Review of Motorola Defy Pro - a secure retro smartphone with a QWERTY keyboard
I consider it necessary to immediately warn that the hero of this post is not a novelty at all. This is a fairly old device, announced in July 2012. It is focused primarily on the Brazilian market, but a bit later it was also delivered to Canada. Because of the unusual form factor for Russians and the (mostly) Brazilian “registration” of sellers, domestic enthusiasts did not pay much attention to this model. I also caused a certain interest in it during the announcement, and as soon as I found someone who wanted to sell me a new Defy Pro, I bought it. For 80 dollars.
For starters, a few words about Android backgrounds with QWERTY keyboards in general. They appeared in Russia in the autumn of 2009. The first was the Highscreen Zeus in the side slider form factor, then the Motorola Milestone deliveries began. Still some attempts to carry keyboard smartphones into Russia were undertaken by HTC (the Desire Z model was remembered), but at the present time there are no such devices on our market.
')
Highscreen Zeus
This is understandable: in the same US, the cult of communication by e-mail has been formed for many years in a row, and smartphones with QWERTY were convenient for this. But the local users have already switched to models with touch screens and without any keyboards. What can we say about us ... I remember that an employee of one of the companies during the days of Windows Mobile told me that about 10-15 copies of a model that does not have such an input device are sold to 1 device with a keyboard in Russia.
Another thing - Latin America. There, at the local, for the most part, they are not at all rich youngsters, there is still a certain demand for keyboard players. As a rule, these are simple phones, that is, without Android. But Motorola decided to make a smartphone in such a form factor, not an ordinary one, but also a protected one.
Exactly: this small peanut, Motorola Defy Pro, complies with the IP67 standard, that is, it is not afraid of diving, sand and dust. I’ll emphasize that this is not some teXet X-Driver , and you shouldn’t throw a Motorola smartphone on the ground. In general, the IP67 standard (as well as IP68), contrary to popular belief, in no way implies protection against shocks and falls, it is only about preventing the penetration of various substances.
So, I personally Motorola Defy Pro is interesting primarily on the eve of the summer, that is, the holiday season. It takes up little space in his pocket, it has a small screen area (which means that it is more difficult to break it than a purely touchscreen display), and water protection is useful on the beach. I remember that last year I wore the Samsung Galaxy S4 to the sea, so I was tortured to pick out the grains of sand from the gap between the front and side panels. (I can’t go to the beach without a smartphone at all - even on vacation I have a job-s, calls-s, mail-s.) With Defy Pro, everything is much easier - you can simply rinse it under the tap. And if you die, you will have to regret the lost exotic: $ 80 is far from the $ 800 that today is being asked for by the modern flagship smartphone of the A-brand. Meanwhile, thanks to Android and all the related infrastructure, the device will allow you to reply to a letter, and even view the document.
However, without grumbling, of course, will not do. Here, for example, a silver frame, framing the front panel. Think it's metal? Yes, I also thought so at first. But it is plastic, and painted, sorry, feet. Immediately after the purchase, I wanted to put the smartphone in the inner pocket of the jacket and accidentally touched the metal snake with this frame. The result - four small, but noticeable scratches.
Motorola has always been very careful in working out such details, but in general in the Latin American market, the company does not shrink from the harsh ODM. That is, sells classic "Chinese" under its own brand. How do you find this miracle (see below) with two SIM-cards and a TV? Maybe Defy Pro was also done by a third-party office ...
I tested the smartphone for water resistance, here it is in a mug of water. Motorola Defy Pro survived a half-hour dive without any consequences.
But we go further. Most of the body is made of soft-touch of acceptable quality, but the back panel is rough and painted with silver paint. There is a strong suspicion that over time, it will wipe out black plastic. The cover is attached to the case with a latch. It looks impressive, although it is easy to push it away.
