Motorola Droid RAZR Review - A Better Clad Bionic
by Brian Klug on December 16, 2011 2:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Droid
- LTE
- 4G
- Motorola
- Android
- Mobile
- Droid RAZR
- motorola droid RAZR
Camera - Still
I guess it shouldn’t come as any surprise at this point that the RAZR, you guessed it, uses the same OmniVision OV8820 8 MP CMOS sensor as the Bionic. That means 1.4µm square backside illuminated pixels. However, as we’ve discussed in the past there really are four parts to the whole smartphone imaging chain: the sensor (CMOS), optical system, Image Signal Processing (ISP), and finally software on the OS talking to the ISP. What’s different on the RAZR versus the Bionic is optical system and software.
The Bionic included F/2.8 optics with a 4.6mm focal length. The RAZR keeps that 4.6mm focal length and includes F/2.4 optics according to EXIF. It’s entirely likely that the focal length field hasn’t changed, but given that from what I can find commercially available OV8820 F/2.4 packages have a focal length around 4.95mm. However, it’s reasonably close. Both of these designs are likely 4P (4 plastic elements) as well.
We’ve done the usual thing and taken photos with the phone under test in our smartphone test locations (which are a bit difficult to control and might have slightly different than usual lighting due to seasons changing) and in our controlled indoor tests.
As a reminder, in the smartphone bench samples only locations 3-7 remain available for testing.
The RAZR does decently well in our controlled testing. Distortion is minimal, the lightbox with light on sample is sharp and looks accurate, and colors look similar to the Bionic. Despite being a half stop wider on the ISO12233 chart we see no more spatial frequencies in the horizontal or vertical (meaning performance is clearly not diffraction limited, which isn’t a surprise). In the lights off test, the RAZR still doesn’t illuminate the scene in the dark, and instead defaults to focusing to infinity which produces a blurry image in our box.
I guess while we’re on the subject of focus, this is a continual problem in the bench test. Focus is soft or missed focus entirely in locations 3 and 4, and in our sample bench video as we’ll show later. I’m not sure what the problem is here, but I’m confident I allowed the AF routine to run properly before capturing - this is just the position the software decided was best focus.
I mentioned software because the RAZR’s camera software subjectively seems less stable than the Bionic’s. I experienced a crash or two in the course of taking bench samples and normal test photos, and like other Motorola camera apps had UI elements disappear sometimes. Obviously not having a physical shutter button makes having a working UI even more important, and the RAZR just needs a bugfix update to address the camera app stability.
Camera - Video
I also shot video at the test location, and here if you look at 1:1 zoom you can see that the RAZR does appear to miss focus despite running its continuous auto focus routine a few times. I shot this video a number of times after a reboot expecting different results but never got a completely sharp video.
The positive part of video recording on the RAZR is that it still uses the same bitrate and H.264 features as the Bionic - 15 Mbps high profile for 1080p30, and 10 Mbps high profile for 720p30. Audio is two-channel stereo AAC at 128 Kbps. You can again pull all of these out of build.prop just as shown below.
ro.media.camcorder.1080p=mp4,h264,30,15000000,aac,128000,44100,2 ro.media.camcorder.720p=mp4,h264,30,10000000,aac,128000,44100,2 ro.media.camcorder.d1NTSC=mp4,h264,30,6000000,aac,128000,44100,2
So that’s a good thing, and again thanks in part to OMAP4’s excellent video encoder, though we see most of the high end smartphones shooting 1080p based on OMAP4 and Exynos using high profile.
Rear Facing 1080p30 Video Sample
Front Facing 720p30 Video Sample
In addition we’ve uploaded the raw rear facing camera video sample without YouTube’s transcoding which you can grab from us in a big zip here. Again the encode quality of the videos is above average, but sharpness would be much better were it not for these focus issues.
