LG Optimus Black

The LG Optimus Black P970 is a mid-range smartphone released in really January, 2011. It comes with a single-core TI OMAP 3630 processor based on ARM Cortex A8 architecture along with 512 MB of RAM and PowerVR SGX530 GPU. The phone has 2 GB of internal storage, out of which, 1 GB is available to the user and it can be extended up to 32 GB using the MicroSD card slot. Various sensors such as accelerometer, gyro-sensor, proximity sensor and a magnetic compass are present to find the orientation, motion and other details about the device.

This smartphone comes with a 4 inch IPS LCD display which is being dubbed as NOVA display from LG, citing its high brightness levels of 700 nits. The multitouch capacitive display has a resolution of 800 x 480 taking its pixel density at 233 ppi which can be considered as decently sharp. The display is also protected using the tough Gorilla Glass panel from Corning. The phone has a touchscreen candy bar design with capacitive buttons at the front. There are volume rockers, power button at the sides of the device. The power on/off button is present at the top of the device. The back is removable which can be used to replace the battery, SIM card or the MicroSD card. The phone has good dimensions with a slimness of 9.2 mm while the weight is fairly light at just 109 grams.

There is a 5 MP autofocus camera in this LG device along with LED flash and the ability to shoot smooth 720p HD videos at 30 fps. The rear camera also has options such as face detection and geo-tagging. There is also a 2 MP camera at the front which can help in shooting self-portraits or video chat using applications like Hangouts or Skype. The phone can play various types of multimedia files such as MP3, FLAC, MP4, WMA, DivX, XviD, etc. This smartphone also has support for stereo FM radio with RDS support, which shows the name of the radio station to the user.

The LG Optimus Black was released with Android v2.2 Froyo but was updated to Android 4.0 IceCream Sandwich in due course of time. It comes with custom skin and UI from LG, dubbed as Optimus UI. Apart from usual features, it comes with Gesture UI, which lets you control the phone using hand gestures.

Apart from the single mini SIM card slot, this smartphone comes with usual array of connectivity features expected in its price range, such as 7.2 Mbps HSDPA 3G, Wi-Fi b/g/n, Bluetooth v2.1 and MicroUSB v2.0. There are also advanced options such as Wi-Fi Direct which comes handy to transfer files using Wi-Fi rather than slower Bluetooth with compatible devices. The Wi-Fi Hotspot can be used to share your phone's Internet connection with near-by Wi-Fi enabled devices. Even DLNA is present which helps in streaming media files from your LG Optimus Black to devices like compatible home theatre or television. The phone comes with A-GPS which helps in finding the location of the user in apps like maps and navigation. The smartphone comes with a 1500 mAh battery which lasts through a day of fairly normal usage and 6 hours of continuous talk-time. The phone can last for up to 375 hours in the stand-by mode.