Immediately after the presentation of the latest flagship smartphone LG G2, it became clear that the device is turned at least unusual and worthy of close attention. Thanks to Berlin’s IFA 2013 I was able to get acquainted with the device up close and explore its main features in detail as time permits. On my return I tried to collect all available information at the time of writing on this hot new product. Namely it is presented in this preliminary survey.
A key message of the presentation G2 smartphone LG’s marketing department made the phrase «Learning from you», that is, “learning on your feedback.” The new models have been used a lot of really wishes and user reviews on previous models. What was the result? The result was a smartphone that claims to be the best smartphone autumn 2013.
The main advantages of LG G2 can be described in a few lines of dry technical specifications:
- 5.2-inch Full HD IPS display;
- The latest quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800;
- “Long-playing” battery 3000 mAh;
- 13-megapixel camera with optical image stabilization system;
- An updated design and a number of proprietary technologies and features.
But such a description is incomplete and, most importantly, totally uninformative. In fact, for the rest of the flagships of this year were not born yesterday, and specifications do not seem any worse? That’s why, to really understand what is the appeal of LG G2, it is necessary to take in hand. After that, a lot falls into place.
Design and construction
Let’s start with the design. LG determined to develop the success of the previous model G Pro , which I liked very much and design, and display. After all, a smartphone – is primarily a display, which means that it has to be large, crisp, juicy and responsive. But in order to display a smartphone with more than 5 inches from turning into “shovel”, which can not be used with one hand, required extraordinary design solutions. And in G2 they are: this, of course, the placement of the control keys. Unlike the vast majority of competitors’ models, LG engineers did not place them on the edges of the body – for each key adds unnecessary millimeters to the frames around the display, and hence to the dimensions. Therefore, G2 power button and volume controls are located behind, on the back cover.
The decision, to be sure, a non-trivial – at least until such earlier experiments, no one is not reached. However, when it became clear that the focus group give a positive review, this innovation has been decided to implement. In advertising, LG says that the use of the backs buttons easier to use than the traditional side, and to some extent this is true – no need to engage in “stretching fingers” holding the device in their hands. There are, however, some disadvantages – the back cover is not removable, the device is not as stable “on the back,” sometimes when you try to click on the button finger can get into the eye of the adjacent chamber. But in general – is quite right to life, is easy to get used to. Especially when you realize what a good purpose for it was done. And in order to “wake up” the phone, without lifting it off the table, just double tapnut the screen.
On the front panel there are also three typical buttons and Android. They are in this case virtual and appear on the main screen, as in some plates. On one hand, this portion of the display space eat off the other – it is more than sufficient, so that it is not critical. Moreover, in some applications, the buttons can be hidden as unnecessary.
Placed on top of an additional microphone and infrared. At the bottom end – the main microphone, 3.5mm audio jack and microUSB port supports MHL. Here is noticeable perforation speakers.
On the left side edge of the slot is visible only for carriage from the microSIM card. As the back cover is not removed, it is the only way to install it to your phone. But support for microSD are not available – probably because of the same non-removable cover.
The rear panel is glossy, and if a white body prints invisible, the black version, despite drawing a fine diagonal stripes, covered them pretty quickly. Well, that’s a reason to think about a convenient carrying case.
Overall design of the smartphone is fully justified ‘flagship’ expectations. The device is lightweight, comfortable, sturdily built, at the expense of non-removable rear cover any creaking and vacillation is not expected. In the hands sits safely and comfortably. It would be desirable, of course, less glossy plastic casing, and if at all plastic – but in general, and it turned out very well.
Display
His Majesty the display to G2 – one of the main arguments in favor of this model. As in the G Pro, it is simply gorgeous! 5.2-inch IPS without air gap is covered by glass Gorilla Glass 3, boasts the highest resolution and outstanding responsiveness. Give it an extra kick the side frame width of only 2.6 mm, it is really very little – it seems that the display is just sticking out the smartphone to the front.
Stand to study the characteristics of displays: Left 4″ Retina, in the center of G2 LG Full HD IPS, right 4,99″ Full HD Amoled.
