Motorola Moto G 16GB Dual SIM XT1033 Indian Retail Version - Ownership Review - Android KitKat 4.4.2 Update

Moto G got launched on 6th Feb 2014 in India and placed the order on first day on Flipkart. Got the phone in hand on 8th Feb. Amount paid for 16Gb version including taxes for this unlocked phone is Rs 13999 which is around USD 225. 

Manufacturer - Motorola Mobility Technologies China Ltd. Tianjin China
Date of import (by Flipkart India) - Jan 2014
Maximum Retain Price (as per box) - Indian Rupees (Rs) 14499.

I also made a small video of this showing box contents. 

Box contents picture - 

Moto G Phone and Included accessories in box for India

Package contains only the phone, ear phones and USB charger. No USB cable is included in this Indian version.

Note that FCC id mentioned on package is IHDT56PF1 

FCC report is available at FCC Report Link.

My initial views on using the phone for few days are positive. 

Screen is sharp. There is no lag in performance with the quad core, 1GB RAM inside. Internet browsing, WiFi performance is good so far.

Phone build quality is good. far better compared to many phones in this price range. Curved body feels good in hand. the metal buttons provided for power and volume control feel good and solid.

Battery is not user replaceable.

Few pictures of the product. 

Non Glossy Textured Back of Moto G

Back of Moto G phone with back cover removed. two IMEI numbers listed for Dual SIM support

Label - saying that battery is not user removable.

Right side view of Moto G with cover removed. This side has SIM2 slot

Buttons are metallic and feel solid

Moto G SIM 2 Slot. Micro SIM is needed.

Moto G - SIM 1 Slot. 

Update to Android 4.4.2 KitKat.

Moto G in India within a week of launch of product received the Android 4.4.2 KitKat update. Here are the product screenshots for the original 4.3 version. update notification and updated version.

Note that the download size is 230.7MB for the version here in India. Not sure if it is same in different geographies.

Moto G Original SW Version Android 4.3 shown in screenshot 

Moto G KitKat update notification screen showing size of the download.

Moto G Screenshot showing updated Android version 4.4.2

Updates - After 2 plus weeks of usage.

I have added the white color flip case that works very well and protects the phone. Switches off and locks the screen when flip cover is closed. 


Phone performance has been good so far. No significant issues on lag or slowness.

Some of the apps which I have added so far include- 

1. Official Chromecast App for use with my Chromecast device 
2. AllCast - again to cast media from my phone with Chromecast device
3. Open Mic+ for Google Now style voice controls and search. 
4. Pedometer app - Noom Walk
5. Kindle App
6. WhatsApp
7. Viber
8. Skype
9. Twitter
10. eBay and Amazon shopping Apps
11. CamScanner for scanning documents through pictures/camera
12. Facebook
13. Lync 2010
14. iPP podcast player

and few games all of which work very well.

Moto G Flip Case Retail Packing

Sample Pictures taken by Moto G

Moto G sample picture - Outdoor in day light

Moto G sample picture - In basement with flash

Moto G sample picture - Evening twilight at a school event

Moto G sample picture - Evening Twilight - Panorama at a school event

Pioneer - MVH-X169UI - 2014 Car Stereo Review and Error - 19 Resolution for USB

Got this Pioneer - MVH-X169UI from Pioneer's 2014 car entertainment line. It is a USB player with Mixtrax, USB direct control for ipod/iphone and certain android phones. It is a unit without any disc drive. So no CD/DVD supported.

Product Features

MIXTRAX (MIXTRAX EZ for Quick Non-Stop MIX Play)
USB Direct Control for iPod/iPhone (Optional Cable Required)
Android MTP -USB Direct Control for Certain Android Phones
Bright USB Port (Front: High Current 1A Handling Capability)
AUX Input (Front)
MP3/WMA/WAV Playback
Advanced Sound Retriever
RCA Preout x 1 (2 V)
5-Band Graphic EQ
Detachable Face Security

USB
DEVICE USB
DECODE(FORMAT)14*WMA/MP3/WAV(4)
LIST SEARCH (File/Folder/iPod)

AUX - 1(Front)
iPod INTERFACE - YES(USB)
ILLUMINATION(COLOR) RED (Single color)

DISPLAY
DEVICE - LCD(NEGA)
COLOR - BLACK BACK(NEGA)
There is no brightness or contrast adjustment

Installed it in car. I have a simple set up with only two front speakers and so installation was easy. Just had to connect wires matching with the description and color coding (only connections required were)
1. Main battery (Yellow)
2. Ground (Black)
3. Red (Ignition key power control)
4. White + White Black - Left front speaker connections
5. Grey + Greay Black - Right front speaker connections
6. Antenna coaxial connection for radio 

Error 19

Initial set up is just setting up the clock if you would like to set up clock. Then connected my iPhone and it worked flawlessly first time after connecting the iPhone USB cable to the unit. Later also tried a USB memory stick. It was an 8GB HP memory with around 3GB worth of music. It started reading but after few seconds later gave ERROR 19 message.

