Now the demand for mobile devices with support for multiple SIM-cards is growing, not so long ago devices with even three slots for SIM-cards appeared. Also, more and more Android smartphones with support for two SIM cards are on sale.
More recently, phones from renowned manufacturers with a touch screen and two SIM cards cost about $ 150. Manufacturers of the second rank offered models with such characteristics cheaper, but, as a rule, these models had various disadvantages. In the second half of 2011, well-known companies (primarily Samsung and LG) released several models with similar specifications, belonging to the budget price segment. One of these models is the LG T510. I have been using this unit for a month now and I can say that the price / quality ratio of the LG T510 is very high. This phone is distinguished by good ergonomics, high-quality (for its price category) display and long battery life.
- Specifications:
- Operation of 2 SIM-cards (in standby mode)
- Work in cellular networks GSM / GPRS / EDGE 850/900/1800/1900
- 2.8-inch touch-sensitive resistive LCD display with a resolution of 240 x 320 pixels, displaying 256 thousand shades
- Bluetooth 2.1 (A2DP)
- 2 megapixel camera
- MicroUSB port, standard 3.5mm audio jack
- 50 MB internal memory, support for microSD memory cards (up to 8 GB)
- Stereo FM radio
CONTENTS OF DELIVERY
The LG T510 phone is a typical budget solution. In this regard, the delivery set includes, in addition to the device, a USB cable, a compact charger and a quick user's guide.
DESIGN, ERGONOMICS
The LG T510 mobile phone is a compact device. The dimensions of the case are 105 x 57.3 x 12.9 mm, the weight of the device is 100 g. The LG T510 is ergonomic. The device is easy to operate with one hand. The LG T510 fits even into small clothing pockets.
The design of the device is calm. In fact, the LG T510 looks better than it does in the photos. Subjectively, the design of the LG T510 is more interesting than that of many Samsung devices. The front side of the case is covered with plastic, on which fingerprints are clearly visible. In my case, after a month of use, no scratches appeared on the front side. During testing, I did not drop the phone and only put the device down on the table a few times, so I cannot say how resistant the display coating is to mechanical stress. The back of the case is made of matte plastic. Fingerprints are not visible on such a coating. Unfortunately, the quality of the plastic is poor. On this side of the case, scuffs and small scratches quickly appeared. The case is assembled quite solidly, no hints of any backlash were found in any parts.
The LG T510 has a 240 x 320 pixel touchscreen LCD (143 ppi). The screen is made using resistive technology, it recognizes only one simultaneous touch. For me, this did not become a fundamental problem in connection with how exactly I use this device. By the way, the sensitivity of the sensor is good for this type of display. Sure, to users accustomed to modern capacitive touchscreens, the LG T510's screen responsiveness will seem weak, but the target audience of this phone is those who buy a touchscreen device for the first time or those who buy a dual SIM phone to use it. as a "dialer". The picture quality on the display of this phone is not bad. If you look closely, in some cases gradation of shades is noticeable. The screen has excellent viewing angles, for example, the budget smartphone LG L3 inverts the colors much faster when the display is tilted than the T510 screen. What grieves me the most is the lack of sunlight resistance of the LG T510's display.On the street, even on a cloudy day, information actually ceases to be readable. Of course, in the room there is enough stock of the screen brightness to the full. By the way, I chose this model, and not a similar device from Samsung, because, according to subjective feelings, the image quality on Samsung phones was noticeably lower even indoors.
Above the display is an inconspicuous earpiece. Below the display there are three mechanical buttons: the central button (Back), buttons on the sides of it - accept and end a call. The End key also functions as a return to the desktop. These hardware keys are convenient to use. The microphone of this phone is located just above the central button. In my opinion, this is the most correct placement of the microphone: it is simply impossible to cover it with your hand during a telephone conversation.
On the right side of the case there is a microUSB port, which is used to exchange data with a computer and to connect a charger, and a slot for microSD memory cards (up to 8 GB). Both compartments are tightly closed with plastic plugs. LG T510 supports hot swapping of memory cards.
On the left side of the case is a volume rocker. This key is thin and relatively tight.
The top end of the LG T510 houses the phone lock / power button. There is also a standard 3.5 mm audio jack. My earbuds fit into the phone jack very firmly. The bottom end of the case remained completely free.
The entire space of the rear side of the case is occupied by the battery compartment cover. On this side there is a 2MP camera lens and an external speaker covered with a grill. The camera lens is recessed into the body, which prevents fingerprints and scratches on the optics. A removable 1100 mAh battery is located under the battery cover. According to the manufacturer, LG T510 can work without recharging up to 17 hours of talk time and up to 696 hours of standby time. In the conditions of domestic cellular networks, the device works on a single battery charge for 2-3 days. My scenario of using this device is as follows: 30-50 minutes of conversations a day, periodic checking of mail and news on social networks, about half an hour of reading articles on the Internet. It takes about two hours to fully charge the battery.