The density of dots per inch screen G2 does not disappoint: 424 ppi make every attempt to consider the pixels with the naked eye in vain. The display is very impressive and certainly smartphone owners take a lot of pleasure.
Unfortunately, the situation was not conducive to the exhibition accurate color reproduction research screen, so this has to be learned from the full testing. At first glance, however, this is also the situation is more than worthy.
In the meantime, the only fly in the ointment on the display – not record the maximum brightness. Make no mistake – it is enough to consider the picture even a bright sunny day. Just sometimes I would like to do a little brighter than the claimed 450 cd/m2 – in bright show floor screens look dull. In addition, with a significant heat inside the smartphone, it automatically limits the maximum brightness – perhaps even more so to get a “heat stroke.”
Although, given the very high resolution displays, greatly increase the brightness is not so easy to make constructive. Did you know that the more screen ppi, the lower its maximum brightness (with the same lighting system)? Well, this is the price for Full HD and excellent viewing angles IPS-technology. But this is not the disadvantage that it makes sense to discuss long – most owners simply do not notice it.
In general, for the display and for its integration LG gets a solid “perfect!”
Hardware Platform
Served as the basis for the latest smartphone system-on-a-chip Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 (chip MSM8974). It includes a quad-core processor with Krait cores 400, able to accelerate to the frequency of 2.3 GHz and a graphics accelerator Adreno 330. The chip is made on 28nm process technology, and is not only the most productive for today, but also one of the most economical. Complete the picture 2 GB of RAM and a 16-gigabyte flash drive. On the drive, given the lack of a memory card slot, a little stingy, of course – can only rely on cloud storage services such as Dropbox.
Performance LG G2 is really impressive, especially not in the synthetic benchmarks, and on a daily basis. The response to any action by virtually instantaneous, the smartphone can wait no longer, and the rendering interface, despite the higher resolution is not accompanied by annoying “lag”. This great achievement is not only a fast processor, but also a special graphics memory subsystem, allowing less to redraw the entire screen and save battery.
Exhibition copies the device did not work on the final version, but also because of the high load tests, benchmarks and permanently on screen heats up. Interestingly, when a smart hand, hardly noticeable heating – the whole heat is concentrated at the top, which is held at the normal outside palm. However, the built-in temperature control system did not allow LG G2 show the power of its processor, slightly limiting limiting frequencies. This control is, of course, can be turned off by the engineering menu, but most users are unlikely to know these subtleties. So I got the result in AnTuTu, which is far from the record on this model can be viewed as an indicator of how the smartphone will work in adverse conditions. If conditions permit, this figure exceeds the record 32,000 points.
There is no doubt in the fact that the graphics accelerator Adreno 330 will be under processing power. I do not have time to scroll through the tests 3DMark, but running heavy games like Real Racing 3D has passed without any problems: the game is going smoothly, with no delays. It is hoped that other games will work fine. When we have on hand will be a commercial sample unit to issue to which we will definitely be back.
Camera
Very few modern smartphones can boast such a compelling advantage as optical stabilization system. It allows you to take pictures without blurring at slower shutter speed in low light conditions. Combined with a 13-megapixel module Sony IMX135 Exmor RS and a lens with an equivalent focal length of the order of 29 mm and a maximum aperture F2.4 this gives great, very detailed pictures in just about any situation.
We should also mention the special shooting modes. Besides which has already become a standard HDR, which allows correctly exposed scene with bright light and deep shadows in one frame, pretty interesting possibility is to shoot with automatic removal of moving “noise” – people, cars or other objects accidentally falling into the frame. To do this, the camera takes shots, analyzes and proposes changes to eliminate the detected moving objects. The result – the picture just what you want to remove, and nothing more.
There is a panorama mode and VR-panoramas (very cool feature, all owners of G2 highly recommend to read it), avtoretushi, series, sports and night photography shoot, as well as automatic combining images from two cameras in one scene. There is shooting from the smile and take pictures in Time catch, which records not only the frames when you press the trigger, but that was for a second before.
