Orange picks up Motorola's Android handset

MOTOROLA HAS LAUNCHED its Dext Android-powered mobile in Blighty on the Orange network.

The handset is the same one that T-Mobile launched last week across the pond under the name Cliq.

This marks the return from the wilderness of Motorola, which hasn't launched a phone in the UK since last year, when it put out the astronomically priced $2,000 Aura mobile back in December.

Sharing the same name as a notorious serial killer, the Dext will be available in early October, free of charge on Orange's Dolphin £35 a month tariff with an all-you-can-eat data package.

The handset boasts a 3.2-inch non-multitouch screen, a 5 megapixel camera and a slide-out physical Qwerty keyboard. Other features of this distinctly Nokia N97 lookalike device are WiFi and a 2GB microSD card.

Motorola has lost Google's endorsement on the handset as it has tinkered around with the OS, much as HTC did with the Hero phone where it too lost the Google OS branding on the handset.

The Android mobile operating system under the name Motoblur has better integration of social networking features such as Facebook and Twitter built into the OS.

That's evident from Motorola's 'happenings' updates on the phone's home screen, which can be seen in our preview video, where content from Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, email and text messages is displayed in real time.

Motoblur also has a cloud element, where contacts and the handset details can be backed up. If the handset is lost or stolen all saved data can be remotely erased and restored to a new device. Apple's Iphone has a similar feature under Mobileme and so do Windows Mobile handsets, as recently seen in this video here at the INQ.

Dext is just the first handset in a range of Android phones planned by Motorola, as we were informed by an Orange staffer who's seen the whole portfolio and is excited about what's coming down the pipeline. µ