USER INTERFACE
The LG T510 mobile phone has a user-friendly, intuitive user interface. The lock screen displays the date and time, as well as notifications for missed calls, new messages and emails. When you listen to music, the track title and artist name appear on the lock screen. To unlock the screen, you must press the lock button or hardware keys on the phone, and then slide the lock screen up. In this regard, users should pay attention to one detail. The resistive screen reacts to the touch of not only hands, but also any objects in general. Once I put my phone in a very small denim pocket. On the go, the phone unlocked and dialed a random number from the contact list.
This phone does not have a dedicated home desktop, so when the screen is unlocked, the user is taken to the last desktop they used.
The main part of the interface is three desktops on which the user can place shortcuts, widgets and contacts. I liked the quality of the widgets implementation. For example, the Clock widget is divided into two parts: if you tap on the clock, the alarm will open, if you click on the date, the calendar will open. There are four shortcuts at the bottom edge of the display: phone keypad, contact list, messages and Main menu.
The notification bar of the LG T510 phone is designed as a thin bar at the top of the screen. It displays the time, signal strength, notification method, notifications about missed calls and received messages. No settings can be made through the notification panel.
The main menu is designed as a 3 x 4 matrix with horizontal page scrolling. You cannot change the location of the labels. When you install games or applications, they will be placed in the appropriate folder.
CORRESPONDENCE, VIRTUAL KEYBOARD
It was a pleasant surprise for me that the Messages application is organized in the same way on the LG T510 phone as on modern smartphones. All correspondence is combined into chains by the name of the correspondent. If you open a thread, then messages will be shown in the form of a chat. You can add an image, video, note, etc. to the SMS text, and the phone will automatically convert the text message to MMS.
The phone comes with a preinstalled email application. It is a functional program that works with any POP / IMAP mailbox. The user can activate several boxes and specify the frequency of checking incoming correspondence. The application has a search function by sender or recipient address and email subject. User can batch delete or archive emails.
The LG T510 comes with a full-size virtual keyboard. Due to the size of the display, using the qwerty keyboard is convenient only with the stylus. At the same time, the typing speed is not high, so I prefer a regular telephone keypad. There is a T9 function and predictive text input. The buttons on this keyboard are large enough to type quickly and without errors. The phone also implements handwriting text input, which works correctly, but the typing speed is extremely low.
CONTACT LIST, 2 SIM CARD WORK, TELEPHONY
The contact list of the LG T510 phone has good functionality. The maximum number of contacts stored in the internal memory of the phone is 1000. The user can create contact groups, a separate ringing signal can be assigned to each group.
You can specify various information about each contact: up to 6 phone numbers, two email addresses, IM, postal address, company name, etc.
In the contact list, next to each name, there is a switch that allows you to set which SIM card to call by default. For each SIM card, you can set up call forwarding, call restrictions, etc.
The phone keypad of this phone is implemented as well as possible. This application has two additional tabs: the contact list and the call list. The call list displays incoming, outgoing and missed calls, as well as incoming and outgoing message notifications. Telephone keypad LG T510 received a full function of Smart Dial: when dialing a number, the phone detects matches in both phone numbers and contact names.
The speaker and microphone quality of the LG T510 meets modern standards. The volume of the external speaker is low. In order not to miss an incoming call, you need to pick up a louder signal.
The screen is automatically locked during a phone call. You can unlock it with a virtual lock button located at the bottom edge of the display, or with a hardware power / lock key. The user can make a sound recording of a telephone conversation. The phone supports conference calling.
MULTIMEDIA
The LG T510 phone has a Gallery application that displays all images and photos stored in your smartphone in one folder. In full screen view, the user can swipe right and left through the pictures. When you click on a snapshot, several virtual buttons will appear on the screen: Options, Send via, Delete and Zoom. Directly from the Gallery, the user can send a picture via Bluetooth or attach it to an email or MMS. The image can be posted to Facebook and Twitter. This "social" component is perhaps the nicest part of the Gallery app.
The video player of this phone plays 3GP files.Weak video codec support is hardly a drawback of this phone, given the physical size and resolution of the display. The player is capable of taking screenshots of the video recording.
The music player of this phone has an intuitive interface. When you launch the application, the screen displays a vertical list of ways to sort your music: Recently played tracks, All tracks, Artists, Albums, Genres, Playlists and Shuffle.
