LG Optimus T (Android smartphone) preview

 

So I managed to get my first smartphone – LG Optimus T from T-mobile. The phone was on sale on T-mobile’s prepaid site, I was able to get it for $120 with a $30 prepaid card. Although it’s described as refurbished, the phone came in in pretty good condition. The only thing that’s a little strange is that T-mobile puts the SIM card inside the phone already. I checked it to make sure that it’s NOT activated already. Accessories include a 2GB microSD card with adapter, a wall charger with detachable USB cable.

Spec:

General
2G Network
GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900

3G Network
HSDPA 1700 / 2100

Size
Dimensions
113.5 x 59 x 13.3 mm

Weight
129 g

Display
Type
TFT capacitive touchscreen, 256K colors

Size
320 x 480 pixels, 3.2 inches

- Accelerometer sensor for UI auto-rotate
- Proximity sensor for auto turn-off

Sound
Alert types
Vibration, MP3 ringtones

Loudspeaker
Yes

3.5mm jack
Yes

Memory
Phonebook
Practically unlimited entries and fields, Photocall

Call records
Practically unlimited

Internal
170 MB

Card slot
microSD, up to 32GB, 2GB included

Data
GPRS
Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots), 32 - 48 kbps

EDGE
Class 10, 236.8 kbps

3G
HSDPA 7.2 Mbps

WLAN
Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g, Wi-Fi hotspot

Bluetooth
Yes, v2.1 with A2DP

Infrared port
No

USB
Yes, microUSB v2.0

Camera
Primary
3.15 MP, 2048x1536 pixels, autofocus

Video
Yes, VGA@18fps

Secondary
No

Features
OS
Android OS, v2.2 (Froyo)

CPU
600 MHz processor

Messaging
SMS (threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Email, IM

Browser
HTML

Radio
Stereo FM radio

Games
Yes + downloadable

Colors
Burgundy, Titanium

GPS
Yes, with A-GPS support

Java
Yes, via Java MIDP emulator

- Digital compass
- Social networking integration
- Google Search, Maps, Gmail
- YouTube, Google Talk, Picasa
- DivX/Xvid/MP4/H.264/H.263/WMV player
- MP3/WAV/WMA/eAAC+ player
- Document viewer
- Organizer
- Voice memo/dial/commands
- Predictive text input (Swype)

Battery
Standard battery, Li-Ion 1500 mAh

Stand-by
Up to 450 h

Talk time
Up to 5 h

 

The first thing I did was rooting the phone so that I can use some apps such as Titanium backup (backup, removing apps), Link2SD (move SELECTED apps from internal storage to SD cards) without restriction. I followed this guide upto the recovery (backup rom) part, didn’t go further to flash a new custom rom since I found the stock system works good enough for my needs. Everything worked out smoothly. Rooting however is NOT to be confused with unlocking. I still need to call T-mobile for the unlocking codes after 60 days.

Since this is my first smartphone, I don’t have very high expectations for what it can do. I have previously owned an entry level Palm, but I wasn’t able to use it much, now it’s just sleeping in my drawer collecting dust. But now after almost a month of using of this LG Optimus T, I’m pretty impressed with what it can do. The most convenient feature is of course the WIFI, which greatly expands the usability of the phone. It integrates google services tightly. You can get all kinds of apps from Android market (or the slim version T-mobile market, not recommended). Of course you’ll have to appreciate majority of them are FREE. Most of the free ones are however ad based, but I don’t mind since developers are of course need to make a living. The performance is mostly decent enough, operation is pretty snappy most of the time. As someone who is moving from a Palm, the most significant change in the input method is instead of a stylus, now you use fingers. It’s a welcome change, but at the 3.2in screen size, I just get tons of input errors which I still have a hard time to overcome. You need to cut fingernails, I found that gets in the way too… But google did make some effort in simplifying the amount of input by including swype and google voice search. Still a stylus is much preferred at this screen size. Another change is the included gravity sensor to auto rotate screen.

  

The only thing is that the video playback performance is extremely poor, since it has a very weak 600Mhz CPU. Although the spec claims to play a variety formats: DivX/Xvid/MP4/H.264/H.263/WMV, from the videos I have tried, it barely managed to play a 640*480 DivX at 1Mbps.

 

Launcher, I found the pre-loaded LG launcher to be decent enough.