Another quick layout change; the games section has been changed to the games and tech section, on account of the fact that I’ve just reviewed my new LG KU990 mobile phone.
I’m pretty interested in technology and PC hardware, and it’s a field of journalism I’m interested in pursuing, so it makes some sense to get a section set up, even if reviews are a little thin on the ground at first.
Cheers,
- Tim
Since this is my inaugural technology review here in the Lair, I feel that I should keep things brief; as such, I shall sum up this phone in one (possibly fragmented) sentence:
You little Viewty!
Ok, now that I have that out of the way, this phone shall never again be referred to by this absolutely abysmal name; I mean really LG, the Viewty (whoops)? What were you guys smoking when they came up with that little doozey? Maybe they’ve decided that stupid names are the best way to get ahead these days; look at the success story that is Nintendo’s Wii.
All of that aside, let’s take a look at what the LG KU990 (remember, not the Viewty) has to offer as both a phone and as a rather sexy piece of tech.
The first thing you notice upon picking up the KU990 is the absolutely gigantic screen; at a whopping three inches (my partner tells me that three inches is a whopper pretty much every day), this bad boy stands out in a way that most phones can only dream of; my beloved Sony Ericssons look positively primitive in comparison.
The next thing you notice is just how slick the whole thing is. The phone is gorgeous and amazingly swanky, and the touch screen interface gives the whole thing a pleasingly futuristic vibe. Even more impressive is the fact that the KU990 touch screen, unlike most of its Samsung or Sony Ericsson counterparts, is incredibly accurate and easy to use; the buttons on screen are all large, and the pinpoint vibration when you tap the screen gives a pleasingly tactile feeling to your interactions with the phone.
The flash-based menu system is laid out quite nicely, and is attractive to look at. All the usual features like a calendar, alarm, convertor, etc. are here and perfectly functional, and really it has everything you would expect a modern phone to have. MP3 and other music file types are supported, and the music player is easy to use and has a built-in visualiser.
In a move sure to please anyone that downloads completely legal television series’ from the internet, the KU990 features DivX support, and comes bundled with conversion software if necessary. Music support does not require the installation of any software at all, and can merely be dragged and dropped over to the phone in a move sure to please anyone that has ever had to use that horrible Samsung music transfer software.
The camera is one of the main features of the phone, and while I have only the most passing interest in digital photography, I was nonetheless impressed by the standard that LG have managed to pack into the KU990; 5.1 megapixels, a Schneider Kreuznach lens (I’m informed that this is a very good thing; when I first heard the name I thought it was one of the bosses from Wolfenstein 3D), Xenon flash, auto and manual focus, and an image stabilizer; it also acts as a video camera with up to 120 fps, and is more than capable of doing some funky slow motion shots should the need ever arise.
One absolute pleasure with the KU990 is document or internet browsing; the interface is a thing of beauty, presenting the full page from a zoomed out perspective that can be switched to widescreen if required. Scroll around, find what you want, and tap to zoom in; in this way you can navigate mobile unfriendly pages with ease, something severely lacking even in some high-end PDA style phones. The fact that the phone has built in Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and PDF support also means that EBooks or getting work done on the go is entirely possible, and the huge screen makes it all that much sweeter.
While this phone is probably the best touch screen phone that I have used to date, and certainly is one of my favourite phones that I’ve ever owned period, it is not without its flaws. The first, albeit minor problem is the fact that the stylus is stored externally, folding up and hanging from the top of the phone; this gives it the advantage of being large and robust, but at the expense of looking…well, just a little bit stupid. Having an ultra-sleek phone with a dangly bit ala a 13 year old girl’s Hello Kitty-themed Nokia is just a tad silly, and takes away from the aesthetic awesomeness.
The next, more serious problem is the occasional lack of logic in the interface itself. Sure, 99% of the time everything works as it should, but occasionally you’ll think, “why are all the necessary buttons on screen when typing a message, but the delete button is a hard button on the phone itself?” or, “why do I need to use a jog wheel on the back of the phone to scroll through menus when I’m not using the stylus?”
These little inconsistencies stand out because the majority of the interface is a thing of beauty, but this fact just makes them all the more annoying. It also must be realised that while the phone is entirely usable with a finger in most cases, some things (such as using the QWERTY keyboard for messaging or easily scrolling through web pages) will just require you to use the stylus, lest you start tearing out hair in frustration; better not lose the dangly little thing then!
The fact that the phone supposedly only supports a 2GB MicroSD is quite disappointing, but apparently there are ways to get it to recognise up to 8GB cards; I haven’t really seen the need for this for myself, but the option is there with some research. Battery life is another little niggle; I’ve found it to last about half the time of my old w810i, less if I play games. Gaming is actually another good point to raise here; generally speaking you will need to find and download games that have been adapted specifically to the KU990, which is easy enough to do with a bit of Googling; just realise that some games aren’t going to work very well on this phone.
All in all the LG (definitely not a Viewty) KU990 is a beautiful phone in every sense of the word; sleek, elegant, and downright sexy, but with just enough in the way of flaws that the beauty feels natural (well, as natural as comparing a lump of plastic to a metaphorical woman can be). Sure the interface might be fiddly at times, or the battery life might not be as long as you’re used to, but the fact is that this is still by far the best touch screen phone to be released so far, and is certainly up there when compared to any upmarket mobile currently released.
Plus it does everything the iPhone does, only better and for a cheaper price; in your face Apple!
I rate the LG KU990: 9/10 (A beautiful phone that is as stunning to use as it is in appearance; with a few minor niggles cleared up in time for the next iteration, LG could have a phone that puts all the competitors to shame. As it is, they came pretty close. I heartily recommend this phone, and not just because I’ve already shelled out for it!)
- Tim Sweeney
Phone specifications (courtesy of Wikipedia):
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