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
Cellular and WiFi Performance
There’s been a bit of discussion about whether the Droid 2 has signal and antenna issues a la iPhone 4. I was excited to get testing, and ran the Droid 2 through our now-regular tests to measure attenuation from holding the phone in different positions.
| Signal Attenuation Comparison in dB—Lower is Better | |||||||
| Cupping Tightly | Holding Naturally | On an Open Palm | |||||
| Droid 2 | 11.5 | 5.1 | 4.5 | ||||
| BlackBerry Torch | 15.9 | 7.1 | 3.7 | ||||
| Dell Streak | 14.0 | 8.7 | 4.0 | ||||
| Droid X | 15.0 | 5.1 | 4.5 | ||||
| iPhone 4 | 24.6 | 19.8 | 9.2 | ||||
| iPhone 3GS | 14.3 | 1.9 | 0.2 | ||||
| HTC Nexus One | 17.7 | 10.7 | 6.7 | ||||
The Droid 2 has just lower than average worst case signal attenuation when cupped deliberately near the antenna in the bottom of the device. Remember, less attenuation is better here. The Droid 2 therefore doesn’t have any problems that stem from the antenna itself, what then of the entire stack?
Remember that on CDMA cellular systems like Sprint and Verizon, voice and data are separate. Voice always operates over 1xRTT (which can also carry data, but at a slower rate with a maximum of 153 kilobits/s) and requires its own slice of spectrum. For faster “3G” data on a CDMA system, EV-DO is used, which likewise also requires its own slice of spectrum. This combination of two technologies from the same family makes most modern CDMA-based cellular systems hybrid in nature, and almost all CDMA handsets can only tune one (1xRTT or EV-DO) at a time. This generally isn’t a problem—most of the time, your CDMA handset polls a 1xRTT paging channel to check for an incoming call, notification, or SMS periodically. How often that happens is defined by the Slot Cycle Index (SCI) which can be anywhere from 1.28 seconds to much higher. Sometimes you can set this parameter yourself in engineering menus (the number corresponds to x^2 seconds), but you can’t exceed a number defined by the cellular system.
There’s a trade-off of course. Longer indexes will earn you a measurable battery life savings, but you’ll get less time to respond to an incoming call—the call will ring until your phone polls and picks it up. Shorter indexes will notify you of calls much more quickly, but drain battery faster.
Android does a good job hiding this all away from the user. In fact, there’s no way to change the SCI on the Droid 2—whether you have access to an engineering menu where you can tweak those things is entirely up to the manufacturer. The Droid Eris, HTC EVO, and Galaxy S phones, for example, have a suite of engineering menus.
I rarely see the 1x symbol pop up even when texts are coming in (despite the fact that it actually is on 1x to receive SMS), and most applications gracefully wait and resume. However, it sometimes still does happen that things don’t work perfectly, and you’ll transact data during this period and get stuck on 1x for a while. That’s actually pretty normal, and I see it all the time on a variety of CDMA devices. On the whole, this data handover has gotten much faster, but there’s still a period where the phone will wait before starting a data call on EVDO after initiating one on 1x. Generally the longest this takes is 3 seconds. But after you’re on 1x, if you keep transferring data, you won’t hop back to EVDO—on every CDMA device I’ve ever used, that only happens when data is idle.
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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