Verizon Readies Its First Dual-Core Smartphone, Droid X2

Motorola's Droid X2 features Nvidia's dual-core processor, the Tegra 2. Photo courtesy of Motorola

Good news for Verizon customers waiting for powerful hardware: Dual-core is coming to town.

Motorola’s Droid X2 smartphone hits stores on May 26, and you’ll be able to pre-order it online beginning May 19. The phone is powered by Nvidia’s Tegra 2 dual-core 1 GHz processor, the powerful chip found in a number of recent tablet and smartphone releases. It’s the first Verizon-carried phone to include a dual-core chip.

Like its predecessor, the Droid X2 will flaunt a 4.3-inch screen, just big enough to watch HD video on without having to squint. It also has HDMI-mirroring capabilities, which means you can watch those videos on your big screen via HDMI output.

The phone only comes running Android version 2.2 (Froyo), but Motorola says it will be upgrading the software to 2.3 (Gingerbread) soon. Of course, we can’t speak to what “soon” actually translates to in actual, real-world wait time.

A big bummer: the Droid X2 only runs on Verizon’s 3G network. That means if you’re tethering up to five Wi-Fi enabled devices using it as a mobile hotspot, you won’t be getting 4G speeds. And from our time spent on the network with the Thunderbolt, we’re digging Verizon’s flavor of 4G.

LG was the first phone manufacturer to release a dual-core phone this year with its Optimus 2X, which initially dropped in Europe before the U.S. version (the G2X) was released in April on T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network. Motorola was soon to follow with its Atrix on AT&T’s 4G network. All three phones run on the Tegra 2 processor.

Out of the big four U.S. telecommunications companies, Sprint is the only carrier not offering a dual-core smartphone.

The Droid X2 will be available in Verizon Wireless stores for $200 with a two-year Verizon Wireless contract beginning May 26.