Motorola (re)build on the RAZR line with MAXX, Droid 4 and purpleness

Sorry for the lack of posts but the start of a term doesn’t mix well with CES for a teenage blogger. We will get through the big stuff this week but it may take time!

At CES, Motorola announced 3 new devices based on the RAZR, a phone that is officially as old as Digixav. While it seems unlikely that they will ever hit the UK as none are featured on the Motorola website, it gives us an excuse to look at the phone that narrowly lost out on our Best Design Award. Despite it’s godawful screen that somehow manages to look bad in adverts.

On the left, we have the RAZR MAXX. As the name suggests, this is a RAZR that is fatter and equipped with a bigger and better battery of 3300mAh. This gives you (supposedly) 21 hours of talk-time and 6 hours of LTE video streaming. It is 8.99mm thick and is otherwise a bog-standard RAZR. This is coming soon for $299 with a 2 year plan.

In the middle, we have the purple RAZR. It is a RAZR. It’s purple. Along with the cut-price white and black models, this will be $199 on contract.

On the right, we have the Droid 4. It’s like a 4 inch RAZR with a sliding QWERTY keyboard and 4.6mm thicker. It’s what the Droid 3 should have been. Like how the heavily delayed and redesigned Bionic is a fat RAZR. The Bionic is like the RAZR MAXX, but with a worse battery. Pricing is currently unannounced but it’ll probably be $249.

All of these phones are Verizon exclusives in the USA and have ‘4G’ LTE, the same internals as each other, splash-resistant nanocoating and Motoblur as a skin. If you are in America and feel the need for Android, forget these and get a Galaxy Nexus. Or get a Windows Phone on AT&T. Made by Nokia.

Samsung Galaxy Nexus/Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich first impressions (Update: ICS updates, pricing announced)

The keynote is over, the Samsung Galaxy Nexus is official and Ice Cream Sandwich finally has a version number, but how does it all look?

Firstly, the phone. The Super AMOLED HD 1280 x 720 16:9 screen sounds fantastic, even if at the mahoosive size of 4.65 inches. The 8.49mm deep handset houses a full gigabyte of RAM, a 1.2GHz Texas Instruments dual core chip and 2 cameras. The 1.3MP front shooter is standard fare but one expects better than a 5MP lens on the back, especially in comparison to the fantastic cameras on the Samsung Galaxy S II, Nokia N8 and of course the iPhone 4S. An NFC chip is incorporated for Android Beam tap-to-share and of course Google Wallet whenever it launches on this side of the pond. The phone will ship with Android 4.0 and will come in both LTE and HSPA+ variants, depending on location and demand. No pricing has been announced, but NTT DoCoMo will be carrying the phone in Japan along with it being another Verizon exclusive stateside if earlier leaks are to be believed.

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BREAKING: Galaxy Nexus leaks on Samsung site (Update: with picture)

The Samsung Galaxy Nexus has leaked on the Samsung site just 3 hours before it’s expected announcement. The leak details that it will be available on Verizon in the USA and the picture of the phone itself matches an earlier leak from Japanese network NTT DoCoMo. Have a look for yourself at the link past the break.

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