Review: Motorola Droid RAZR M, a true iPhone competitor [Video]

For years, Android-running smartphones have been trending toward bulky frames to fit ever larger screens, but Motorola’s new Droid RAZR M is an excellent exception with a big display in a compact size at just $99.

The Droid RAZR M features a 4.3-inch screen with a 960-by-540-pixel resolution. To fit the large screen but retain a small frame, the display extends from edge to edge quite impressively. The screen isn’t HD, but you still get a high-quality image with bright vibrant colors.

The Motorola phone also feels like it’s built to last. The Droid RAZR M has an aluminum frame with three big screws on each side that add to its aura of toughness, and it’s back plate is coated with Kevlar, making it scratch-resistant.

The Droid RAZR M also includes most of the features you expect out of Androids nowadays.

It’s capable of connecting to high-speed 4G LTE, it has a 1.5-Ghz dual-core processor and it comes with a front camera and 8-megapixel rear camera. It also includes Near-Field Communication technology, or NFC, so you can pass data from this device to another Android by simply tapping them.

For now, the Droid RAZR M is running on Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, but Motorola has promised the device will make the jump to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean before the year ends.

All in all, the Droid RAZR M had everything I wanted in a phone in this day and age as well as one thing from phones of yesteryear: a long-lasting battery.

On paper, Motorola says the Droid RAZR M can get up to 20 hours of battery from “mixed-usage,� but in my experience, this phone usually got a full 24 hours worth of battery before needing a recharge. That’s a feature that big talkers will love, but even if you’re not a big talker, you can take advantage of this by using live wallpapers or simply not carrying your charger around anymore.

Unfortunately, the Droid RAZR M only has 8-gigabytes of storage, which is a letdown considering Motorola says only 4.5 GB of it is available to users. But the shortcoming isn’t so bad considering you can now get a lot of your content from the cloud and Motorola did give the device a microSD slot where you can add up to 32 GB of storage.

But what truly makes this phone stand out is its price. Verizon sells the Droid RAZR M for $99 on a two-year contract.

At that price point, you’re getting a true iPhone competitor with a big 4.3-inch screen and no bulky frame. That’s tough to beat.

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