LG Introduces the Optimus Black

LG was late entering the smartphone market with a competitive flagship handset, but it looks like the company is launching a winner with the Optimus Black.

The Optimus Black looks rather like much of its competition, combining the black-slab touchscreen design with a candybar form-factor. With this device, however, LG has some hidden features up its sleeve, which might give it a slight edge over the competition.

Its main selling point is its screen, which features a new technology called the Nova Display. LG’s NOVA technology is designed to give a consistently clear display, and it crucially uses significantly less power in everyday use to rival OLED panels. Furthermore, LG is boasting that it has the brightest screen ever on a smart, with 700 nit (compared to the iPhone 4’s 500 nit).

LG also managed to make the Optimus Black amusingly thin and light. It weighs in at 3.84 ounces (109 grams) and 0.36” (9.2mm) at its thickest, which really raises the bar, considering that it has a large 4″, 480×800 pixel display.

Internal specs for this device aren’t especially innovative, but they’re good enough to put the Optimus Black on par with other major Android models on the market. You’ll find it Android 2.2 out of the box, but LG is promising an early upgrade to Android 2.3 (Honeycomb).

It packs 2 GB storage, 512 MB RAM, and a TI OMAP 1 GHz processor. There are two cameras: the rear 5MP camera with autofocus, and a 2MP front-facing camera for video chatting and self portraits.

One other novel feature is WiFi direct, which allows WiFi enabled devices to communicate with each other directly. This will make things like file transfers and printing much easier to do, so kudos to LG for adding some innovative software to the Optimus Black.

If you’re looking for more of the latest smartphone news, you’ll want to check out Kyocera Echo and Droid 2 Global.

Via: GSM Arena