There is no Cyrillic on the keyboard, but this is not really a problem. I put the keyboard on the Russian Keyboard, chose the Translit Ru layout and go straight to the mines. Supports quick launch of any applications with the combination of [Letter] + Search. It's comfortable.
The buttons are quite pleasant, I did not find a fundamental difference with my BlackBerry Curve 9220 . Someone on the Internet writes that the buttons are pressed tight. I did not notice such a nuance. In general, by the way, Motorola Defy Pro strongly resembles BlackBerry keyboard models:
Motorola Defy Pro and BlackBerry Curve 9220
The screen in the smartphone is 2.7-inch (horror !!!) with a resolution of 320 x 480 pixels (I'm shocked !!!), it is covered with Gorilla Glass. Capacitive touch display, multitouch supported. If it is serious, then with such a diagonal and resolution it is quite possible to live for yourself. Yes, not as good as in the case of a 5-inch full HD matrix, but possible.
Much more trouble delivers not resolution or even diagonal, but the orientation of the display. She, damn it, horizontal. And some apps — for example, the official Instagram client — appear like this.
Here in the client "VKontakte" horizontal mode is provided.
And in the application CPU RAM RAM Identifier is not provided ...
Speaking of iron. Qualcomm MSM7227a with one core and 512 MB of RAM, of which no more than 100 are available, is, of course, not great. The device is clearly not for games. Although you can fly in Angry Birds, even if it is not very convenient to do it, holding the smartphone vertically.
With integrated memory - full of seams. Free space of 70 megabytes, apparently, that is why microSD for 2 GB was inserted into the box. It is good that my copy was already rutovan, and I deleted Go2Meeting program with a weight of 90 MB, which was chosen by Motorola. Thus, the place was made for several "extra" programlins. (The fact is that not all Android programs still support transfer to a USB flash drive.)
There is a front camera, but I will not talk about it - everything is bad. The main 5-megapixel with autofocus and flash, the results of its work - below. In principle, go.
Camera Interface:
Actually pictures:
The software is also quite ancient. Defy Pro uses Android 2.3.7, thoroughly reworked by Motorola. The interface here is upgraded:
Another added compass.
The program with a pedometer and a binding to GPS for fitness.
Company gallery with a timeline.
Flashlight, enabling flash.
Immediately two programs to work with DLNA.
Well, something else on the little things. It turned out well, and, oddly enough, this old decrepit "Robot" displayed on a 2.7-inch screen does not cause any special rejection.
Yes, an important point: there is no Russian language in the apparatus, but it is possible to partially Russify the system using folk methods, which was done by those from whom I bought the apparatus.
The application for optimizing power consumption stands apart. Probably, the word Pro in the name of the device should hint at users - professionals who often wander around on business trips. Anyway, on a charge of 1 700 mAh battery, and with the optimizer mentioned above, Defy Pro lives with me for 3 days. And this, in my opinion, is a very worthy result. For a phone call with the mail - and in my case it cannot claim the larger device in question - excellent. And for long trips, I recently have Highscreen Boost 2 SE , which plows up to 2 weeks.
To sum up is difficult here. Coincidentally, I needed a compact, secure smartphone, and the screen diagonal, the number of cores and other newfangled parameters were not fundamental. So the Motorola Defy Pro for $ 80 was almost the perfect solution. To you, the model may seem strange crooked old stuff. I won’t be offended: it’s possible, in some way it is. But, nevertheless, I find this smartphone attractive. And from the point of view of solving my problem, and from the point of view of “archeology” (not to be confused with necrophilia!) In the field of gadgets :)
Full specifications :
Platform: Qualcomm MSM7227A, 1 core up to 1 GHz, Adreno 200 graphics
RAM: 512 MB
Built-in memory: 1 GB
Memory Cards: MicroSD up to 32 GB
Front camera: 0.3 megapixels
Main camera: 5 megapixels, autofocus, flash
Screen: 2.7 inches, TFT, 320 x 480 pixels, capacitive, touch, multitouch
Case: IP67 protection, the screen is covered with Gorilla Glass
Bluetooth: Yes (3.0)
Wi-Fi: Yes (802.11n)
GPS: Yes
Operating system: Android 2.3.7
Battery: 1,700 mAh
Dimensions / weight: 110 x 66 x 12 mm / 115 g
For starters, a few words about Android backgrounds with QWERTY keyboards in general. They appeared in Russia in the autumn of 2009. The first was the Highscreen Zeus in the side slider form factor, then the Motorola Milestone deliveries began. Still some attempts to carry keyboard smartphones into Russia were undertaken by HTC (the Desire Z model was remembered), but at the present time there are no such devices on our market.