From the video capabilities worth mentioning shooting mode Full HD 1080 p60 – ie with twice the frame rate. This increases the volume of commercials shot, but makes them move in a much more fluid, without the annoying “jumps”. Unfortunately, at the moment Youtube does not support frame rates above 30 frames / s, so the opportunity to show this is not so simple. However, when viewed on a computer or on the smartphone positive effect is even noticeable.
As a result, the camera LG G2 – one of the best in today’s flagship smartphones, gives a detailed and rich picture full of all the necessary functions and modes. And its optical stabilization, which allows to obtain more quality shots – a wonderful and much needed bonus.
The software and functionality
LG G2 runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean with a proprietary shell LG Optimus UI, one of the fastest and least irritating of all such programs. You can choose a theme and customize to your liking very much, almost everything.
In general, the interface is very similar to G2 G Pro, which we have already discussed, but there are interesting innovations. For example, the “guest” mode – when you submit your smartphone to a child or another person, you can set it up so that when you unlock it showed only a limited set of applications and settings. Thus, your “guest” will be able to use a smartphone, but do not have access to your personal files, and will not be able to make a significant change your settings.
To lock and unlock the smartphone does not need to access the hardware key, located on the rear panel. Simply double tapa on the screen: “tuk-tuk”, a smartphone wakes up, or vice versa, falls asleep. Very convenient.
Android software keys are nice because they can be customized to your liking. If the standard suite of “back”, “home” and “context menu” you are not satisfied, you can freely change the order or add here is the call button the top notification bar (not to drag her finger across the screen) and run QuickMemo, familiar to all users of smart phones LG program for creating quick notes. Very convenient!
QSlide allows you to run several applications on top of an already running program. This includes a video player, browser, phone, message list, calendar, e-mail, notes, recorder, calculator and file manager. Windows gadgets can scale and change of transparency – when the window is translucent, it passes “through itself” tapas and swipe to the main application running “under” him.
QuickRemote, as before, will make of LG G2 universal remote control for all home appliances in the home.
From branded “chips” should also mention the Smart screen, which keeps the screen on while you look at it, and Quiet mode, which is a mode of “do not disturb”. You can adjust the time range in which this function is activated every day (for example, in the evening and night hours).
Autonomy
For most flagship smartphones autonomy – this is very important and urgent problem. The powerful processor and graphics accelerator and display with Full HD resolution capable of active use in a matter of hours to defuse even the most capacious battery, so the question of energy savings all developers pay close attention.
LG has put a lot of effort to fit in a slim and compact smartphone bigger battery. The battery capacity is 3000 mAh at a voltage of 3.8 V. The shape of the battery under the hood repeats its shape for maximum use of available space.
In a show I have not had the opportunity to conduct a full test of autonomy smartphone. Therefore turn to the experience more successful foreign colleagues who have already managed to conduct a full test G2.
According to GSMArena, LG G2 lasted 25 hours of talk time, more than 11 hours of Web browsing and almost 12 hours of video playback – an outstanding result! A resource Anandtech generally called runtime G2 «shockingly good” and “very impressive” – as in the tests and in actual operation, and put it on this parameter in the first place among all modern smartphones. Also, there is a very rapid charge, which is also important for a battery capacity.
In the end, I can not wait to get access to the commercial model smartphone and check out these rave reviews in person. If it turns out that the LG G2 really allows you to actively use them more typical of the day, we can talk about the remarkable achievements in this field.
The preliminary results
After the release of the very popular Optimus G and the wonderful Optimus G Pro , LG continues to surprise and delight pleasure.And let the name of the new flagship disappeared word Optimus, but the device itself when we first met with him leaves a very good impression – both in terms of both design and performance, the quality of the display and the camera and battery life. Hopefully, during the full testing they will multiply even more.
Home sales LG G2 is expected on September 27, the estimated retail price of 5555 USD, which also looks quite reasonable against the background of the cost of other flagship devices. Well, be patient, the benefit will not be long the wait is.
Read another very interesting article about alternative energy of the Sun, water and air.
