View-ty A Kill (LG KU990 Viewty)

Member Name: icetsunami

Product:	LG KU990 Viewty
Date:	30/06/09 (29 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Full touchscreen, good camera, DivX support

Disadvantages: No physical keypad

Back in Black:

This addition to LG's 'Black' series has been out a while now and thoroughly reviewed though I do feel it is still relevant in terms of both spec and price. The Viewty (strange name) is in a nicely shaped and solid feeling candy bar shape in a choice of black or silver.

A-Z:

The Viewty packs a substantial arsenal of specifications that still cut it when placed amongst mid-range mobiles.
Connectivity is via HSDPA, GPRS and EDGE. Fans of synching will be pleased with the obligatory bluetooth 2.0 and USB 2.0 support.
The 262k display is a 3" touch screen with haptic feedback with a resolution of 240*400 and is very nice to look at.
Music file support comes in the shape of MP3, WMA and AAC plus AMR voice. Playback is decent as its not a dedicated music player but really unless you are a diehard audiophile it will suffice. The FM radio inclusion is also a welcome feature though through experience it tends to be rarely used.
Imaging comes from a 5.1m camera with strobe flash, AF, MF and ISO 800. The pictures are of a good standard generally but I found dark environments a struggle. If you like to play around with settings you could improve the situation possibly. The camera does capture VGA quality video at 30FPS @ 640*480 and QVGA @ 320*240. Playback gives 3GP, Mpeg4 and DivX.
Storage capacity is a poor 100mb but is expandable to 2GB via SD and MMC.
Be aware that there is NO physical keypad.

In reality?

Now a lot has been said about the sensitivity and usability of the touchscreen. I had no problems at all using touch or stylus and it provides nice levels of feedback when navigating the interface. When the phone is in a case I have noticed some reduced sensitivity on the right edge of the screen when scrolling through menus. There has been no detrimental effects to the functionality of the phone otherwise.
The custom OS devised by LG is simple and relatively intuitive and most people would have no need to refer to the manual. Call quality is very good and the camera is consistent in providing good shots.

Spend or save?

In my opinion this is a very good phone which is crammed with all the necessary features you would expect. There's no Wi-fi or GPS but this handset can be picked up for less than £100 and holds its own against many similarly priced models, if not exceeding them.
Spend your money with confidence. If Wi-fi and GPS are really that important you should look to the high end Nokia's, HTC's and similar smartphones.

In the end:

First rate. I would have no hesitation in recommending this handset to anyone.

Summary: Excellent

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