- Aug 12, 2010
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For anyone who still cares about my thoughts on N5 vs the Moto X, I am actually going to go against the majority here and say that the Moto X is not an upgrade over the Nexus 5, except for in a few areas.
What the Moto X clearly does better is GPS strength, loud speaker, and build quality. The GPS locks on (and stays locked on) very quickly and very well during Map and Navigation use. The loud speaker, while disappointingly only mono, is clear and the volume gets very high up there -- probably my favorite improvement over the Nexus 5 (the N5 speaker is pathetic). Build quality requires no explanation; Moto Maker is fun and the device looks and feels great.
As for things that "break-even" in my opinion: The screen; the Moto X additional features (I will explain); and battery life.
The screen - this is really a matter of preference between AMOLED and LCD. Personally, I like LCD better. The whites look better and since most web browsing websites are black text over white background, I find LCD to be better suited. Colors definitely do pop a little better on AMOLED, but at the same time, colors on LCD screen look more realistic and "proper" for lack of a better word. I can understand why people might prefer AMOLED, however. Like I said, this is more a matter of preference. AMOLD, to me, just looks gloomier, somehow. Also, I dislike having to worry about bright/dark colors in relation to battery life. This is a real bummer, in my opinion.
Moto X Features - at first, these were great, but I started taking up issue. I don't really use Assist so please keep that in mind. As for Actions, Voice, and Display, they are nice features and a great attempt and making the device more user-friendly, but in my opinion, ultimately don't make or break the decision between a Moto X and a Nexus 5. Yes, Voice is great, but you have to say your keyword so specifically to get it going. And yes, Action/Display is fine, but they're not must-haves. I can more or less mimic similar features on the Nexus 5 with third party apps (Notifier Pro, in particular is something that I think is better than Moto Display). I wish Motorola would allow an option that lets the Display show more details than just an icon when it first lights up. I wish I didn't always have to press on the icon just to see who it's from. I'd love to be able to see additional info right away. Again, to be clear, I'm not knocking on these features, and they are actually quite nice. My point here is to say that they're not must-have features if you're really on the fence between the X/N5.
Battery life - It's not too early for me to say the battery life is about on-par with the Nexus 5. It might be slightly better here and there because of slightly better signal strength, but it's not enough to make a difference. If you're going out at night, you'll have to juice it up a bit. Again, not necessarily a knock, and as I said, at times it seems to be a hair better, but it's not enough to make any sort of decision-making difference.
Now, at last, we come to what I think are the real deal-breakers:
Camera - To put it simply: the camera is abysmal. I know most reviews and feedback say it's either on par with the competition, or decent, or slightly better than the Nexus 5, but my experience is anything but any of that. My photos (regular and HDR, auto-focus and manual-focus) result in noisy, blurry, grainy, poor quality pictures. Under good lighting, it's better, of course, but that's not saying much. Indoors (even in well lit rooms) the camera suffers terribly. The auto-focus is slow and entirely unreliable. You have to really struggle to get a good shot off. The camera is hit or miss with a lot more misses before you'll get hits. And even the hits are subpar. In my opinion, this is regrettably a deal-breaking issue with this phone. This is unacceptable for a 2014 device, even if it may be priced slightly lower than the competition.
So how's the camera compared to the Nexus 5? That's the main question here. And the answer is that it is worse. Sometimes far worse. The Nexus 5 camera, despite getting a bad rap early on, is actually really decent (dare I even say, good). HDR Nexus 5 photos, especially, blow HDR Moto X photos out of the water. HDR Nexus 5 photos are crisp, clear, with colors well represented, while the HDR Moto X photos still show a dreadful amount of grain. Look at just these examples:
I'll let you guess which one is which.
Touch-response - So this one might be more obscure, but is it me or is the touch screen somewhat less responsive to slides? It's especially apparent in Flipboard where you slide left-to-right to exit an article and to navigate around the menus... something about the Moto X doesn't register slides as quickly as it does on the Nexus 5. It keeps clicking into and opening articles instead of sliding. It's as if the phone registers my slide as a touch. This happens once in a while in the App Drawer too. When I'm sliding between pages, sometimes it'll actually open the app that my finger starts the slide on. I'm not sliding fast nor slow. Just sliding normally. I'm not sure if this is a software or hardware issue. It's an oddity, but I just know it does not happen on my Nexus 5. It just seems to understand slides a lot slower than my Nexus 5. Is this an AMOLED vs LCD issue? I don't know, but it makes the device frustrating to use.
No Wireless Charging -- not much to elaborate on here. It's a damn shame there is no wireless charging built in. This is a lovely feature of the Nexus 5. Wireless charging isn't so much about ease of charging, but the fact that your battery is always being "topped off" every time you set it down on your charger, especially if you have a few lying around the house/work, etc. It's a sorely missed feature.
Anyway, I'm still undecided on whether I'll keep the Moto X, but it's looking like I might return it, and stick it out with my Nexus 5. There are many things to complain about the Nexus 5 (weak speakers, weak GPS/Radio strengths, inconsistent battery), but given the fact that I paid about $550+ dollars for the Moto X, the upgrades should be more significant, and there should really be no steps backwards (the camera).
So, I say again that my opinions based off my side to side experience of the Moto X and the Nexus 5 is that the Moto X is not as big of an upgrade over the Nexus 5 as others have said. I'd go as far to say it's a downgrade given the value/price you have to pay. It may not have been worth the $550+ dollars I paid for to switch. I am considering a return. There's more I can probably say, but I'll leave it there as I think that touches on the main key points everyone always wonders about between the two devices.
Hope that helps anyone wondering. Happy to answer any questions, as well.