')
Highscreen Zeus
This is understandable: in the same US, the cult of communication by e-mail has been formed for many years in a row, and smartphones with QWERTY were convenient for this. But the local users have already switched to models with touch screens and without any keyboards. What can we say about us ... I remember that an employee of one of the companies during the days of Windows Mobile told me that about 10-15 copies of a model that does not have such an input device are sold to 1 device with a keyboard in Russia.
Another thing - Latin America. There, at the local, for the most part, they are not at all rich youngsters, there is still a certain demand for keyboard players. As a rule, these are simple phones, that is, without Android. But Motorola decided to make a smartphone in such a form factor, not an ordinary one, but also a protected one.
Exactly: this small peanut, Motorola Defy Pro, complies with the IP67 standard, that is, it is not afraid of diving, sand and dust. I’ll emphasize that this is not some teXet X-Driver , and you shouldn’t throw a Motorola smartphone on the ground. In general, the IP67 standard (as well as IP68), contrary to popular belief, in no way implies protection against shocks and falls, it is only about preventing the penetration of various substances.
So, I personally Motorola Defy Pro is interesting primarily on the eve of the summer, that is, the holiday season. It takes up little space in his pocket, it has a small screen area (which means that it is more difficult to break it than a purely touchscreen display), and water protection is useful on the beach. I remember that last year I wore the Samsung Galaxy S4 to the sea, so I was tortured to pick out the grains of sand from the gap between the front and side panels. (I can’t go to the beach without a smartphone at all - even on vacation I have a job-s, calls-s, mail-s.) With Defy Pro, everything is much easier - you can simply rinse it under the tap. And if you die, you will have to regret the lost exotic: $ 80 is far from the $ 800 that today is being asked for by the modern flagship smartphone of the A-brand. Meanwhile, thanks to Android and all the related infrastructure, the device will allow you to reply to a letter, and even view the document.
However, without grumbling, of course, will not do. Here, for example, a silver frame, framing the front panel. Think it's metal? Yes, I also thought so at first. But it is plastic, and painted, sorry, feet. Immediately after the purchase, I wanted to put the smartphone in the inner pocket of the jacket and accidentally touched the metal snake with this frame. The result - four small, but noticeable scratches.
Motorola has always been very careful in working out such details, but in general in the Latin American market, the company does not shrink from the harsh ODM. That is, sells classic "Chinese" under its own brand. How do you find this miracle (see below) with two SIM-cards and a TV? Maybe Defy Pro was also done by a third-party office ...
I tested the smartphone for water resistance, here it is in a mug of water. Motorola Defy Pro survived a half-hour dive without any consequences.
But we go further. Most of the body is made of soft-touch of acceptable quality, but the back panel is rough and painted with silver paint. There is a strong suspicion that over time, it will wipe out black plastic. The cover is attached to the case with a latch. It looks impressive, although it is easy to push it away.
There is no Cyrillic on the keyboard, but this is not really a problem. I put the keyboard on the Russian Keyboard, chose the Translit Ru layout and go straight to the mines. Supports quick launch of any applications with the combination of [Letter] + Search. It's comfortable.
