Motorola Defy

Motorola Defy A8210
Manufacturer Motorola Mobility
Compatible networks Quad band GSM with GPRS/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz in all regions)
Dual band UMTS with HSPA+/HSUPA (850/1700/2100 MHz in the USA, 900/2100 MHz in Europe, and 850/2100 MHz in Australia, New Zealand and Thailand)
First released 1 October 2010 (2010-10-01)
Successor Motorola Defy Plus
Type Smartphone
Form factor Slate
Dimensions 4.21 in (107 mm) H
2.32 in (59 mm) W
0.53 in (13 mm) D
Weight 118.0 grams (4.16 oz)
Operating system Android 2.1-update1, 2.2.1, 2.2.2, 2.3.4 (beta) with enhanced Motoblur; 4.0.3 Ice Cream Sandwich(CyanogenMod) & MIUI;[1] 4.1.2 ,4.2.1 Jelly Bean(CyanogenMod);[2] 4.4 KitKat(CyanogenMod)[3]
CPU 800 Mhz TI OMAP3610-800 (or OMAP3630-800)
GPU PowerVR SGX 530
Memory 512 MB RAM
Storage 2 GB, internal storage (approx. 1.2 GB available)
Removable storage microSDHC supports up to 32 GB
Battery 1,540 mAh
internal rechargeable Li-ion (replaceable)
Data inputs Capacitive touchscreen display
Display 3.7 in (94 mm) S-TFT FWVGA 854×480 px using Gorilla Glass
Rear camera 5 megapixel (2,560 × 1,920)
LED flash
Other built-in FM radio, requires headset/headphones cable to be plugged into the audio jack to function, as this cable serves as antenna.
SAR 1.52 W/kg (head)
1.53 W/kg (body)
References [4][5]

The Motorola Defy, also known as Motorola Defy A8210 & MB525, is an Android-based smartphone from Motorola. It fills a unique market segment, by being one of the few small, IP67 rated smartphones available. It is water-resistant, dust-resistant, and has an impact-resistant screen.[6] The phone has been launched unlocked in Germany, France, Italy, Hungary, India, Thailand, Spain, the UK, Turkey, Romania and Greece under various networks and is distributed exclusively by a number of carriers, including T-Mobile in the United States, Telus in Canada, and Telstra and Optus in Australia. An updated version of the original MB525, Defy+ (MB526) is also available.

Description

The phone is a bar format with a touch screen and four Android touch buttons on the front. It has Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11b-1999, IEEE 802.11g-2003, IEEE 802.11n-2009),[7] 5-megapixel camera with LED flash, speakerphone, 800 MHz TI OMAP3630 processor, a 3.7 in (9.4 cm) FWVGA LCD. Lacking a physical keyboard, the phone instead provides the Swype virtual keyboard and an alternative multi-touch QWERTY keyboard.[8] The Defy shares its platform with Motorola Bravo though there are minor differences in exterior design, 3G band, lower resolution camera without LED flash and non-weather resistance. The Defy is "water-resistant" with all covers closed (battery, USB, and audio jack).

Hardware

The Defy CPU/GPU is TI OMAP3 architecture OMAP3630 and the PowerVR SGX530. The OMAP 3 is the industry's first 45-nm CMOS processor set at 800 MHz in ARM Cortex-A8 superscalar microprocessor core.[9] Under-clocked CPU frequencies (below ARM manufacturer specs of 1 GHz) & high CPU voltage levels on the stock phone led to much lower performance and battery life on stock settings than the hardware is capable of. This can be modified on rooted phones, using 3rd party tools (e.g. SetVSel app) or custom ROMs, with stable performance over 1 GHz being common.

A minor hardware change and possible hardware refresh on MB526 models was observed, mainly noticeable by the camera lens being red ('Bayer' camera), instead of green.[10]

Three successors models Motorola Defy Plus, Motorola Defy XT and Motorola Defy Mini have been released.[11] The Defy Plus uses a 1 GHz processor setting by default, a higher resolution camera and a 1700 mAh battery.

The Defy Mini variation uses a 600 MHz CPU in ARM Cortex-A5 microprocessor core, 512 MiB RAM, Adreno 200 Enhanced GPU at 200 MHz with a Qualcomm MSM architecture, MSM7225A chipset and a 3.2 inch screen, with a 320x480 resolution (180 dpi). The Mini is targeted at the low-end category of smartphones.

The Defy XT variation uses a 1 GHz CPU in ARM Cortex-A5 microprocessor core, 512 MiB RAM, Adreno 200 Enhanced GPU at 245 MHz with a Qualcomm MSM architecture, MSM7627A chipset and a 3.7 inch screen, with an 854x480 resolution (245 dpi). The Defy XT is targeted at the mid-range category of smartphones.

Customization

Although the boot loader is locked, techniques exist to root the phone and load after market ROMs. CyanogenMod is an example ROM. An official CM7.x build is available, and unofficial builds of CM10.1 supporting Android 4.2.2 (as of May 2013) and custom kernels (using the 2nd Boot method). As of November 2013, XDA Developers have come up with Android 4.4 for Defy and Defy+. There is an active user community, contributing guides for improvements, e.g. extending battery life, etc. The XDA Developers Forums are popular with Defy users. In November 2014, The popular XDA Developer, Quarx had managed to port Android 5.0 Lollipop from the Moto 360 smartwatch as it has the same chipset. It was undergoing development till January 2015 but due to unknown reasons the development is either stopped or paused as there is no news since then.

Manufacturer criticism

There is speculation the phone was intentionally crippled with lower CPU frequency settings to avoid competing with other Motorola devices like the Atrix and to allow a later Defy+ model (which are otherwise nearly identical to the Defy apart from camera and slight battery improvement). The higher than necessary voltage levels were speculated to be an attempt to reduce support costs for faulty batteries.

Despite being perfectly capable of running newer versions of Android (e.g. 4.x), Motorola failed to provide later versions and didn't meet announced release dates on earlier versions (e.g. 2.3). The use of a locked boot loader, which prevents initial boot kernel upgrades and source code auditing, has also led to strong criticism of Motorola for failing to make this available (particularly as upgrade support continued to drop).

These limits are speculated to be examples of planned obsolescence, which has led to after-market correction by user communities.

See also

References

  1. "ICS "CM9" Experimental Builds for the Defy!". XDA Developers. Retrieved 2012-02-07.
  2. "JB CM10 build for Defy!". XDA Developers. Retrieved 2012-06-10.
  3. "[Kitkat] AOSP/CM11 Android 4.4 for the Defy(+)". XDA Developers. Retrieved 2013-06-09.
  4. "MOTODEV > Products > DEFY MB525 specifications". Motorola. Retrieved 2011-03-09.
  5. "Motorola DEFY - Full phone specifications". GSMArena. Retrieved 2011-03-09.
  6. "Motorola DEFY". Clove Technology. Retrieved 2011-03-09.
  7. Lee, Nicole (3 November 2010). "Motorola Defy Specs (T-Mobile)". CNET Reviews. Retrieved 14 April 2011.
  8. "Motorola Defy: Android 2.1 goes rugged with water, dust and scratch resistance". Engadget. 2010-09-01. Retrieved 2010-12-13.
  9. "OMAP3630 Processor". Texas Instruments. Retrieved 5 May 2011.
  10. "Motorola DefyPlus". Retrieved 27 June 2011.
  11. "Defy Plus". Clove. Retrieved 16 September 2011.
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