LG GD550

Some customers across the world still look for phones with big buttons. Whether it is believable or not, it is the fact. The LG GD550 is on the safer side as it has less technical specifications inside it in order to make only few things to function wrongly. It may be less than a gadget for advanced users and a safe gadget for those who look in for basic devices. It is an old fashioned slider handset with a good measure of metal on the exterior and has a good keyboard. This is a new addition to the LG’s GD series of handsets that has devices ranging from basic touch screens to the extravagant Crystal displays.

Features

The GD550 Pure has a TFT display that measures 2.4 inches in dimension and has a resolution of 240 x 320 pixels. It supports 65 K colors and uses the Pure user interface. The handset packs a 5 megapixel camera equipped with auto focus. It is capable of capturing images with a resolution of 2560 x 1920 pixels and record videos with a resolution of 720 x 480 pixels and with a frame rate of 30 fps. The handset has 60 MB of internal storage capacity along with a micro SD card slot that can support cards up to 16 GB. There is a micro USB port and a 3.5 mm headset jack in the handset. It also has a HTML browser and a stereo FM radio with the RDS support. The handset supports class 10 GPRS with a speed of 32 to 48 kbps, class 10 EDGE with 236.8 kbps speed and 3G with HSDPA of 3.6 Mbps speed networks respectively. It also has the Bluetooth 2.1 with the A2DP technology. The included 900 mAh lithium ion battery provides a life of 320 hours of stand by time and 4 hours of talk time in the 3G networks.

Design

The GD550 Pure measures 105.5 x 51 x 12.4 mm in dimension and weighs around 132 grams. The design of the GD550 Pure is great with a blend of simplicity and maturity. The body is quite imposing but is clean from too much of embellishments. There are not many controls on it and it a good example of a mobile with minimal and traditional design. It has a TFT display that measures 2.4 inches in dimension and has a resolution of 240 x 320 pixels with support to 65 K colors. Though this display does not produce good contrast levels, it offers excellent viewing angles. The handset has good sunlight legibility also.

The large D-pad that is framed with metal is the main control for navigation in the GD550 Pure. There is a huge confirm key at the middle and it has LED backlighting. There are a couple of soft keys in between the display and the D-pad. All the keys are pleasant to press and provide a tactile feedback. The loudspeaker cum earpiece is at the center above the display. The volume rocker, flap covering the micro USB port and the dedicated camera key are on the right side while the Silent/Ring switch is on the left side. The top has the battery cover latch and the power key. The number pad is opened on sliding the handset upwards. The camera lens is at the back side of the handset.

Interface

The GD550 is the first handset to use the Pure user interface. As the name indicates, the interface is straightforward and easy to use. It is highly responsive and snappy. The slider form factor does some contribution to the interface. Once the handset is slide upwards, the main menu is opened while the screen gets locked on sliding the handset down. The lock screen displays the status bar on the top with the date and time line. This screen can customized with clock styles and wallpapers. It also includes dual time zones. It also displays notifications such as missed calls, new messages, etc. the notifications cannot be scrolled and the lock screen has to be removed by sliding the handset up. The main menu opens on sliding the handset and it displays a rotating view of five of the main icons. This occupies the upper half of the screen. They can be scrolled horizontally with the D-pad. The five icons represent the Camera, Calls, Messages, Organizer and More. The lower half of the screen displays the submenus of the selected menu icon. These are vertically scrollable.

Functions and Performance

The GD550 Pure has a phonebook that can store up to 1000 contacts each associated with some fields. It provides problem free and smooth performance in making calls. The in call quality and reception are good on either side. The smart dialing feature is lacking. It can support the SMS, MMS, email and EMS. The message editor is simple with basic looks. Creating an email account is very simple with the device. The image gallery is basic but has nice zooming and panning speeds. The music player supports the filtering of tracks based on categories and can be minimized on the background. It has five presets for the equalizer while it cannot create a new one. The video player is not very impressive with only limited options to delete and send files. The handset packs a 5 megapixel camera equipped with auto focus.

It is capable of capturing images with a resolution of 2560 x 1920 pixels and record videos with a resolution of 720 x 480 pixels and with a frame rate of 30 fps. The interface of the camera seeks some improvement and the image quality is also poor. The images lack details and suffer from over sharpening, noise reduction and aggressive compression. The colors are accurate and lively without any purple fringing. The videos also lack details and suffer from visible compression artifacts. The browser is good and basic with good page rendering. It lacks the Flash support and the small size of the display makes it less impressive.