The buttons are quite pleasant, I did not find a fundamental difference with my BlackBerry Curve 9220 . Someone on the Internet writes that the buttons are pressed tight. I did not notice such a nuance. In general, by the way, Motorola Defy Pro strongly resembles BlackBerry keyboard models:
Motorola Defy Pro and BlackBerry Curve 9220
The screen in the smartphone is 2.7-inch (horror !!!) with a resolution of 320 x 480 pixels (I'm shocked !!!), it is covered with Gorilla Glass. Capacitive touch display, multitouch supported. If it is serious, then with such a diagonal and resolution it is quite possible to live for yourself. Yes, not as good as in the case of a 5-inch full HD matrix, but possible.
Much more trouble delivers not resolution or even diagonal, but the orientation of the display. She, damn it, horizontal. And some apps — for example, the official Instagram client — appear like this.
Here in the client "VKontakte" horizontal mode is provided.
And in the application CPU RAM RAM Identifier is not provided ...
Speaking of iron. Qualcomm MSM7227a with one core and 512 MB of RAM, of which no more than 100 are available, is, of course, not great. The device is clearly not for games. Although you can fly in Angry Birds, even if it is not very convenient to do it, holding the smartphone vertically.
With integrated memory - full of seams. Free space of 70 megabytes, apparently, that is why microSD for 2 GB was inserted into the box. It is good that my copy was already rutovan, and I deleted Go2Meeting program with a weight of 90 MB, which was chosen by Motorola. Thus, the place was made for several "extra" programlins. (The fact is that not all Android programs still support transfer to a USB flash drive.)
There is a front camera, but I will not talk about it - everything is bad. The main 5-megapixel with autofocus and flash, the results of its work - below. In principle, go.
Camera Interface:
Actually pictures:
The software is also quite ancient. Defy Pro uses Android 2.3.7, thoroughly reworked by Motorola. The interface here is upgraded:
Another added compass.
The program with a pedometer and a binding to GPS for fitness.
Company gallery with a timeline.
Flashlight, enabling flash.
Immediately two programs to work with DLNA.
Well, something else on the little things. It turned out well, and, oddly enough, this old decrepit "Robot" displayed on a 2.7-inch screen does not cause any special rejection.
Yes, an important point: there is no Russian language in the apparatus, but it is possible to partially Russify the system using folk methods, which was done by those from whom I bought the apparatus.
The application for optimizing power consumption stands apart. Probably, the word Pro in the name of the device should hint at users - professionals who often wander around on business trips. Anyway, on a charge of 1 700 mAh battery, and with the optimizer mentioned above, Defy Pro lives with me for 3 days. And this, in my opinion, is a very worthy result. For a phone call with the mail - and in my case it cannot claim the larger device in question - excellent. And for long trips, I recently have Highscreen Boost 2 SE , which plows up to 2 weeks.
To sum up is difficult here. Coincidentally, I needed a compact, secure smartphone, and the screen diagonal, the number of cores and other newfangled parameters were not fundamental. So the Motorola Defy Pro for $ 80 was almost the perfect solution. To you, the model may seem strange crooked old stuff. I won’t be offended: it’s possible, in some way it is. But, nevertheless, I find this smartphone attractive. And from the point of view of solving my problem, and from the point of view of “archeology” (not to be confused with necrophilia!) In the field of gadgets :)
Full specifications :
Platform: Qualcomm MSM7227A, 1 core up to 1 GHz, Adreno 200 graphics
RAM: 512 MB
Built-in memory: 1 GB
Memory Cards: MicroSD up to 32 GB
Front camera: 0.3 megapixels
Main camera: 5 megapixels, autofocus, flash
Screen: 2.7 inches, TFT, 320 x 480 pixels, capacitive, touch, multitouch
Case: IP67 protection, the screen is covered with Gorilla Glass
Bluetooth: Yes (3.0)
Wi-Fi: Yes (802.11n)
GPS: Yes
Operating system: Android 2.3.7
Battery: 1,700 mAh
Dimensions / weight: 110 x 66 x 12 mm / 115 g
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/217843/
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