By far one of the worst aspects of the launch of the Moto Z has been Verizon exclusivity. Since the phone’s launch, it has been available only through “The Big Red”, with the eventual promise of the device going up for sale unlocked. Now, Lenovo is finally revealing when that new model will be available.
As we said in our review, Moto Mods make enhancing your phone easy. Want better speakers? Slap on a JBL speaker mod. Want better battery life? Add a battery pack! Motorola’s current line up of Moto Mods include all of the fairly obvious use cases, but today the company has launched a new Moto Mod at IFA: a camera from Hasselblad.
Following its release last month, Lenovo has just pushed the first software update to the Moto Z DROID Edition. Updates have been a topic of controversy for the Moto Z, with Motorola confirming that the device would not be receiving monthly security updates as most Android devices currently do.
Ahead of IFA later this month, Lenovo has just released a new teaser video for its upcoming product announcements. This new teaser looks back at some of the previous tech Lenovo has released at IFA such as its Yoga Windows laptops, tablets, and even give us another look at those crazy flexible phones and tablets from Tech World earlier this year.
In this week’s top stories: We give you new Galaxy Note 7 details ahead of an official launch, go hands-on w/ Moto Z , Moto Z Force, & Moto Mods, and we get a look at early Android Nougat builds running on the Nexus 6P and Huawei P9.
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Now this one’s a doozy. Sometimes you just can’t get clear and concise statements from a company about a product’s features, and the latest is about whether or not Motorola/Lenovo will commit to monthly security updates for the Moto Z. It’s been a bit of a roller coaster, but the latest suggests that while you will get updates, you shouldn’t expect to get security patches on a monthly basis…
Moto Z is the first Moto-branded flagship since Lenovo began phasing out the Motorola brand name, and the successor to the popular Moto X line. At the time of its unveiling, Moto X represented a new Motorola with a new, clearer vision under the influence of Google itself. The company ditched the heavy skins commonly found on Android handsets, built a solid phone that was a good overall experience, and added some features here and there that made it stand out from the crowd. It was the ideal prototype of what an Android OEM should do.
But the Moto X is gone now, and Motorola is now owned by Lenovo. Slowly but surely, we have seen Lenovo make its mark on the Moto phones of years previous, and this year things took another step in a new direction. Lenovo skipped over Y and has now launched the Moto Z, and deserving of its new name the device is indeed. The curved back and the Moto dimple of the X line are gone, replaced with an aluminum and glass surface that makes a bold attempt at a new super-thin sexiness. Is it a good phone, though? Let’s talk about that…
Lenovo/Motorola have finally launched the new Moto Z here in the United States, but that’s not the only place we’ll see it go up for sale. After a brief period of exclusivity at Verizon Wireless, the phone will go on sale in markets around the world as a GSM unlocked device. One of those markets includes China, but there the Moto Z will be getting some major changes in the software department.
It’s been a few weeks since Lenovo officially announced the Moto Z and Moto Z Force, and in the time since we’ve only had two big question: when are they coming, and how much will they cost? Today those questions are answered, at least for the Verizon editions.
We’re hard at work on our full review of Lenovo’s upcoming Moto Z and and Moto Z Force (coming next week!), but for now you’re going to have to settle for some quick unboxing footage. Follow after the break for the video, in which we disassemble the packing for Lenovo’s latest flagship…
We went hands-on with the Moto Z and Moto Z Force earlier this year at Lenovo’s event in San Francisco, California. But now, as the phones are about to hit store shelves (or at least Verizon’s shelves), we’ve finally received our review units. While our full review(s) won’t drop until next week, we wanted to give you all an opportunity to ask about the phones — ask us anything!
Breaking the first images of the Moto Z, HelloMotoHK has a realtively reliable record when it comes to Motorola devices. A new leak suggests that Moto Z devices sold in China will forgo Moto’s lightly skinned version of Android for Lenovo’s. Fortunately, models sold in the US and around the world will reportedly stick with the near stock Android we’re familiar with.