Looked at the manual and it says Error 19 is a communication error and Perform one of the operations
- Turn the ignition switch OFF and back ON.
- Disconnect the USB portable audio player/USB
- Change to a different source.
Then, return to the USB portable audio player/USB memory.

I tried all these few times but nothing seemed to help. Then I brought the USB to my Windows machine and did a scan / error checking to fix the file system and bad sector errors. Device was formatted originally to FAT32 which is OK. USB scan for error reported that there were few file system errors which are fixed. So after that I tried the USB device again in MVH-X169UI and it started working without any problems.

Photo of installed unit running from USB after resolving the Error 19

I did search on web and saw some people suggesting different bit rates settings, not using variable bit rate songs etc and also removing the tags information from songs to make it compatible. I did not do any of these things and atleast my problem got resolved just by scanning and fixing the file system errors.

This solution may or may not work for all but I hope this information is useful for some of the users.

Updates on WD TV Live and comparison to Google Chromecast usage in India (Bangalore)

I have been using WD TV Live on and off and also more recently got a Google Chromecast device also so thought of updating how WD TV Live and Chromecast experience have been for online applications, streaming from India.

For earlier usage reviews you can refer to my original post here.

WD Live TV 2011 model experience

WD has been updating firmware regularly and now there are many more applications available compared to what we had in 2011. There are changes within applications like YouTube, where now we can also control videos from mobile/tablets by pairing your device. This then becomes very similar to what we do with Chromecast for playing YouTube videos.

Good application additions to WD TV Live include Euro News (euronews), CinemaNow and also Red Bull TV.

Current list of active services on WD TV Live in Asia Pacific include -

1. Facebook
2. YouTube
3. AOL HD
4. SlingPlayer
5. Tweet by WD TV
6. Flixster
7. Euronews
8. Creepster.TV
9. PlayJam Games
10. TuneIn
11. RedBull TV
12. Shoutcast Radio
13. Vimeo
14. Picasa
15. Dailymotion
16. Live 265
17. Launchpad by Flingo
18. Accu Weather
19. Yupp TV
20. WSJ Live
21. Deezer
22. XOS College Sport
23. WatchMojo
24. Comedy Time
25. American Pop Classics
26. ADC
27. All Fitness TV
28. Asian Rush
29. Cook
30. CloudMe
31. Family TV
32. GoDigital
33. Great Movies
34. Manga
35. MBC America on Demand
36. Pop Flix Classic Movies
37. Pop Flix Classic TV
38. TG Toon Goggles
39. Vanguard
40. Snag Films
41. SEC Digital Network

One of the recent Firmware releases has been 1.16.13 and detailed release notes are available from WD support site .

Link to WD Support and Download page.

Current List of Applications on Chromecast from Wikipedia Chromecast Page.
Wikipedia Chromecast Page - list of Apps

Ebay India phone buying experience / review - ebay.in Seller sankyoelectronics

Being adventurous in online shopping does not go well always!

I placed an order for a cell phone from ebay India seller sankyoelectronics who is from Chennai.

http://cgi.ebay.in/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=150835286131

As per seller listing it is
Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini Pro SK17i Mobile + Warranty
Condition "New: A brand-new, unused and undamaged item."
http://myworld.ebay.in/sankyoelectronics


Shipper/Seller Address -
Gopalakrishnan M
Sankyo Electronics
14 Periyar Street , Kulasekarapuram
Virugambakkam Chennai - 600092 
Seller phone number 044-43518526

On packing there was also a from Sticker
K J Enterprises
#27 Kasim Street Royapettah
Chennai - 600014

Surprisingly as against claimed by seller that it is a brand new unused item it was a used one without proper packing.

