Motorola Droid Pro
Phone Scoop Review
Nov 15, 2010 by Philip Berne
The Motorola Droid Pro offers a form factor that will be instantly familiar to BlackBerry users, with all the social networking goodness Motorola brings to Android. Does the Droid Pro offer the best work / life balance? read review ›
User Reviews
Average Ratings
Annoying Droooiiiiid Start-Up Sound
I moved from Blackberry to this Droid Pro. Overall, I'm pleased. Much better Browser and screen. It's fast and you can really look at documents, such as .xls and .pdf.
This phone has a very serious defect: the robotish and juvenile DROIIIIDDDD start-up sound. Unless you are 15 years old, this will drive you crazy. Every morning I have to start my day thinking how I can boot up without having to hear this. And forget about rebooting during a meeting or when the baby is sleeping.
People will write that you have to uncheck the SD Card notification, turn down the phone before you turn it off, and other well-meaning but uninformed tips. That works on other Droid phones, but not on this. According to Verizon and Moto, unless you want to root the phone and void the warranty, there is no way to get rid of this.
Imagine you are the product manager for this phone. Your goal is to attack the Enterprise market full of busy business people. Do you honestly think this market wants to hear that annoying sound every morning? Come on Verizon and Moto...give us a solution!
Great device, but uh...email?
Coming from a Blackjack: I bought this device after getting tired of waiting for the Dell Venue Pro. I want a portrait keyboard. I wish I waited longer. The phone is great with respect to the Android ecosystem. There are far more Android devices than WP7 devices, so there will be more Android apps for years. I like the Candybar qwerty design. The keyboard is more cramped and harder to use than on the Blackjack. The call quality has not been good. These are annoyances. The thing that really is hurting me is the e-mail client. I wish I did more research, because this is an Android issue and not a device issue. Either way, I am now stuck for 2 years with a mess of 3rd party email apps that can hand IMAP correctly. The device I give 4.5 stars but the OS is 3 stars because I of the e-mail client issue. You canât compete with Blackberry until you have an e-mail client that is for real.
Motorola Droid Pro
I've had this phone for about a week, and I'm really liking it so far.
Right off the bat, I liked the size and form factor of the Pro. It was light weight and thinner than I thought it would be. I expected it to be as long as the Droid X but it seems to be a bit shorter, but not by much. The screen is nice, and not as cramped as I thought it would be. The touch screen is very responsive, just as the other Droid phones I've owned.
I'm still getting used to keyboard as far as typing speed is concerned, but I've been mostly on touch screen phones for a while so I guess that is expected. The keyboard though is excellent and I am picking up speed the more I use it. The phone is sturdy and seems to be built strong. The battery door seems to be a finger print magnet but I bought a silicone cover for it today so that should resolve that minor issue. Back to the keyboard, it is much better in my opinion than the keyboard on the Droid or the Droid 2. It looks as if it came right off a Blackberry Bold, but I'm not complaining. They keys are a bit stiff but I do like that, it doesn't feel cheap. Although it should probably loosen up a bit over time.
The phone itself is super fast and responsive. Haven't noticed any lag at all so far. Screen switching and going through the app drawer is fluid.
The camera, in my opinion, is just ok. Nothing to really brag about but it isn't bad. The camcorder is the same. Granted, the first time I tried using the camera was at a concert the other night and the light quality was quite poor. Maybe I should give it a fair shot.
The only reason I gave it 4.5 instead of 5 is two-fold. 1. Nothing is perfect. 2. The call quality could be crisper for a high-end smartphone.
Pros:
Lightweight
Overall battery isn't bad
Messaging is better with the keyboard
Nice screen and keyboard integration
Added security features and Exchange for Business users
Cons:
Call quality could be crisper
Indifferent:
Email is still better on a BB, though it's not bad.
Good Phone for Typists
I purchased one used off of eBay for about $110... they go for less now, and they still work well.
The Good
* Keyboard like a Blackberry allows for extreme typing speed
* 1 GHz Processor and 512 MB RAM
* 1 GB Storage
* Global Roaming, 4-band
* 5 MP Camera and 480p Video
* Gingerbread 2.3.4 on latest update
* Slim Design makes for a very pocketable phone
The Bad
* Mediocre Battery Life
* Too easy to cover the mic when holding the phone
* Charging port is in the way of typing when plugged in
* qVGA display limits screen real-estate
* No Android 4.0 Update
The Ugly
* This is the only Android Phone with both a Blackberry design and also with a 1 GHz CPU
* There is no successor to this phone, unfortunately
* They are cheap on eBay, so they're a good "desperation" replacement phone
Overall, I say Motorola did a good job with this phone. It's not the best Android phone out there, but for ppl that have to type often and quickly, it really did the job well. I'm only getting rid of mine because the Keyboard is starting to fail, which happens to some phones that have Keyboards.
THE ABSOLUTE WORST!
I am a phone junkie, contantly switching the phone I have for something better. Only this time I switched jobs and couldn't afford to switch. I got stuck with this piece of crap for almost a year. This phone (if you want to call it that) was replaced by warrenty 3 times! Before I gave up and activated an old phone.
Best Buy stores, I was told by a employee that they can't even carry the pro because of all the defects and recalls on the device.
PROS:
Decent look. Looks PROfessional
Good sturdy feel
Good sound
CONS:
BATTERY! Renders the phone practically useless- Couldn't go 1/2 a day without it dying. (had replaced 2 times.)
Camera: Yes I know it's a phone, but it still was not good quality for the advertisment and the price.
