LG Optimus G Pro: The new phablet king

 

South Korean manufacturer LG is on a spree to challenge its cross town rival Samsung on all fronts in the smartphone market. While its answer to Galaxy S III in the form of the acclaimed Optimus G was much delayed, the company has taken a slight lead on Galaxy Note III (going by the rumoured specs of the upcoming Samsung phone). The company launched the Optimus G Pro in February this year, with specs that will help it match what the next-gen Note phablet is likely to offer.

At the India launch event for the Optimus G Pro, the company compared the handset to the currently available Galaxy Note II several times. While the two phones are miles apart when it comes to features and spec sheets, it is a wise comparison since the latter has a huge fan following in India.

We do a review of the LG Optimus G Pro to see exactly how good it is and whether it is a better buy than Samsung Galaxy Note II and indeed over the upcoming Note III, going by leaked specs. 

Hardware and design:

LG Optimus G Pro features a 5.5-inch screen, just as big as the one in Galaxy Note II. However, at first look you will see the difference between the two displays. The LG phone's screen is considerably clearer and brighter than that of Note II. This is because the smartphone features screen resolution of 1920x1080p, with pixel density amounting of 401ppi. In contrast, Note II user has to stay content with relatively low 1280x720p resolution and 267ppi pixel density. The LG phone has a huge advantage over its Samsung rival in this area.

The phone packs the same 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon S600 processor that we saw in LGOptimus G. The phone has 2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage, microSD card support up to 32GBand a 3,140mAh removable battery. Its connectivity features include 2G, 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, microUSB, infrared and NFC. On the back, you get a 13MP camera with LED flash, while a2MP camera is placed in the front. All in all, LG Optimus G Pro has all the makings of a top-endphablet.



Coming to design, you will find that LG Optimus G Pro vastly differs from its sibling Optimus G. Instead of the finely cut, sharp edges that defined the look of Optimus G, you fill find that the new phablet is characterized by curves. In fact, it looks quite like Note II, albeit slimmer and longer. Nevertheless, the phone feels good in the hand and all buttons are easy to access, though we feel that the positions of the volume rocker and Q Memo key should be interchanged as the former is used more often.

The phone is made entirely using plastic, instead of premium materials like glass and metal. At 172 gram, it is not the most lightweight phablet in the market today, but still weighs lesser than Samsung Galaxy Note II and Sony Xperia Z Ultra.

The front holds the secondary camera and the usual set of sensors above the screen and the three-key layout below it. The audio jack and IR blaster are on top of the phone, while the microUSBport is at the bottom. On the left is the QMemo shortcut key as well as the volume rocker, while the Power/Lock button is on the right. The speaker grille sits on the left side of the rear camera, while the LED flash is on its right.

The back of the device bears a shimmering pattern, similar to the design we have seen in OptimusG as well as Nexus 4 (also manufactured by LG). However, the effect is not as attractive onOptimus G Pro's plastic body as it is on the glass back of the other two smartphones.

Software:

Sadly, LG Optimus G Pro runs on Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean), in a market where all top-end handsets are powered by Android 4.2. Even though the upgrades in the latest version of Google's free OS are not too many, we would still like to have the best in hand when paying as high as Rs42,500 for a phone.

However, the Korean manufacturer has used its Optimus UI on top of the operating system in this phone. We have seen this user interface in Optimus G and OptimusL7 II dual. This skin has several good things on its side. It is very light, making the overall user experience very zippy. It is also the only Android skin that supports landscape orientation. It offers much more customization than the custom UIs of other manufacturers.

The notification bar has the usual toggles (spread across three tabs), access to floating apps, brightness etc. You can make notes or annotate on any homescreen or app via QMemo(accessible via the hardware key on top left side or the app itself). Floating apps, which Samsung and Sony also offer, are apps that open in small windows rather than taking up the whole screen. You can move them around, change their size or alter their transparency levels. By default, you get five floating apps, Videos, Web Browser, Memo, Calendar and Calculator; others can be downloaded from the app marketplace.


LG Optimus G Pro also has a notification LED light that is embedded in the Home key, instead of being placed on top of the screen, as is the case with most phones. You can choose the colour of LED light assigned to your contacts (in the Contacts app). Other customization options in the phone include home screen transition effects and preloaded themes. The phone pauses videos automatically when you look away from the screen; you can hold an icon and tilt phone sideways to move towards the right or left homescreen.

