Motorola Devour Cell Phone Review

Main Design

As shown in Figure 4, the Devour is a simple candy-bar shape of cell phone. Made of extruded aluminum, it has a very sturdy feel and good design. The mat silver finish has good-looking black accents. Measuring 4.55” x 2.4” x .61” (11.55 x 6.09 x 1.54 cm) and weighing 6.35 oz. (180 grams), this is not the smallest cell phone on the block. And although it is not much heavier than the Droid or the iPhone, the density of the phone makes it feel a little heavier. It’s like having a block of metal in your hand giving you a solid feeling about the phone.

Figure 4: The front of the Devour.

As you can also see in Figure 4, the screen has a black surround on all four sides. The black area under the screen has three icons which are touchable. Left to right, they are the Menu Key, the Home Key and the Back Key. When the screen is locked, the Menu Key also functions as the Unlock Key. Pressing on any of these key areas give you a tactile feedback, so you know you have completed the press. To the left of the Menu Key is a notification LED which lights when connected to charge and for a new notification.

There is also a fairly large silver area on the top and the bottom of the screen. On the top there is only the “M” for Motorola and the ear piece. On the bottom is the small square optical navigation scroll button. This button is a bit unusual so it takes a little getting used to, but you can just swipe your finger across it to make your choices. After we used it for awhile, we found it very functional for scrolling to and selecting various options.

The Devour has a bright, clear, and very responsive 3.1-inch touch screen (480×320 pixels with 65,000 colors). After using an iPhone or a Droid, this screen seems much too small and since there is so much unused real estate on the front of the phone, we were left wondering why Motorola didn’t put a larger screen in the Devour.

The Devour has an accelerometer and a proximity sensor. You can adjust the brightness and backlight time. There is a useable onscreen virtual keyboard that appears automatically.

There are five home screens that you can customize. The default home screen can be seen in Figure 5. The black arrow on the gray tab at the center bottom of the screen can be tapped to open a screen of apps. Figure 6 shows the apps screen. You can use your finger to scroll up and down the apps to see them all.

Figure 5: The default home screen.

Figure 6: The apps screen.

As we write this there are about 38,000 apps available in the Android Market and the number continues to grow. You can download apps directly to your phone. Verizon has added a few of its own apps including support for VZ Navigator, V Cast streaming video, and V Cast Music with Rhapsody. Be aware though, that some of the Verizon extras like the VZ Navigator require an additional monthly fee.

A few other useful apps also come pre-installed. The one that impressed us the most was the Moto Phone Portal. This allows you to use the phone’s Wi-Fi capabilities (or USB) to get instant access to the files from your phone on your computer. When accessing by Wi-FI, once you enable Wi-Fi and start the Phone Portal app, you are given the IP address of your phone. You simply enter that into a web browser address bar on any Internet-connected computer and you can see and work with all the files on your phone, including photos, wallpaper, ringtones, bookmarks, and browser and call history. It’s a great way access the data on your phone.

The apps are stored on the Devours 192MB of integrated memory, so there is the possibility of running out of room for the apps. Also, you have to be careful that the apps you choose are compatible with Android version 1.6 which is what the Devour runs. Many apps are for the 2.0 Android operating system and will not work on the Devour.