Review: LG Optimus 7Q

Brenton Currie
Tuesday, 26 July 2011 05:04

Mobile devices

It's an upside but, as seems to be the case for most QWERTY phones at the moment, also its downfall. When you pick up the device for the first time, you'll notice the weight, thanks mostly to the keyboard under the phone's capacitative touch screen. It also makes the phone difficult to carry in your pocket, although the curved edges mean the device feels smooth in your hand. However for those who insist on using a physical keyboard, the Optimus provides a welcome relief from the seven other Windows Phone 7 phones available in the Australian market at the moment.

The keyboard itself is far from cramped, with the keys evenly spaced with a nice gap in between meaning typing can be undertaken quickly with few typing errors. There's even a button on the keyboard especially for emoticons as well as a function and caps lock key, both of which are curiously placed on the far left-hand side of the device and are smaller, circular buttons. On the whole, the keyboard is really quite good for a mobile phone.

Snappy and speedy are two words to describe just how fast most interactions are on the Optimus. Flipping through menus, loading applications and playing games all occur very quickly and make for a pleasurable experience when compared to other smartphones. Battery life is reasonable, with the device able to last a day of moderate usage.

Of  course being a Windows Phone 7 phone the device has to feature a camera, search and back button - with all bar the camera button found at the bottom of the screen. Unfortunately they don't vibrate when you press them - something we quite liked on other Windows Phone 7 devices. Still, the camera key is located on the side of the device, which when pressed will launch the Panorama application to allow you to take pictures with the 5 mega-pixel camera found on the rear of the device, which can shoot video and still images. Unfortunately there's no front-facing camera, meaning video calls are out of the question on the Optimus.