US-Assembled Moto X Boasts Of ‘Touchless’ Controls

Motorola has officially unveiled the Moto X, its first smartphone since it was acquired by Google in an £8 billion takeover in 2012, promising users will have an unprecedented ability to customise the design of the handset.

The Moto X is powered by the eight-core Motorola X8 mobile computing system, which comprises a 1.7 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Processor, a natural language processor and a contextual computing processor.

The inclusion of the natural language processor enables users to control many of the Moto X’s functions simply by using their voice. Information such as weather and traffic information can be summoned without touching the screen, while functions such as music and texting information can also be performed.

Motorola X8 mobile computing system

“Moto X doesn’t guess like other phones do. It knows,” claimed Motorola, rather creepily.

The contextual computing processor is used in the Active Display feature, which claims to reduce the amount of intrusive notifications by showing information “quietly” on the screen. Updates such as emails, calls and texts will be faded on and off the display, reducing the amount of times users need to “wake up” their phone and saving battery.

The Moto X’s contextual computing processor also enables users to launch the camera application using the phone’s accelerometer. The processor detects whether the phone is out of your pocket or bag, and if so, a quick flick of the wrist opens the camera.

The ten megapixel rear camera promises to take quality photos in both low light and bright light conditions, while a two megapixel camera is also on board.

Motorola promises that none of these features drain the phone’s battery life, of which it is particularly proud of, claiming it will last for 24 hours through “mixed use”.

Born in the USA

The Moto X features a curved back designed to fit more easily in the hand, while it has a 4.7-inch AMOLED screen and weights 130 grams. It runs Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean, has 2GB of RAM and comes in 16GB or 32GB varieties, both supplemented by 50GB of Google Drive cloud storage, free for two years.

It is the first Motorola smartphone to be built in the USA (does that make it easier for the NSA to bug then? – ed.), enabling US-based customers to choose aspects of the Moto X’s design, including colours, back, front, accents and wallpapers, and have it delivered within four days.

There are 2,000 different combinations possible and each phone is assembled in a new purpose-built facility in Fort Worth, Texas. The Moto X will be available in the US, Canada and Latin America from late August or early September for $199 with a two-year contract, but no UK release date has been mentioned.

Google will hope the Moto X will allow it to seize some market share from the likes of Apple and Samsung, given that losses at the Motorola Mobility unit have increased to $342 million during the second quarter of 2013, compared to a $199 million loss in the same period last year.

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