Red PCMag Moto X

I'm not done with Android after all.

A few months ago, I wrote a column, "Why I'm Giving Up on Android." Android phone makers had gotten trapped in a cycle of moar rather than more, competing on bigger screens, higher megapixels, and huge buckets of features rather than actual usability.

Well, better is back, and its name is the Moto X.

Android manufacturers are rediscovering the joys of high-quality, one-handed phones with handsets like the Motorola Droid Mini and HTC One Mini. The Moto X is still big compared to earlier phones, but at under 2.6 inches wide (with a surprisingly large screen given the width), it's safely within the one-handed range. Notice I'm leaving out the Galaxy S4 Mini, which gets the idea wrong: smaller doesn't have to mean cheaper or lower quality.

The Moto X's triumph goes well beyond its size, though. Rather than just throwing in "moar" features, Motorola actually thought about how people use their phones, and how to make those tasks easier.

Moto X: The Human Phone
We all know about Samsung's Microsoft Office-like kitchen-sink approach to phone features: the company throws in every idea it can come up with, hoping you'll like some of them. It works for Samsung, but you have to be as big as Samsung to pull it off.

HTC is a better comparison. HTC made some big bets on changing the way people use their phones with features in the HTC One: Zoe video/photo combos, the BlinkFeed Flipboard clone, and a TV remote control. They haven't taken off.

Motorola, on the other hand, looked at what people are already doing. We launch the camera app. We check notifications. We get annoyed when the phone rings while we're asleep. It turned out that HTC couldn't change the way we use our phones, but Motorola can enhance it.

There's also the question of taste. I have a Droid Mini right here, and in a lot of ways, it's just like the Moto X. It's even a little smaller, without sacrificing speed or screen resolution. I might end up rating it a little higher.

But Verizon's horribly aggressive robot-ninja-warrior Droid branding, with its Eye of Sauron start screen and trumpeting "DROID" notification tone, is inhuman. That's the point, right? 

Take a look at Motorola's Moto Maker website, where you can design Moto X phones. It's all about being human. It's about being who you already are, expressed through custom phone design. It's not about being a killer robot.

Moto X is a phone for people, created with lots of thinking about how people use their phones.

Holding Out Hope for Windows Phone
I'm going to stick with my HTC 8X Windows Phone for at least a few more weeks as I wait for the Moto X to arrive on T-Mobile, my personal carrier. The 8X is a good phone, and Windows Phone is still an attractive, easy-to-use platform. The platform is growing, and I've recommended it to friends. I'm looking forward to seeing what Microsoft and its partners come out with next (probably in late October.)

But as a power user, I've spent the past six months coming up against a drip-drip-drip of missing apps. The biggest deal for me is the far better points-of-interest search on Google Maps compared to HERE Maps. But there are a ton of other little, niggling things: Feedly, Dropbox, the Amtrak app, gluten-free dining apps, the app with the map of my local mall, and the RPGs I like to play. Windows Phone has enough apps to be viable, but as my own research and recent third-party studies have shown, it's stuck at about two-thirds of the most popular apps on Android and iOS.

Windows has its specialties, of course: my daughter is going to have to give up playing Windows-exclusive games like Max & The Magic Marker and IloMilo on the way to school. But I'm pretty confident I'll be able to entertain her with Android apps like Toca Hair Salon 2 and Drawing Pad.

The Moto X's quality doesn't guarantee it'll be a big seller. Motorola's parent Google doesn't have a great track record selling physical objects to mainstream consumers. Verizon will downplay the X for its own Droid line, and T-Mobile isn't officially carrying the phone. AT&T has so many high-end smartphones, meanwhile, that I can't see the carrier spotlighting the X for very long.

If you're looking for a phone that's a little more human than the current run of big-screen, over-featured super-phones, though, I encourage you to seek this one out. Hopefully, word will spread.

For more, see PCMag's Q&A with Rick Osterloh, senior vice president of product at Motorola Mobility.