QUICK LOOK

• Touchscreen smartphone
• OS - Android 2.2 upgradable to 2.3
• 5MP/2MP camera back and front respectively
• 4” Nova display
• Slim and very light at 6mm thick and a grand 109g
• 1GB phone storage + SD card slot

Being a recent convert and now devout iPhone 4 preacher, the thought of swapping my beloved “hasn’t been switched off since I got it, comes to bed with me” iPhone, for something of the Android persuasion, very nearly left me speechless. Luckily for me, and you, there is a whole lot to say about this little Android beauty.

As I mentioned in my snapshot, the first thing that I noticed about this phone was how incredibly light it was. While I love the reassuring weight of my own phone, the feather-light LG, weighing in at a mere 109 grams, battery included, was a pleasure to hold, pocket (didn’t pull my at my jeans) or slip into my handbag. Half the time I had to check and double check that I had actually put it where I thought I had.

The screen, which LG hails as a “World First” is described as a 4-inch Nova display. This display is extra bright, super clear and delivers a pretty impressive viewing experience. The phone also uses an auto adjust feature that shifts the brightness of the display depending on the light it is in, in an attempt to improve ease of use. The additional claim in this regard is that it has the potential to save battery power, however I didn’t see any evidence of this, personally. The quality of the screen makes picture viewing and video playback a pleasure.

One of the things I really liked about this phone was that the applications menu is a separate entity. By this I mean that you don’t have to have all your apps on your home pages, as with the iPhone - no matter how organised I am with folders and categories, every single app is visible on the homescreens. On the Optimus Black, your apps menu is an entity unto itself, which tucks everything neatly away when you don’t need it. This means that you only need your most used apps on your home screens if you prefer to keep things neat and tidy, however there is ample space if you have a need for everything out in the open.

Adding, removing and organising widgets on the homescreens is as simple as holding down the app you want to manipulate, and either adding, trashing or sliding your widget to its desired position.

There are 7 customisable homescreens on which you can arrange all your important and frequently used applications and widgets in whatever order suits you best. With my mild OCD tendencies, I like to categorise my apps and split the pages into relevant categories too. You can view thumbnails of all 7 screens with a pinch (this is missing from the iPhone but is somewhat reminiscent of functionality on other apple products), and switching between home screens at full size is achievable with the slide or flick of a finger. You can also set your home screen to whichever of the 7 you choose. I left my homescreen as the one in the centre, meaning I could slide left or right from home, depending on what I was looking for. This is also probably the quicker option if you are using all 7 of the screens, but some might prefer to start with the far left.

A permanent feature at the top of the screen is a strip with your notifications, clock, battery, signal, connectivity etc. Sliding your finger down from the top of the screen brings up your notifications page which brings up a list of all your notifications, which you can then scroll through, and from there manoeuvre to whichever is most important first. This is also an access point to manage your wireless/3G connection and your music player, saving you the time of going through the (not unsubstantial) settings menu. To get rid of the notifications menu, simply swipe back up the screen and it will fold itself away.

I battled with the keyboard that came standard with the phone finding that I regularly misspelt things and hit the full stop without intending to. As an avid WhatsApp and Twitter user, messager and e-mailer, a decent keyboard is a really important on my phone, as I’m sure it would be to most people looking at a smartphone such as this. Never fear as there is, indeed, “an app for that”. Simply typing ‘keyboard’ into the search bar of the Android Market (which has over 200 000 apps now available in the South African market), yielded several different free keyboard applications downloadable for free. I quickly downloaded it, was notified when it was finished, slid down the notifications screen, selected that notification and the app was installed automatically. The next time I opened Twitter, the new keyboard was there and ready to use. Simple.

With regard to Twitter, and Facebook too, LG has developed their very own clients for these social networks, which come standard with the phone, along with a host of other apps and tools. I used the Facebook for LG without any complaints however I didn’t really like the Twitter for LG app and decided to download the official Twitter app which ran very nicely. Google Mail is another app that comes standard on the phone and these all made life just a little easier when setting everything up.

