Hands On: LG Optimus GT540

The LG Optimus GT540 is LG’s second Android smartphone in the Indian market after the LG GW620. By all accounts, it looks like LG is taking the cautious approach with respect to Google’s mobile operating system. We received the LG Optimus in our labs and while a full review will be coming very soon, here’s a hands-on preview of the device.

The LG Optimus that we got has an all-plastic body with a brushed steel finish. Although, it’s not exactly metal, the Optimus still looks classy. The phone is built well and feels kind of heavy in the hand. The Optimus is currently running Android v1.6 and LG has said that a 2.1 update will be made available in the future. However, we got in touch with LG and the dates weren’t clear at this juncture.

LG has played around with the default Android UI. You can choose between three, five and seven homescreens, all of which can be customized with shortcuts, widgets and folders. The notifications bar that slides out from the top of the screen has also changed a little bit. LG has added a couple of buttons that let you switch on/off the phone’s sound, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS at the top of the notification bar.

While playing around with the Optimus for an hour or so I realized that the touch input wasn’t as accurate as I would have liked it. In fact to get somewhat decent accuracy I had to calibrate the touchscreen a couple of times. Things like this make you miss capacitive touchscreens.

The LG Optimus also came pre-installed with a couple of interesting apps that you won’t find on a default Android installation including Ndrive- a GPS navigation tool and FourSquare the very popular location based app.

The LG Optimus is now available in stores for a price of Rs. 12,999. We’ll have the review up very soon. Till then, here are some images to keep you satiated:

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