Overview
Available from both Sprint and AT&T, the LG Optimus G touts a quad-core processor, 32GB of memory, and depending on the carrier a 13 megapixel camera, all for a suggested retail price of $200 with contract. Is it more than the sum of its parts? Brighthand takes a look.
Build and Design
The first impression that the Optimus G gives when coming out of the box is one of simplicity. It's a very minimalistic design: not a lot of curves, not a lot of flash to it, but it is very shiny. In an odd design choice, LG coated the back of the phone with glass as well as the front and the rear panel is a thin layer of glass over plastic. It looks cool, sure, but I'm not convinced how well that'll work out in the long run. Not only will you have to worry about twice as much glass to break in the event of dropping your phone, but dropping it will become far more likely considering that glass back also makes the thing very, very slippery to hold.
But the more you look over the device, the more you come back to simplicity. One micro-USB connector. No battery cover. No doors to access a SIM or memory card -- at least on the Sprint version I got, which I'll talk about later. Besides the screen and the rear glass, the Optimus G has almost no real design elements. If you like the no frills approach, it's on display here.
I didn't have any real complaints about the build quality on the Optimus -- it feels pretty solid. But I do still worry about that rear glass. Only time will tell.
Screen
In a rather odd move, the screen on the Optimus G isn't the "normal" HD resolution of 1280 x 720: it's actually 1280 x 768. That gives you a little extra width in the screen compared to other HD devices. But when it comes down to numbers, it's only about a 7% increase in actual resolution, so you're not going to see a big difference.
Overall, the G's screen is quite good, with great brightness, sharpness, and good quality colors. It's not quite as high contrast as the AMOLED screens found in the high-end Motorola and Samsung phones, but you're not going to have much reason to be disappointed even if you hold it up next to one of those. It's a very good quality LCD. You'll probably miss the power savings of AMOLED more than you do the contrast.
Performance
The LG Optimus G has the distinction of being one of the relatively few phones yet available in the U.S. that stocks a quad-core processor, instead of the usual dual cores. Theoretically, that should give it a huge advantage in performance. However, despite doubling the number of cores, performance on the Optimus was surprisingly inconsistent. Five run-throughs of Quadrant benchmark gave it an average performance mark of 6144, which is good, albeit only about 20% faster than the dual-core Galaxy S III, Droid RAZRs, and other similar models.
In this case though, averages don't tell the whole tale. On individual runs, the Optimus scored as high as 6899 at times -- and also as low as 5556, which would put it barely above the 5000-ish Samsung Galaxy S III and Motorola Droid RAZR HD. Why is that? Well, despite having twice as many cores, a quad-core phone doesn't necessarily pack twice as much power. The actual performance is going to be dictated by how well it uses the processor, which isn't guaranteed to be any more efficient than a dual core, especially given how new and untested quad-cores are. There's also going to be a point of diminishing returns -- two, actually. One for benchmarks, where simply throwing more power into the CPU won't overcome limitations on the code, memory, and other components that can dictate speed. And the second is for the user. Above a certain point, the user simply isn't going to see or feel any added bonus despite having a slightly higher benchmark; most people won't feel the difference between a dual core and a quad core on a current phone and platform.
The Optimus G also stocks a healthy 32GB of internal storage, of which 25GB is available out of the box... and here's where we have a little weirdness we need to discuss. As mentioned earlier, the Optimus G is available on both Sprint and AT&T. Usually, when you see the same phone on different carriers, there's relatively little change in hardware. Maybe one version has a little more memory or something, but they're basically the same. And that sort of applies here: the Sprint version I got for review features 32GB of internal storage, the AT&T version only 16GB. Advantage Sprint, right? Not quite: because the AT&T version also comes with a 16GB microSD card. Not only does the Sprint version not do that, it doesn't come with a microSD card slot at all. Apparently at the same time that they were removing the SIM card slot for Sprint's version, they decided to drop expandable memory entirely. The net result is that while both Optimus G variants come with roughly equivalent amounts of memory out of the box, the AT&T version can be upgraded to a 32 or 64GB memory card, while the Sprint model -- despite having more internal memory -- can't. Advantage AT&T.
Speaking of storage, it's partially important because with that blazing fast processor and nice screen, the Optimus G seems like an obvious choice for playing back HD video. And it is, just so long as you're not necessarily planning to hook it up to a big screen TV. Unfortunately while the smartphone supports HDMI out, it only supports it via an MHL connection. For those who don't know, MHL its a way of providing HDMI through a micro-USB connector. But it requires you not only to buy an adapter, but also to carry that adapter, an HDMI cable, and a power supply around with you any time you want to use it, making it very bulky and inconvenient. Contrast that with a standard micro-HDMI connector like the RAZR models have, where all you need is one standard mini-sized cable. Having personally used MHL-equipped devices as my main phone, I can testify that it was so much hassle to use that I gave up on it -- it's only barely better than not having HDMI at all. You're better off using DLNA to stream media to your TV, if you can, even though that doesn't support browsing or playing games using the big screen.
