Should I pull the trigger? Need some quick advice.

[jer39]

Hey all,

Trying to decide whether to turn in my iPhone 6 for a Turbo and needed some questions answered quickly as my 14 day return window is close to expiring. I've been an Android guy for years but in mid October, when I was sorely overdue for an upgrade, I couldn't find an Android device that checked all the boxes, and at the time, the rumors were that the Turbo was only coming out in 32gb, which was a deal-breaker. So I took the plunge on an iPhone. Days later the Turbo unveiling revealed a 64gb option, and in the meantime, I've come to realize how much happier I was with Android OS than with iOS. That said, there are many things about the iPhone that work well (which couldn't always be said of my very laggy Samsung phones). So now I'm wondering if I should swap phones.

I've read conflicting reports from online reviews on the below issues, each of which are important in the decision making process, so I wanted to hear from you Turbo owners about your thoughts...

(1) Form Factor: Most importantly, as a male with relatively small-to-medium sized hands, can I operate this thing one-handed? Is the device too heavy? Does it fit comfortably in a jeans pocket? Will I also need to throw a case on it or is it durable enough to withstand a waist or head height drop?

(2) Audio Quality: I'm not so worried about the quality of the external speaker, but how is the audio quality with headphones on? My phone is my exclusive music player and I use it daily during commutes, at work, etc., so sound quality is important to me.

(3) Sunlight Display: How easy/difficult is this phone to see/operate/read from in direct sunlight?

(4) Camera speed and quality: I've read everything from "this is the same cruddy camera as the Moto X" to "this is second only to the iPhone 6 Plus." So which is it? While I'm not aspiring to be a professional photographer, as a new father, I want a camera that will take good quality photos of my kid (in outdoor and indoor/low light situations) and a shutter that won't lag so much that it misses out on a fleeting photogenic moment.

(5) Battery drain: How bad does this guy drain during standby time (I live in NYC, so getting a signal usually isn't a problem for me).

Any other things I should know about before I go ahead and pull the trigger?

 

[CaptainSS]

My answer to everyone of you questions is overwhelming positive. This turbo is an amazing device

 

[24c]

My answer to everyone of you questions is overwhelming positive. This turbo is an amazing device

What he said...

 

[94lt1]

In order... 1, my hands aren't huge.. I have no issues..

2,my favorite questions are about audio.. Cause I'm an audiophile.. I use westone custom iem's that I also use on stage (6drivers) and the sound is phenomenal when I use power amp.. The only way to improve it imho would be a parametric eq...but its not needed..

3, this display gets the job done, it's crisp, it's vibrant and not over saturated.. I run mine at 15% and can still see it.

4, the camera is not awesome.. Its nit bad and only needs some software tweaks to get it going in a better direction.. Its the best moto camera I've had yet.. And I've owned ALL of the droids..

5, battery drain.. Standby time isn't as good as the maxx right now.. But give it a little bit.. An update will without a doubt, fix this.. As it is.. Its not terrible.. I've gotten nearly 8 hours of on screen time, and 24 hours of use on my 3rd charge.. And its only getting better.. Get rid of any GPS settings and it improves.. Such is with any device...

Yes.. Other things you should know... Can you handle awesomeness?? If not.. Don't buy it

 

[jer39]

In order... 1, my hands aren't huge.. I have no issues..

2,my favorite questions are about audio.. Cause I'm an audiophile.. I use westone custom iem's that I also use on stage (6drivers) and the sound is phenomenal when I use power amp.. The only way to improve it imho would be a parametric eq...but its not needed..

3, this display gets the job done, it's crisp, it's vibrant and not over saturated.. I run mine at 15% and can still see it.

4, the camera is not awesome.. Its nit bad and only needs some software tweaks to get it going in a better direction.. Its the best moto camera I've had yet.. And I've owned ALL of the droids..

5, battery drain.. Standby time isn't as good as the maxx right now.. But give it a little bit.. An update will without a doubt, fix this.. As it is.. Its not terrible.. I've gotten nearly 8 hours of on screen time, and 24 hours of use on my 3rd charge.. And its only getting better.. Get rid of any GPS settings and it improves.. Such is with any device...

Yes.. Other things you should know... Can you handle awesomeness?? If not.. Don't buy it

Thanks for the thorough response. A few follow-ups. Just out of curiosity, any clue if westone and/or power amp work when playing music through a third-party app like Rhapsody? (Virtually my entire music library is essentially rented and downloaded from Rhapsody.)

As for the screen, when you say you run yours at 15% I assume you mean indoors, yes? What about outdoors?

With the camera and battery drain issues, you mention that a software update would fix it...but are there any reports that Motorola actually intends to fix these issues via an update?

