Got me some of that fresh Moto X Pure Edition

"Textured Soy Protein" (texturedsoyprotein)
09/21/2015 at 12:47 • Filed to: None

I got a Moto X Pure Edition this weekend. In spite of having a really stupid name, it’s a good phone. Since I use a case, I don’t care about the fancy wood or other finishes, nor did I want to pay for them. Instead, I wanted to get my grubby mitts on it immediately, so I got the plain black version at Best Buy.

For those wondering about size, I can tell you that for my slightly above-average sized male human hands, the X Pure is slightly too big. My previous phone was an LG G2. With its 5.2” screen, it was totally manageable for me, even with a slim case on it. The X Pure is 5.7” and I have to do the rest-the-bottom-of-the-phone-on-my-pinkie-and- strrrretch maneuver to reach the top of the screen a tad more than I’d want, but it’s manageable. I tried out a Nexus 6 and that was definitely more unwieldy than the X Pure.

Shockingly, it’s been a whole two years since I bought my LG G2. I would’ve been fine keeping it longer, except it started developing touchscreen glitches. In portrait orientation, the part of the screen just below the very top doesn’t register touches anymore. This is super annoying since lots of things you’re supposed to tap on are right at the top of the screen .

(Before anyone tries to tell me how to fix it, I tried what you think I should try. Trust me.)

I also took this opportunity to switch from Verizon to Cricket. Cricket is AT&T’s wild ‘n crazy low priced prepaid brand. So now I have 10 GB data + unlimited talk/text + assorted international features like unlimited texting to Mexico, for $55/month all-in. I don’t know anyone in Mexico, but now I can text literally everyone in that country as much as I want, for no additional charge!

Apparently I’m not the only person who jumped on the X Pure at Best Buy, since multiple news outlets are reporting that the X Pure !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . I got the last one at my local store, a black 16 GB model. Coincidentally, the only one still in stock on bestbuy.com is the black 16 GB.

I also scored a 32 GB microSD card for 5 bucks, after an Amazon price match, and a $10 Best Buy reward certificate I needed to use up.

For anyone who remembers how many tablets I bought and returned before settling on one, you’ll be happy to know that I have no such plans to do that with phones. There are way more good phones out there than 10” Android tablets.

DISCUSSION (13)

JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! > Textured Soy Protein
09/21/2015 at 13:17

Very very jealous!

I went from a Nexus 4 to first gen Moto X to a LG G3. I like the size of the G3 but hate bloatware. I plan on getting the Pure edition soon

Textured Soy Protein > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder!
09/21/2015 at 13:23

I hated the stock KitKat ROM on the G2 but Lollipop wasn’t so bad. I’d imagine that the G3 Lollipop ROM is similar.

Have you done the usual de-bloating like disabling unwanted built-in apps and switching out the launcher and keyboard? Google Now Launcher and Nova Launcher are both way better than the crap LG launcher.

My favorite keyboards are Swype and Google Keyboard, although Swype is annoying in that it replaces the very good Google voice recognition for terrible Dragon Dictation (Dragon is made by Nuance which also owns Swype). One nice thing about having my G2 rooted was there was a root-only tweak to have Swype use Google instead of Dragon.

I’m using Google Keyboard on the X Pure because a) it’s the default keyboard and b) I don’t want to be stuck with Swype’s terrible voice recognition. I use Swype on my tablet though because I typically use voice input more on my phone than tablet.

Tareim - V8 powered > Textured Soy Protein
09/21/2015 at 13:29

This is the phone I would like to upgrade to, tempted for the wood back as well

Tapas > Textured Soy Protein
09/21/2015 at 15:50

I also have cricket. You can actually text internationally to any country for free :)

But I think if you travel there, the roaming is free for Canada and Mexico.

Spasoje > Textured Soy Protein
09/22/2015 at 19:06

Thanks for posting this – I’m about to pull the trigger on one myself! How’s the call quality?

Textured Soy Protein > Spasoje
09/22/2015 at 19:10

I...haven’t made a call on it yet except to set up my voicemail. Even though I’ve had it activated since Sunday.

Spasoje > Textured Soy Protein
09/22/2015 at 19:22

No worries haha

Let me know when you try it out! I’m most likely ordering one in about two weeks...

Textured Soy Protein > Spasoje
09/22/2015 at 19:28

So far the only annoyance I can tell you is that Moto Display is useful in theory but worthless in practice because it has terrible pocket detection.

Moto Display is supposed to kinda halfway wake up the screen when you get a new notification, or if you shake the phone, or if you wave your hand in front of it while it’s chilling on a table. You then get a notification icon that you can tap and hold on to see more information about.

But the first couple days I’ve had the phone, occasionally I noticed I would pull it out of my pocket and nothing at all would happen. It would be fully off, or messed up in some way that I had to hold the power button in for several seconds and it’d turn back on.

When I switched from Moto Display to Ambient Display, which is the built-in Android Lollipop lockscreen notification thingie, the problem went away. So my guess is Moto Display was waking the phone up in my pocket and then registering a bunch of touches from my leg which led to the phone getting messed up in some way.

So with Ambient Display instead of Moto Display, I still get lockscreen notifications, but there’s no jedi mind trick waving your phone over the front of the screen to wake it up. Oh well...

Spasoje > Textured Soy Protein
09/22/2015 at 19:34

Thanks for the info! It’s very good to know that the phone doesn’t force Moto Display on you... That said, it would be ideal if someone figures out how to activate the notification LED, but we shall see I guess.

Textured Soy Protein > Spasoje
09/22/2015 at 20:14

Yeah it’s pretty easy to switch to the standard Android Ambient Display. You just go to settings > display > screen notifications and then you have these options:

Kinja'd!!!

Spasoje > Textured Soy Protein
09/22/2015 at 20:58

Fantastic! Can’t wait to switch to stock Android, coming from a Galaxy S3 – or should I say, coming from my Nokia “candy bar” phone from before that. It still works, unlike the Galaxy...

Spasoje > Textured Soy Protein
10/08/2015 at 21:30

Did you get a chance to try out the call quality yet?

Textured Soy Protein > Spasoje
10/09/2015 at 21:18

Oh, yeah I’ve made some calls, they’re totally fine.

Also I’ve learned that Cricket limits LTE devices to 8 Mbps download speed, and completely blocks mobile hotspot access for bring-your-own device customers.

Fun.