Well, it’s been a busy two weeks for mid to high end phones with touchscreens.  Firstly, last week UK Gadgeteer attended the launch of the LG Renoir (previously covered here as the LG KC910).  Although not the top of the LG range (a position still held by the LG Secret), this phones builds on the success of the LG Viewty from last year, and offers some key improvements.

Firstly, they have increased the camera to 8 megapixels.  They have also included a GPS, although it’s only standard function in the phone is to support geotagging pictures as they are taken.  We’ll be interested to see over the next few weeks (we’re hoping to get a review phone soon) as to whether it can also be used with Map applications such as Google Maps for Mobile or MGMaps.  Finally, the other amazing feature in the phone is the support for Dolby Mobile, which really improves the sound quality, even with the standard stock headphones.  A nice feature is that the headphones come with a little remote on the cable which can control the music, but also, and believed to be a first, can also control the camera to act as a remote trigger.

We expect this will be a big seller for LG when it hits the shelves in the next month.

In terms of hype, rumours, and long term interest, however, is the more important announcement yesterday of the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic phone.  This is the phone previously known as the Nokia Tube, and is a mid range Symbian based smartphone.  However, it adds a touchscreen (not for the first time, and certainly not the last), and should be the start of a new generation of touchscreen based devices from Nokia.

In order to achieve this, Nokia / Symbian have needed to update the OS, and has therefore launched S60 5th Edition (skipping the 4th edition as the number 4 is considered very unlucky in Asia, a key market for Nokia).

As is typical for a recent Symbian based phone, this phone features Quad Band GSM, Dual Band UMTS (with HSDPA support), Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, TV-Out, built in GPS (with geotagging), and a 3.5mm audio jack.  In addition, it features Haptic feedback on the 3.2″ 640×360 touchscreen (similar to the LG Viewty and LG Renoir), an accelerometer and a proximity sensor.  Unlike the LG Renoir, but still better than the iPhone, it features a 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus.  The key point of this phone is music, and there will be a variant of the phone next year that will come with Nokia’s new “Comes with Music” service, which offers unlimited music downloads onto your PC and phone for 12 months, and even better, at the end of your subscription you can still continue to play the music.  However, today, as well as the audio jack, the phone features stereo speakers with built in surround sound for playback of the music.

In the box is likely to be an 8Gb microSD card, a carry case, and a little desktop stand, as well as a spare stylus.  The phone itself will come in black, red or blue.

This should also be available in the UK before Christmas, although we suspect the LG Renoir will be on the shelves first.  We’re hearing it’s likely to be priced around £220 *unlocked*, which may well see many people buying this phone to replace their current branded and locked phone to last them to the end of their current mobile phone contract.

All this, on top of the Google G1 phone as well…

We promised more information on the latest LG phone, the LG KC910, which is the replacement for the LG Viewty, which was hugely successful, and a phone we liked when we tried one for a few months. The KC910 has an impressive spec:

• 3″ WQVGA 240×400 pixel full touchscreen
• ISO1600 8MP camera with Schneider-Kreuznach optics, digital zoom, image stabiliser and geotagging
• Videocamera has VGA capability at 30fps and QVGA capability at 120fps and DivX and Xvid support
• HSDPA connectivity
• GPS
• Bluetooth 2.0, Wi-Fi
• TV-out (especially useful for playing back those DivX and Xvid films)
• SD card support (up to 8GB)

This is likely to be another good seller by LG for Christmas, as it goes on sale in mid October.

Thanks to Chris at LG Blog for providing us with this information.

We’ll bring you more information and pictures next week, but LG have let us know that they’ve just announed the LG KC910, which features an 8 megapixel camera, and is destined to replace the Viewty released last year. As well as 3G and Bluetooth, LG have added WiFi and GPS capabilities into this touchscreen phone.

Well, after 4 months of daily use, the LG Viewty has finally been replaced by something smaller, lighter, better built for the impacts of every day life (it has a tempered glass screen, which should resist all manner of attempts to scratch the screen), yet still featuring the 5 megapixel camera, DivX support, and 120fps video capture. On top of that it adds a slider function with real buttons (which makes dialling calls and writing texts a little easier than the Viewty). However, we will miss the nice sliding cover over the headphone / charging port from the Viewty, although we won’t miss the lack of ability of sending all contacts via Bluetooth (a feature the new phone does have).

We’ll see how the new LG Secret fares over the next few weeks before we provide an in depth review, but right now it’s looking pretty good. Announced on Thursday last week, LG have kindly provided us an early production sample in advance of the full availability in June.

The new LG phone we first mentioned here a few weeks back has now been formally announced, and named by LG. It’s the LG Secret, following on from the Chocolate and Shine Black Label phones, although it’s also known as the KF750. It’s 11.8mm thick, with a carbon fibre profile, and like the LG Viewty it has a 5 megapixel camera, video support, and DivX support built in.

