Motorola just made the second generation of Moto E official – the screen size grew to 4.5-inch, the chipset moved to a 64-bit one and also got 4G LTE connectivity. The 5MP camera can now record 720p video and there’s a VGA front-facing camera. There’s no mention of a dual-SIM version yet though.
The Moto E (2015) is slightly bigger, but practically the same thickness and weight as its predecessor. The screen is still at qHD (540 x 960px), which means it’s not very sharp, at least it’s an IPS LCD with Gorilla Glass 3 and a anti-smudge coating.
The chipset is a Snapdragon 410 – a 64-bit quad-core Cortex-A53 at 1.2GHz with 1GB of RAM and Adreno 306 GPU. That’s for the 4G LTE version though, the 3G version will arrive with an old-school Snapdragon 200, which goes back to 32-bit Cortex-A7 cores and the slower Adreno 302 GPU.
It runs Android 5.0 Lollipop, which looks unmodified so it should get updates quickly, despite the change of ownership. There’s 8GB of built-in storage (double what the 1st gen had) and a microSD card slot.
The main camera is a 5MP shooter with an f/2.2 aperture and can record 720p video at 30fps. There are two microphones on the handset for stereo audio. There’s a VGA camera on the front, not exactly a selfie dream but better than nothing (which is what the original model has).
The Motorola Moto E (2015) has the same water resistance coating used on its bigger bros and a larger 2,390mAh battery (up from 1,980mAh).
The phone costs $150 and is available in Black and White. You can also get a Motorola Band in Golden Yellow, Turquoise, Blue, Raspberry, Purple, Red if you want to add a touch of color. The 3G version will presumably cost less, though pricing isn’t available yet.
