Review of my Motorola Photon Q LTE

I've owned my Motorola Photon Q LTE 4G smart phone for several months, so it's time for a review.  I bought this little puppy because of the full size keyboard.  Very nice.  I like the keyboard.

However, the keyboard makes it rather heavy, which reminds me of a brick  So I call it my "Brick Phone".

 It's somewhat smaller than your standard brick.

Your standard brick lacks a slide out qwerty keyboard.

Both don't have much happening on the bottom edge.

 

On the side, the Motorola Photon Q LTE 4G on the sprint network has a micro USB port and a Mini HDMI port.  The brick is noticeably lacking ports.

 

Here's what you can do with an HDMI cord and the Photon Q.  You can't do this with a brick.

You can't display a phone contact on your TV using a brick. 

 The brick is not functional as a smart phone.

 I'm an old fashioned IT guy, so I keep my Motorola Photon Q LTE 4G in a leather belt case.  It  has a "Verizon" logo so I don't always have to defend why I am on the lousy Sprint network.  (I have no problem with Sprint.  Dunno why so many people think it's not a real cell phone company.)

 The home screen on the Android 4.0.4 operating system is nice.  I put several cities in the "current weather" bubble.  Here are up to the minute stats:

• Landisville 42 degrees, partly sunny
• London 46 degrees, cloudy
• New York 42 degrees, sunny
• Oranjestad 82 degrees, sunny
• Nairobi 69 degrees, night time and cloudy

With a smart phone, you need one or two apps.  I like Endomondo for tracking my jogging.  

 

 I need to turn on GPS satellites for Endomondo to track the route successfully.  In general, I keep all location services turned off.  I discovered location services seem to be a huge energy hog, and with them on  my battery couldn't last much more than half a day.  In fact I spend several hours each week fiddling with the phone, trying to gain an extra minute or two of battery life.  If you own a Motorola Q LTE 4G on the Sprint network, buy tons of chargers and keep them at any place where you stay more than 45 minutes.  Here are the proper settings:

Even with these turned off, I'm sure Google knows where I am and what I am thinking.

The camera is nice, and ever since the demise of my little Olympus, this has been my primary camera.  It takes nice panoramas.  Here is one I took of the 911 Memorial in NYC.

The camera shutter sound is incredibly loud.  It sounds like a horse's femur being smashed. Turns out it's illegal in some countries to take silent photos, and this is an international phone.  So it's impossible to turn off the shutter sound.  I looked it up on the internet and found one country with this law: South Korea.  I guess South Korea is to cell phones like California is to auto emissions standards.

I discovered one work-around is to use Panorama mode, and only take the first image.  Trouble is, the photos appear all squished.  Like these photos from the Christmas Party of my Rotary Club, (which strangely feels squished and surreal when you experience it in person at 7:15am, anyway):

Another good option is to download the Silent Camera app.  This works, but it's a persnickety program and sometimes locks up.

Here are some other apps I use:

• Out of Milk:  We share and sync the grocery list, so whoever goes shopping has an up-to-the-minute list of what we need.
• FaceBook: Good for looking at FaceBook
• CNN, Lancaster Online, PennLive, BBC: News
• Dropbox: Keep files in the cloud.
• Kingston Office: Best app for working with Office documents IMHO.
• Flipboard:  Sort of like a news aggregator or something.  A real time waster but always has something interesting.
• Fing: Impress your friends by showing them all the devices on their wireless network.
• SharesFinder: try to break in to your friends computer if they have lousy security.
• Silent Camera: see above.
• Endomondo: Track your running or cycling.
• Prey: Find your phone if it gets stolen.

Overall, I like my phone for it's look and feel.  I like the QWERTY keyboard.  I don't like the lack of battery life.  I am happy with the device and would buy it again, but I am also happy that phones expire after two years.  I'll be ready for the next big thing!

And kiddies, don't forget the two unbreakable commandments of Smart Phone usage:

I.  Thou shalt lock your smart phone with a PIN or pattern code.

II.  Thou shalt not take any photos with your phone that you wouldn't want broadcast around the world.