Last week LG sent me one of their new “Chocolate” (KG800) mobile phones on loan.
I’m a bit late blogging about it, but rather than immediately blogging “ooh shiny”, I wanted to give it a real trial before reporting back…
For a start, it’s worth pointing out that I tend to hate mobile phones and the mobile phone industry. In particular I’ve discussed before my lack of interest in the “secondary mobile phone company” products, namely the non Nokia/Sony Ericsson phones from companies such as Samsung, Motorola and LG.
The KG800 packaging is practically Apple-like. It resembles a chocolate box (same shape, look/feel, etc) and opens up to reveal different compartments for the charger, USB cable, hands free, etc.
Personally, I’m not fussed either way about packaging, but I’m minded of Joel Spolsky’s Etech05 presentation on the importance of aesthetics and emotion being an important part of people’s perception of a product.
So, look, I’ll admit it – the phone itself is a much prettier and classier designed phone then I expected from a non-European manufacturer. My experience of Asian-manufacturer mobile phones is that they are usually not quite as visually stunning as their European counterparts. In other words, they tend to focus on functionality, or size, instead of the Joel Spoolsky-observed aesthetics/emotion concept.
Some of the things I like about the phone include:
- Overall design – the all-black shiny body with low-profile screen is v nicely designed
- Build quality – the slider on the phone feels really solid
- The touch-sensitive buttons are great
- The dimensions of the phone, its less than a cm thick
- The menu system, generally speaking, is as intuitive as a Sony Ericsson T610/K750
However there are a list of things that I was slightly disapointed with:
- The phone scratches easily (it comes with a little draw-string bag, but it’s quite impractical to keep the phone in there and answer it in time before it diverts to voicemail)
- The port on the phone to plug in the charger, USB cable and hands-free is really tricky to pull out and I keep thinking I’m going to rip it from the thin bit of plastic it hangs from. Considering the phone needs charging every couple of days, it would have been nice to have had a stand for the KG800 to sit in (and charge from a port in the base of the phone).
The biggest disappointment – or tease at least – has been the hands-free mic which doubles as an mp3-player remote. When I saw it, I thought the phone was going to be an amazing mp3 player. The remote has all the buttons you need in addition to doubling up as a microphone for the hands-free system – it’s pretty cool.
However the KG800 only has 128MB of memory to store MP3’s on – which is practically nothing (maybe 1 or 2 albums max). Sadly there are no slots on the phone to upgrade via external memory cards.
I’m not quite sure why LG released a phone with a really nifty mp3 remote that only contains 128MB of RAM because clearly you aren’t going to have many tracks to warrant a remote control… oh well.
So don’t get me wrong, I do like the phone. But clearly it’s been designed for a particular style-conscious market such as those who currently own Motorola V3 RAZR and SLIVR phones. It’s not for people who want strong personal information management applications, etc.
Even without the sweet little remote the phone stands up as a nicely designed, easy to use, uber-cool mobile.
Of course, if you’re looking to trade in your Crackberry, then this phone is not for you. But if you’re in the market for a style-phone then I’d certainly recommend the LG Chocolate Phone to you.
I give the LG KG800 8/10.
My Sanyo phone was awesome. Seriously at the time you couldn’t really get a better phone when it came to features.
The style is what let it down. Sony/Nokia know what there doing when it comes to style but how long do you feel it will take LG, Sanyo, Samsung, even Toshiba etc to start paying western designs to design there phones? Not long, specially with such a large market in the west.
Don’t touch just anything…
If you’ve read any of the media or blog reviews of the Chocolate Phone that we’ve featured here, you’ll know by now that one of the key features is it’s glowing red touch pad.
