LG Optimus Net Review

LG were one of the first companies to get into the low-budget Android phones segment with their Optimus One, which made quite a mark in the Android world. Now, the company has announced the successor to its Optimus One, the new LG Optimus Net. The P690 places itself as a budget Android phone as well, but is it worth a purchase? Let’s find out. 

The top consists of the tiny power button and 3.5 mm jack

Design and Build Quality

The Optimus Net looks very much like the original Optimus P500 phone. It’s got a 320x480, 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen, so the display size hasn’t changed from its predecessor. The back and the sides are quite glossy, so fingerprints will be a problem, which you’ll have to get used to. The phone does feel quite light at 122 grams, but at the same time, it looks and feels quite plasticy, which is a disappointment. The volume rocker buttons are located on the left, while the microUSB slot is housed underneath a protective flap on the right of the phone. The top consists of the tiny power button and the 3.5mm headphone jack. The rear flap is easy to remove and only the SIM card is placed under the battery, so the memory card is hot swappable. 

The build feels quite flimsy and cheap

The physical button layout at the bottom has the options key on the left, followed by the home, return key and search buttons. There are two separate panels with the home and back button in one block, and the other two in the exterior block.  The center block buttons feel just fine, but the menu button feels lighter, hollower, and doesn’t have a very consistent feel to it. This complaint extends to the side volume buttons as well. LG could have done a lot better with the build quality of the Net.

Features

Interface

The Optimus Net runs on an 800MHz processor with an Adreno 200 GPU and on first impression the phone runs pretty quick. The P690 has a fluid interface and navigation through the home screen and the various menus is fast and lag-free. But the one problem the interface has, like the other LG phones, is that it’s not polished. Take for example the drop down notification bar. The icons have a very sharp and contrasting feel to them and it looks like several separate sections have been stitched together into one menu. The interface doesn’t look as appealing as the HTC Explorer we reviewed earlier. 

Homescreen interface

The Optimus Net has a similar UI to the Optimus 3D.  Long pressing on the home screen brings up a pop up window to load widgets and shortcuts. Music playback can be controlled without unlocking the screen. There’s a new Social+ integration widget that gives you the latest news feeds from your social networking accounts. We’re not big fans of the Excuse Msg feature present on the phone, which automatically sends messages to your contacts, in case you don’t pick up their call. It’s not customizable to include only local calls and in our case, the phone sent a couple of international messages on its own accord. A 3.2-inch screen more often than not makes typing a nightmare, especially in the portrait mode, but the keyboard is spaced pretty well and is easy to use. In terms of synthetic benchmarks, the Optimus Net falls shorter of the Explorer in the AnTuTu application. The Net got a score of 1445, as opposed to the 2099 that the Explorer received, so that’s definitely not a good score for a phone with a better processor. 

The benchmark scores

Media

The P690 provides a pretty basic media experience. There are no equalizers or sound enhancements. In fact, the only options available in the music player are Shuffle, Repeat and Party Shuffle. Video and audio format support is pretty standard and you’ll have to download a third party app, if you want to get more out of your phone.