LG KC550 review

Our first impression of LG's KC550 was that it looked pretty cool - a sleek black slider with a big screen. What's not to like?

But our warm fuzzy feelings were dashed when we picked it up and found that it just doesn't feel like a quality phone. It's cheap plastic with a rattly slider and a spongey keypad. The build quality didn't fill us with confidence.

But it's LG's cheapest 5 megapixel camphone, we reminded ourselves, it's not meant to be a high end phone. No indeed. So we persevered, and our impressions after that got steadily better.

For a start, the 2.4-inch, 262,000-colour screen didn't let us down. It's sharp and clear, and bright enough to view in sunlight. You can negotiate the menus using the D-pad of course but each menu icon also has a number, so you can get where you want to quicker using the keypad - every phone should have this option.

Camera

You can access the camera simply by sliding back the sturdy lens cover on the back. It's easy to find with your fingers since it takes up a good three quarters of the length of the phone. The camera starts up quickly too (between two and three seconds) so it's good for quick snaps.

The camera apparently has the same Schneider-Kreuznach 'certified' (whatever that means) lens as LG's fancier Viewty and it's really rather good, delivering clear, sharp pictures with decent colour definition in good light. There's an LED photo light but like virtually all of these on camphones, you'll need to get really close to your subject for it to have any effect.

In camera mode the D-pad offers short cuts including, album, flash settings, macro mode and image stabilisation which proved really useful once we'd discovered them, (they don't apply in video mode incidentally).

There's self-timer and burst mode, as well as autofocus, and the volume buttons on the side operate the digital zoom. After you've taken your pics there's a range of editing options, allowing you to resize, rotate, crop, and add effects, frames and text on the fly.

Viewing pictures in the album seemed a bit quirky however. There's an accelerometer on board which doesn't seem to have any effect on the menus. But when we looked at pictures in the album, turning the phone changed the orientation, though not necessarily how we expected, displaying a full-screen pic in portrait mode on the screen when the phone is on its side, but switching to cramped landscape when we turned the phone lengthways. We're still not sure if this was a quirk on our test model - try before you buy, and let us know.

Unlike most camphones, the KC550 actually takes video seriously, offering 720x480 pixels at 30 frames per second (most will only offer 320x240 (VGA). It's certainly better than the video we've seen on many a camphone, but that doesn't mean it'll compare with any dedicated camcorder you might care to name. Resolution is pretty good, but we found the results a bit jerky, considering there's supposed to be an image stabiliser on board.

Music player

The music player features all the usual functions and it's easy to drag and drop tracks onto the handset from your computer or transfer via Bluetooth. But there's no 3.5mm jack to upgrade your headphones so you're stuck with LG's rather tacky-looking supplied pair. While they look and feel cheap, there's actually a degree more bass than you might expect, though it comes at the price of a bit of muffling in the midrange. There's also an FM radio which offers auto scan and a maximum of nine preset channels.

Other features

The accelerometer also comes into play on a series of six preloaded games called M-Toy. You can twist the handset to line up darts, a fishing line, strike a baseball, throw a hammer or work your way through a maze.

There's also a rolling 'magic ball' that answers questions you put to it. It's okay, but feels a bit underdeveloped, and not in the same league as, say, the highly tactile marble game on HTC's Touch Diamond. Then again, it could be like the Wii to the PS3 - not so sophisticated, but arguably more fun.

The web browser is standard fare, with no fancy zoom or sizing options, and with no 3G or Wi-Fi to offer fast downloads, it feels pretty clunky overall. The accelerometer didn't seem to switch the orientation of web pages either.

Battery life stood up well though, giving us three days of moderate use with only a little bit of Bluetooth thrown in.

The LG KC550 is intended as a cheap 'n' cheerful pay-as-you-go phone, and on that level, it doesn't disappoint. It looks fairly classy, even if it feels less so, and it certainly has an impressive camera, even it doesn't have 3G. If you're after a decent enough phone that covers all the basics, but also has a good camera, it's definitely worth a look.