Camera:

The new Optimus G Pro has a 13MP camera on the back, which takes images with good details even though there is some noise. However, colour reproduction in the images is not exactly accurate, though it is extremely close. The daylight photos we captured were good, but lowlightimages suffered as the LED flash is not powerful enough. Volume rocker key doubles up as a hardware camera key in this phone.

The Camera app has features like Burst Mode, voice commands (say terms like LG and cheese to click images), HDR and panorama. Apart from these, the phone has several unique features like Beauty Shot, which alters features of the subject to make the face brighter and smoother. Time Catch takes quick photos even before you capture any image so that you can also save lost moments. 
The dual capture mode works while capturing photos as well as videos, wherein the front as well as rear cameras operate simultaneously to capture the subject as well as your own expressions in real time (this feature is present in other phones like Samsung Galaxy S4HTC One, and now Nokia Lumia 1020). Other cool features in the phone's camera are capturing a photo while recording a video and 360-degree panorama.

In terms of megapixel count, LG Optimus G Pro's camera ranks in the league of Samsung Galaxy S4 and Sony Xperia Z. However, as we saw in Optimus G, LG's 13MP camera is not really a match for the best in the segment. While the image quality has improved a lot as compared toOptimus G, it still does not match the photos delivered by Samsung Galaxy S4. It is likely thatS4's imaging capabilities will be replicated or even bettered in Note III.

Performance:

The Snapdragon 600 processor that Optimus G Pro carries is one of the most powerful in the market. It delivered excellent results when we tested it earlier in Optimus G and the streak continues with this phone. On Antutu benchmark, it delivered a score of over 19000, which is respectable by any yardstick. However, it is not the highest in phones currently available in India (HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4 deliver higher scores). More importantly for LG, the upcoming Samsung Galaxy Note III is said to beat these scores by a huge margin, with leakedAntutu screenshots showing that it notches up 34000 on the same test.

The display of LG Optimus, though gorgeous, is quite reflective and easily gets smeared with fingerprints. The colours are good while viewing videos but the contrast is a little off. Nevertheless, in big-screen smartphones in India, this is one of the only two phones that deliver such display quality, the other being Lenovo K900.

If you find the phone too big for your hands, you can choose the one-handed operation feature, where the keyboard, phone dialler etc can be moved towards the left or right so that it is easier to type on the big screen.

One thing we liked about the phone is its music player app, which is smooth, clean and has a YouTube icon that allows you to search for the song's video on the video sharing website directly from the music player. The stock video player of the phone can handle all popular video formats and features in-video zooming by default.

The 3,140mAh battery of LG Optimus G Pro is one of the biggest selling points of this phone. It last us over a day on a single charge, with usage being two-three hours of internet browsing and videos, four-five hours of music playback, an hour of gaming and calling.

Rivals:

LG Optimus G Pro obviously targets the high-end phablet market that Samsung Galaxy Note II dominates. However, this phone has to not only compete against Note II, but also Lenovo K900. Lenovo is not known for its smartphones in India, but K900 is a direct competitor of Optimus G Pro, albeit with a price difference of over Rs 10,000.

Both the phones have 5.5-inch displays with 1080p resolution and 401ppi pixel densities as well as13MP cameras. However, the LG device bags a major victory due to a more powerful processor, though Lenovo's handset is made using a much more durable material, steel, and runs on Android 4.2.

Overall, LG Optimus G Pro pushes the right buttons and can lord over the top-end phablet market easily.

Verdict:

If you want a top-end phablet today, then LG Optimus G Pro is the device for you. However, its stay at the top is likely to be short as Samsung is expected to launch the Galaxy Note III at the start of September. The upcoming gadget will have two crucial advantages - a bigger screen and a faster processor.

If you can wait for another couple of months to spend over Rs 40,000 on a phablet, then Note III would be the device of choice. But if your purchase needs to be made in the next few weeks, then we have no qualms in recommending LG Optimus G Pro over any phablet in India, including Samsung Galaxy Note II.

What we like:

Gorgeous screen
Fast processor
Great battery

Several customization options


What we don't like:

Sub-par camera
High price
Plastic body

Price: Rs 42,500