In order to access the Android market, you need to set up a Google account, and log in with your account details. These will be the same details you use for Gmail if you already have a Gmail account and will give you access to all of the apps and enable you to download any of the free ones direct to your phone. I didn’t actually go through the process of purchasing any apps, but in order to do so you would need to link your credit card with your Google account that you are using with the phone. Once it is linked, you will be able to purchase apps, which will be billed directly to your credit card. To link your card, go to checkout.google.com

The phonebook enables you to synchronise your contacts with your Facebook, Twitter, Gmail and even MySpace accounts so that you will never be without the details of anyone you’ve ever been in touch with. Not necessarily something I feel I need in a phone. I tend to keep my contacts down to a minimum and if you need anyone’s contacts from any of those accounts, all you need to do is tap the app and navigate to the relevant page. From the phonebook when you select someone to call, if you have Skype, or any other voice calling app, you will then be asked to choose what function you would like to use to call this person. When you go into messaging, if you have any other messaging app, like WhatsApp for example, you will be asked to select which messaging platform you would like to use. You can set these to default to whichever you select at the time, but this actually irritated me. If I set my messaging to certain people as WhatsApp and then find myself out of 3G or data range do I then have to go and change the default every time I want to send a message? It seemed a piece of unnecessary functionality that was more likely to irritate me than help.

The 2MP camera on the front of the phone is another first and LG has taken boasting rights on this one. Added to the 5MP camera on the back there’s a pretty decent photo taking capability on this phone. Unfortunately, this does not ring true. The cameras work all right in broad daylight, but low light situations leave your pictures pretty dismal. There is also a massive lag between the time you press the button and when the actual photo takes, and again between taking the photo and being able to see it. There is most definitely no chance of capturing a quick succession of images. The 5MP camera has an LED flash and this does little to improve the camera situation. There is an option for geo-tagging your photos, but that means capturing photos that you’d actually like to tag first.

In terms of connectivity, the Optimus Black offers everything you would expect from a smartphone and then some. Wireless, 3G, Bluetooth and GPS are the standard options, but there is also the option of Wi-Fi Direct. This is basically a faster version of Bluetooth, and as such can only be used in connection with other wireless direct enabled devices. Another available function is the ability to make your phone a wireless hotspot, which means you can connect to the Wi-Fi on your phone from your other devices.

The radio was simple to set up and it scanned and saved every station it could find the first time I opened it. This was a pretty comprehensive list - a lot of stations I had no idea existed - but somehow managed to miss 5FM. No problem though as a quick slide of the dial to the correct frequency and it was easy to save and name and was therefore added to the list. The headphones offer very clear sound quality. (I didn’t pump them up to full volume so I’m not sure how loud the phone actually is, but it is definitely sufficient for listening under any normal circumstances, and would be loud enough to hear clearly if you were in a car using your hands free as well.)

Speaking of using this phone in the car, there is an in-car application with voice recognition functionality, enabling phonebook search. I think there is still some work to be done on that as it is not entirely accurate, but nice to know that the functionality is there.

When it comes to the battery life, as a primary phone you will need to charge it on a daily basis. Switching off all connectivity - wireless and 3G - will increase battery life but not substantially. 

You can lock the screen, just like any other phone, by pressing the button on the top of the phone (same as the hold button on an iPhone) and you can add a password in order to unlock the screen if you want some added security. To unlock the screen you have to press the hold key again in order to activate the screen (something I found to be a little frustrating as I often found myself holding the phone upside down, and there are no other physical buttons to activate the screen), and then slide across the unlock button. The volume buttons can be found on the left side of the phone, as can the Gesture button.

The Gesture button is an attempt to enable some one handed operations of the phone. For example if you hold the Gesture key when your phone is ringing, and pick the phone up, it will answer the call, if you tap it while music is playing it will skip to the next song, and if you tilt sharply to the side from the home screen, while holding the Gesture key, the camera will open. This seems a little unnecessary to me and I doubt I would ever use the functionality, but it is a little something extra that may hold appeal to others.

All things considered, I found that the LG Optimus offers almost everything a girl (or guy) could hope for. It’s so easy to use – I even recommended my dad give it a try before he decides on his upgrade (and my folks are not the most tech-savvy around).

Turn Ons

• Very light but still feels sturdy
• Android Market
• App Menu
• Notifications slide down screen
• Nova screen – it’s bright and clear
• Very customisable and intuitive

Turn Offs

• Camera
• No Instagram for Android (yet)!

Price: R4,499.95