Android phones have had a steadily growing fan following and many devices have been launched in the higher price segment. However, catering to the entry level consumers, LG has introduced their Android smartphone, the LG Optimus GT540, and it has surely impressed quite a bit.
To start with, Optimus if anything, is a very good looking Android phone and is quite compact and light weight. It comes packaged with a stylus, headphone, micro USB connector cable, charger and a velvet carry pouch. Since the phone does not have a slot for the stylus, the pouch has been designed to keep it in place, which is fine. However, using the device is even comfortable without the stylus.
The black and curvey device with its metal brush finish (though plastic) looks quite smart and sleek. A 3-inch TFT resistive touchscreen dominates the front of the GT540 with two touch sensitive keys and a back button just below it. Under these are three buttons (sadly plastic again)?the call receive, home and the call disconnect button. At the back is a 3 mega pixel camera and a 3.5 mm jack is at the top. The left of the device features the volume/zoom rocker and to the right are the micro USB slot, camera button and the quick search button. The back panel can be removed easily and under it is the 1500mAh battery with a hot-swappable microSD slot and the SIM card slot is under the battery. The battery compartment is a tight fit and thus a user would have to use the stylus or a similar pointed object to remove the battery.
What impressed me the most among other things is the interface?smooth as silk. Optimus comes with Android?s version 1.6 that is upgradable to version 2.1. It can feature 3, 5 or 7 home screens that give sufficient space for multiple widgets, shortcuts and folders. At the bottom of the screen are three non changable icons for call, menu and messaging. The menu is single screen scrollable type. Applications are a plenty that can be downloaded from the Android app store. The accelerometer works quite well and the transition is quick.
The sound quality both in-ear and on the loudspeaker is very clear, though not loud. The video player plays videos in good clarity alongwith DivX and Xvid videos as well. The 3 mega pixel Auto Focus camera clicks clear images, however, the flash is something that we really miss here. Also, a secondary camera would have helped the purpose of enabling 3G in the device. The video recorder takes videos without stutter but do not expect much from it at 17fps. The internal memory of 130 MB is supported by an expandable memory slot of upto 32 GB, which is great to put loads of music, images and videos. Also, the gallery view is interesting with a slight effort to make it look 3D. Messaging on LG Optimus is a breeze on the virtual keyboard, both on the compact and full QWERTY keypad.
In terms of connectivity, the GT450 features the Google bundle along with the numerous applications (mostly free) from the Android app store. The Wi-Fi network connects seamlessly and so does the GPRS to Twitters, Facebooks and other apps in the world. The images and videos clicked can be uploaded directly on the Web and GPS-A enable location tagging as well. The micro USB slot and Bluetooth connects the device with other devices or a PC and allows content transfer easily. The battery stays powered for upto an average one and a half days or more depending on the usage.
Overall, the LG Optimus GT540 is a good enough smartphone aptly targeted at college goers and first time smartphone users. However, the Galaxy Spica I5700 is the Android offering from Samsung that sports about the same features at about the same price.
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