LG GLANCE REVIEW

LG is going Verizon-crazy lately, what with the new members of the enV family (the enV3 and the enV Touch), and now this new entry-level model, the LG Glance. Check out the review of the LG Glance after the jump.

First off, this phone is a cellular mullet: work in the front, and an awful, plastic party in the back. Seriously, the back of this phone looks like a failed Giorgio Armani prototype, with its gaudy, sparkly battery cover between some charcoal-grey plastic, a speakerphone, and a 1.3 megapixel camera. But the front, however, looks decent. The buttons are large and tactile, and for an entry-level phone, the QVGA (240 x 320) screen looks admirable. This phone is also amazingly thin (.3 inches, or 1 cm). A major difference, though, between this and other candy bars, happens to be the placement of the clear button. Note how it’s in the center, directly under the refreshing addition of a joystick.

Because this is an entry-level phone, there aren't as many fancy Verizon doo-dads to play with as on their higher-end LG phones, such as GPS(woopsie, according to commenter Nate, the phone DOES have GPS), 3G, or visual voicemail support. Luckily, though, this phone has a 1.3 megapixel camera (no flash), Bluetooth support, and the ability to add more memory via microSD and the misfortune of being stuck with measly built-in memory (thanks commenters!). Unfortunately, the software looks a bit sluggish (as is the case with most candy bar phones...or any non-smartphone in general), and the joystick's tactility looks to be questionable. But for its price and basic feature set, if you can just look into the phones eyes--and avoid its rear--there's a lot to like here.

The LG Glance went on sale on Verizon Wireless on June 5 for $49.99 after a $50.00 dollar rebate with a 2-year-contract.

Pros

• Front of phone is quite pretty, and the profile is very thin
• Joystick is a welcome refresher from a d-pad
• Buttons are quite tactile and large
• Reasonable feature set for the price

Cons

• Back of phone looks disastrously ugly
• Software is sluggish
• No flash for camera
• No 3G whatsoever (to be expected for price point)
• 2.5mm headset jack, though no real multimedia features are present