The Ultra-Wide Optimus Vu Hands-On Review

Before the MWC, LG revealed the Optimus Vu in a press release and I thought that it was a very interesting product because it’s screen aspect ratio was rare among Smartphones. Most other Smartphones have a 16:9 or 16:10 aspect ratio but this device has a 4:3 ratio. This arosed my curiosity and when I had a chance to actually experience the device at MWC I had a number of different thoughts.

It is Big and Wide
There’s no need to handle the device to know this – at a glance the device looks big and wide. Reading about the 4:3 ratio, I thought that it would be wide but it was even bigger than I imagined.

Strongly Resembles Prada
Optimus Vu looks exactly like a wider version of the Prada 3.0. You could even say that Optimus Vu is a Prada with a wider screen. The back of the phone doesn’t have Prada’s Saffiano pattern. Instead it has a similar but distinct pattern. The phone is is also surprisingly thin!

Holding it in my Hand
When I held the phone with one hand, I could feel its size. It is quite big so even I, a grown man, had to stretch out my hand to grasp the whole thing. Despite its large size, the phone is very light.

Great Readability
The screen is one of the highest quality I’ve seen. Even small letters are very readable on the 768 x 1024 resolution 5-inch screen. I can’t say enough on this – the readability is just AWESOME!

The Aspect-Ratio while Viewing a Document
The 4:3 ratio does have its own strengths and weakness. The experience of viewing cartoons depended on the format but when you view a document or webpage it feels so much nicer.

Watching a Video
Videos cannot fill the screen and this is a shortcoming for watching video. But when I stood the device up, video did look better. If the phone has a DMB tuner built in, it will be better to hold the phone vertically.

Ordinary Touch Pen
Optimus Vu comes with a stylus. While it is comfortable to hold the electrostatic pen, it does not work on the hardware buttons below the screen.

The Pen was… not so good
I thought that because the Optimus Vu has a 5-inch screen and a wide aspect ratio, the pen might be necessary. But I found that the pen was not as advanced as I would have liked. When I tried to write or draw something I felt its limitations.

It is more like a Smart pad than a Smartphone…

The Optimus Vu was more like a 5-inch Smart pad rather than a Smartphone and its best feature was being able to view data in a convenient way. This doesn’t mean that the phone quality is bad – it’s just that due to its size, it wasn’t easy to have a conversation while holding this phone with one hand. I loved the readability of the phone but the pen wasn’t very useful and it performed poorly. Maybe the sample was a problem but the company will need to improve the pen eventually.

*NOTE: This blog post is from CHITSOL’s Blog, a Korean IT Blogger, on February 29, 2012. If you have any further information about this blog post please contact us.(AdvancedTechKR@gmail.com) We will be happy to help you to get the related information. Thank you.