 

[TatDroid]

1) I'm not a big guy, but I have no problem. It's not as slim as an iPhone, but I have no problem at all keeping it in my front pocket. It is on the heavy side, but I made a conscious decision to take a 3900mAh battery over slim and lightweight but short life.
2) Sorry, no help here.
3) I have it set to auto, but manually turn it up in bright sunlight. An AMOLED is never going to be terribly bright in sunlight, but it works fine for me. (ask the Verizon store to take it outside so you can see for yourself)
4) I don't take a ton of pictures, but have been very pleased so far. Even shots inside in lower light look good to me. People talk a lot about shutter speed, but to me the biggest delay is picking up the phone and starting the camera. There is NO FASTER WAY to start a camera than the quick flick of the wrist for the Turbo. Even from standby. No pass code needed. It's awesome. Overall the picture quality is definitely a huge improvement over my Moto X camera (although that may not be too hard to do).
5) I have found standby time to average about 1% to 1.5% per hour. And, you didn't ask, but screen-on time seems to average about 10% per hour. Add those two together in any combination you'd like to get a general idea of what to expect.

Sent from my Droid Turbo

 

[94lt1]

Thanks for the thorough response. A few follow-ups. Just out of curiosity, any clue if westone and/or power amp work when playing music through a third-party app like Rhapsody? (Virtually my entire music library is essentially rented and downloaded from Rhapsody.)

As for the screen, when you say you run yours at 15% I assume you mean indoors, yes? What about outdoors?

With the camera and battery drain issues, you mention that a software update would fix it...but are there any reports that Motorola actually intends to fix these issues via an update?

Poweramp is a music player you can buy... Westone is a high end ear phone manufacturer out of Colorado, used by the military and lots of performers and hearing impaired people they're the go to iem(in ear monitor) people for me... Rhapsody has to let you pull down your music, don't they?? You buy the song.. You bought the license to own it...

My screen inside is 15%..outside its 15%..if i need to bump it up, I use the power control widget on tap it up to 50%..never needed to go further.. I live in Southeast Texas... It's like Florida.. With dumb people instead of old people... Sorry.. But its the truth.. Lol


Camera.. Its not that bad.. But with a 21mp shooter.. And lots of people not being thrilled with the turbos camera.. I'd say they will invest some time in it..

Battery drain... Lollipop is touted to be 20 percent more battery friendly(this is as far as I recall) but yes.. Moto is always about the battery life on the maxx's... And a turbo is a maxx.. On roids..

 

[jer39]

Poweramp is a music player you can buy... Westone is a high end ear phone manufacturer out of Colorado, used by the military and lots of performers and hearing impaired people they're the go to iem(in ear monitor) people for me... Rhapsody has to let you pull down your music, don't they?? You buy the song.. You bought the license to own it...

My screen inside is 15%..outside its 15%..if i need to bump it up, I use the power control widget on tap it up to 50%..never needed to go further.. I live in Southeast Texas... It's like Florida.. With dumb people instead of old people... Sorry.. But its the truth.. Lol


Camera.. Its not that bad.. But with a 21mp shooter.. And lots of people not being thrilled with the turbos camera.. I'd say they will invest some time in it..

Battery drain... Lollipop is touted to be 20 percent more battery friendly(this is as far as I recall) but yes.. Moto is always about the battery life on the maxx's... And a turbo is a maxx.. On roids..

If PowerAmp is a separate music player then no, I can't play my Rhapsody tracks through it. You can only play Rhapsody tracks on the Rhapsody app. (While they are downloaded on my phone, I'm actually just renting them on a month-to-month basis, so I can't play them on any other player.) Anyway, as long as you've found that the DT is capable of producing good quality audio, I should be fine, since I've generally been pleased with the quality of Rhapsody's downloads on other phones.

 

[94lt1]

If PowerAmp is a separate music player then no, I can't play my Rhapsody tracks through it. You can only play Rhapsody tracks on the Rhapsody app. (While they are downloaded on my phone, I'm actually just renting them on a month-to-month basis, so I can't play them on any other player.) Anyway, as long as you've found that the DT is capable of producing good quality audio, I should be fine, since I've generally been pleased with the quality of Rhapsody's downloads on other phones.

Yeah I just played some music through the turbo natively... It sounds fine.. There are "audio settings" you can adjust... It sounds fine.. Your iem's or ear phones will shape the sound..

 

[jer39]

Thanks for this. T

1) I'm not a big guy, but I have no problem. It's not as slim as an iPhone, but I have no problem at all keeping it in my front pocket. It is on the heavy side, but I made a conscious decision to take a 3900mAh battery over slim and lightweight but short life.
2) Sorry, no help here.
3) I have it set to auto, but manually turn it up in bright sunlight. An AMOLED is never going to be terribly bright in sunlight, but it works fine for me. (ask the Verizon store to take it outside so you can see for yourself)
4) I don't take a ton of pictures, but have been very pleased so far. Even shots inside in lower light look good to me. People talk a lot about shutter speed, but to me the biggest delay is picking up the phone and starting the camera. There is NO FASTER WAY to start a camera than the quick flick of the wrist for the Turbo. Even from standby. No pass code needed. It's awesome. Overall the picture quality is definitely a huge improvement over my Moto X camera (although that may not be too hard to do).
5) I have found standby time to average about 1% to 1.5% per hour. And, you didn't ask, but screen-on time seems to average about 10% per hour. Add those two together in any combination you'd like to get a general idea of what to expect.

