Chai Time: Hola Moto, the curse of owning a moto x in mexico-Phil Monnier

No, it isn’t!

A couple years ago, a Sony Xperia S was my daily driver. My contract would expire in a few months, and I had no idea of which phone to buy. HTC customer service is atrocious in Mexico, Touchwiz is not my deal, and I didn’t want another Sony phone. Motorola had never gotten my attention, until I heard about the upcoming Moto X. It drove me nuts. I fell desperately enough for the Active Display, Touchless Controls, and most importantly: the promise of quick updates. That last promise, I knew was hard to keep. The carriers in Mexico have lots of room for improvement. The issue is that said room remains empty. The situation is so ridiculous, that my Xperia S, which in the box said “Updatable to Jellybean”, didn’t get said update until years later. On my Moto X, I got Android 4.4.4 until the first months this year. This version was released in June 2014. I know, this isn’t Motorola’s fault. It is my carrier’s (Telcel), since phones are updated through its servers. So, given said background, I didn’t expect my phone to update to Lollipop any time close to its release date.

Lollipop was unveiled in June 25, and started rolling out as of November. There was plenty of time for Motorola to start preparing for rolling out the update. There have been plenty of excuses for delaying the update, from updating directly to 5.1, and the X8 computing system. Oh, the magical X8 computing system, which allows Active Display and Touchless controls to come to life, at the price of speedy updates. However, I assume that Motorola was aware of the changes that would come with Lollipop, ART was even in beta through KitKat. If Motorola wasn’t able to prepare even with all of this information, why still promise quick updates?

We have already a complicated situation with Motorola, who has trouble updating quickly. Now, let’s add to the current situation Motorola and Telcel (my carrier) parting ways, and the situation for X2013 users becomes a lost case. To be honest, I thought an update was never coming now. No carrier for the update, and an already complicated situation with Motorola.

I found out a few days ago that Motorola is working with the institute of communications, or something of the sort, to give the stranded Telcel users an update. If they succeed (apparently they are, since the G is getting the update), Moto will regain my respect and affection. They had an adverse situation, and it seems like they are rising above it. My complaint is, us users were kept in the dark all along. No one let us know the current situation, only that the update would arrive soon. Last time I checked, soon didn’t stand for half a year’s wait.

Have your own problems with phones in Mexico? Let us know about them on Twitter @masala_tech, and remember to keep things spicy! 

-By Phil Monnier