Once you’ve touched it, you won’t want t…
i think that fone is f**kin wiked i want one
Superb lookin little phone all the basci features, but thats about it, basic. The problems that i have occured with my little gem is that unlike many mobiles it wont let me play soundclipsabove 100kb which i quite shockin considering its not that big another problems is that any picture above 460 kb cannot be displayed eithr which was no problem for my sony k750i which in my opinion sony are at the forefront of mobile technology and marketing, but as i sayi cant knock the lg chocolate, it does make calls, lol
That phone is so cool! I really want one! so do all my mates! lol! :oD
my lg is the worst phone i have ever had i have had it a month. The battery life is trrible, the screen has for some reason gone muliti coloured and in general it is terrible. DON NOT GET THIS PHONE IT IS FULL ON FUCKING BOLLOCKS……………………
i am getting his phone soon (tomorrow) i will let you know in bout 2 weeks how i get on with my phone
1st impressions looks cool bit worried about the tough screen callin people in my blazer pocket though.
I’m considering this phone but not sure after reading a few comments. What i really need to know is the memory good? Can you hold alot? I’ve currently got E720 which has 81920k (whatever that means). Memory is ok but i want better but obviously if this phone (albeit it looks better) is smaller, then i will not be purchasing it.
I’ve just recieved this phone free on upgrade. DON’T BUY IT. When the phone gets a little warm, either through using it for more than 5 minutes or in a warm place, the touchpad starts to react to the heat and freaks out. I was at a concert last night trying to take pictures and it kept on cancelling them and deleting them, i got really annoyed. I’m thinking of sending it back.
Had this phone about 4 days now and even though it looks amazing Im not sure if ive made a wise choice. Like the post above the touchpad starts to do its own thing when its warm and its very easy to cut off a call with your face or ear mid conversation.
Blue tooth is very slow and a few of my friends have had problems getting more games downloaded onto the phone.
Wish id bought the new samsung!
Hey guys. I’m having a small problem with my LG and I was wondering if anyone can help. I’ve saved a bunch of pictures under PHOTOS and OTHER in “My stuff” and I can’t figure out how to use them as display pictures. Can anyone help???
i have had my lg chocolate since may, it is now back in the hands of lg, the screen went multi-coloured then white then turn fuzzy and diagonal, i also have serious problems with getting a signal. so in other words, DON’T BUY THIS PHONE!
Ref post above about My Stuff photos being used as contact display pictures – you can’. you ave to use the ones taken by the phone at 72dpi setting, which is very titchy!
sorry for confusion on post above “can'” should read “can’t”
I have one. Yes its cool, but i have a BIG problem. It won’t turn on! It’s new, i got it in august 2006 and now when im trying to turn it on it wouldn’t, i’ve tried everything, charged it, top up my credit, but nothing, can anyone help me please?
Well, my hubby surprised me with the phone after I saw it on the tele and said ohhh I want that! So at first LOVED it and all the gadgets…there is a service on it my area doesnt have yet (vcast) which is partually y i wanted it. Got the little san disc microchip thing holds tons of stuff pictures music ect…music only worked once on it so I deleted it an havent had time to redownload it…takes awesome pics!
now my clear button doesnt work and I have to press rather hard to use the send button when making a call (even played with sensor setting) going to return it for a new one and I hope it performs better. (only had it a month) Of course now they are coming out with new colors :(( But i can always trade in .
battery life is rubbish – one long call and your gonna have to recharge again but worse is the volume, i can’t hear a thing anyone says! – going in for repair (just over a month old) but do not feel to optimistic at all.
I have had this phone for 4 months and it has just gone in for a repair as I can’t hear anything on it after a few minutes. Another problem I have is that my LG Chocolate white phone is starting to turn yellow.
Does anyone else have these problems?
Got the LG Chocolate (Black) about a month ago. All the cool features and that everyone working at the wireless store had one. So I picked one up. First thing I noticed was the low sound so I returned to the store and they told me to go to Verizon store and they would download the handsfree program. Verizon told me it already had it installed and showed me how to use it. I was not thrilled about the handsfree volume but I figured I was going Bluetooth anyway. Next thing I noticed was that only two day later I ended up with a scratch on the screen but don’t know how it got there. It did not come with a memory card (thank God I took my old one out of my Nextel phone before I traded it in). I still have to get a better holder from an online store and a data cable and earphones with was weird since all the Nextels I owned before came with everything I needed. Also not thrilled with the attachment you need to plug into the phone (pulls out easily) and has the micro small jacks for the ear phones. Also noticed that pics that are too large will not adjust to fit the screen like Nextels did, and if they are too large the will not load as wallpaper. So keep all this in mind if you plan on getting the chocolate.