Lastly, on the software side, the Optimus G runs Android 4.0.4 out of the box. There's an upgrade to 4.1 "Jellybean" in the pipeline, but it's currently uncertain when it'll be available. Meanwhile LG has made a fair number of changes to the stock Android interface, but none of them are too drastic, and the pre-loaded software is mostly kept to things which are useful or at least semi-useful: a backup utility, a file manager, etc.
Communication
While the Optimus G supports Sprint's LTE network, the strikingly few cities that are enabled with it so far means you're most likely to be spending your time on 3G. As a result, you'd no doubt get quite a healthy bit of use out of the device's Wi-Fi when you want a little better speed.
Bluetooth rounds out the basics, to make for a straightforward communications package. No international roaming, but that's not a very big deal.
The Optimus G also features Near Field Communication. While NFC has definitely been one of the most boring new smartphone features recently, this LG device manages to actually make it a little more interesting by including two NFC "tags" in the box. These are NFC-enabled stickers that you can program to make your phone do various things. For instance, you could stick one in your car, tap your phone on it when you get in, and have it set to enable a "car mode," such as turning on GPS and turning up the sound. Or launch a specific app, configure other options, or any other setup you like. Set it once using the tags app on the phone, then tap once on the sticker: you're ready to go. Since you can completely control the customization, the sky's the limit. You can even write contacts, web addresses, and short text notes to tags. Heck, stick one with a note on it in an unobtrusive place and you can pass secret messages to a friend. Extra credit for LG in at least trying to show the potential of NFC.
Productivity
Besides the almost de rigueur Office suite, in the form of Polaris Office 4.0, there's a lot of little apps on the Optimus G which could be considered productive, aside from the stock Android apps for scheduling, email, etc. LG added a notebook, voice recorder, stock tracker, and a few other small ones. Nothing major, but potentially convenient, depending on your use.
The Optimus G does come with one very useful tool in how it does DLNA. It allow for sending something to a DLNA equipped TV in the background, while still using your phone--for instance, displaying a presentation on a TV, while still being able to read your notes separately. Good for business users.
Entertainment
The only entertainment apps to be found on the Optimus G are the standard Android ones: Google Music, Google Books, Google Movies & TV.
Camera
Once again, I have to make a hardware note. The Sprint version of the Optimus G, the one shipped to me for review, contains a 13 megapixel camera; the AT&T model sticks with a more conventional 8 megapixels. And in doing so, the Optimus G has proven once again that megapixels aren't what's holding back smartphone cameras.
Simply put, the quality of the pictures taken by the Optimus G, even at highest resolution, are remarkable only in how completely middling they are. The device suffers all the same weaknesses as any 8MP camera, or even a 5MP camera: A not very crisp focus, weak performance in anything other than broad daylight, excessive noise, and a tendency to lose sharp edges and textures. Not only does it not do better, it actually does worse: you're cramming in millions more pixels worth of noise and blur that you have to store, for no appreciable gain in clarity. All you end up with is huge, blurry 3MB photos. Combining a 13 megapixel resolution with cheap, poor quality optics is like using a 60-inch HDTV to play back 30-year-old VHS tapes. It's simply a waste of hardware.
The LG camera app also features a "Cheese shutter" feature, allowing you to voice activate the camera by saying one of five pre-chosen words including "Cheese," "LG," and "Whiskey." Of course, aside from the fact that it only recognizes the word about half the time, it's kind of a cheesy feature in and of itself, since it's not like you're going to set your smartphone up on a tripod and walk away from it. It's pretty much just a novelty feature.
Battery Life
Powered by a 2100 mAh battery, the Optimus G's battery life isn't bad... but it's also not particularly good. It gets significantly less time on a charge, for instance, than the Sprint Galaxy S III that I tested earlier this year, with the same battery capacity.
For that, we can probably look at the quad-core processor and less efficient LCD screen as the culprits; those are going to draw a lot more juice. I would say an average user should still be able to pull a day out of it, probably even a day of heavy use, but I wouldn't expect much more out of it than that.
Conclusion
The LG Optimus G isn't a bad smartphone: it's fast, has a lot of storage, a good screen, and a decent (albeit not extraordinary) battery life. However, the two biggest features that are intended to make it stand out of the pack -- the quad core processor and the 13 megapixel camera -- both seriously fail to impress. And without those, there isn't really much to recommend it over other more noteworthy devices.
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Cons:
Bottom Line:
Not a bad device, but one that fails to live up to its potential.