Thanks for this. Glad to hear that standby is 1-1.5%...I'd read other people saying it was closer to 3% which surprised me. Actually the iPhone 6 battery has been fantastic on standby. I can have it sitting next to my bed overnight and wake up 6 or 7 hours later to see the battery at or around the same percentage...or on a day like today where I'm at my desk and doing most of my web browsing on the computer, I'm still at 70% despite being unplugged for 8.5 hours and just 2.75 hours of usage time. Based on at least one other review, I had visions of a 20% drop on the Turbo during similar conditions. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure the Turbo smashes the iPhone on battery life...was just wondering where its weak points were.

 

[jer39]

Cool. Got the Harmon Kardon CL's, so no complaints on the headphones front.

Yeah I just played some music through the turbo natively... It sounds fine.. There are "audio settings" you can adjust... It sounds fine.. Your iem's or ear phones will shape the sound..

 

[FoxKat]

I second both 94lt1 & TatDroid's thorough evaluations, as well as CaptainSS's sentiments. The Turbo is a beast. You will not be disappointed. The Turbo can also shoot pics in RAW so if you're a budding photographer you'll appreciate being able to edit the full RAW files offline and get fantastic images out of it.

The audio componentry is excellent and works very well with my Sennheisers as well as a couple other "cans" I have around the house, Audio Technica, Pioneer (vintage), a few others, and even cough, cough Bose, cough, choke!!!

The battery life WILL improve with Lollipop and I can't wait.

The form factor works perfectly for me and I'm 5'6" so my hands are average to smaller. No, you can't completely use it one-handed but mostly. The feel and weight are fine, in fact it actually feels better in my hands than my Motorola Droid MAXX, and that was both smaller and lighter, but with the rounded back the Turbo is better.

Screen brightness isn't at the top of the charts, and as said AMOLED's are never going to be as bright as some other display types but it's plenty bright enough for me.

The camera speed and quality as said is better than any previous Motorola cameras on phones, but I hold out hope for great improvements coming. It's a great imager and with 21MP it should be able to take awesome shots, even if they would have to be dumbed down after in processing. Let's see what the future holds for that aspect, however I think this is THE phone to own.

 

[jer39]

I second both 94lt1 & TatDroid's thorough evaluations, as well as CaptainSS's sentiments. The Turbo is a beast. You will not be disappointed. The Turbo can also shoot pics in RAW so if you're a budding photographer you'll appreciate being able to edit the full RAW files offline and get fantastic images out of it.

The audio componentry is excellent and works very well with my Sennheisers as well as a couple other "cans" I have around the house, Audio Technica, Pioneer (vintage), a few others, and even cough, cough Bose, cough, choke!!!

The battery life WILL improve with Lollipop and I can't wait.

The form factor works perfectly for me and I'm 5'6" so my hands are average to smaller. No, you can't completely use it one-handed but mostly. The feel and weight are fine, in fact it actually feels better in my hands than my Motorola Droid MAXX, and that was both smaller and lighter, but with the rounded back the Turbo is better.

Screen brightness isn't at the top of the charts, and as said AMOLED's are never going to be as bright as some other display types but it's plenty bright enough for me.

The camera speed and quality as said is better than any previous Motorola cameras on phones, but I hold out hope for great improvements coming. It's a great imager and with 21MP it should be able to take awesome shots, even if they would have to be dumbed down after in processing. Let's see what the future holds for that aspect, however I think this is THE phone to own.

Thanks for this. When you say you can't completely use it one-handed...where are situations where you would or wouldn't be ok with one-handed use? I know it's stupid, but I spend a decent amount of time out walking my two dogs with one hand and sifting through web pages, banging out texts/emails, watching video with the other. Are you able to do most of those things? Is typing with one hand relatively easy (assuming Swiftkey Flow/Swype) or not so much?

As for Screen Brightness, I definitely realize AMOLED may not match the iPhone 6's or even the S5's Super AMOLED maximum brightness, but "bright enough" doesn't necessarily need to mean "as bright as the brightest". Do you have any difficulty reading webpages or watching video or seeing the screen while trying to shoot an outdoor photo when you're in direct sunlight? Put differently, in direct sunlight conditions, is it that you can see perfectly fine with the Turbo even though there are even brighter screens out there...or is more like you can make out enough to get the job done but it's not nearly as bright as you'd want it?

 

[jer39]

Oh, also...what's the deal with phone call reception? Are all of you guys having the same difficulty as others hearing phone calls, especially in noisier environments? As an NYC native, there's tons of noise surrounding you anytime you step out on the street...should I worry that I'll have any trouble hearing people on the other end of the call? Sorry to barrage you guys with so many questions!

 

[94lt1]

How can I answer the brightness questions... Seen a g3 and how dim they are?? The turbo is way way way brighter...

Now.. The n4 is even brighter... But in no way is the turbo screen dim.. It will eat your eyeballs in the dark.. The n4 will melt your face... Lol