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What will your next phone be?

Outatime

Android Expert
Hello everyone,

For those like myself that picked up the Maxx on release day, you should be coming up on your upgrade date towards the end of August. What phone looks like a good replacement for you? There's a couple to choose from out now or soon to be out. They include the Nexus 6, the Samsung S6/S6 Edge, LG G4 and others.

Or... are there rumors of something else coming bigger and better? From my searching I couldn't find anything from Motorola for the summer which I thought was odd.

What are your plans?
 
II'll start by saying I still really like the Droid Maxx.

t's hard to say without seeing or handling the phones, but if I had to guess right now:

1 (Tie): Galaxy S6 (no interest in the Edge)
1 (Tie): whatever the iPhone 6 size model will be this fall, presumably the 6s
3: Whatever the Moto X will be this fall, particularly if the battery is larger. Qi charging would be a plus, too
4 (Tie): Whatever the Droid will be this fall
4 (Tie): The HTC M9

From what I have seen with the Turbo, I've been a little disappointed. It has had some weird issues that took too long to fix - some people had missed phone calls; delayed VoLTE implementation (which I don't care for, as my house has no LTE coverage, so the Maxx is by far the better phone for me right now, but the fact that it shipped without VoLTE just as the Maxx and Ultra was getting it is head-scratching to me); I've seen reports of the phone spontaneously rebooting when connected to Apple Airport routers, and those are what I use. Lollipop is now approaching 5 months without an update for the Turbo, and I always thought that was going to be a Motorola strength: faster updates. From what I have seen, the camera remains disappointing, particularly for shots of things in motion. (Mediocre cameras are also downgrading the Moto X and HTC One for me.) The battery, of course, is great, and both Moto phones get ranked up for Moto Display and Moto Voice (though Moto Voice is becoming less of an advantage with Android's built in support for similar features), and the Droids I like for Qi charging. (However, I have both Qi and Powermat chargers here, so that's a slightly bigger plus for the S6.)

For whatever reason, I just don't want anything by LG. Also, the Nexus 6 is way too big for me - in fact, the Droid Maxx is really about as large as I'd like to see a phone get - so that rules out the iPhone 6+ (or the S version this fall), Note 4 or, presumably, a Note 5 this fall.

Right now I am leaning toward staying Android, so that's probably the Galaxy. I do worry a bit about the smaller batteries in the S6, the Moto X (especially the Moto X), but the truth is that I can probably figure out a way to get my phone topped up during the day almost every day. And the glass back of the S6 - I'm a little worried about that being too fragile. We'll have to see what sort of cases there are when it comes out. But, FWIW, when it comes to accessories, no Android phones beat Samsung, usually.

The iPhone is tempting to me. Apple really makes great hardware, supports it better than anybody else (there is an Apple Store 25 minutes from my house; I have no idea where a Samsung, Motorola, LG, or HTC store is), there is far more accessory and third party hardware support for iOS than Android (I can plug in an iPhone to either of my car stereos and have it play easily, attach to BT right away as part of the cabled connection for phone calls), and, of course, the cameras are great. Also, the rest of the family are all iPhone (and that's literally - my wife and kids, my siblings, my wife's siblings except one and a sister-in-law who have an Android phone, their kids, even my Mom - that's 23 iPhones and 3 Android phones), so staying connected with them will be easier. Still, there are things about Android I prefer to iOS, particularly iOS's poorer support of Google services, so I think I'm still leaning strongly toward Android.
 
I went from the Maxx to the Turbo (64GB) in November. It was a surprising improvement. Screen. Speed. Camera (outdoors and still). Turbo charging (0% to 100% in less than an hour).

It seems pretty early for an upgrade for the Turbo.

Motorola voice quality is still superb.

... Thom
 
I went from the Maxx to the Turbo (64GB) in November. It was a surprising improvement. Screen. Speed. Camera (outdoors and still). Turbo charging (0% to 100% in less than an hour).

It seems pretty early for an upgrade for the Turbo.

Motorola voice quality is still superb.

... Thom
They've been upgrading the Droids yearly, so I expect that there should be a new one this fall, close to the time that I'm ready to upgrade. My date is August 20...

Turbo charging is not unique to the Turbo. All snapdragon 800 and later phones can use qualcomm's quick charge 2.0, as far as I know (so, the Moto X, presumably this year's X, the M9), and the S6 isn't qualcomm quick charge compatible but they say it has "4 hours of battery life in 10 minutes" charging. It'd be just the iPhone in my list that has no quick charge or wireless charging - unless Apple adds something like that to this year's iPhone.
 
My comparison was Maxx to Turbo. I was surprised.

Turbo charging is clearly here to stay and is a definite improvement.

Some outdoor still photos from my Turbo were good enough to be used in large add illustrations.

As for yearly updates ... I'm not sure. I think the push for the Turbo was really so they could get the Moto Maxx launched.

I still keep coming back to ... if you are going to use it as a phone (your only phone) then it will have a Motorola logo on it.

... Thom
 
My reasons:

I fight iOS on my iPad constantly. I will admit it is stable but as much as I love Apple (first computer I ever used was a IIe, then a IIc then a Mac+) I cannot see myself fighting iOS on my phone.

I continue to be impressed by the build quality of MOTO phones, much more so than Samsung. Not enough experience with LG to comment.

The battery life of my MAXX (and the TURBO from what I have read) is still unequaled.

I have gotten so used to the beauty, speed and uncluttered view of the (almost) stock android interface that having to fight the Samsung or LG overlay is maddening. That almost a deal breaker on its own...
 
As for yearly updates ... I'm not sure. I think the push for the Turbo was really so they could get the Moto Maxx launched.
I'm as close to 100% sure as I could be. I'm sure that there will be a new Droid, just to keep up with competitive products.