I bought the Chocolate for Christmas and this has been the most disapointing phone I have ever owned. The battery life is awful (I had to re-charge after two and a half hours) despite a rated talk time of 3.5 and the charger plug-in is extremely difficult and sensitive to plug in. Every time I had to re-charge (which is frequent) I felt like I was going to break the plug in piece.
To be fair, I actually liked the keypad despite its sensitivity and I liked the slider feature since I am not a big flip phone fan. The poor battery life alone however made me want to get rid of this phone. My Krzr gets a little over 4 hours talk time and is much easier to use.
its not all bad and since getting i can just say that the phone is ok nothing spesh. i have had no problems since i got it about 4 months ago until yesterday. THE LIGHT WON’T BACKLIGHT WON’T TURN OFF WHEN I SHUT THE SLIDE AND TO MAKE MATTERS WORST THE PHONES IS MAKING THIS SOUND EVERY 4 SECONDS therefore forcing me to leave it on vibration or turn the phone off altogether. I will be getting it fixed soon but it is very frustrating and almost reduced me to tears last night.c v
was thinking of buying LG Chocolate but after reading such horrible comments i have changed my mind. I would say NO ONE SHOULD BUY IT.
it would be waste of money
I bought my husband an LG800 for xmas, he has not been able to get music to the mp3 player, it is showing that it is on the player, but coming up list empty so he cannot access the player, has anyone had this problem/solved it ? Also how do you turn it off ?
My phone doesn’t ring and vibrate at the same time, it doesn’t have that feature, and now it doesn’t even vibrate at all, and I’ve only had it 2 months now
i got this phone 3 days ago had to sent it back because it was faulty, now got a new one and having probs trying to get music for my mp3 player can any 1 help……
My battery life sucks. I took it into a technician and they sent me a new battery, and that battery sucks as well. I think the phone design is defective. Hopefully, Verizon will trade me for a new phone.
As for getting songs on the MP3 player, I just bought a USB scandisk card reader for $15 at Best Buy. From there I just drop the MP3’s into the right folder and the phone plays the songs. Pretty easy.
You don’t need the music hook up wires/package at all.
I Bought the Chocolate Phone only 3 weeks ago and I have encountered numerous problems.
The battery life is so short that you can’t go with one day without recharging it. The Ringtones don’t work properly and the phone is easily scratched. The touchpad can be too sensitive at times and makes it easy to accidently call people!
2 days ago the phone decided that it wouldn’t turn on! When i rang up the company i bought it from they told me that it is a problem with the phone..like hello if LG know that the phone do’sen’t even turn on why even sell it!
Its not even a month old and i’ve had so many problems with it! Message to everyone DON’T BUY THE CHOCOLATE PHONE its a WASTE OF MONEY!
lg is crap, my fone screen goes all white and then lines started on screen in different angles took it to fone shop and they said it is a blue tooth virus
bought my white chocolate phone in august 2006, as soon as i got it home, it wouldnt ring or take any incoming calls, took it back and got a new one. couple of months down the line, i couldnt hear anybody when i rang them up but they could hear me. that problem went away and now im having problems with the screen blanking out and just turnin white. also the screen goes fuzzy in the top left hand corner. its such a nice looking phone and im gutted its doing all this. dont bother getting it as you can see by how many negative comments there are.
livi
you can put your fone on battery save in settings also if your screen goes funny its porbably been over heated so you neeed to turn it off take out the back and then let it rest for a couple of mins. you also have a buffer with you LG so that if it gets scrayched you can buff the scratch away
Exactly how do you put the phone on battery save? I have looked through every menu. Also, my phone stops ringing so quickly – I constantly miss calls. How can I change the number of rings?
