LG Optimus L7

“The Optimus L7 really catches the eye. With its large, bright screen, slim 8.7mm waistline, and pleasantly-textured back panel, it is a very comfortable phone to hold in hand. The interface is littered with cool transitions and effects, and the presence of all those nifty Ice Cream Sandwich optimizations are a welcome sight. It comes with Gorilla Glass and a hefty 1700 mAh battery.When you look under the hood however, things are not nearly as pretty. The single-core 1 GHz processor may have been great a few years ago and maybe good enough last year, but nowadays it seems that it's go multi-core or go home, at least as far as ICS smartphones are concerned. More often than not the phone keeps up with what you're trying to do, but performance hiccups are not too rare a sight, especially when you're trying to do multiple things at once and that's really damaging the whole experience. And let's not forget the particularly bumpy ride that is web browsing on the L7.And having a good-looking (but laggy) phone tends to hurt in one place most of all: your wallet, which brings us to the retail cost of the Optimus L7. Right now, you can find it for about €250 in most markets. While this is a definite midrange price point, the question is whether the LG Optimus L7 is a definite midrange phone. For this device, it's not as cut and dry as usual, while the screen size and design bring it up, the processor and performance bring it down.”

“As much as we wanted to like the Optimus L7, we must strongly urge those who want an entry-level smartphone to look elsewhere. It's quite a shame, really, because LG's design efforts hinted at something so much greater. We genuinely appreciate the phone's display, handy NFC capabilities, excellent battery life and even its software, which features LG's UI 3.0 layered on top of Android 4.0.Unfortunately, that's where the party ends. The Optimus L7 is a sluggish performer that is further hindered by unnecessary animations and transition effects in the UI. While that alone wouldn't qualify as a deal-breaker in the budget category, its slow data transmission speeds, incompatible trans-Atlantic 3G bands, woeful camera, lack of an ambient light sensor, subpar voice quality and flaky touch response all point to a regrettable purchase. As it stands, if your budget dictates your next smartphone, look instead toward the HTC One V, Sony Xperia U and Samsung Galaxy S Advance for more compelling options. Similarly, if you're able to avoid the contract subsidies and go SIM-free, the Galaxy Nexus is now more affordable than ever.”

“The LG Optimus L7's slow processor is ultimately a real deal killer for me. It's annoyingly slow and doesn't do the sleek device justice. Especially since the smartphone is running the latest Android OS and sports a modern design, having that extra lag time is a drag.However, if you put that issue aside (or you simply don't need a fast CPU), the L7 definitely pushes the definition of midlevel up a few notches. Its NFC capabilities and solid Nova display alone already put it ahead of most midrange LG handsets, and the Ice Cream Sandwich OS is the pleasant cherry on top.”

“Despite being the flagship of the new L series, the LG Optimus L7 main virtue is that it ships with the newest Android Ice Cream Sandwich out of the box, rather than design and specs.The handset is indeed thin and light, but the chassis looks run-of-the-mill with its rectangular shape made of black plastic, despite the metal plate around the camera module. Whether it's software optimization or just the single-core processor and 512MB of RAM, shmoozing around in the interface, browser and apps isn't devoid of slowdowns and interruptions.There are some really neat ideas in the new interface, like the scrolling connectivity toggles in the notification bar, but these are overshadowed by the mediocre pictures and video quality, for example.”