A tweet from Motorola's President, Rick Osterloh, today:

https://twitter.com/rosterloh/status/580852300698267648

.@northead we try to stay on a roughly annual cycle for all of our products including Moto X. #AskRickO

That's not the Droid, but I can't believe that Verizon won't want a new phone this fall.
 
I see no reason to update just because you can. I intend to wait until I am in the presence of a product that is so compelling that I choose to upgrade.

The Maxx will charge faster if you use an adequate power supply. Not sure about the actual Turbo thing from Qualcomm. It may be in phones with Snapdragon 8xx but I think the key ingredient is a power integrated circuit in the new reference drawing for the later phone designs.
 
I like the M9 and the Samsung S6 but I don't think I could ever go back to something that wasn't in "always listening" mode. I really like that.
 
I think my Turbo is simply great. 64GB version. There was a recent price drop in Verizon. This is usually the indicator that an updated version is coming out in 3-5 months.

If you can hold off until October it might be beneficial. (No way to know for sure.)

... Thom
 
Yeah, I'm going to stick it out. If that article I posted is accurate and the new Droid is an updated Nexus 6 I think that could be "the one."
 
An update to my ongoing dilemma...

https://twitter.com/evleaks/status/621209532610560000

The upcoming Huawei Nexus is rumored to have a 5.7" screen. I really wanted my next phone to be 6"+ ...I've been using my Maxx as nothing more than a hot spot since I bought my used 2012 Nexus 7. I really like it, it's just a bit long in the tooth.

I am giving serious consideration to a Nexus 6.
 
An update to my ongoing dilemma...

https://twitter.com/evleaks/status/621209532610560000

The upcoming Huawei Nexus is rumored to have a 5.7" screen. I really wanted my next phone to be 6"+ ...I've been using my Maxx as nothing more than a hot spot since I bought my used 2012 Nexus 7. I really like it, it's just a bit long in the tooth.

I am giving serious consideration to a Nexus 6.

I recently switched from a Droid Maxx to a Nexus 6 and I absolutely love it. I loved the Maxx as well and it performed great even after 18 months, but I just got sick of waiting for Lollipop. (At this point I will be surprised if the Maxx ever gets Lollipop.) When the N6 went on sale for $499 at Amazon I decided to try one out at the Verizon store, and was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed the form factor. The display is absolutely gorgeous, and Lollipop just flies on it. The "Moto dimple" helps balance it in hand.

Anyway I ordered one from Amazon (sprang for the 64 Gb version for $50 more) and got it up and running on Verizon's network just by popping in the nano-sim from the Maxx. It quickly downloaded all the OTA updates and I was able to activate VoLTE on it easily. Bottom line, if you are OK with the form factor you will not regret switching to the N6. However I would be wary of that supposed "Droid brand" N6 because you know Verizon will drag their feet on updates -- look at the Turbo which only now is getting Lollipop after 9 months of delays. Screw that, get a Nexus and always enjoy the latest version of Android.
 
I've uses the 64GB Turbo since day one and was on 4.4.4 most of that time. I missed all the "fun" people were having with 5.0 ... thank you Motorola. The upgrade to 5.1 came ... I upgraded ... and wondered what all the hype was about.

I'm wondering if the sheer power of the Turbo and memory size made incremental improvements from 4.4.4 to 5.1 less than obvious.

... Thom
 
I've uses the 64GB Turbo since day one and was on 4.4.4 most of that time. I missed all the "fun" people were having with 5.0 ... thank you Motorola. The upgrade to 5.1 came ... I upgraded ... and wondered what all the hype was about.

I'm wondering if the sheer power of the Turbo and memory size made incremental improvements from 4.4.4 to 5.1 less than obvious.

... Thom

I didn’t have any performance issues under 4.4.4 on my Maxx either, to be honest. I'm just one of those users who always wants to try out the latest features. I've sideloaded updates in the past just to get them faster and never had issues with updates on my OG Droid or Bionic. For me, Moto set an expectation of fast updates with how quickly they updated the original Moto X to KitKat, and then their promise that the Maxx would get Lollipop (it still says that on their update website). Unfortunately it seems that the Lenovo acquisition caused them to backslide, either through employee cuts or a different corporate focus, who really knows. At any rate, I will not be buying another Moto phone (unless it's a Nexus since Google updates those) until they demonstrate that they have gotten their act together again with regard to timely updates.
 
I'm keeping my Nexus 5 for a while. It will get Android M and I'm very happy with it. Same goes for my wife and her Nexus 6. Neither of us has any need or desire to get a new phone.

But when the time comes and it inevitably will, our new phones will be Nexus devices. Of all the phones we've had, only once did we buy something not running vanilla Android. That was a HTC a few years ago. One mistake was enough.
 
I thought there wasn't a UK version of the Turbo, did you just pick up an import?

I think I'll wait and see what's on the horizon, I really really want a phone with decent battery life, I'm really not bothered if its 2mm thicker. I think Samsung made a mistake with the smaller battery, I'm sick of all this Apple chasing mentality. Battery, battery, battery :)

At the moment I'm happy with my Galaxy S5, popped a 64 GB class 10 SD in it and CyanogenMod 12.1 OS and I really like it. I need a really good reason to update.
 
I went from Maxx 32GB to Turbo 64GB. The difference was not prenominal. The screen is larger and much sharper. It is faster ... how much you will notice is not clear. There is the turbo charger and additional memory and 5.1 came sooner. The word Verizon is not on the case (64GB version). The textured back on the ballistic nylon case is great. Without looking I can tell when I am picking up the Turbo from a group of three phones.

If I had to summarize it ... the Maxx is a great phone ... the Turbo is a greater phone.

... Thom
 
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