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JonnyDough - Saturday, December 17, 2011 - link
I should probably mention too that when I got my phone (through Verizon) that I had mobile hotspot, it was one of the reasons I got the phone. Of course, a month later they had made it pay-to-use and blocked me from it with an update. Its kind of like the whole ISP industry putting caps on it because they quote "can't afford" to not do it. Laugh. ArsTechnica had a whole article on that. Its a really good read.loribeth - Tuesday, December 27, 2011 - link
Don't worry, the hot spot connection is a known Razor issue, or at least that is what I have read doing a Google search. I just dropped my hot spot, today. I also got a refund of al charges since my purchase. It will connect, but will immediately disconnect.Shinobi_III - Saturday, December 17, 2011 - link
The razr screen might look bad under a microscope, but compared with the SGS2, the colours are so much better, and no banding at all.The SGS2 with it's supposedly better layout, looks like sh*t next to a razr in the real world displaying photos or even most games that happen to have a color fade.
anandtech pirate - Sunday, December 18, 2011 - link
It’s a bit odd to see the Epic Touch getting better battery life with Wimax than with 3G. Could this be related to a bad Sprint signal at your test location? Sprint 3G data speeds have been terrible in many locations for the past 6 months.victorjr - Sunday, December 18, 2011 - link
This is what should be called Review! "Reviews" done by other sites are a joke. We can decide with much more success. We can read facts and not only biased opinions. Anandtech is the place I have been for years. This will continue. Cant wait to the Galaxy Nexus review.iSayuSay - Sunday, December 18, 2011 - link
I don't want to start another flame because I actually feel this Razr is a damn fine phone (apart from it's not bundled with ICS yet), but truly .. Apple just did it again.Some hi-end Android now start to use a user un-effin-replacable battery in pursue of thinness and the ability of using hi grade material..
Adobe start to drop future support on Mobile Flash plugin.
Some Android now bundled with software or apps which basically iTunes wannabe with all syncing, copying, and not-so-free device managing, something most people bash on iPod and iPhones?
And I'm sure more and more Android handset going to adapt microSIM on their phone. Just like this phone.
Long story short, somehow .. smartphone trend start to follow something that most people hate .. the iPhone
lexluthermiester - Sunday, December 18, 2011 - link
Had to deal with two iPhones with batteries that stopped holding a charge and a few friends have had to deal with similar problems with their iPads. Sealing the battery inside gives the manufacturer an opportunity cut corners in the battery department. Totally unacceptable.doobydoo - Tuesday, January 17, 2012 - link
Thankfully you're in a tiny minority. And you can get dodgy batteries whether it's removable or not.georgekn3mp - Monday, December 19, 2011 - link
I have had the HTC ReZound for a month now, and did not like the width and height of the Razr (or the screen compared to true HD 720p on the ReZound) and hope to see a Galaxy nexus review soon even if Anad never publishes one for the ReZound. I researched all 3 before buying the ReZound and found it was best for my needs and wants for a halo phone.Even if the SunSpider and Vellamo tests on GNex beat the ReZound..I am not switching. I love my first smartphone...with a non-Pentile HD 720p display, dual-core at 1.5ghz, a better 8MP camera with f2.2 lens and not as big a bezel. I like the phone dimensions on Rezound better anyway...I can swipe my thumbs all the way across holding it one-handed and can't on GNex.
So the only thing GNex has that ReZound does not is Android 4.0 (and that will happen eventually). So NFC is crippled anyway without the Google Wallet. Heh, all that waiting for a GNex which is already sporting outdated hardware....I bet both the Razr and ReZound beat it when they get Ice Cream Sandwich...just have to wait long enough.
Rowlf - Monday, December 19, 2011 - link
I just came back from the verizon store in an attempt to escape apple hell. I so desperately wanted the RAZR or galaxy nexus to be a replacement for my old iphone. The razr and nexus seemed to be choking on this review or anywhere on anandtech. Scrolling was not smooth and the nexus even crashed once. I tried the newest iphone just for kicks and it had no problems. Was it the demo floor model?Also the nexus seemed to be half as bright as my old phone. Yes I made sure brightness was as maximum and auto brightness was off. Was it the demo model?
Do I need to go to a different verizon store? Is that as good as it gets at this time and I should be looking or waiting for something else?