GADGET GIZMO REVIEW WON'T CRACK UNDER PRESSURE MOTO X FORCE

GADGET GIZMO REVIEW

WON'T CRACK UNDER

PRESSURE

MOTO X FORCE

It's a horrible, sinking feeling -your precious phone slips

from your hands and lands on the hard stone or concrete

floor. Face down! You almost don't want to pick it up,

fearing the worst. And it's true, screen breakages are

becoming too common now, thanks to features like

larger screens and thinner bezels that everyone is

lusting after. Replacing phone screens can be expensive,

sometimes costing up to half the value of the phone itself.

So what do people do? Buy insurance, use a thick case,

apply glass screen protectors and sometimes, all of the

above.

Well, what if you never had to worry about your screen

breakage again?
What if you could drop your phone all you want, face

down, on purpose even -and just assume it will be fine.

That's what Motorola is promising with the Moto X Force.

First off, before we even got around to the performance,

camera and battery , we decided to torture

-yes, literally torture -the display during the course of

this review. These are things you wouldn't dream of

doing to any screen. Yet, we did! We dropped large

bunches of keys on it from 5 feet, we threw rocks at it,

we threw the phone across the room to unsuspecting

friends (who would usually drop the phone and stare in disbelief)

 and we dropped it face down on the hardest surfaces we

could find. Thing is, this device truly has a shatterproof

display . You don't need to ever worry about cracking or

breaking the phone screen -however, this doesn't mean

that the screen won't scratch. And the rest of the device

can also get dings and dents if dropped.

With that out of the way, the device doesn't look very

rugged: it's just like any other phone. It doesn't have

large rubber bumpers or a prominent lip around the

screen. All shatter-proof tech is in the screen itself.

Around the back, there's a layer of tough ballistic nylon

which adds grip and looks cool. There's a smart metal

frame, power and volume buttons are on the right

(power button is ridged, so you can feel it), 3.5mm

and SIM slot is on top while micro USB is on the bottom edge.

Up front is the excellent amoled screen and like a typical

amoled, it offers punchy colours and deep blacks. It tends

to be stay on the warmer side of the colour spectrum and

there are no colour temperature adjustments.

There is no branding around the screen : you'll see a

couple of front facing speakers (both under the screen

strangely), earpiece, camera and LED flash while the

Android buttons are on screen. Big props to Motorola

for the very nice stock Android interface with zero

bloatware. Because of this, the phone feels blazing

fast too. It has the Snapdragon 810 and the fact is,

you can get devices with similar performance that

cost a fraction (see Redmi Note 3 on the same page).

But Moto backs this up with a nice camera and great

battery life (almost 5 hours of screen on time, and

more than a full day of use).The TurboPower technology

can zap in a full 8 hours of use in just 15 minutes of

charging -when using the supplied 25W charger of course.

We like the Moto X, but it's priced too high for comfort.

You're paying a big premium for the screen technology .

For instance, you could get the Moto X Play at less than

half the price and many onlookers won't be able to tell the

difference. But if you're the kind who's always dropping

phones and breaking screens, it could be a good deal,

considering the amount you save on screen replacement costs.

Hitesh.Bhagat@timesgroup.com

ET9MAR16