Gadgetory

LG is stepping its game abuzz it throws its latest smartphone into this year's group of flagships it's Joshua regard from Android authority what's going on everybody and I'm reporting to you live from New York City with your first look at the LG g4 given the different leaks that we've seen recently the new leather backings were already expected but more on that later the device we got ample time with was a titanium finished plastic build if you don't want one of the menu leather color options there will also be a gold version and a white ceramic finish plastic available give an LG success when it comes to curved displays it shouldn't come as any surprise that the g4 sports one but it's really subtle subtle enough in fact that the g4 will benefit from the durability afforded the Flex line without having a pronounced curve with a 5.5 inch display the g4 takes some of the best aspects of the previous two releases including their signature rear facing button layout that is easily hit by the index finger they'll distinct in the middle struck us as just a little bit showy the leather actually gives the g4 an enhanced feel it is sourced from actual cows and is vegetable tanned to give a warm look and an authentic feel plenty of colors including black blue and yellow will be available for the leather backing with even more coming in the summer the leather is also supposed to keep the back pretty cool to the touch closer to skin temperature no matter what temperature environment you are in and the best part all of the backings are removable which means a 3000 milliamp hour replaceable unit and a micro SD card slot that you might need for camera specific features are inside LG is tackling the Super AMOLED displays of the world with an enhanced version of their already well-regarded IPS panels what we have here is a quantum display aptly named because the RBG coloration is achieved by passing colors through a specific phosphor layer quantum physics they said their focus however was on making the quad HD display rival the DCI standard that is found in general television and cinema whereas the Super AMOLED display might over saturate colors a bit past the DCI standard the LG g4 quantum display hits 90% of that mark now we didn't see any problems in our short time with the g4 display experience though the immersion achieved in the G flex 2 is no longer observed obviously because the curve is more subtle now which brings us to performance where the LG g4 is the result a very close relationship with Qualcomm the Snapdragon 808 with three gigabytes of RAM powers this phone and has been optimized as much as possible 4G for operation much like Samsung did with their in-house XE knows the Snapdragon 808 is cater specifically to the needs of the g4 and I am happy to report that the phone moved very smoothly in my usage though we might not have had the best time with the G flex 2 in terms of performance such is not the case thus far with the g4 and that's a good development already mentioned before is the removable back that means the LG g4 sports a couple of features many current flagships actually lack replaceable battery and expandable storage LG claims that the battery life can get close to 20 hours of talktime and close to 95 hours for music playback but we'll look forward to our full review for those actual tests what we're really excited for as usual is the camera which LG put a lot of work into AF 1.8 aperture package 1ups the competition and also includes a larger sensor than plenty of the others found in flagships today OAS has also been enhanced with a wider stabilization range and color has been given a big focus with LG adding in what is called a color spectrum sensor found right next to the optics that will analyze the scene to help achieve the right white balance automatically and accurately so far colors on the photos look good but we will obviously test this out with our own unit in the future now what's really great is the manual mode which is another big story as LG has put in all of the big features photographers usually get in full cameras a full white balance gamut a lot of ISO stops manual focus even a histogram and even the ability to shoot raw and JPEG simultaneously which would definitely require the expanded storage option the g4 camera looks really robust and might be one of its greatest sells and finally in software we have a very familiar user interface that has been optimized in our short time with the phone lag and start over very minimal even if the look of the GUI hasn't changed much additions in the OS include an enhanced calendar that can save captures from most parts of the phone as reminders on dates and a more powerful gallery application that among other uses groups photos into memories categories for an easy way to look back on your photos of worthy mention is LG's continued relationship with Google as the g4 will sport an almost Nexus like experience as they said chrome is the default browser Google Drive is integrated across LG Apps and plenty of LG's applications already work well with Android wear not to mention a free 100 gigabyte Google Drive storage option for two years and so there you have it the LG g4 likely to be priced similarly to the LG g3 adds own launch and do out by June we've seen companies rethink that our smart phone philosophies and then others simply refined the established formula LG seems to be doing a bit of both making a phone that can be a fashion statement a powerful camera companion or even a mini theatrical experience due to the quantum display well might excite us the most though is that the LG g4 quite possibly can be all of these things at once stay tuned for even more from our coverage here in New York City here at the LG g4 launch at Andrew thority