Motorola Atrix review

We’ve already seen the tablet that can also be a laptop, the Asus Eee Pad Transformer, and now with the Motorola Atrix, we have a smartphone that can be a laptop or a desktop PC. Given how bullish so many people have been about mobile devices of late, it seems strange that some manufacturers aren’t quite ready to let go of the keyboard.

Motorola does have a rather smart concept here, though. The key idea is that you only need one device, namely the Atrix smartphone; no laptop, desktop, tablet and media player, just a phone. That way you only have one device you need keep updated with the latest software. All your bookmarks and files are in one place, too, or stored in the cloud.

ATRIX REVOLUTIONS

Of course on one level, the Atrix functions just like any other Android smartphone, at first glance we can’t see anyone buying this handset over sleeker examples (such as the Samsung Galaxy S2), if they weren’t also interested in the so-called LapDock or HD Multimedia Dock. But look a little deeper and it certainly has its advantages.

The handset’s 4in screen has a big resolution of 960×540 pixels. This is close to Apple’s much-talked-about retina display, with its 960×640 resolution, although the Atrix does have a larger screen – the iPhone 4’s measures only 3.5in. In use it’s still highly-detailed, bright and crisp, but can’t quite compare to the Galaxy S2’s AMOLED screen. Inside is a 1GHz dual-core processor, and Android feels slick and responsive. Like most other dual-core smartphones and tablets, it uses Nvidia’s Tegra 2 chipset.

As an Android smartphone it’s pretty quick, in fact we were surprised at its score of 2,760 in the Quadrant benchmark. It can’t quite match the 1.2GHz Samsung Galaxy S2’s score of 3,165, but it does outscore every other 1GHz Tegra-based device we’ve seen.

Opening the rear of the Atrix, we discovered one reason why it’s a little on the chunky side – a big 1,930mAh battery. Unsurprisingly, it gave impressive results in our battery tests, with 52 hours of constant audio playback – better than even the iPhone 4 – and nearly seven and-a-half hours of video playback. There’s also a micro SDHC card slot under here, to supplement the generous 16GB of built-in storage.

The exterior, as we previously noted, isn’t the slimmest or most stylish example. The black plastic casing appears to have been designed as a middle-ground for consumer and corporate users. It’s not unpleasant at all, just instantly forgettable. One notable design feature is the large power button on the top edge of the handset, which sits at a 45 degree angle. This also integrates a fingerprint reader, another nod to corporate users (who greatly value security), but handy for everyone.

You set up the reader to accept your left and right forefingers, and then you can unlock the handset with a quick swipe, rather than the usual onscreen pattern password. It’s easy to press the button or swipe your finger using the hand you’re holding the device with, plus it’s easy to reach when it’s mounted in a dock too.

You need to setup a MotoBlur account to use all the phones features – but that only takes a couple of minutes. After that though there’s a decent wizard to help integrate your various social networking accounts, with all the usual suspects included, such as Facebook, LastFM, Twitter and LinkedIn.

The handset runs Android 2.2, rather than the latest 2.3 edition, presumably due to the amount of customisation that’s gone into the Atrix. It’s not a huge deal, as 2.3 wasn’t a big update, however owners may find that the latest apps, designed to work on both 2.3 and the tablet-specific 3.0, may not work perfectly – a pity given the big-screen laptop add-on.

On the left-hand side of the Atrix are micro HDMI and USB ports, side-by-side, and it’s these that the handset uses to dock with the HD Multimedia Dock or LapDock. It slots home securely in either, with just the ports holding and a small recess it in place.

DOCKING MANOUEVRES

We really like the minimalism of the dock. With no serious processing power inside, there’s no need for any unsightly vents. It’s really slender too and weighs just 1kg, that’s less than an 11in MacBook Air. It’s not as sturdy and stiff as the Air, but for such a slender device it’s pretty impressive.

The touchpad is huge and has a neat double-tap disable function in the top-left corner, with a little light to tell you if it’s on or off. Essential as you’ll be knocking it all the time otherwise. That said, precise cursor control can be difficult with a little lag apparent in your inputs, which worsens noticeably when the device is under load. The keyboard is the main draw here, but it’s not great. The keys have an understandably shallow travel, but we feel they could have been springier and a little larger too.

The screen itself is 11.6in diagonally, with a resolution of 1,366×768, far better for web browsing, watching videos and office work than the phone’s own screen. However, in an effort to keep the price down we guess, image quality isn’t great. The screen loses contrast significantly at its highest brightness setting, plus poor viewing angles and average contrast and colour vibrancy mark it out as a TN panel.

Those viewing angle are a particular problem as the dock also suffers from preposterously limited range of movement, simply put it doesn’t tilt back enough. Sat in an economy seat on a plane, you would barely be able to read the screen. Even using it at our desk, we found we had to place it far further away than we would usually to see the display square on.

