Motorola is doing a pretty good job with updates as of late. Although the original Moto X isn’t going to be getting Android 6.0 Marshmallow, not a huge surprise given the hardware and that it is a 2-year old device now, and pretty typical for most manufacturers. But it has been updated to Android 5.1 Lollipop, which is always good to see with these smartphones. Motorola has just posted the kernel source for the Android 5.1 update for the original Moto X, which was codenamed ‘Ghost’. It’s actually required that Motorola post the kernel source, so there you go.
As you would expect, the kernel source doesn’t do much for the normal end user. However developers that are looking to debug their apps or build custom ROMs and custom kernels, this is a big deal. As it gives them the necessary source code to build better custom ROMs and kernels for the Moto X 2013. And considering Motorola is just about done updating it (at least as far as big updates go, it’ll still get security patches from time to time), this is pretty important. As this is when the developer community will keep it alive.
The source code is available in both a .zip and a .tar.gz file, so you can take your pick as to which one you’d like to download. The download weighs in at about 135MB in size. And those developers that want to go through it and see what they can make, have at it. You can find it all in the source link below.
Just to take a trip down memory lane, the Moto X 2013 featured a 4.7-inch 720p AMOLED display, a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro (which was a custom chip for the Moto X), as well as 2GB of RAM, 16GB of storage and a 10MP ClearPixel camera. These days, even the mid-range smartphones have better specs than the 2013 Moto X. With the Moto X, the company was trying to show everyone that specs don’t always mean a high-end device. Which they succeeded a little bit, but that custom-made Snapdragon S4 Pro proved to be the downfall for this device.