LG Voyager Cell Phone Review - Software
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Alfredo Padilla Published on December 04, 2007 Comment on this |
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OS (4.0)
The LG Voyager runs a proprietary operating system that is a combination of the touch screen OS we saw in the LG Prada and Verizon's standard BREW interface. We found the OS interface fairly straightforward in most areas and we especially found the touch screen interface to be well organized and easy to use. Our biggest problem was that in some areas the interface lacked a certain amount of elegance, for example when entering text with the touch screen keypad or in the calendar application the interface can seem busy and crowded. Apart from this though we enjoyed using the LG Voyager's operating system, it has nowhere near the power of a smart phone OS like Windows Mobile or Symbian, but for a regular phone OS it does a pretty good job. We do have to say that we like the iPhone's OS and the Helio Ocean's OS a little better though. Our score for proprietary operating systems is capped at a maximum of five points, we reserve higher scores for smart phone operating systems.
Home Screen Score (6.5)
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In this section we will focus on the home screen on the exterior touch display since the interior screen is pretty much what you expect to see from any Verizon phone. On the exterior display though there are a few interesting items. Most of the screen is taken up by your wallpaper, with a line of indicator icons along the top like signal strength and battery life. Near the bottom are four quick access icons that allow you to access messaging, phone, main menu and address book by default. Unfortunately, unlike the shortcuts assigned to the D-Pd in the interior display these shortcuts cannot be changed. For more quick access to features though you can just tape anywhere on the wallpaper to bring up a shortcut menu. This has 12 icons with access to things like voice command, text messaging, calculator and calendar, amongst others. We found ourselves using this shortcut menu a lot during our testing and really like this feature. We have to say though that we would have liked it even more if we had been able to customize it. The final verdict is that the home screen on the LG Voyager does a very good job of putting a lot of functionality in easy reach of users in a very usable manner.
Extensibility (1.0)
One of the places where the LG Voyager falls down in comparison to other advanced and expensive phones is that it's a fairly closed platform. The only thing you can install on the Voyager are BREW applications. There are no native third party applications like on Windows Mobile or Symbian devices. You can't even install Java applications like on most phones so things like Opera Mini for browsing the web or Google Maps for navigation are not available to you. We are not fans of closed platforms and this is one area where those looking for a "smart" device will find the Voyager severely lacking.
Customizability (3.0)
The LG Voyager is fairly standard when it comes to customizability options. You can change your wallpaper, including separate wallpaper for the exterior and interior screen, and choose from two themes installed on the phone: color and black & white. You can also change the font used for the interface or the dialing screen and do things like add a banner to the home screen. When on the interior home screen you can also change the programs assigned to the four directions of the D-Pad, but unfortunately you can't change the shortcuts items at the bottom of the exterior screen or the items that appear on the shortcut menu. This is another place where the Voyager is not as good as an advanced smart phone, as these provide you with much more customization options.
OS Responsiveness (5.0)
We found the operating system on the LG Voyager to be mixed. In most cases it was fairly responsive, but we did find some programs (such as the music player and camera) took too long to launch. We also noticed that with the touch interface sometimes even after a program launched it took another half a second for your presses on the screen to be recognized. The LG Voyager isn't as laggy as some of the worst phones we've seen, like the T-Mobile Wing, but it's also not as responsive as the iPhone.
Browser Features (7.0)
The Browser on the LG Voyager is one we haven't seen on Verizon Wireless devices before. Unlike the standard mobile browsers seen on most phones the Voyager's renders pages like they would appear on a desktop browser. In terms of actual web technologies supported, the LG Voyager isn't better than any of several advanced web browsers we've seen on mobile devices. It supports mobile WAP pages as well as standard HTML pages. It also supports frames and Javascript as well as images, cookies and encryption. It does not support more advanced web technologies like Java or Flash. You also can't save web pages or images to your device, subscribe to RSS feeds or manage your passwords in the browser. Browsing Interface (8.0)
As we mentioned above, the LG Voyager's browser joins a growing number of mobile web browsers that make a credible attempt at displaying full-fledged web pages as they are viewed on your desktop. The LG Voyager's browser does a very good job of rendering web pages so all the content looks just like it would on your desktop browser. Where it doesn't do as good a job however is in how you get around this. Because the screen is obviously smaller than a computer's, you only see a small portion of the web page.
Like the Series 60 Web as found on phones like the E90 the LG Voyager's browser provides you with a small thumbnail overview of the page to assist in getting around. Although this helps a great deal, the implementation isn't nearly as good. You have three options with the thumbnail view, turn it off, leave it on all the time and turn it on automatically when you scroll. Although this last may seem optimal in practice any time you scroll even a small amount the thumbnail will pop up obscuring part of the screen. We found this annoying and wish it worked more like the Series 60 Web where you had to scroll a bit before the thumbnail popped up. That being said the browser on the Voyager is miles ahead of the typical browser we see on Verizon phones and we hope that it is improved and more widely implemented on devices in the future.
The browser controls obviously differ depending on whether you are viewing it via the external display or the internal. In the internal display the left soft key is strangely unused, while the right soft key opens a menu where you can access all the browser functions. On the exterior screen there are a line of controls along the bottom with the back button on the bottom left, zoom controls next to it, a "Go to WWW" button next to that and a menu button on the right. The menu button brings up a similar menu to the interior right soft key.
Menu options on the LG Voyager's browser allow you to manage memory, zoom level and thumbnail functionality. There's also a settings menu where you can do things like set a home page, restart the browser and adjust scrolling speed. We found the web browser on the LG Voyager to be one of the best we've seen on a mobile device. Although it's still not the cream of the crop -- that spot is shared between Safari on the iPhone and Series 60 Web - it's as good as Opera Mini, which we recommend as an alternative browser all the time. Our biggest issues with the LG Voyager's browser is that the overview thumbnail doesn't work as well as it could and that bookmarks can't be organized into folders. Aside from that you should have a very good browsing experience on the Voyager.
Browser Access (6.67)
To see how easy it is to navigate to a web page on the LG Voyager we count the number of steps it takes to go from the home screen unlocked until we have browsed to our site. We use steps here instead of a timed test because we don't want network issues to interfere. Entering the web address is counted as a single step. The LG Voyager's browser took six steps to complete this test. This is pretty speedy, only the Helio Ocean and Apple iPhone did better here than the Voyager. We found the shortcuts menu that you get by tapping on the home screen wallpaper to again help us out as this contains a shortcut to the browser. It should be noted though that even though it doesn't take many steps the browser is one of the slower programs to load on the Voyager.
| Cell Phone | Steps | Score |
| LG Voyager | 6 | 6.67 |
| HTC Touch on Sprint | 7 | 5.71 |
| Pantech Duo | 9 | 4.44 |
| Nokia E90 | 10 | 4.00 |
| Helio Ocean | 5 | 8.00 |
| Apple iPhone | 4 | 10.00 |
Gaming (3.3)
Calculator (3.0)
Alarm (6.5)
Document Software (0.0)
The LG Voyager doesn't include any software to view or edit office documents like Word or Excel files. This is a shame as the Voyager's large screens and QWERTY keyboard are certainly better suited for document editing than some Windows Mobile devices we've seen like the HTC Touch. Unfortunately though this is another area that is a clear indicator that the Voyager is not a smart phone, and those who need this kind of advanced functionality should look elsewhere.
Other Software (0.0)
We did not feel there was any additional software on the LG Voyager worthy of points.
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