The current playback interface is minimalistic. The screen displays album art, timeline and playback control buttons. At the bottom of the screen there are two additional buttons: Repeat (one or all tracks) and Shuffle. The phone has a set of preset equalizers: Classic, Jazz, Pop, Rock, Treble.
If you minimize the audio player, a widget will appear on the desktop under the notification panel, which will display a creeping line with the song name, artist name and music genre. Clicking on the widget will open the current playback. When you listen to music, the song title and artist name are displayed on the lock screen above the clock. Naturally, the LG T510 does not support multitasking, so you cannot listen to music in the background. Even in order to write an SMS, the audio player will have to be closed. The player will only work when you launch the default web browser and utilities (calculator, alarm clock).
The phone is equipped with a stereo FM radio with RDS support. The radio interface is convenient. The radio scans for stations and stores them automatically. The radio broadcast can be played back through an external speaker. In this case, headphones must be connected in order to function as an antenna. The user can turn on the recording of the radio broadcast.
In terms of audio playback quality, this phone is at a low level. For comparison, I listened to the same track through headphones on the phone and on the Sony NWZ-B153F player - the difference is enormous. The sound in the phone lacks sufficient depth and clarity.
CAMERA
The LG T510 phone is equipped with a fixed-focal camera with a resolution of 2 megapixels. The camera does not have a flash and a hardware shutter button. The maximum image resolution is 1600 x 1200 pixels.
The camera interface is minimalistic. At the right edge of the display, a virtual shutter button is displayed, which is also a switch between photo and video modes. Below is a shortcut to the Gallery application. If you tap on the screen, along the top edge of the display, an indication of the battery charge, the resolution of the picture and the path to save the picture (internal phone memory or memory card) will appear. At the left edge of the display, three virtual buttons are displayed: zoom, brightness adjustment and all camera settings. The user can select the image resolution, color effect (negative, sepia, black and white) and set the white balance. Surprisingly, the photo can be edited without leaving the Camera application. The user can add text to the image, apply filters (Negative, Blur, Watercolor, Sharpen, etc.) and adjust the image (change the contrast, brightness of the image, adjust the RGB channels, etc.).
The quality of the images taken is very low. Photos not only lack color saturation and contrast, but even sharpness. The camera is capable of shooting 3GP video with a resolution of 176 x 144 pixels and a frequency of 15 frames per second. This quality is only suitable for sending via MMS.
INTERFACES, CONNECTIONS
The phone operates in four GSM / GPRS / EDGE frequency bands. The phone is equipped with a Bluetooth 2.1 module (it is possible to transmit stereo sound). For data exchange with a computer, a microUSB port is provided on the phone. This interface connector is also used to charge the battery.
ANNEXES
The LG T510 comes with a number of useful programs and utilities.Due to the fact that the phone is positioned as a youth solution, this device has several SNS applications (Facebook, Twitter, MSN), which work fast enough and have an ergonomic interface. The SNS folder contains Vkontakte and Odnoklassniki sections, but these are not separate applications, but links to the mobile versions of these social networks.
The default web browser of the smartphone is very inconvenient to use due to the lack of a function to align text to the width of the page. Fortunately, the phone comes preinstalled with the Opera Mini 5 web browser, which I use all the time. This browser loads even pages with a lot of images without any problems. By clicking once on a page, the browser instantly enlarges the corresponding portion of the web page and automatically aligns the text to the width of the screen. The default display settings are comfortable in my opinion.
The LG T510 phone comes to the domestic market with a number of pre-installed "domestic" services - these are applications from Yandex (Mail, Maps, Metro) and Mail.ru Agent. Using Maps and Metro services is difficult due to the low speed of these applications on this phone. I find the ABBYY Lingvo English-Russian dictionary a useful program. There are three games preinstalled on the phone: Tetris Pop, MingleMangle and Containers Block. LG T510 phone supports java, so user can install other applications.
The phone has a number of utilities: Calendar, Dictaphone, World Clock, Calculator, Stopwatch, Currency Converter.
CONCLUSION
The low price of a device with a touch screen and 2 SIM cards is the main advantage of the LG T510 phone. The user interface of this phone is simple and functional. I was pleased with the battery life of this device and the presence of pre-installed services Facebook and Twitter. To be honest, my choice of the LG T510 phone was also influenced by the design of this phone.
Of course, the buyer of this device will not receive a high-quality camera and will not be able to comfortably watch video on the screen of this device, but the overwhelming majority of users will not pay attention to these details.
Buyers can also opt for a similar device from LG, but with a Wi-Fi module - LG T515. The direct competitor of LG T510 is the Samsung C3312 Duos phone, the specifications of both devices are almost identical. If the user prefers devices with capacitive touch screens and high-quality cameras, he will be interested in the Samsung S5222 Star 3 Duos phone.
