Decent camera, good battery life, sensible price
Cheap casing, not the fastest
Last year's Optimus L7 was a solid midrange performer without doing much to help it stand out. This year's Optimus L7 II tries to address that with an improved processor and camera, plus a few other improvements.
Design
The new version looks much the same as the old, though the grippy plastic back has now been replaced with a faux brushed metal look (which isn't fooling anybody). As before, the hard home button is surrounded by an LED that glows with different colours depending on what's occurring -- red for low battery, green for incoming messages etc, plus you can customise the colours. There's also a customisable hard button on the side above the volume rocker which can be used as a short cut to almost any app you wish.
It has the same 4.3-inch touchscreen with a resolution of 800x480 pixels (217ppi) as last time, which is only disappointing because we'd hoped for better. It's not the sharpest but it's sharp enough to do justice to busy web pages and YouTube videos without being irritatingly fuzzy. It's sensitive enough too, and we didn't feel the need for extra presses as sometimes happens with cheaper screens.
Processor and Android
The 1GHz dual-core processor backed by 512MB RAM is a step up from the previous single-core version, but it still won't break any records, and our AnTuTu benchmark test delivered a score of 7,623 -- quite disappointing considering the Acer Liquid Z3, available for under £100, managed 9,568. Scores aren't everything though, and in use it performed reasonably smoothly, with only a slight delay when opening apps, though it seemed to struggle a little with some hi-res games from Google Play.
It's running Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, which is still fairly recent, and is overlaid with LG's UX interface, which adds a few aesthetic touches but doesn't get in the way of standard Android.
Extras include LG's QuickMemo, available from the drop-down menu, which allows you to write on whichever screen you're using.
Photography
The eight-megapixel camera has been upgraded from the original five megapixels and proved to be not bad at all. It has autofocus and an LED flash, plus a few other settings like voice operation and a variety of scene modes. Picture quality isn't particularly outstanding but it's okay -- so long as you're careful with your light you can get some decently sharp and vibrant shots.
There's a paltry 4GB of memory on board but you can boost that by up to 32GB via microSD. Battery life meanwhile has been bumped up with a larger 2,460mAh battery (the original was 1,700mAh) and it got us through two days of steady use with no hassle.
Conclusion
The Optimus L7 II makes some good upgrades to the original, particularly with the improved processor and camera, though it would have been nice to see a sharper screen too. Its price keeps it competitive at the lower end of the midrange and if it can't match the abilities of the Google Nexus 4 (also made by LG) it has the benefit of being around £80 cheaper.
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Software: Google Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean
Processor: Dual-core 1GHz Cortex-A5
Memory slot: Yes
Display: 4.3in TFT LCD, 800x480 pixels
Connectivity: Wi-Fi b/g/n, Bluetooth 3.0
Ports: microUSB, 3.5mm headphone jack
Camera: 8 megapixel, autofocus, LED flash; VGA front-facing camera
Video playback: MP4, H.264, H.263, DivX, Xvid, WMV
Audio playback: MP3, WAV, WMA, AAC
Radio: Yes
Battery: 2460mAh
Size: 128x69x9mm
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
