LG Optimus 2X review: Double the potential

Rich messaging capabilities

The LG Optimus 2X can handle all common types of messages with ease - SMS, MMS and email. Email support is excellent with support for Exchange out of the box and social media buffs will be pleased with the level of integration of that content as well.

A press-and-hold on the text box gives you access to functions such as cut, copy and paste. You are free to paste the copied text across applications like email, notes, chats, etc.

Sending Dexter a message

The extended Gmail features include batch operations, which allow multiple emails to be archived, labeled or deleted, spam report and of course conversation-style email view mode.

The Gmail app is simple to use but very functional

The generic email client supports multiple accounts. If you do add multiple accounts, then the Combined Inbox feature will come in handy. Too bad there’s no conversation-style view like in Gmail.

The generic email app

There are two types of on-screen keyboard you get with the LG Optimus 2X – the phone dialpad and the on-screen QWERTY keyboard. The QWERTY is available in both portrait and landscape.

The QWERTY keyboard looks a little iPhone-like but the good news is that it’s very good too. Portrait mode is quite accurate for text input and the landscape mode makes things even better.

While editing text you can also use the tap gestures – a tap on the side of the phone will push the text cursor in the opposite direction.

The on-screen QWERTY keyboard

Image gallery with 3D effects

The LG Optimus 2X uses the standard Android gallery. The gallery automatically locates the images and videos no matter where they are stored. The gallery boasts cool 3D effects and transitions, which we find rather attractive.

Images and videos placed in different folders appear in different sub-galleries that automatically get the name of the folder, which is very convenient - just like a file manager.

The different albums appear as piles of photos, which fall in neat grids once selected.

The gallery certainly is a looker • sorting by date

Alternatively, you photos can be organized by date with the help of a button in the top right corner, which switches between grid and timeline view. In grid view, there’s a date slider, which can also be used to find photos taken on a certain date.

The pinch zooming is also available here thanks to the Optimus 2X multi-touch support but you can also use double tap or even the +/- virtual buttons.

Looking at a single photo

There are tons of options for a picture – you can crop or rotate it directly in the gallery. The Send feature offers quick sharing via Facebook, Twitter, Picasa, Email apps or Bluetooth.

Zooming and panning is fast and smooth, but there’s a perceptible lag until the actual panning (or zooming) starts, which is slightly annoying.

Eye-candy music player

The music looks familiar but it has seen some polish. It can do the usual filtering by album and artist and you have alphabet search and regular search for finding songs quicker.

The updated music player

The Now playing interface places a big album art image in the center with controls above and below it.

Swiping the album art left or right is the easiest way to skip a song or go back to the previous one.

A press and hold on the album art will bring up a menu to search – for the title, the artist or the album title. After that you can pick where to search – your music collection, YouTube or a general Internet search.

The "Now playing" screen • Searching

There are equalizer presets available including a Virtual surround option, which works even without headphones, but the effect doesn’t do much without them.

Equalizer • Music controls in the notification area

Flipping the phone on its side reveals a cool 3D wall of all the albums you have in your music collection. Tap on an album and you’ll see a list of all songs from it. There’s an alphabet scroll at the bottom of the screen to make finding albums faster.

The cool 3D wall of albums

The LG Optimus 2X also comes with three “theme songs” composed by Ennio Morricone especially for the handset. This used to be a perk exclusive to luxury phones – it’s nothing major but it’s still a nice gift by LG.