be their priorities. On the other hand, I remember all the HTC One complaints about the camera and it is still has sold well. In addition to my comments above, I would like to see some photobomber software added My son has a 1020 work phone and it is amazing in its capability.

 

[Paisley]

somewhere I read that the Ok Google Now was chosen to get a phrase that was hard to duplicate between various speakers in an attempt to prevent false triggering. Sounds like it can be triggered by other people at times but is pretty robust.

the cool part was, it was very obvious how awesome their noise cancelling software is. It was not quite in the store and i was saying very quietly to the woman away from the phones what she needed to say to set them off, and when i would say it (very softly) all 4 models would light up and ask me what i wanted. :O. that was cool.

 

[grooks]

the cool part was, it was very obvious how awesome their noise cancelling software is. It was not quite in the store and i was saying very quietly to the woman away from the phones what she needed to say to set them off, and when i would say it (very softly) all 4 models would light up and ask me what i wanted. :O. that was cool.

Did you tell her to wait for the Moto X?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 4

 

[Paisley]

Did you tell her to wait for the Moto X?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 4

i can't tell any of them apart at this point. lol. I know that droid mini was damn cute!!

 

[Strawdawg]

they may have floor models up to be triggered easily? Everything I have read says the noise cancelling is really good and the audio is really clear. The hardware seems to be very capable with regard to performance and I really like the direction they took the phone to make it useful. I admit I would like a better camera but from all the pic comparisons I have seen, I can live with it. I live on a ranch and most of my photos are outdoor shots. I am waiting to see what the new Sony offers, but otherwise, I am pretty much down to the Moto...today anyway LOL What I would really like is a screen that I could see in the sunlight instead of hoping I was aiming at the thing I am trying to take a pic of!

 

[anon(4196132)]

Thanks for this. I was hoping for more improvement, and I agree with the assessment of the shots.

This camera is better than what I have now on my GN, so it will work for me. If I needed, I can fix what I have seen with Snapseed. I still have not gotten to the point that I like to use my phone for anything more than a snapshot anyway.

I should state upfront that the *speed* of the camera app alone makes me prefer it over the GalaxyNexus camera. I've missed an incredible number of shots because of how long it takes for the GN to focus/shoot.

That said: in my experience the Galaxy Nexus is better at dealing with significant contrasts between bright and dark scenes. It's also a more 'punchy' camera than the Moto X. However, the Moto X focuses and shoots *WAY* faster, and the 'good' pictures taken with my Moto X outstrip the Galaxy Nexus by far. The 'greyness' with the Moto X really dulls natural colours - I routinely shoot pictures of the deer that wander by my office on a daily basis, and while their coats/vegetation are vibrant on the GN they're much more muted on the Moto.

 

[anon(4196132)]

Again, this phone does not seem to be aimed at a target group that hang out on forums. I would like to hope that future software updates may improve some of the autofocus issues and processing. I suspect 80% of the potential buyers use their cameras to post to FB or such and will never notice that it is not as good as a SG4 because they never owned a phone like that anyway.

I think that, when you get to a point where significant contrasts (i.e. deep blacks and strong whites) prevent taking a decent shot, people will notice. What's worse, is there isn't (as I've been playing with it) a way to take the shot short of actually moving around significant, often reframing the shot and taking picture from a significantly different position and light profile. People aren't gonna move about that way: it's the inconvenience of not being able to take even a marginally good picture - where their friends with iPhones can - that'll hurt the phone's sales.

 

[anon(4196132)]

Just a few pictures to underscore some of what I said above. First, both of the below images were taken within seconds of one another. Note how changing the angle slightly massively shifts the light captured/displayed in the photos. This is a problem, insofar as you can get incredibly different images - the sensor is just not great IMHO at dealing with variations of light/dark.

The next two shots are taken, out my office window, at some of the local fauna. Note how grey/washed out the images are. I didn't get this degree of 'washed out' on my Galaxy Nexus.

Next, some shots from another office that I work out of.

On the whole, I prefer the Moto X camera because of its speed. That said, I think that the software is doing something screwy and hopefully that can be fixed in an update. Moto's started to put their on-device software into Google Play (and already put out updates), which gives some hope that the company might push out updates to other Moto/Droid-specific software more aggressively than other manufacturers.

 

[cdmta]

Those look pretty darn good. I think it will work for my needs. Waiting for Vzw release. Then for end of exclusivity :'(

Posted via Android Central App

 

[Astrotrain00]

How is the screen in sunlight? Can you compare it to a GNex? Also, for those that have had it a few days, how is the battery life holding up?