This is a nice, easy to use, mid range phone. Compared to the Viewty it’s actually easier to use for some functions (real keys make typing SMSes much easier), but the spec is not as high. The camera is “only” 3 megapixel (compared to 5 on the Viewty). The smaller touchscreen area (only the bottom area is a touchscreen) does not affect the operation, and many of the advanced functions you would expect. We’ll be using this phone over the next few weeks and will report back on what it’s really like.

Here’s an interesting rumour we’ve picked up on via the internet. It appears that Nokia might be trying to beat Apple to the launch of the first 3G touchscreen smartphone, by announcing the 5800 Tube in advance of the iPhone announcement in June. Although they’ve both been beaten to touchscreen mobiles (like the LG Viewty), it would be an interesting turn of events if Nokia beat Apple to this crown. It’s unlikely, but an interesting rumour nonetheless…

We’ve just released our LG Viewty mobile phone review, courtesy of LGBlog. Overall we are very impressed with the phone, although it will be interesting to see what LG announce at Mobile World Congress over the next few days.

Thanks to LGBlog, we’ve had an LG Viewty phone here for a while now, and we want to provide you with some details about it.

What is it?

It’s a high spec mobile phone, with a 3″ touchscreen which makes the device very easy to use, and easy to pick up without reading the manual. It’s a bit like an iPhone, although it does have a few buttons on the sides, which makes certain functions easy to use. It has a 5 megapixel camera (with a Xenon flash), Bluetooth, and ships with a USB cable, a CD-ROM with software, a charger, a wired headset (also used for the FM radio), and a screen protector (which is a nice touch). Two optional extras are available, a deskstand and a leather case.

Call quality is fine, and we had no major issues with any part of the phone, in fact, we found most functions intuitive, and did not need to refer to the manual, except for a few functions.

How Big is it?

The phone is 103.5 x 54.4 x 14.8 mm and weighs 112g, which makes it very pocketable. We found the phone the right size to hold and use (unlike some phones which are a little too small to use day in day out).

Nice features…

The camera has to get a special mention. Not just is it a 5 megapixel with a decent flash (Xenon), but it’s got Image Stabilisation (which works well), and in video mode (120fps recording) also features a slow motion replay mode. On top of this, the phone support TV-out, allowing you to show these videos and high quality pictures direct on a TV. As the device also supports DivX videos, you can even watch videos on the TV from the device.  There is a little shutter lag though.

The phone has a microSD card slot (although it quite hidden behind the battery). IT’s well worth getting a card as somewhere to store all those high quality pictures and video footage the Viewty encourages you to take.

There are various buttons on the device which provide useful functions. Around the camera is a jog wheel (for scrolling through menus); we found this a little difficult to use at times, but the new LG Silver Viewty has a redesigned jog wheel, so we guess LG has reacted to user feedback here. There’s a lock/unlock button (which is very welcome, allowing the ability to quickly unlock the touchscreen when you need to use it). If you don’t lock the screen / buttons, it will automatically lock after a (configurable) time too. Also on the side is a slider (to select between camera, video camera, and playback mode), a shutter button (much more convenient than the iPhone), and the lock/unlock button turns on/off image stabilisation.

The small USB port (a fairly new port style) is located on the side, which seems strange, but is nicely protected with a sliding cover. This is used for the USB cable, and charging (the USB cable can charge at the same time). Although we were concerned about needing to carry “another” cable type around, this is can be used for charging, so you only need to carry this single cable with you.

Downsides…

No SyncML support - for a high spec camera phone, it’s going to be up against the likes of the Nokia N81/82/95, and we missed the lack of SyncML. We use SyncML services to allow access to a single contact database / calendar on a multitude of devices, so not having this support meant a fair bit of manually editing information (although it was possible to get some contacts onto the device via other means, such as Bluetooth).

As the phone is not marketed as a smartphone, it understandably has no Wi-Fi, although it does have HSDPA, so with the right data contract, the lack of Wi-Fi should not be an issue for most people.

Other points to note

As long term Nokia users, we are used to firmware updates, which were previously performed at Nokia Service Centres, but more recently the phones have supported firmware upgrades via the PC. We could find no reference to user controlled firmwares, and hence can only assume this is not an option. We understand LG may release new firmwares for the device, should it be necessary, but we could not get confirmation as to how these would be made available to users.

Overall opinion

After a month of usage, not just are we impressed with the phone, we intend to keep on using the phone on a daily basis, which we believe says something about the phone.

After the success of the black LG Viewty, LG have announced that from the end of January, the new “Dark Silver” version will also be available. The main specs are the same, although they’ve redesigned the jog wheel slightly. We’ve been using a black LG Viewty for some while now, and hope to have our review online soon.