TL/DR: What the Moto X does better than the Nexus 5, it does better marginally. What it does worse, it does much worse. It likely isn't worth the "upgrade."
What the Moto X clearly does better is GPS strength, loud speaker, and build quality. The GPS locks on (and stays locked on) very quickly and very well during Map and Navigation use. The loud speaker, while disappointingly only mono, is clear and the volume gets very high up there -- probably my favorite improvement over the Nexus 5 (the N5 speaker is pathetic). Build quality requires no explanation; Moto Maker is fun and the device looks and feels great.
As for things that "break-even" in my opinion: The screen; the Moto X additional features (I will explain); and battery life.
The screen - this is really a matter of preference between AMOLED and LCD. Personally, I like LCD better. The whites look better and since most web browsing websites are black text over white background, I find LCD to be better suited. Colors definitely do pop a little better on AMOLED, but at the same time, colors on LCD screen look more realistic and "proper" for lack of a better word. I can understand why people might prefer AMOLED, however. Like I said, this is more a matter of preference. AMOLD, to me, just looks gloomier, somehow. Also, I dislike having to worry about bright/dark colors in relation to battery life. This is a real bummer, in my opinion.
Moto X Features - at first, these were great, but I started taking up issue. I don't really use Assist so please keep that in mind. As for Actions, Voice, and Display, they are nice features and a great attempt and making the device more user-friendly, but in my opinion, ultimately don't make or break the decision between a Moto X and a Nexus 5. Yes, Voice is great, but you have to say your keyword so specifically to get it going. And yes, Action/Display is fine, but they're not must-haves. I can more or less mimic similar features on the Nexus 5 with third party apps (Notifier Pro, in particular is something that I think is better than Moto Display). I wish Motorola would allow an option that lets the Display show more details than just an icon when it first lights up. I wish I didn't always have to press on the icon just to see who it's from. I'd love to be able to see additional info right away. Again, to be clear, I'm not knocking on these features, and they are actually quite nice. My point here is to say that they're not must-have features if you're really on the fence between the X/N5.
Battery life - It's not too early for me to say the battery life is about on-par with the Nexus 5. It might be slightly better here and there because of slightly better signal strength, but it's not enough to make a difference. If you're going out at night, you'll have to juice it up a bit. Again, not necessarily a knock, and as I said, at times it seems to be a hair better, but it's not enough to make any sort of decision-making difference.
Now, at last, we come to what I think are the real deal-breakers:
Camera - To put it simply: the camera is abysmal. I know most reviews and feedback say it's either on par with the competition, or decent, or slightly better than the Nexus 5, but my experience is anything but any of that. My photos (regular and HDR, auto-focus and manual-focus) result in noisy, blurry, grainy, poor quality pictures. Under good lighting, it's better, of course, but that's not saying much. Indoors (even in well lit rooms) the camera suffers terribly. The auto-focus is slow and entirely unreliable. You have to really struggle to get a good shot off. The camera is hit or miss with a lot more misses before you'll get hits. And even the hits are subpar. In my opinion, this is regrettably a deal-breaking issue with this phone. This is unacceptable for a 2014 device, even if it may be priced slightly lower than the competition.
So how's the camera compared to the Nexus 5? That's the main question here. And the answer is that it is worse. Sometimes far worse. The Nexus 5 camera, despite getting a bad rap early on, is actually really decent (dare I even say, good). HDR Nexus 5 photos, especially, blow HDR Moto X photos out of the water. HDR Nexus 5 photos are crisp, clear, with colors well represented, while the HDR Moto X photos still show a dreadful amount of grain. Look at just these examples:
I'll let you guess which one is which.
Touch-response - So this one might be more obscure, but is it me or is the touch screen somewhat less responsive to slides? It's especially apparent in Flipboard where you slide left-to-right to exit an article and to navigate around the menus... something about the Moto X doesn't register slides as quickly as it does on the Nexus 5. It keeps clicking into and opening articles instead of sliding. It's as if the phone registers my slide as a touch. This happens once in a while in the App Drawer too. When I'm sliding between pages, sometimes it'll actually open the app that my finger starts the slide on. I'm not sliding fast nor slow. Just sliding normally. I'm not sure if this is a software or hardware issue. It's an oddity, but I just know it does not happen on my Nexus 5. It just seems to understand slides a lot slower than my Nexus 5. Is this an AMOLED vs LCD issue? I don't know, but it makes the device frustrating to use.
No Wireless Charging -- not much to elaborate on here. It's a damn shame there is no wireless charging built in. This is a lovely feature of the Nexus 5. Wireless charging isn't so much about ease of charging, but the fact that your battery is always being "topped off" every time you set it down on your charger, especially if you have a few lying around the house/work, etc. It's a sorely missed feature.
Anyway, I'm still undecided on whether I'll keep the Moto X, but it's looking like I might return it, and stick it out with my Nexus 5. There are many things to complain about the Nexus 5 (weak speakers, weak GPS/Radio strengths, inconsistent battery), but given the fact that I paid about $550+ dollars for the Moto X, the upgrades should be more significant, and there should really be no steps backwards (the camera).
So, I say again that my opinions based off my side to side experience of the Moto X and the Nexus 5 is that the Moto X is not as big of an upgrade over the Nexus 5 as others have said. I'd go as far to say it's a downgrade given the value/price you have to pay. It may not have been worth the $550+ dollars I paid for to switch. I am considering a return. There's more I can probably say, but I'll leave it there as I think that touches on the main key points everyone always wonders about between the two devices.
Hope that helps anyone wondering. Happy to answer any questions, as well.
TL/DR: What the Moto X does better than the Nexus 5, it does better marginally. What it does worse, it does much worse. It likely isn't worth the "upgrade."
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