While Lenovo’s new Moto Z is grabbing attention for a lot of reasons, the main selling point for this new device is its design supporting modular backplates. With a few strong magnets and some pins, a special module called a ‘Moto Mod‘ can instantly expand the capabilities of the phone. At Tech World last week, the company showed off several mods that would be available at launch. It didn’t, however, reveal pricing. Thankfully, Verizon has.
The Moto Z and Moto Z Force are now official but there’s still a lot about these phones that Lenovo didn’t announce on stage. One thing we know from the event, however, is that Verizon will be getting exclusive rights to sell the phone for a few weeks starting this Summer prior to the unlocked launch in September. The “DROID Edition” isn’t too much different from the standard model, but it seems like it will be coming with an extra perk over the standard model.
Yesterday we got our hands on Lenovo’s just-announced Moto Z and Phab2 Pro, but one of the most important new features of the former — the company’s true flagship this year — is support for new modular backplates called Moto Mods. Lenovo announced a slew of them yesterday, including speakers from JBL, a camera module from Hasselblad, a pico projector called the Moto Insta-Share, an Incopio battery pack, and more.
Let’s take a look…
Yesterday Lenovo made the Moto Z official, but with that they also confirmed that it would be exclusive to Verizon Wireless for several weeks. Both the Moto Z and Moto Z Force will launch on Verizon this Summer, with an unlocked model coming in September. Sadly however, that unlocked model won’t work with Verizon.
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Lenovo announced the first line of Moto phones since its acquisition of Motorola today, and there was not a single mention of the company from which the new devices got their namesake. The Moto X is gone replaced by the Moto Z and the Moto Z Force — the former being the true flagship with a super-thin build and the latter being a more rugged version with a better camera, a little more thickness, and a shatterproof screen.
Let’s take a look at the regular Moto Z, which in my opinion is the nicest phone Lenovo announced today…
The new Moto Z is officially the world’s thinnest smartphone at just 5.2mm, but to achieve that they’ve had to make some sacrifices. The battery is quite a bit smaller than most phones at just 2,600 mAh, and another issue with the razor thin design is that you won’t have a 3.5mm headphone jack.
Along with their announcement of the Moto Z, Lenovo today announced MotoMods, a collection of special attachments to the phone which can expand the capabilities of the phone. The first three MotoMods that will hit the market include the ‘Insta-share projector’, JBL SoundBoost speaker, and the offGRID power pack from Incipio. However Lenovo is learning from the mistakes that LG made with the G5 by opening up a developer program to encourage development of more new modules.
While technically not the first Lenovo-made Moto device, the Moto Z is the most important. After dropping Motorola for just Moto and replacing long time head Rick Osterloh, Lenovo is finally fleshing out its 2014 acquisition from Google. The Moto Z lineup consists of two devices with nearly identical designs and compatibility with backplate modules that add extra functionality and styling.
From new Moto devices to Project Tango, Lenovo will have a full lineup of announcements this Thursday at Tech World 2016. Now, a new render has surfaced highlighting the thinness of the Moto Z, while a Bluetooth certification points to low-end devices also set to carry the Moto name.
Motorola Lenovo is just a few short days away from announcing their next Android flagship, the Moto Z (or Moto X 2016 as it’s also known). We’re all excited to see what will be unveiled, but through a series of leaks we know quite a lot about the new phone. We know that it’ll have a metal design, but one of the biggest downsides to that is that users won’t be able to customize the look of the phone. However thanks to a new set of leaks, it looks like we’ll be able to retain that after all, sort of.
The only confirmed launch from Lenovo’s Tech World event on June 9th is a consumer Project Tango-enabled smartphone. An invite from the reliable MotoHK now also points to a reveal of the next Moto flagship at the event. Furthermore, the Moto Z trademark has just passed (via Droid Life) the US Patent Office.
It was 2006, you were in high school, and everybody had a Motorola RAZR. At least, that’s how Motorola wants you to remember your life ten years ago, in its latest teaser for the upcoming Moto X (or Moto Z) announcement.
Of course, one year later the iPhone was launched and the entire mobile industry was turned on its head. But for that one brief spell, the RAZR was without doubt the most popular phone around, and it turned heads.
