Here she is, the Motorola Milestone 2, complete with a brand new keyboard and Froyo on board. How does she handle? Find out right here with our first impressions and hands on photos.
First, a history lesson for the uninitiated. The Motorola Milestone first came out last year in the US as the Droid: it was the first phone to run Android 2.0, and it was a huge hit, in spite of its flaws, like a keyboard with buttons that were a nightmare to press and rapidly eclipsed processor. It didn’t prove quite so popular in the UK, but based on our quick play today, its successor, the Motorola Milestone 2, deserves to.
At a glance, not much seems to have changed with the Motorola Milestone 2: its 3.7-inch WVGA screen is near identical, but there was never anything wrong with it in the first place. But jump around on Android 2.2 on the Motorola Milestone 2 and you can tell there’s something much snappier running under the bonnet – a 1GHz CPU in fact. We were shown a Flash video running in the Motorola Milestone 2′s browser and it was smooth, even while pinch zooming in and out.
It’s a bit disappointing that Moto has chosen to skin Android 2.2 – we can’t see any benefits the social networking app on MotoBlur brings over just using the official Android Facebook and Twitter apps – but on the Motorola Milestone 2 it’s still nippy, packs Flash 10.1 and mobile hotspot support (Which we saw in action streaming a YouTube video to a laptop comfortably), and we can’t deny that the company has proved to be one of the best when it comes to providing firmware updates.
The keyboard on the Motorola Milestone 2, you’ll be pleased to hear, is vastly improved, and likely to be one of the biggest selling points of a not especially beautiful or ergonomic handset. It slides open and stays reassuringly, and the buttons are now well defined and differentiated – you’ll definitely be able to hit much faster speeds straight away than with the first Milestone. The weird trackpad is now also gone, replaced by sensible cursor buttons.
What we’re concerned about more than anything with the Motorola Milestone 2 is availability. While Moto is having a storming resurgence in the US with Android, the company’s been sheepishly setting the same phones on sale here for sky high unlocked prices and without network partners. A Motorola spokesperson wouldn’t confirm if network partners would be onboard from the start for the Motorola Milestone 2 – we hope there are though.
We’ll be bringing you a full Motorola Milestone 2 review just as soon as we can, but in the meantime, check out all the photos of it in action right here.
Out Q4 2010 | £TBC | Motorola
