Intel’s mobile chipsets have popped up in a handful of devices over the past few months, but Motorola — arguably the biggest of Intel’s smartphone partners — has been content to keep quiet about the fruits of its efforts longer than others.
Well, that wait is finally over. Motorola officially revealed the Intel-powered RAZR i at a (relatively brief) press event in London today, and as early rumors foretold it looks nearly identical to the recently-released RAZR M.
Seriously, not even Motorola could tell them apart — the two phones look so similar that Motorola Europe erroneously used an image of the Verizon phone in its announcement photo on Facebook. Way to go, guys.
That said, it should come as no surprise that both Ice Cream Sandwich-powered devices sport the same 4.3-inch Super AMOLED screen (swathed in Corning’s Gorilla Glass, naturally), 2,000mAh battery, Circle-laden UI, and the now-standard Kevlar trim around the back. The only physical difference here is the inclusion of a dedicated camera button, something that the M certainly could’ve used too.
Of course, the real star here can’t easily be discerned just by poking around the outside. Intel’s single-core Medfield chipset (specifically the Atom Z2480) runs the show here and its clock speed tops out at a whopping 2GHz, though what that actually means in terms of performance remains to be seen. Motorola was also quick to play up what the processor means for the device’s camera — specifically, the handset maker noted that the Camera app fire up and be ready to snap a shot in under a second.
Pricing has yet to be revealed (as usual), but the RAZR i is slated to touch down in the U.K., France, Germany, Argentina, Brazil and Mexico in October. Sadly, there’s no word on if/when the device will officially make its way Stateside, but if any Intel-powered smartphone to date had a shot of making it in the U.S. market, it’s this one.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EC6X9azWHuw&w=640&h=360]
