Gadgetory

after spending much of recent history is something of an also-ran in the US market LG is set on making a big dent in the Android world with its follow-up to last year's Optimus G the lg g2 with a new design and one of the beefiest spec sheets around the new flagship seems poised to finally earn LG some long-overdue recognition but in terms of features how much is too much let's find out I'm Michael Fisher this is PocketNow and this is our video review of the LG g2 if this phone spec sheet were the cast list of a Hollywood film the g2 would be one of the biggest blockbusters of the year it's one of the first smartphones to be powered by the new Snapdragon 800 SOC whose four cores run at 2.2 6 gigahertz that are backed up by 2 gigs of RAM the phone's storage is not expandable the but with 16 or 32 gig options most people will be covered and though the battery is embedded it tips the scales at 3000 milliamp hours or 11.4 watt hours for maximum endurance the camera is a 13 megapixel unit with optical image stabilization and the display is a 5.2 inch 1080p IPS panel with the density of 423 pixels per inch on top of those sits a bunch of bonus features like an IR transmitter Mirasol compatibility an FM radio and many more this phone is not playing around so how does all that power feel sitting in the palm of your hand well if you're still with us after that spec dump we'll tell you in a word disappointing it's not that the g2 feels cheap per se but it does represent a step backward for LG last year's Optimus G might have been a little on the low-profile side aesthetically but at least it's all glass construction gave it a premium feel the g2 with its glossy plastic and lightweight build feels a lot more like a Samsung device now look if you like the feel of the galaxy s4 as millions of people do you won't have a problem with the g2 we were just hoping for something a little more Premium from a late 2013 flagship on the plus side LG is gamble to place the volume and power standby keys on the back of the device has worked out well the new placement is pretty finger friendly in most situations and it's allowed the company to slim the screen bezels down to a tenth of an inch per side as a result the display dominates the front of the phone and it's truly stunning the software running on that display is sometimes equally stunning but not always for the right reasons LG informs us that the custom build of Android 4.2.2 is not final software but it's close enough to the release software that we're pretty confident this is almost identical to what people are seeing on store shelves on the plus side the software is eminently tweakable and usually quite responsive we said in our g2 vs. HTC one comparison video that the g2 doesn't know what lag is but unfortunately that's since proved untrue like most Android phones the g2 does stutter a bit as its home screens get more loaded down with apps and widgets but it's still impressively smooth most of the time given how many animations LG has shoehorn into the experience and you can adjust almost everything from unlock and scrolling animations to the home key button Rose appearance you can even put a shortcut button down at the bottom to deploy the notification shade with a tap that shade is a great example of an area we think LG misses the mark in software put simply it's a mess the toggles up top are scrollable and very convenient but the qslide shortcuts below waste a lot of space and they lead to small windowed versions of a limited selection of apps this is supposed to help with multitasking but the execution is not good enough to make it truly useful outside maybe hovering a calculator over your email window to add up expenses or something a qslide is a symptom of a larger problem the g2 features three different ways to multitask and only one of them is routinely useful that's not qslide and it's not LG's new slide aside feature either which is cumbersome and doesn't play nicely with many apps due to its side sliding activate gesture instead it's the stock app ribbon that remains useful which you can find on any Android phone LG would have been better served leaving well enough alone here or implementing a different multi screen approach as is it seems like a half realized effort to make the g2 into more than a smartphone given its large screen size that makes sense but it doesn't really work in a word LG's software experience is best described as overwrought the company has obviously done a lot of work to make the Android experience its own and look some of it really is beautiful but a lot of it is just tacky and there's very little attention to detail there are more korean to english translation problems and layout errors than there should be in software for a flagship device fortunately the sun comes out again when we take a look at the g2 s camera the 13 megapixel resolution is nice even if the phone defaults to 10 megapixel shots for wide angle cropping but the real halo feature is the optical image stabilization which LG has managed to include without resorting to a large unsightly bulge in the casing what's more the slimming down hasn't affected the OIS system's performance video shot with the g2 is very stable and the camera also does quite a nice job with saturation and exposure adjustments though it's a little slow in terms of autofocus for stills the g-tube packs a lot of viewfinder modes from the truly useful like manual focus adjustment to the just for fun like the dual shot yeah I mean dual camera feature yes it's almost a direct port of Samsung's camera software and let's face it so is a lot of the g2 software load but in the case of the camera it's a good copy that works well that's borne out by the stills the g2 captures it may not quite live up to the low-light performance of Nokia's Lumia line but it Trump's pretty much all of its Android competition in this space once you get into the light of day that's where the g2 s camera really shines sharp edges fine detail and rich use some might say - rich saturation for photos that really pop LG has definitely made a camera to be proud of here if photography factors heavily in your smartphone purchasing decisions the g2 is definitely a contender in other domains we go back and forth call quality on the g2 is just about average with callers telling us we sounded fine and our own experience on our end mirroring that except on speakerphone which was weak audio performance for media playback was also average with LG's acoustic enhancements sounding great through earbuds but again only average through the bottom mounted speakers which are low amplitude and a little on the tinny side while that low volume takes away from the gaming experience a bit gameplay itself was no problem during our one-week review period with titles like sparkle 2 and f-18 carrier landing performing flawlessly and we didn't have to worry about battery life much while playing either the g2 lasted over 26 hours of mixed use on our first time off the charger and it's performance has held up nicely since it would still be nice to have a removable battery and a part of that power savings is no doubt a result of no LTE on our global unit here but even so most moderate users should still feel ok taking the g2 on an overnight trip even if they forget their charger the g2 is a confusing device on the one hand it's got specs that beat most other phones out there with a gorgeous display and one of the best cameras we've seen on an Android phone on the other it's got a casing that doesn't really stand out from the crowd along with software that while very customizable is also tacky and over engineered with some pretty undercooked areas hiding in the shadows still the g2 is a better equipped contender than we typically see from LG and despite its similarity to Samsung's Galaxy family it does offer enough standouts to serve as a refreshing alternative to that Android juggernaut we give the LG g2 a 7 point 7 out of 10 so those are our thoughts on the lg g2 folks but before you go anywhere let us know what you think drop us a line in the comments tell us whether you would consider buying a g2 over something like a galaxy s4 and HTC One and then check out our comparison videos detailing those devices the full text of the g2 full review will be available at pocketnow.com starting September 18th go check that out but before you go anywhere please drop us a like if you enjoyed the video follow us on social media so you don't miss more from PocketNow but most importantly thank you for watching we'll see you next time