 

[dwd3885]

Those look pretty darn good. I think it will work for my needs. Waiting for Vzw release. Then for end of exclusivity :'(

Posted via Android Central App

Yes those dont look too bad really. Even with the HTC One,I find myself having to snap a few times to get a good shot.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 4

 

[Paisley]

Just a few pictures to underscore some of what I said above. First, both of the below images were taken within seconds of one another. Note how changing the angle slightly massively shifts the light captured/displayed in the photos. This is a problem, insofar as you can get incredibly different images - the sensor is just not great IMHO at dealing with variations of light/dark.

The next two shots are taken, out my office window, at some of the local fauna. Note how grey/washed out the images are. I didn't get this degree of 'washed out' on my Galaxy Nexus.

On the whole, I prefer the Moto X camera because of its speed. That said, I think that the software is doing something screwy and hopefully that can be fixed in an update. Moto's started to put their on-device software into Google Play (and already put out updates), which gives some hope that the company might push out updates to other Moto/Droid-specific software more aggressively than other manufacturers.

exactly. i've seen it take nice clear pictures, it just has some very strange issues in 1. certain lighting (most, in some lighting it does very well), and 2. it does strange things with colors in certain lighting.

and that twisty thing done while the camera is locked, is awesome. I also really hope they do a little something with the interface, give an option or 2 more in some way. It was extremely bare bones and manipulating afterwords while in the program was unpleasant (at best).

 

[Strawdawg]

If one really wants to optimize a picture beyond the typical snapshot, then I guess one can do it once out of the picture. How many pics I have taken with my SG2 that look just like those where bright light drove the sensor and the deer, goat, cow, whatever I was trying to take a picture of was in the shade. As I have stated prior in the thread, I would like a better picture, but as said above, the inability to take a quick picture has cost me many a picture. For some reason, Moto and Google seem to focus on building a good phone without considering the camera. Maybe this one will end up being improved as said.

Our judgement tends to be colored by the best we have seen before,but that is just human nature. We expect constant improvement which is not really a bad thing

 

[rajeshr68]

How is the screen in sunlight? Can you compare it to a GNex? Also, for those that have had it a few days, how is the battery life holding up?

The screen is fine in sunlight - it washes out a bit, but I've seen a lot worse. And as for battery life (after three days), it does not seem as good as the claims I've seen from Motorola. I pulled it off the charger at 5:30am yesterday and by 7:00pm, it was down to about 30%. This was with moderate usage - no streaming videos/music, only one phone call for a few minutes and about two dozen emails received and a few answered. This is just slightly worse than my GS4, but I hope that it gets better over the next few days. As expected, the screen is the biggest battery hog but I see the Android OS as the other big hog. The screen was at 44%, while the Android OS was 33% - not sure if there's anything running in the background (other than my email). I'll install a battery stats app and see what's up.

 

[GadgetMomma]

I have a bit of a goofy question. This might actually pertain more to software than the actual phone, but since this is the phone I want I thought I would check here. How is the group messaging? I tried to make the switch from an iPhone to an S3 last fall, and the group messaging sent me right back! For as frequently as I use it, it was a huge deal breaker for me. I didn't care to download a third party texting app (I would have done that anyway for the customization), but the fact that it would come in as an individual message, convert to mms, THEN open in the group chat meant that I was always several messages behind (when there was real time texting going on). Like I said, I think this may have been resolved on the S3, but I wanted to know how it is on the motoX. Is group messaging available by default, with no third party app required? And if it is, is it "smooth", for lack of a better word, or does it need to load and convert like the S3 had to do? I have to admit that I did get spoiled with the iPhones group messaging - it was incredibly easy and I didn't even have to think about it. I just want to make sure I can do the same with the motoX before I make the jump back to android! Thanks in advance, and I'm sorry if this is not the right place to ask this question!

Oh also, could I get your opinion? If I get the phone tomorrow but opt for the customization, is it supposed to just be four days until it's at my door, as in Tuesday, or four business days, as in Thursday?

 

[thegrants82]

wow so the battery is worse than a GS4 so far? thanks for all of your posts because nothing beats a real users opinions.

The screen is fine in sunlight - it washes out a bit, but I've seen a lot worse. And as for battery life (after three days), it does not seem as good as the claims I've seen from Motorola. I pulled it off the charger at 5:30am yesterday and by 7:00pm, it was down to about 30%. This was with moderate usage - no streaming videos/music, only one phone call for a few minutes and about two dozen emails received and a few answered. This is just slightly worse than my GS4, but I hope that it gets better over the next few days. As expected, the screen is the biggest battery hog but I see the Android OS as the other big hog. The screen was at 44%, while the Android OS was 33% - not sure if there's anything running in the background (other than my email). I'll install a battery stats app and see what's up.

 

[Paisley]

wow so the battery is worse than a GS4 so far? thanks for all of your posts because nothing beats a real users opinions.

i've always heard it takes days for a phone to give an a true idea of it's battery life.