The LG KU990 Viewty Mobile Phone - Martin's Quick Review

While there are other 5 megapixel camera phones on the market, our experience with the LG KU990 Viewty has been an eye opening experience. Not because it's the most gee whiz camera on the market, but because it combines a rich panoply of easy to use features in a nice, compact format.

What makes the Viewty such a pleasure to hold is its quality ergonomic design – it's basically a touch screen phone that slips nicely into your hand, whether yours are small (as my daughters are) or meat hooks (like mine). The touch screen is quick and bright and responsive, and the side mounted rocker-wheel is right up there with the iPod's "click wheel" in terms of "Why didn't they think of this years ago?" user interfaces. We found it to be a dream to shuffle through the options, and the menus clearly had someone paying attention to people learning to use the phone when they were laid out. (Far too many consumer electronics menus are laid out by engineers for engineers, rather than aimed at an end-user). As an added bonus, the touch screen has a vibrate function that I can only describe as pure magic – it gives most of the sensation of hitting physical keys without, well, physical keys.

The camera itself has a 5 megapixel CCD with a good response rate, and excellent saturation and color response. The Xenon flash is a wonderful addition for something this size, and the autofocus is excellent. Pictures show up wonderfully on the aforementioned bright touch screen, with a shutter delay of under one second. We do wish there were a lens shutter on the optics. Indeed, a lack of cover is the primary complaint about the phone. The touch screen is a fingerprint/oil magnet, and we were always afraid of scratching it, though it held up to teenager abuse more readily than expected.

Pictures are vivid and crisp, and the camera is even capable of taking 120 frame per second video, and uploading it straight to YouTube, which is, as near as I can tell, a first. The data connections are very quick, with HSDPA being the norm. Its web browser steals a march from the Apple iPhone, with the ability to browse full sized web sites, munge them around with your fingertips, and zip in to read what you want to read. (Be warned – get the flat rate data plan with this phone. You won't believe how much it changes your perceptions of what a data phone can be.) The built in photo viewer application is also very "iPhone-like", allowing you to drag them around, push into them to zoom in, and add doodles and annotations and some minor color correction and red eye reduction.

If the LG Viewty were JUST a pocket sized camera with video functions, we'd probably be happy with it. As a phone, it supports the full gamut of digital music formats, and its calendaring apps are excellent. Sound quality is very good, and we were quite pleased with the quality of its speaker phone.

If you are on a budget, compare the cheapest LG KU990 mobile phone deals or consider mobile phone contracts with a free Apple iPod Touch. With a little research you can get the phone you want without breaking the bank.