LG Chocolate VX8500 Cell Phone Review - Multimedia
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Alfredo Padilla Published on March 16, 2007 Comment on this |
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Accessing Music Software (4.2)
To test how easy it is to access music software we time how long it takes to go from the phone closed position to playing music. We set the phone up with our test album and make sure the music software has it loaded. The LG Chocolate is touted as a music phone and as such you would expect access to the music software to be simple. In this we were not disappointed, as it took the Chocolate only an average of 4.73 seconds to get a song playing. This is significantly faster than the Motorola Razr V3m, which took 12.1 seconds.
The Chocolate’s score is undoubtedly helped by the dedicated music key located on the right side of the phone. The score may even have been faster if we had not been stymied by the Chocolate’s touch controls on some of our test runs. Overall we were impressed by how easy it was to access your music on the LG Chocolate.
Dedicated Music Controls (2.0)
For a music device we were disappointed by the LG Chocolate’s lack of dedicated music controls. When music is playing and you are on the home screen there are no keys that will allow you to control your music. The volume keys will allow you to control music volume separately from the phone’s master volume however. Many phones that have music functions are beginning to put dedicated music keys for play/pause, next and previous tracks, for example the Sanyo M1 has these controls, and we wish that the Chocolate had them as well.
Music Software Functionality and Organization (5.2)
The Music software on the LG Chocolate provides a solid array of functionality. There is support for playlists created on the device, although our sample playlist in the standard .pls format was not recognized. Idv3 tags on our sample mp3’s were recognized correctly, and tags from our sample windows media song were also recognized. The software did not recognize our sample aac file at all. Music can be viewed by artist, genre or album.
There is no support for album art, visualizations or ratings, however there is automatic library updating when you add new music and music does play in the background. There is support for up to 7 different preset equalizer settings, but you cannot set the equalizer manually. On issue we did have was that music files placed on the memory card manually cannot be in folders, this adds an annoying steps to those who have all there albums organized into folders on their computer. Overall we were pleased with the range of options found on the LG Chocolate’s music software, it is significantly better than that found on the Motorolar Razr V3m, for example. For the most part it lives up to what you would expect from a music handset.
Online Song Downloading (8.0)
The LG Chocolate supports Verizon's Vcast Music Store for direct downloading of music to your handset. In order to access the store from the My Music menu. This launchd the store interface where you can browse and download music. We were pleased to see that items on the screen were associated with number keys making for one key press activation. Selecting a song shows you the title, artist and length along with the price. Most songs cost $1.99 each. You can purchase the song by hitting the center action key on the D-Pad. You are then asked if you want to download the song immediately or wait for later. Overall we found the V Cast music store to be very intuitive and easy to use, but a little slow.
Streaming (0.0)
The LG Chocolate does not support streaming audio using any standard formats. Streaming audio is not usually supported by regular phones, for example the Motorola Razr V3m does not support it.
Podcast Support (0.0)
The LG Chocolate does not include any software that allow you to download, synchronize or organize podcasts. This is an unfortunate omission, although not an uncommon one. Given the popularity of podcasts we wish that manufacturers would do more to start extending support for this format to phones like the Chocolate that are music enabled. You can of course simply drop a podcast audio file onto your memory card and listen to it using the music software, but dedicated software like that found on Nokia S60 devices is a much more elegant solution.
Music Sync with PC (0.0)
The LG Chocolate is not capable of synchronizing with a PC out of the box. You can purchase a music essential kit from Verizon that includes headphones, a USB cord and software that allows you to synchronize your music with Windows Media Player on a PC for $29.99. We only score a phone’s capabilities based on what comes in the box, and as such the LG Chocolate does not receive any points for music synchronization.
Music Formats and DRM (4.0)
The LG Chocolate supports Mp3 and WMA encoded files. It does not support files encoded in the AAC or Real formats. Mp3 is the global standard, and we were glad to see support for that. Anyone who uses Windows Media Player on a PC as their principal music creator and organizer will welcome the WMA support, however itunes users will find that AAC encoded files ripped from CD’s will not work on the Chocolate.
