Let’s talk a little bit old school stuff here, c'mmon, take a look at LG Optimus One, the first of the bunch. This is not the newest and coolest device on the market today, it appeared in late 2010 but it still plays ball. Even 2 years later, it’s still a cool looking droid, with Android 2.2 Froyo on board, now at a very tempting price tag, with excellent build quality and a full set of features, 1 million units sold in the first few months, ladies and gentlemen, here it comes:
Key features:
• 3.2" 256K-color capacitive TFT touchscreen of HVGA resolution (320 x 480 pixels); Multi-touch input
• Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE support
• Dual-band 3G with HSDPA (7.2 Mbps)
• 600MHz CPU running Android 2.2 Froyo; 419MB RAM
• 3 megapixel autofocus camera; face and smile detection, geotagging
• VGA video recording @ 18fps
• microSD card slot, up to 32GB, 2GB in the box
• Standard 3.5mm audio jack
• Standard microUSB port (charging)
• GPS receiver with A-GPS; Digital compass
• Wi-Fi b/g; Wi-Fi hotspot functionality built-in
• Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP
• Accelerometer for screen auto rotate; Proximity sensor
• FM radio with RDS
• Office document editor
• Portrait and landscape on-screen QWERTY keyboard
• Social networking integration
• DivX/XviD support
• Smart dialing
• Excellent loudspeaker performance
Full specs here.
So, it has a modest CPU, clocked at 600 MHz, single core of course, but on Froyo it runs like a hobbit on ecstasy, the RAM is enough to open as many apps you want, it has Facebook and Twitter apps preinstalled by the way, the video player supports DivX and XviD out of the box, it features even a document editor, for such a cheap device, this means lots of fun for any kind of user.
Let’s start with unpacking; it contains the essentials, like the charger, a micro USB cable, a headset and a complementary 2 GB micro SD card.
The phone measures 113.5 x 59 x 13.3 mm and weighs 129 grams, the screen is 3.2 inches wide, the device feels very well built and sits well in hand.
LG Optimus One’s chassis has rounded corners and the design focuses on practicality rather than fashion, you have a few colors to choose from, Black Wine, Titan, Blue and Silver.
The HVGA capacitive screen is constantly bright (you don’t get an ambient light sensor on this baby), with vivid colors and good contrast, the viewing angles are surprisingly good, also sunlight legibility, even if the screen is a little bit reflective.
The capacitive screen is fine tuned not to react, as others, at the lightest touch, this eliminates many accidental presses, unfortunately there is no sensitivity setting for those to prefer otherwise. You do get a proximity sensor on the front panel; the earpiece also doubles as a loudspeaker.
Below the screen there are the usual Android buttons, big and solid to press, on the right you find the volume rocker, on the top the 3.5 mm audio jack and the Power/Lock key, on the bottom a micro USB port and the mouthpiece.
On the back panel lays the 3 MP camera with autofocus, the panel itself is made of matte plastic, very soft and pleasant to the touch and fingerprint resistant. Under it, lays a huge 1500 mAh battery, rated at 700 hours of standby (in 2G, 550 h in 3G) and up to 8 hours of talk time (in 2G, 7 h 30 min in 3G).
The microSD card slot is located to the left of the camera lens. The phone body is entirely made of plastic, but this is by no means a bad thing, the phone is very comfortable to use, sits well in any pocket, it has a nice finish and the plastic is high quality.
The OS running on LG Optimus One P500 is Android 2.2 Froyo out of the box and it has been fine tuned by LG. Overall, the software is responsive and pretty smooth, considering that the CPU is clocked at 600 MHz.
In terms of telephony, everything is ok, signal reception and in call sound quality are strong in any circumstances, you get Smart Dial that works excellent.
LG Optimus One P500 can handle all types of messages - SMS, MMS and email. Email support is excellent, with a little help from Exchange and Gmail, which is normal for Android devices. The app supports multiple accounts; the text input is trouble free due to the virtual QWERTY keyboard which is fast and responsive, both in landscape and portrait mode.
The music player is your usual Android one, is not bad at all actually even if it has not been updated for a while now, the interface uses four tabs, which offer the four main ways to search your music collection - by artist, album, song or the playlists you've created.
The LG Optimus One comes also with an FM radio built in with RDS, with a simple interface and the tuning dial can save up to 48 radio stations.
As for audio quality output, Optimus One is a good performer; it may not be the best on the market in this department but, in any case, is above average.
The video player is simple and easy to use, there’s DivX/XviD support built-in to go along with the 3GP, MP4 and WMV support but, due to its pretty small screen, it’s not the ideal media player. Anyway, it can do the job and handle many types of videos.
The camera has 3 Megapixels, autofocus and plenty of features, there’s scenes, panorama, geo-tagging and face detection (the Optimus One can track up to 5 faces) but that’s just the basics. Smile detection is also supported as are LG’s Beauty and Art shots and face effects.
For a 3 MP device, Optimus One is not a bad shooter, the autofocus is fast and so is the shot to shot time.
Video recording is not that good, it can produce only 18 fps VGA clips saved in 3gp format.
For its class, Optimus One shines in terms of connectivity, there’s quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE support along with dual-band 3G with 7.2Mbps HDSPA. Local connectivity is handled by Wi-Fi b/g, Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP and a microUSB cable. There’s also a standard 3.5mm audio jack.
The Optimus One also packs a built-in GPS receiver with a digital compass, for navigation you get Google Maps with Street View mode supported.
Running on Android, LG Optimus One has one of the best browsers possible, a very fast one and without glitches, with a minimalistic UI, typical for Google. Even if it lacks Flash support, you can watch YouTube on a special app.
For business users, you get a pretty good organizer and also the Think Free Office editor, this baby supports viewing and editing Word, Excel, and PowerPoint (with Office 2007 support) and also PDF files.
Optimus One also features great social network integration, with Facebook and Tweeter contacts that can be added to the phonebook. The Facebook app lets you read news feeds, post messages on people’s walls, browse their profiles and so on. You can of course post status updates and including a photo is very easy. Of course, from the Android Market you can get tons of free apps, including games.
In conclusion, with LG Optimus One you get a low end droid but a very good performer, in its price bracket of course. This is a phone for the people, it can do almost anything, it’s a great device for a first android user or if you’re looking for a smartphone on a tight budget.
You can get one here, please visit us for a deal.
No comments:
Post a Comment