The product received was not in new condition. See pictures

1. Box was not sealed.
2. Company packing was missing in the box
3. All items were packed in old plastic covers with cello tape attached.
4. Phone had a lot of finger prints and marks on the body. I cleaned there was no screen damage.
5. Charger also has marks and repacked. definitely old used charger.
6. The ear phone was also old piece not the one company gives with this model.
7. Clock was already set on the phone. some one had used it earlier.

Shipment

Seal on top only

No seal on bottom. clearly opened and closed from bottom of the box

Repackaged in old cover. not fresh piece

Lots of fingerprints and marks on screen

These were the contents packed in individual old plastic covers.
No other internal packing or documentation etc. One paper only

Charger is also used  with marks on it

This is an older model Sony Ericsson HPM-60/J  not the latest  earphone that comes with this model.

Clock was already set when turned on. Cleaned the screen, there was no damage to the screen.

Product was not in brand new condition as described by seller. It is otherwise working.

I have raised an ebay case for resolution with the seller.

Original Seller Listing

Although seller has 98% positive feedback, recently few people have complained against old / missing items. I went by the positive feedback and took a chance of ordering. It ended up a bad experience. Please be careful dealing with this and similar sellers on ebay.

Seller cheated - despite his promise that he will ship new accessories like charger and earphone he did not ship. He requested that he has a review with Ebay and his business gets hurt by negative feedback and so his feedback should be changed from negative to positive. I trusted him and changed feedback. After that he stopped responding to my emails and phone calls. Never trust such seller and give them any business.

Don't trust sellers and change feedback until they fix your problem.  After you change feedback like I did for Sankyo Electronics, even Ebay does not care.

Update Nov 2012- Based on comments to my post I see that many buyers faced issues with products and quality of service from this seller. Now while browing ebay I just noted that this seller SankyoElectronics is no longer registered on ebay and his ID is deactivated.

Ebay page showing that seller is no longer registered. 

Blackberry Curve Series Phone - BB Curve 8520 after a year plus of ownership. Poor Product and Service from Blackberry India.

My first mobile phone was a Philips phone in 1998 which were followed through the years by many phones from Nokia, Sony Ericson, LG, Samsung and then around 1.5 year back a Blackberry. Blackberry usage experience has been good but the handset itself is a bad experience in terms of reliability and usable life. Never seen a phone or its parts falling apart the way this Blackberry handset did.

Blackberry was out of compulsion to access corporate emails and I settled for the modest BB Curve 8520 which was purchased through the service provider Airtel. The phone felt robust in hand had a good keyboard, dedicated music buttons, rubberized grip around the phone, couple of buttons which can be customized and had decent features and easy to use.

After around 8 months of use the rubber parts on the body started feeling rough and grainy and I thought this is regular wear and tear. After few months I started seeing few cracks on it and eventually over next few months there were more of these. After a year or so the rubber material buttons started cracking and one fine day when I tried to press a button on side to turn on the data connection there was no button. The button (which is actually just part of the molded rubber part of the body) had just cracked and fallen some where. Over next week one by one all the buttons even the ones rarely used and rubber around the buttons had just vanished.

To my surprise in my office when I looked at BB curve phones used by others many of them had faced same problem and any one having a phone for more than a year typically had buttons on their phone missing. Many even had the buttons on top (three music/mute buttons) missing. Problem with missing button, you can not control volume and many other features of the phone and also water and dust can easily go inside and phone looks ugly.

See 2 buttons of right side gone and upper volume button in process of cracking and next one shows button gone.Left side one button also gone missing.

And now the Blackberry Service in India. 

When I called service center in Bangalore I was told body etc are not covered specially when it is one year old and out of warranty. I posted a message to BB India through twitter and then said they can look into it. I also posted few pictures for them to look at and informed the fact that it is not only me and many other users who have problem and it is a design issue with the kind of material and button design being used in the Curve series of phones. BB India informed that their service partner Redington will get in touch and fix problem for me.

Redington after few followups informed me they will cosmetic upgrade (change the body) on my phone in coming days but after few days informed that phone is not sold through their channel and they can not do any thing about it and will tell BB India the same. On reminding BB again they mentioned contact the service provider. They communicate through Twitter direct message and never have really looked into the issue seriously. Curve has been one of the best sellers for Blackberry but so many users have this problem due to bad design and poor choice of material. They continue to sell Curve series of phones with this design and even the newly launched model Curve 9220 uses similar rubberized button design.