I got the Pink LG Choclote phone on my free upgrade at the carphone warehouse ! DO NOT INVEST!!!! i am so glad i took out insurance on this piece of shit the screen alwas splits in two and i have to turn it off and on about 20 times to get a decent picture i cant watch videos anymore or record any or take photos you get one crapy maths game my headset doesnt work and the screen is just fucked the picture is stupid bluetooth is too slow and the quality of the phone is stupid !when you put your phone on vibrate before you go to sleep incase anyone rings and you dont want to be disturbed and youve set the alarm the alarm only vibrates!the battery life is the worst ever ! i took it to the shop and the man blammed me but i think i’ll get my phone sent off and i want a replacement the best phones i recommend is the ” Sony Ericsson Walkman ” series … reliable but mine got stolen off british airways wen their was a terrorist attack on augest the 10th ! DO NOT BUY THE LG CHOCLOTE PHONE UNLESS YOU WANT HELL AND A SHIT PHONE !
can any 1 help me i bought an lg chocolate second hand ive got a voice mail message up in the corner but there is no voice mail message at all so can some 1 please help me and tell me how to getit off please
i had the chocolete for a bit now.. and i had problems.. my camera option shuts the phone off instantly! and now my screen goes white and wont work… im pissed i have no idea why its doing this 🙁 if sombody knows how i can fix this .. or if they know anything about it let me know
lg chocolate is the best phone ever and if any1 else says otherwise its cos theyr lying
this is fucking stupid.
i charge it first, and it says “battery full” then when i take the charger off it just dies and wont turn on.
I’ve literally had it for not even a day
k liek i got the phone.. cuz i had to get it fixed for the um3rd time i have had it since christmas and my music doesnt work when i putthe little chip in it is liek this is curropt 0code…the liek numbers… and like so i went to put picutes on it and it said somthgin gay..does anyone else have this problem and knwo how to fix it?
this chocolate phone is pissin me off big time sometimes it wont turn on and if it does the screen turns white within a few seconds. i turn it off then bak on agen but it still wont work, is this happenin to any1 else?
i bought the chocolate lg phone two months ago.
a month ago i started having software problems.
like not being able to download music or ringtones or anything of that sort in general.
then later throught on my text msgs…it’s restarts itself.
and what once was a full on battery. is now down to last bar.
the touch keys wouldn’t work most the time.
and yesterday it died. it just. doesn’t deal now.
it started with my screen having some weird image on it…like my background image was scattered.
and then it finally had a lit up blue screen. or a full on white or black.
i can’t get it back to normal.
and all they can do is send it off for a few weeks for some guy to twiddle with it just to send me bacl some frankenstien phone.
i hate the chocolate phone.
and i don’t understand why it’s doing this.
and i guess there is four other people who been having problems with theirs too. and razr phones.
and what really pisses me off is i payed over $500 for mine and now it’s only for $220.
i hate telus on another level than before.
I had the Cherry Chocolate phone for about a month now. I got out of work, went to go turn it on and the screen just turns white and every like 10 seconds it turns black then white again. I have no sound and it doesn’t respond to any of the buttons and doesn’t light up.
I called Customer Service and I get my new phone tomorrow, which isn’t a big deal then. I don’t mind as long as I get a new one. I love the phone too much to change over to another phone.
I’ve had my LG Chocolate for a few weeks now. I’ve heard that they have some problems and here is some information I’m willing to help out with:
1.) BUY A CASE! Definitely get a case for this phone. It’s exactly like an iPod. If you want to keep the screen and the phone nice, you’ll buy a case.
2.) Turn the sensitivity down. I had the same problem with the touch keys. I like to lay down and rest the phone on the side of my face when talking. I lost a lot of calls that way… 😛
3.) Don’t worry about the mp3 feature. I understand that a plus to this phone was the mp3 capability, but seriously, it’s a phone. Buy an iPod or some other mp3 player for your music.
4.) The battery is pretty terrible. I would recommend setting your backlight to turn off 5 after 5 seconds. It helps a lot and isn’t as short as you would think.
5.) To put your own images on the phone you will need to Format the SD card. This took me hours to figure out. Once you have the SD card formatted, just plug it in to your Mac 🙂 or PC and drag the file you would like to MyPIX.
6.) To make your own ringtones, use a program called BitPim. You can just Google it and find a download. Note that your ringtones will only be about 30 seconds in length and about 100KBPS bitrate.
7.) Make sure that you put on the keylock! This can be accomplished by just pressing the microphone key (left side of the phone) once you have it closed. Wait a moment for the status bar at the bottom to say ‘Slide key to unlock.’
