Motorola Introduces the Moto G with LTE and MicroSD
by Brandon Chester on May 13, 2014 7:45 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Motorola
- Mobile
- Moto G
Along with the launch of the new Motorola Moto E, Motorola has also provided information about an update to the Motorola Moto G. In our review of the Moto G we felt it provided a very good experience relative to its price. The one thing the device was lacking was support for LTE. The Moto G only shipped with support for 21.1Mbps HSDPA. What is interesting is that the MSM8x26 in the Moto G is capable of dual cell HSPA+ (DC-HSPA) at 42Mbps and category 4 LTE but Motorola was unable to include it as the software support was unavailable in time for launch.
It has been around six months since the launch of the Moto G and Motorola is finally deciding to offer up a model with LTE support. Motorola has not given any specifics about frequency support but the model available for pre-order on their North American website lists it as a US GSM model which means there is at least support for bands 2, 4, and 17 in the US market. In addition to LTE support, Motorola has also included a MicroSD slot on the device much like on the newly launched Moto E. It's interesting that Motorola is now including MicroSD support on their smartphones now that they are in the process of being sold to Lenovo.
The new Motorola Moto G with LTE is available for pre-order at $219 in the US for the 8GB model and will be available £149 in the UK by the beginning of June.
Source: Official Motorola Blog
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kpkp - Tuesday, May 13, 2014 - link
Interesting...So someone at XDA could enable this with the help of the Moto G 4G ROM or is that a Qualcomm firmware? Can you expand on that a bit, thx?
kpb321 - Sunday, May 18, 2014 - link
There probably is a hardware difference. The software for the radio is only one part of the chain and you need it supported in every part of the chain so the new phone probably has more or different antenna's and amplifiers too. For the Nexus 4 they were actually able to unlock LTE but it only worked on one band. It happened to be AWS, which is the band T-Mobile was deploying on so it was useful but that mainly because they also do DC HSPA+ on AWS.ryuzaki - Saturday, July 19, 2014 - link
I don't understand, the Moto 4G LTE has the support to DC-HSPA up to 42Mbps?Impulses - Tuesday, May 13, 2014 - link
Much more interesting than the whole microSD/Google/Lenovo debate is their continued commitment to the low end market (and to lowering phone prices in general)... Granted, this and the E were likely in development long before talks with Lenovo, but still, they could've been axed instead.iamlilysdad - Wednesday, May 14, 2014 - link
I'm trying to figure out how there could be any connection between these getting SD cards and Lenovo buying them. That decision was most likely made before Lenovo had any say at all.Klug4Pres - Wednesday, May 14, 2014 - link
I think it may be quite easy to change the design to include or exclude an SD card, at least when we are talking about relatively bulky, non-unibody phones such as the Moto G. Even if the takeover of Motorola has not technically completed, I would expect Lenovo will already be influencing some decisions there.suresh.rajasekaran - Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - link
when it Will be Available in India?