Motorola Droid 2 Review: Rebooting the Droid
by Brian Klug on September 19, 2010 7:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Droid
- Motorola Droid 2
- Android
- Mobile
Conclusions
The Droid 2 is obviously incremental—look no further than the name. But even nailing incremental product refreshes can be hard, and Motorola has largely done it with the Droid 2's excellent hardware. The masculine industrial design of the first still shines through on the Droid 2, and the hardware itself retains what was great about the form factor without changing everything needlessly.
For the most part, virtually every major complaint about the first device has been addressed, and for that Motorola deserves credit. The D-Pad is gone, the keyboard is completely revamped for the better, troublesome buttons refined, awkward chin tucked away, and the platform's SoC has been updated. The device hardware itself is thoroughly modern with the exception of the camera stack's inability to record 720P video.
Though the Droid 2's hardware is unequivocally excellent, the software still needs tweaking. There's absolutely no doubt in my mind that 3G tethering needs some major attention, and performance in some areas just isn't where it should be. Hopefully all of this can and will be addressed with a timely OTA update. There's also the matter of Motorola's BLUR skin, which there isn't any way to turn off short of rooting and loading a different ROM.
If you're an existing Motorola Droid owner, the Droid 2 will feel like almost completely familiar territory. Quite honestly, unless you're absolutely dissatisfied with the speed of that device, the Droid 2 will feel exactly the same. The differences lie in the keyboard, and whether you'll have the 'Wow' moment I did will depend entirely on which original Droid keyboard you ended up with.
If the original Droid was a slightly insecure adolescent that made up for being the newcomer with brash masculine boasting, the Droid 2 would conversely be a much more confident polished 30-something. It's still hip, but there's nothing earth-shattering about the whole package this time around—it's just a safe update. If you've got the original Droid, the Droid 2 just isn't quite enough of a huge leap forward to warrant an upgrade unless you really need the speed. Faster performance will come late 2010 and early 2011 in the form of ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore based devices running at even faster clock speeds. That said, if you're in the market for an Android phone on Verizon with a keyboard, look no further than the Droid 2.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
39 Comments
View All Comments
bjacobson - Sunday, September 19, 2010 - link
My Droid's keyboard now has very bubbled keys. Try running your fingernails down and across in the creases beteween keys. I did this a few times pressing hard, went back to typing texts, and it's made my keys bubbled like the Droid2's, even moreso in my opinion than the photograph there.Also, I believe the resistance in the sliding mechanism is the mechanical sliders; I'm pretty sure 2 teflon strips on the back of the phone won't fix that.
sotoa - Monday, September 20, 2010 - link
I like having a dpad on my droid, I just wish it was on the left side like a gamepad, and wish it had diagonals.KaRRiLLioN - Monday, September 20, 2010 - link
I bought the Droid 2 the day it came out but had to return it for several reasons, most of which I hope have been fixed. Corporate email synch had a terrible bug where it wouldn't synch contacts from Exchange if they had categories. Facebook synch would synch EVERYONE instead of just existing contacts. There was no option to change that.Most of these issues were caused by BLUR. Any idea if these items now work as advertised?
So I still have my original Droid with the original flat keyboard. I'm pretty used to it now and have no issues. I think I'll stick to this until another Android-based phone catches my eye. I wouldn't mind something like the Droid X, but I want Super AMOLED.
LoneWolf15 - Monday, September 20, 2010 - link
To fix the Facebook issue, download the Facebook app instead of using the Droid 2's "Social Networking" app.I'm not using my D2 for Exchange (we have a Google Apps Domain) but after a week, I've been very happy with my switch from a Blackberry Tour (which I was reasonably satisfied with).
PubicTheHare - Monday, September 20, 2010 - link
The best keyboard on any smart phone is found on the Epic 4G. I played with it yesterday and was amazed at the tactile feedback and overall usability.Also, I don't buy that the Droid 2 screen is brighter than the Epic/Fascinate/Captivate/Vibrant's.
I have the Fascinate and placed it side by side with the Droid 2, both in a store and against a friend's Droid 2 outdoors, and the Fascinate's display was substantially brighter and had more contrast.
Great review. It seems like Motorola is hitting it out of the ballpark with its latest phones, though I still think they have the most bland styling and their UI (Motoblur) is hideous.
I bet the OMAP processors are about 80% responsible for the impressive battery life. 9.5 hrs is ridiculous!
Thanks, Anand.
Myrandex - Monday, September 20, 2010 - link
The Keyboard does look much better than the original Droid, however it still doesn't look like it comes close to the HTC Touch Pro 2 series phone's keyboard. That one is the thing to beat in my opinion. I love the spaced out offset keys and the dedicated row of numbers at the top. I sure hope my next phone has one at least that good.Jason
silverblue - Monday, September 20, 2010 - link
...that you barely mentioned the Epic 4G and its Galaxy S variants. Not trying to justify my purchase, however the lack of a mention on even the gaming and video capture fronts was a little disappointing.MrPIppy - Monday, September 20, 2010 - link
It's interesting that the Motorola Droids have always been a huge design win for TI, even though almost no other Android phones use TI's OMAP or wireless chips. The Droid, Droid X, and Droid 2 use TI OMAP and WiLink (for WiFi/BT), instead of the almost universal combination of Qualcomm MSM+Broadcom BCM4329. Even Motorola's other Android phones (Backflip, Cliq, etc.) use MSM+BCM4329. Any idea why the Droids get the TI parts?bil3 - Tuesday, September 21, 2010 - link
Surprised that Anandtech doesn't know, but the Droid JIT performance in linpack is normal.Only Snapdragon's scorpion and cortex A9 devices have a fast 128bit FPU which the JIT is optimized for and takes full advantage of.
This is a very specific case for this operating system as it's very much Java based, JIT performance matters in many operations.
The OMAP uses the standard A8 FPU which is anemic in comparison (just like the hummingbird & co.)
The CPU itself is not bad, that's why it's fast enough in raw performance benchmarks or benchs that aren't limited by the JIT.
In all cases, the JIT still bring a good bit of performance, just not as much as on devices with a fast FPU.
Brian Klug - Tuesday, September 21, 2010 - link
Bil3,Very interesting, I wondered for a while about the performance delta being due to the A8 architecture versus Qualcomm's own Scorpion design, but couldn't find that remaining detail. Intriguing that the 128bit FPU makes such a big difference.
Awesome tidbit!
-Brian