I hope you all find this information a bit helpful. The LG community is non existent and I found it pretty hard to get where I wanted with this phone. All in all I’d say it’s not too bad, but I wouldn’t recommend switching service providers just to get it.
LG Chocolate = 7/10.
I’ve had this phone since mid October. At first I loved it,, and I still enjoy it for the most part except for the minor fact that its always breaking on me! This is my fourth chocolate since then because something goes wrong every time. First the touch pad went all whack and would keep scrolling. On the next one the screen started to turn black at random times. Then I got another one, and the earpiece went out and it no longer would vibrate. And NOW I’ve had this one for a good three weeks, there’s nothing wrong with it and it won’t turn on. Basically it’s a piece of crap, and I hope Verizon will just give ma new phone that actually works.
I’ve had mine since October, and i’ve loved it… until earlier this week. Now, the screen is all negative (got round it by taking a new pic for wallpaper in negative, negative + negative = normal) plus sometimes when i slide the phone up, it stops responding ON THE SCREEN. However, when i go to close it, the screen lets me glimpise at what should have been there, if the screen didn’t freeze. PLUS, sometimes the screen spilts into a half (negative frozen) and two quarters of the same screen (multi-coloured, pixelated.)
This is so frustrating – this phone really is ABSOLUTE SHITE.
FUCK YOU LG.
Hi, i also have a LG KG800, mine won’t seem to turn on. I’ve tried charging it, charging the battery separately, nothing seems to work.. can someone please help me out??
thanks
i dropped my phone in water and now it doesnt turn on at all and when i plug it in the screen goes white. for a while the screen was white for the whole time and just vibrated . any help ?
i got an lg for christmas from the start it’s been faulty and never worked the way it’s apost to i took the phone back to be told i will lose every think on the phone an that it will be returned in 3 for 4 weeks and i can only take it back three times and then i have to pay for a new one.
Ive had this phone for 6 days, worked fine, left it charge last night and when i went to turn it on this morning it wouldent. so i took out the bettery and tried again. nothing. so i let it charge all day.. NOTHING im so frustrated. apparently alot of other people have this problem but noone has the answer? please let me know this is total bs. charles_harbridge@hotmail.com
I got the phone in february and after about a month the screen started to freeze and then it turned completely white and no matter what I did it would not return to normal. I sent it back and got another one. After about 3 weeks, my phone will no longer vibrate at all. I am sending it back tomorrow and this will be the third one, hopefully it won’t have any defects. Also, sometimes the heat sensor buttons will not work no matter how many times I press them and it gets extremely frusterating. It also scratches easily and the battery dies QUICKLY. I just want my old phone back and buying this one was the biggest mistake ever! I thought it looked cool and wanted it but I rather just have one that works properly. DONT BUY IT BUYER BEWARE!
i’ve hade my LG since oktober 2006. right now i have returned it for service for the third time in 7 months! the problem has always been that i can’t hear people who’s calling me! not a singel non disturbed phonecall in 7 months.
also it forgets the T9-word-thingie.
i’m very disappointed over the mp3 memory. why even bother having a mp3-part in it when you don’t have space enough to use it?
the alarm function is terrible! why make an alarm that you have to choose the ring tone for every time you set the alarm?! instead of choosing one ringtone for all alarms? sucks.
and also i’ve noticed that if i save a picture from a mms, it gets into one folder, other folder then the pictures i take with my camera. but when i connect the phone to my computer i don’t have access to that map, just the map for my own phone pictures.
so right now i am waiting for the subscription for my phone to end so i can get a new one! that’s just about a year away now, hehe. so i hope nokia comes out with a killer phone until then. this is the first time i have a phone that is not nokia. and do i have to tell you how disappointed i am? 😉 *grmbl*
ok it may look good…ave had mines bout 5 months n its the worst fone ave ever had in ma life….it is fecked n its gnna cost me up to £200 to fix it….it jst started freezin one day n then the screen as turned all different colours :@ a h8 it!! n alost the silver bit that is round the sides of the fne…2nd day were startin 2 peel off!!!