Ben Patterson takes a turn tapping on the LG F9200, an easy-on-the-eyes messaging phone with a slide-out thumbboard for texting, IMs and e-mails.
Review summary of the LG F9200:
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 If you’re all about the text, the F9200’s relatively robust messaging features will likely make the grade. But for anyone who even remotely cares about phone displays or image quality on your snapshots, the phone’s cheap LCD and mediocre camera are sure to disappoint – especially considering that LG’s feature-packed (and 3G-enabled) VX9800 is available at Verizon Wireless for just $50 more. Release: January 2006. Price: $150.
Pros: Strong messaging features; good battery life; decent thumbboard
Cons: Cheap display with poor image quality; sub-par snapshots from camera; a bit bulky and heavy
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67%
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Full review of the LG F9200:
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LG takes a swipe at the growing teen messaging market with the F9200, a QWERTY phone designed for all things text: SMS, MMS, IM, e-mail, you name it. This sleeker version of last year’s F9100 also adds a VGA camera for on-the-go shutterbugs. Unfortunately, the F9200’s messaging prowess is marred by the cheap display and sub-par camera. Our bottom line? Not bad, but you can do better.
Extra girth
The white-and-black F9200 looks reasonably slick, with its curved, silver keypad and 1.75-inch, black-bordered LCD. Measuring 4.3 by 2 by 1 inches and weighing in at 4.7 ounces, the phone’s overall size feels about average for a candybar model, if a bit on the thick side; then again, that’s not surprising given the slide-out QWERTY keypad. Does the F9200 fit in a jeans pocket? Well, yes, as long as you don’t mind the noticeable bulge.
Give the edge of the phone a nudge with your thumb and the thumbboard snaps out in a smooth sliding motion; the LCD automatically switches from portrait to landscape mode, and the two buttons on the right side of the screen become your soft keys. The QWERTY keys are small but flat, and within a few minutes we were tapping away with relative ease. That said, you’ll have to press a function key before typing any numbers or symbols, which can be annoying for anyone who’s a stickler for punctuation.
Bargain-basement display
While typing on the F9200 wasn’t a big problem, we weren’t nearly as thrilled by the sub-par 65,000-color, 128 by 160-pixel LCD. LG clearly cut a corner by using a passive-matrix STN version rather than the standard active-matrix TFT variety, and the difference shows: colors look washed-out, spaces between the pixels are clearly visible, and the overall image quality looks soft. Very disappointing.
The F9200 regains some ground with its strong messaging features. In addition to the typical SMS and MMS messaging, the phone comes with an instant-messaging client that supports AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo IM, ICQ, and Cingular’s own messaging service. The app lets you view and edit your buddy list and tweak your privacy options, and your IM sessions will run in the background while you’re on a call or using the handset’s other features – unfortunately, you can only sign onto one IM service at a time. Meanwhile, e-mail addicts can use the F9200’s Mobile E-Mail feature to access their Yahoo, AOL, AIM, and Hotmail accounts. (Our review unit suffered from e-mail glitches at press time, but LG assured us that the problem was specific to our handset; we’ll check back soon with more details.)
Prefer some actual voice-to-voice communication? The F9200 features a speakerphone (a little tinny, but that’s to be expected), five-way conference calling, voice dialing and recording, and you can check and send text messages while you’re in a call. The address book holds up to 250 numbers on the SIM card and 255 in the phone’s memory, and the handset supports picture calling ID (although not specific ringers for individual contacts). Our voice calls sounded loud and clear, with no echoes or tunneling.
So-so snapshots
The phone’s VGA camera didn’t exactly wow us. With resolutions ranging from 640 by 480 to 160 by 120 pixels, the camera boasts a series of white balance and brightness controls, plus some image effects (just sepia, monochrome, and standard color), a three- and 10-second self-timer, a three-shot rapid-fire mode, a 4X zoom for resolutions below full VGA. That’s all well and good, but our snapshots looked disappointingly soft and washed out, even for a VGA cameraphone. Trust us, you won’t be saving these pictures in your scrapbook.
The GPRS-enabled F9200 comes with your standard WAP 2.0 browser, which does a fair (if predictably slow) job of surfing the mobile Web, although the browser grew sluggish as we scrolled down long Web pages. The handset also comes with a typical suite of tools, including an alarm clock, a calendar (with monthly and daily views, but no weekly view), a calculator, a notepad, a world clock, a unit converter, and a tip calculator.
Battery life on the F9200 was quite good; in our tests, it scored more than five hours of talk time, easily beating the promised four hours. The handset is also rated for more than 12 days of standby time.
Price and availability
The LG F9200 will start selling for $150 ((Cingular)) in January 2006.
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