Motorola held a fairly large event today. I know how some of us feel about ol’ Moto, but their announcements are nothing to scoff at. Or are they? We’ll see.
MotoActv
Today, Moto announced MotoActv – “The Ultimate Fusion of Music and Fitness.” Taking what looks like an iPod Nano, and making it less, well, nano, they’ve essentially ported android to a wrist-wearable fitness tracker. The device boasts GPS tracking, and heart-rate monitoring via earbuds – both wired and Bluetooth. The 8GB or 16GB device holds all your favorite music, and connects via Bluetooth to your Android smartphone so you can talk and walk, or text and run. Even though I believe the point of exercising is to escape such things, it’s nice that they’re allowing you to stay on the grid, assuming you carry both the MotoActv and your Droid with you.
The device is water-resistant (they claim sweat and rain as the water) and is meant to be with you at all times. They brought Bob Harper of Biggest Loser fame on stage to proclaim how awesome the device is for people who want to track their activity all day. Although the device starts at $249(8GB) or $299(16GB), it’s way above the (easily) comparable iPod Nano, which is $129 for 8GB and $149 for the 16GB. Doubling the price of your competitor is not a good way to make sales. When you take into account the bulk of the device (9.6 mm to the Nano’s 8.78mm) and it doesn’t appear to be justified. The biggest improvements over the Nano are the GPS and Heart-Rate Monitor, which make this a true stand-alone exercise buddy.
Motorola Razr
Just when you had forgotten about that silly flip phone that dominated the world, Motorola decides to bring it back. My biggest complaint (aside from the fact that the new Razr isn’t a flip phone) is that they should have named it the StarTac. This Kevlar backed, steel-backboned phone is meant to be a svelt (7.1mm) beast, rocking a dual-core 1.2 GHz processor and 1GB of RAM underneath a coating of waterproof magic (both the screen and the internal circuitry.)
But what happened to the SLVR? It’s reborn as well, as an accessory. The SLIVER is the hands free headset designed to go with the Razr. The pre-loaded MotoCast app allows you to stream or download content from your PC, which is a cool feature. Want to do some Skyping? This bad-boy comes with a 720p front facing camera, and has a full 1080p 8MP rear facing camera, further eliminating the need for point and shoots. I am not sure about the “cinematic quality” that Moto claims in the press release, but it’s bound to be better than most of the stuff on YouTube.
No word on what version of Android it’ll be running, but Android fans are hoping that it’ll be a Blur-less Ice Cream Sandwich. Honestly, anything less would be a mistake.
Sources: MotoActv Press Release, Razr Press Release
From the demonstration video on Engadget, the Droid RAZR will be running a Blur-modified version of Gingerbread, which means who knows when (if ever) it will get Ice Cream Sandwich. Too bad, it’s a nice looking phone with a sweet screen and nice specs.