It’s a Droid on steroids.
Motorola has ramped up the speed with its just-released Droid X2, the follow-up to its popular Droid X, by powering the smartphone with a dual-core, 1-gigahertz Nvidia Tegra 2 processor and 512 megabytes of RAM.
Priced at $199 with a two-year Verizon contract, Droid X2 is a solidly engineered Android 2.2 device that looks similar to the original –— with its metal casing, soft-touch finish and four physical buttons along the bottom — but the display looks better and responds quicker.
The Droid X2’s new HD screen, with 540-by-960 resolution, is sharp looking, especially when you’re Web browsing on the phone. Press the home button twice and you get a thumbnail view of the device’s seven home screens.
At 5.47 ounces, it’s a little heavier than recent smartphones from Samsung and HTC, but the X2 has a full-metal jacket.
The X2 is easy to start up and use, letting you set up your e-mail and social media accounts quickly and easily. I entered my G-mail, Facebook and Twitter accounts and within less than a minute messages came funneling through. Web browsing is also very good on the Droid X2. Although the X2 is a 3G phone, it got me connected almost as fast as my 4G phone.
The dual-core processor on the X2 supports HD playback and allows you to mirror what’s on the phone onto your TV.
To test the video, I loaded up my SIM card with the movie “Paul.” The fast-talking alien looked great and played seamlessly. The movie played just as smoothly when I connected the X2 to my 46-inch LCD TV via the phone’s HDMI connection.
But while video looks and plays great on the X2, I was less impressed with the audio. Playing through the MP3s on my test SIM card, I found the sound rather harsh listening through a set of high-quality earbuds. There was too much treble and not enough bass.
The Droid X2 does get great phone reception — calls were loud and clear — and there’s even a noise-cancellation feature.
The phone comes with an 8-megapixel camera that takes OK photos, even in dark light, thanks to its dual-LED flash. The camera will also record HD video in 720p.
As for battery life, I was pleasantly surprised. It lasted nearly two days with a lot of use and given the demands of the dual-core processor.
To sum up, the Droid X2 is a solid smartphone, even as the world has moved on to 4G. But if you’re not in an area that gets Verizon 4G LTE or don’t want to spring for a 4G phone, the Droid X2 will fit most users’ needs very well.