There is support for Microsoft’s playsforsure DRM, however no support for Apple’s Fairplay or Real’s Rhapsody DNA. Songs downloaded from Verizon’s Vcast music store are encoded as WMA, but the DRM associated with them applies only to the phone they are downloaded to. Overall the LG Chocolate provides an average array of music format and DRM options, the support for Microsoft’s Playsforsure DRM means that you can use the phone with online services such as Yahoo! Music and other that support it.
Music Interruption (4.0)
The LG Chocolate does a middling job of interrupting your music when you receive a call. The Music will pause when the call comes in, unfortunately it will not resume again when you complete the call. You will need to go into the music application and resume manually. This is unfortunate as phones like the Motorola Razr V3m both pause and resume music without issue. We expected no less from a music focused handset like the Chocolate.
Video
Video Software Access (3.75)
To test how easy it is to access video software on the LG Chocolate we time how long it takes to go from standby to playing a video. We do this five times and take the average. The LG Chocolate took an average of 5.34 seconds to get a video playing. This is a good score, faster than the Motorola Razr V3m’s 6.3 seconds or the Motorola Q’s 8.6 seconds. The Chocolate is helped by the fact that one of the shortcut keys on the home screen takes you to the photo and video menu.
Video Controls (6.0)
The LG Chocolate provides an average range of controls while watching video. The D-Pad provides access to Play/Pause, Stop, Fast Forward and Rewind. The volume keys control video volume, while the left soft key allows you to mute sound completely. This is about the same number of controls as the Motorola Razr V3m, albeit in a slightly different configuration. There are no advanced features available like the ability to configure your own controls.
Video Software & Organization (1.5)
The video software on the LG Chocolate is very basic, meant to view videos you take yourself with the camera. There are no advanced features available like library update/organization or the ability to assign ratings. We were pleased to see the ability to view video in full screen. Overall we were not impressed by the LG Chocolate’s video software, it did not even include options found on the Motorola Razr V3m, like watching videos sequentially.
As we mentioned, the video software on the LG Chocolate was really meant to simply organize and watch the videos you capture yourself with the phone. As such there are very few video organization options. Videos are listed in alphabetical order; there are no options to sort by anything else, or playlist support. There is also no option for background play. The video organization on the LG Chocolate is what you would expect from very basic video software.
Video Sync with PC (0.0)
The LG Chocolate does not allow you to synchronize your videos with a PC.
Video Formats (2.0)
The LG Chocolate played audio on all of our test 3GP files, but did not play the video beyond the first frame except for the file encoded with Mpeg-4 and an AAC audio stream. The LG chocolate also supported a standard MP4 file, which seems to indicate that it is only able to play video encoded in Mpeg-4. We were disappointed that the Chocolate did not support industry standard 3GP files encoded with the H263 codec, but please to see that it supported standard MP4 files.
Video DRM (0.0)
The LG Chocolate does not support any digital rights management software for video. This means that you cannot purchase video from the iTunes store, for example, and watch them on your phone.
Video Playback Smoothness (2.0)
To test video playback smoothness we play back 5 3GP files and note when they don’t become viewable. On the LG Chocolate the 56 Kbps file played smoothly. We began to notice choppiness and fragmentation with the next file at 112 Kbps. At 256 Kbps this was even more evident, and the 384 Kbps file was unwatchable. The 112 and 256 Kbps files were more watchable on the Chocolate than they were on the Motorola Razr V3m; however that still didn’t make them particularly watchable.
Online Video Downloading (0.0)
The LG Chocolate does not support any online video download services.
Video Streaming (unscored)
Because streaming video is not easy to test comprehensively we do not score phones on this section. That being said, the LG Chocolate will allow you to use the Verizon’s V Cast Video store, which provides an array of short clips at various prices. The LG Chocolate did not support any 3GP streaming video clips which we tested.
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