Motorola had a surprise for Canadian owners of the Moto X over the holidays. Select users on the WIND Mobile and TELUS networks were given what at first seemed to be like an unexpected Christmas present, but later turned into a nightmare.

The thing is Motorola pushed out a small soak test for the above-mentioned devices. A soak test implies a small, control group of customers are given Android 5.0 Lollipop treatment in order to determine if the build was clean and smooth and ready for a wider roll-out.

Android 5.0 Lollipop bricked WIND Mobile Moto X devices

While the TELUS test didn’t encounter any major bumps, things took a turn for the worse over at WIND. Users installing the Lollipop build on their device found their handsets would succumb into a boot loop which could not be reversed, even as users trying resetting the phone to its factory settings (as seen at Reddit).

After much turmoil over trying to find a solution, it was revealed that the only way to save the phone was to reflash it to the older Android version, namely Android 4.4.4 KitKat. But not everyone out there is willing to go through this complicated process.

In the meanwhile, Motorola and WIND have announced they are working together to find a way to fix the broken update.
Motorola will be replacing affected Moto X devices

Later on, Motorola came back with a bunch of good and bad news. The good news is that after initially saying that WIND stores were not allowed to replace bricked Moto X smartphones, Motorola is now giving the green light.

Customers who have seen their devices affected by the soak test will be given a replacement at their local WIND store, no questions asked.

The negative part in the story is that you’ll end up losing your apps, photos and data unless you took the precaution and backed up, which we hope you did.