All this is probably a stylistic decision as, with the screen right back, both the dock and display sit at the same pleasing angle. Whatever Motorola’s thinking, it’s disastrous for a device that’s clearly aimed at those who want to work on the move, but without having to carry both a smartphone and fully-fledged 2kg laptop.

There’s a tiny pair of stereo speakers at the rear, which take over from the ones on the phone, but they’re still pretty weedy even by laptop standards. Also on the rear is a pair of USB ports, which can be used to attach storage devices – you get an onscreen indication when you plug in a drive, and it then appears in the pre-installed file manager. You can also plug in a keyboard and mouse if you wish.

The LapDock has its own built-in battery, which effectively doubles the battery life of the Atrix itself, plugged into its dock, we got 16 hours of video playback from it – around the same figure as the Asus Transformer with its keyboard attachment.

The HD Multimedia Dock is a far simpler, and more successful, design. It has a micro HDMI output, so you can connect it to a digital monitor or HD TV. There’s also a minijack audio output if you just want to use it to play music. For media playback the Atrix has a special interface, which displays the time in big letters, and gives you easy access to media playback functions. You get a range of dock widgets and can also add and remove shortcuts as with the usual Android home screen. In addition there are three USB ports, primarily so you can add a keyboard and mouse and turn the Atrix into a desktop PC.

TOP IT OFF

Whichever dock you’re using, you get the same onscreen interface, called the Webtop. There’s not a lot on the Webtop interface, with the vast majority of content coming through the pre-installed Firefox browser. There’s little to say about the browser, it has all the features you’d expect, including Adobe Flash 10.1. When you unplug the handset it adds a shortcut to the notification bar with the tabs you had open in Firefox; you can then reopen these easily on the handset.

It’s not all smooth sailing though, the browser couldn’t play 720p or 1080p YouTube content back through the browser without stuttering and losing audio sync. This certainly isn’t a hardware issue, as the handset itself is perfectly capable of playing such videos out of its HDMI output. The browser also felt sluggish scrolling when around inside a Google text document, and stutters sometimes, so that you end up deleting the wrong thing, it got a character or two behind, even with my moderate typing speed.

The OS X-like bar of icons at the bottom is divided in half. Everything on the right is related to the browser, with stuff on the left for the handset. For example, on the right is a Facebook shortcut, but that just brings up the site in its own headless browser window. While on the left are shortcuts for text messaging and making phone calls – the Lapdock has a built-in mic and speakers for the latter.

Webtop allows access to Android via its Mobile View. You can do all the usual phone actions, such as making calls and sending texts. The actual resolution isn’t increased beyond that of the phone, but you can choose to run the Mobile View in an appropriately-sized window (landscape or portrait), or stretch it to full-screen dimensions.

In this way you can run Android apps full screen, but without a touch screen interface it’s a very hit and miss affair. For example, there’s no multi-touch support, so no pinch-to-zoom in Google Maps (you think you’d be better off launching it in Firefox, but the Webtop browser didn’t seem to have a clue where we were, while the mobile version located us instantly). On the other hand, the mouse pointer provided excellent accuracy in full-screen games of Angry Birds.

Receiving text messages, while browsing the web on a full-sized laptop display, and then banging out a quick reply using the keyboard is exactly the kind of joined-up efficiency that Motorola was thinking of when it came up with the Atrix. It’s a very satisfying way of bringing together two usually disparate pieces of technology. Running your full smartphone interface in a window on the desktop is a great idea. A dock and software that could do this for any Android phone in Windows 7 would be incredibly handy for many people.

ENTER THE ATRIX?

Pricing on the Atrix is complex, and it’s only available on Orange and T-Mobile at present. They offer different packages, but since the two have merged there’s no real competition here. At present you’ll be paying at least £35 a month for the handset on a 24-month plan, and maybe £40 if you want the HD dock and a wireless keyboard and mouse thrown in too. The LapDock then costs a whopping £300 on top of that, which is steep for what it is, especially given its limited capabilities compared to a proper Windows laptop.

The dock idea has a lot of merit, but Motorola needs to do a lot more work on it, and drop the price of the LapDock significantly, before we’d be convinced that it’s a genuine replacement for a proper laptop.

The Atrix itself is a decent dual-core smartphone, one that doesn’t sacrifice battery life for good looks, and with a handy fingerprint reader. If you’re looking for a fast and practical Android handset then it would be a good buy. However, at present it’s quite expensive at £35 a month on contract, and we’re not convinced that its a better buy over far cheaper single-core handsets like the older Samsung Galaxy S, which can be got on contract for around £20 per month if you shop around.