New phone

[peterb]

Motorola have held off on Android 5 for ages, I think they have waited until it is stable. Should be fine.

But is there any compelling reason why 5 is better than 4.4.4? What can it do extra (or better)

[Spreadie]

Moto G (gen 1) here, running Lollipop. All is well - had the phone for ~ 15 months with no complaints.

Not a fan of the Samsungs - the cheap ones are trash, and the S3 mini I have as a work phone is bloody awful. I've had numerous instances of not being able to answer a call because the screen simply refuses to respond to the swipe motion. A couple of staff have S4s, which seem to spend a lot of time crashing and rebooting.

The only Samsung that seems to be fairly reliable and robust is the Galaxy Ace, but the Moto G and E are better phones.

But is there any compelling reason why 5 is better than 4.4.4? What can it do extra (or better)

No idea what the advantages are - Kit Kat was just fine for me and Lollipop feels a little ungainly in comparison, but it's perfectly usable.

[DanceswithUnix]

My Moto G 4G is still on KitKat. It doesn't seem to be as important as it used to be if you are on an old version now that Google services update lots of APIs through the play store, in the past (happened to me on Gingerbread) being stranded with an old version was a right pain.

[Biscuit]

But is there any compelling reason why 5 is better than 4.4.4? What can it do extra (or better)

So far in my experience its a lot smoother and refined than 4.x.x versions of Android. It does come with its own oddities, however you soon get used to them. Not a lot of reason to have one or the other however I have been looking to see if there is any decent tablets to replace my Hudl as that is still on KitKat...

[peterb]

So now the slightly underwhelmed owner of the Moto G 4G. I decided the dual Sim wasn't that important.

However, I am slightly disappointed with the OS. I quite liked android on my touchpad, but this seems counter-intuitive and clunky. Too many help screens that aren't. Setting up one POP e mail account was straightforward, the IMAP. Ones less so.

I miss the lhardware home button, and the icons aren't very obvious.

The phone itself is fine, nice clear screen, the phone itself is just about on the upper limit for size, but android just seems... Clunky.

It is early days, and I haven't yet chopped my SIM card to fit.

At the moment it's doing an upgrade, so that might help.

Beginning to wish I'd dug deep and bought an iPhone. On the other hand, for saving £300 I'll persevere a bit longer.

Need to find the general set up page next.

And where are the home page icons?

And how do you get rid of that irritating voice recognition bit on the screen that covers the cancel X ?

(At least I have got 14 days to return it)

[Biscuit]

Is it the Moto G-2 or G-1? Which Version of android are you currently on?

I actually agree about the icons on android 5, I dont know why they simplified them so much. Fortunately i know them so there isnt really an issue once you figure it out.

on Android 5, General setup pages can be accessed by dragging down the top status bar twice, then pressing the cog. It can also be accessed by pressing the 'all apps' button and selecting 'settings'. On android 4 its basically the same except you don't drag down twice, you drag down with two fingers (or drag down with one and press the top right icon)

Not sure what you mean about the home page icons or the voice recognition bit though.

Always makes me laugh when people say Android is clunky, that's exactly how I feel when I use iOS devices. Just what you're used too I guess!

[DanceswithUnix]

Need to find the general set up page next.

Either look for a cog icon labelled "Settings" in the application list, or swipe down from the top of the display to get the notifications panel and then click the top right icon to get the power controls & user login panel, and the top right cog gets you the same settings.

And where are the home page icons?

Hold down on a blank bit of home page, and add what you want.

I downloaded the Google Now launcher, if you like the sort of integration that gets Saracen reaching for the holy water.

Yeah it isn't all obvious, I think it is teenager optimised, but not hard to get the hang of.

Is it the Moto G-2 or G-1?

He said 4G, which is the update of the first generation (and the one I have).

[Biscuit]

He said 4G, which is the update of the first generation (and the one I have).

Actually they released a 4G version of the 1st generation Moto G.
http://www.motorola.com/us/smartphon...en/moto-g.html
http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/mobil...-choice-for-4g

[DanceswithUnix]

Actually they released a 4G version of the 1st generation Moto G.
http://www.motorola.com/us/smartphon...en/moto-g.html
http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/mobil...-choice-for-4g

Yes, I thought the second gen 4G isn't out yet just hinted at. The second gen ones I have seen with the bigger screen have been 3G.

[peterb]

This is the XT1072 MotoG (2nd generation) 4G

[DanceswithUnix]

This is the XT1072 MotoG (2nd generation) 4G

Ah, so they are actually available now then! My mistake. I presume that comes with Android 5.0.2/Lollipop as standard then?

[peterb]

Ah, so they are actually available now then! My mistake. I presume that comes with Android 5.0.2/Lollipop as standard then?

I suppose so, it did do an upgrade when it connected to wi-fi.

Not put a Sim in it yet, but I'm still thinking about returning. I did have a play last night and managed to turn off the more irritating 'features', the vibrate on touch, the multiple tones on touch (all I need is a keyboard click, but I can't find that) neither can I find how to disable wallpaper, all of which make me feel slightly nauseous.

So far, I just don't find using the phone pleasure. The interface feels as if it was designed to appeal to a five year old.

But at least I know that the jarring white bit with ask Google is a search bar, but not found a way of hiding it.

I think the other disturbing bit is how pervasive Google is, and very 'In your face'.

So rather disappointed, not with the phone as a piece of hardware, but with the way Android has gone after my pleasant experience with an earlier version.

[MrRockliffe]

I really enjoy the new material design, everything looks neat and uniform instead of messy and generally untidy.

By far my favourite version of Android. I will say, though, that it takes time to learn what it can do, and once you understand the basics of Android, you'll either love it, or still prefer iOS. I personally love android, but I do get tired of slow software updates and general bugginess. I'm supposedly on a stable release version of a modified version of Android (Cyanogenmod) and there are quite a few bugs. The biggest being the memory leak, which significantly increases the amount of app reloading that takes place. Feels more like I have 1GB of ram than 3.

[peterb]

I really enjoy the new material design, everything looks neat and uniform instead of messy and generally untidy.

You must be using a different version!

None of the icons appear to line up on the home screen, and they are different shapes with no uniformity of theme. They DO line up, it's just an illusion caused by poor design. Maybe if I could get rid of the wallpaper they would look better.

I really want to like this, not least because of the price. But I can't access my iCloud calendar, which is one thing I do want, and while I could transfer everything to google calendar, I then seem to lose local storage. The calendar only seems to work with google drive (and the interface isn't that good either).

[DanceswithUnix]

The wallpaper hasn't ever bothered me so I hadn't looked for ways to turn it off. Can't see a way in KitKat, but you can set any picture you want as wallpaper so you could use a jpg of all black or white. I use a picture I took off the pier at Bournmouth.

I expect the only way to get rid of the Google search bar is to use a different Launcher app for your homepage. Given the Google Now integration in the normal Google Now launcher that I believe is standard on Lollipop it seems a daft feature to waste screen space on a mandatory search bar. Sure enough a quick search throws up this: http://trendblog.net/remove-google-search-bar-android/, which gives a few ways but as everything is customisable you can install one of http://trendblog.net/best-android-la...w-spring-2015/

[MrRockliffe]

I personally find the quickest launcher to be Nova. Great free features and apart from not having Google now integration (for me personally) it's great.