Keyboard: got used to the size however, its weak, the lights constantly went out. Wouldn't light up at night.
Apps/Widgets: Cool to download, but basically since the battery is so terrible, the only thing you get to do with the apps after you install them is... uninstall them.
I'm sorry for everyone who was hoping to read all positive reviews, but thats not happening with this junk phone.
Great
I went from a Blackberry to a DROID, then the DROID 2, and just upgraded to the DROID Pro about a week and a half ago now. After using the Blackberry keyboard for so long, I got used to it, and loved having the physical keyboard. With my other DROID phones I realized I missed having the keyboard and the ease of use, which is what initially drew me to the phone. The night I ordered it, I looked up some user reviews (which I probably SHOULD have done BEFORE I ordered the phone) and I started having some major second thoughts about my purchase, since there are a lot of negative reviews. After having it for about 10 days, I thought I would post my review about the phone.
I don't really use this phone for business purposes, which is the targeted demographic. I have my personal email, work email, and of course facebook all synced up with it and usually send and receive only about 30 emails a day. I wouldn't consider myself a heavy user. The reviews I read were mostly about the poor battery life, which I found to be comparable to the other two DROID phones I've owned, but like I said, I guarantee I'm not using it nearly as heavily as the "business-type" demographic they target it towards, so for me it holds up well.
As with any DROID, the market to get apps is great. Also, the way you can have three different profile screens - the home, work, and weekend, and the seven different home screens on each profile to customize is great.
The only negative thing I can honestly say about this phone is the home button, menu button, back button, etc., is too close to the top rows of the keyboard, so sometimes, if I get too into typing something long, I accidently press them. This is only a mild inconvenience, nothing I would get fired up about, but I think if they come out with a DROID Pro 2 they should maybe put those keys on the top since they're touch keys and are a lot more sensitive than the physical keys - obviously. For that reason I give this phone a 4.5 out of 5.
Frustrating device for my first smart phone.
Great phone when it works. The features, reception, and battery life work for me and how I use the phone. But I am constantly having what I think are software issues. The screen freezes or takes up to 30 seconds to do what I tell it to, and I mean even just sliding over to another home screen. Other times the phone will re-lock right after I unlock it, up to about 10 - 15 times before it stays open.
Forgot to mention this is my second device. I had to use the warranty and get it replaced once because the screen was losing pixel lines, and half the back light for the keyboard totally went out.
It says the current System version is;
Version.3.8.7.XT610.Verizon.en.US
Android version 2.2.1
As much as I can tell, the problems I'm having seem to be software related in some way. I'm not sure.
PROs: I like the keyboard, that is the main reason I went with this Droid, I hate touch screen texting.
Easy to use, no problems with any widgets or calls, texting or using it as a 3G hot spot.
CONs: Like I said, it works great when it wants to.
The battery life can always be longer, but wasn't horrible for me. The guy may have a different story on this subject.
The screen is not as clear or bright as other droids I've looked at.
It's Alright
Pro's
-Like the dual touchscreen/keyboard
-Like the Android technology and options
-Like the widgets
Cons
-Battery life is lousy
-Battery cover is thin
-Phone quality is fuzzy or so I have been told. I can hear them just fine.
-I consistently hit speaker or mute on the touch screen (may be user error)
Not overly impressed. Will probably end up going back to my BB Tour. Don't have the option of plugging in the phone every 6 hours or so in a day.
I have never owned a phone that I actually wanted to smash against a rock before
Whatever marketing sexiness and "neato features" it has are trumped by several major design flaws that render the phone practically unusable.
CONS:
- Battery life: Unless you are willing to disable *all* useful features, the *standby* life on this phone is approximately 5-6 hours. That is, disable all desktop widgets, only ever use wi-fi when it is plugged into a charger, disable push email, and carry a charger at all times. If you use the street-level nav, you will exhaust the battery in less than 20 minutes. If you charge the phone all afternoon and leave at 5PM, without exception the phone will be dead before midnight. If you need to count on your phone for business or personal uses, you need to plan for this or look for another phone.
- Keyboard: It is obvious that not a single person ever actually used this before the device was shipped to stores. The four "droid keys" are immediately above the phone and use a button-less contact, so waving your fingers close to them will cause them to be pressed. As they are right on the top row of the keyboard it's basically impossible to type without activating one of these functions -- all of which have the effect of throwing you out of what you are doing into 3 or 4 menus back, leaving you to then go back and find what you were doing and hope that it was something that kept a draft. To send an email or normal sized text message, this process will repeat several times.
- Voice Dial: I still am unclear about what bizarre combination of keys causes this menu to come up, but like the keyboard issue above it happens when you do not want it to. Unlike the former example however, the voice dial takes about 3-5 seconds to load, so your phone is effectively frozen for that time.
PROS:
- Cool Droid Widgets: If you use your phone while it is on the charger, you can probably take advantage of these
- Makes telephone calls
- Lots of neat, battery-sucking eye candy in the user interface
love it so far
Came over from bberry curve about 2wks ago and am very happy so far. The beveled keyboard is excellent and I actually prefer it to my older bberry model. The web and video capabilities this phone opens up are immense coming from bberry. I can do so much between the apps and browser video capabilities and all very quickly loading and switching from one thing to another. The voice to type feature is so cool. Tap one button and speak and you can write a whole email if you like. Not to mention wifi and tethering as well as document capabilities. I don't see a big downside and huge upside compared to bberry. This is a great phone and i would hate to have to go back.
Pro: great keyboard, apps, browsing and video capabilities, talk to text, quick multitasking
Con: battery life, call quality
