LG KG800 Chocolate review: Dressed to impress

31 May 2006
A new LG phone has hit the streets. The possible suspect is described as black, slim, sexy and most of all fashionable. Well then, we might just have some information on that suspect, Mr. Officer. The LG Chocolate phone is a gorgeous mobile phone offering a red-glowing navigation touchpad, 128MB of internal memory, 1.3 megapixel camera and MP3 player, tri-band GSM and GPRS support - all that incorporated into a slim slider shell.

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  • r
  • ronnie
  • 2CA
  • 13 Oct 2006

sorry people... i hav no idea wat u guys are talking about... let me explain why i am lost.

first of all, all these problems that have happened to others havent happened to me, and if you are experiencing problems with SMSing, it usually has something to do with the t9 dictionary. to enter our words without the chocolate making some of its own, go to messages > write message > text message > options > t9 lanugages> t9 off. at least it worked for me. hope this solves the problem, i will come back for more problem solving later.

    • D
    • Daniel
    • puC
    • 08 Oct 2006

    I got the KG800 a few days ago and am very disappointed. I decided to go with less features and more looks, but it turns out even the features that are included are very badly done. Here is a list of some things that annoy me, that the GSMarena review didn't mention:

    • Speech quality is bad. The microphone is so weak, you have to be in a really quiet place so that your call partner can hear what you are saying.
    • It often just loses connection in the middle of calls. That never happened to me before, and I heard of many others who encountered this too.
    • MMS and E-Mail sending is limited to 100KB max. Which means you cannot send pictures you made with the phone in high resolution.
    • No dynamic dictionary. You can enter new words, but you have to quit the message editor, go to the "add word" function and enter it there. My old Motorola added words I typed automatically to the dictionary. The LG method is such a mess, I don't use the dictionary at all anymore.
    • You can't enter numbers into messages by just pressing the appropriate keys. Switch mode to numbers, enter numbers, switch mode back to letters. The same goes for capital letters: 1x mode button for capital letters, make 1 capital letter, 2x mode button to write lower case letters again. Enough said.
    • Built-in sound effects for slide open/close and even new message notification CANNOT be changed, only chosen from the 4 that LG put in.
    • Doesn't support subfolders. Anything you put in a folder that LG didn't create for you, is just ignored by the phone.
    • I'd like to know why there are 3 folders for pictures: Album, Photos and Pictures. It seems Pictures is in "Main memory" while Photos and Albums is in "Multimedia Memory". However, only pictures you have just taken with the phone's camera go into the Albums folder. Together with the fact that you can only use pictures from that folder for phonebook entries, this means that you have to take those pictures directly with the phone. If you move them to the computer and right back to the phone again, you can't use them for the phonebook anymore.
    • The photo viewer is bad. Actually, there are three photo viewers, one for each folder, and they don't have much in common. The best one is the one for the Albums folder as you can have a thumbnail view and fullscreen display of pictures, but the Albums folder is the least useful. You can't zoom to original size in any of the viewers.
    • Sometimes, the menu just hangs for 2-3 seconds, and doesn't respond to anything you press. This happens about once in every 3 minutes.
    • Entering texts is just as slow. You have to put long pauses in between consecutive pushes of the same button, or the phone is only going to acknowledge 2/3 of them.
    • The battery is weak. Much weaker than what the specs say, which already isn't that good.
    • There's a big, bulky digital watch and date display on the home screen, which you cannot disable.
    • Memos up to 80 characters and voice notes up to 20 seconds are stupid limitations.

    I am putting my phone back up for sale after less than 2 day of regular use.

      • v
      • veronica
      • U2W
      • 07 Oct 2006

      saw the ad for this phone today on the internet. "makes everything else seem old fashioned". I think i agree (i hav this fone)

        • t
        • tarrantm
        • YbQ
        • 03 Oct 2006

        I just bought an LG VX8500 yesterday, fully loaded, 2Gig mem card and the music kit, etc for over 350 bucks. Suffice to say I returned the phone today and got a full refund because:
        - The phone kept rebooting each time the phone's music software tried to access the memory card. I was able to transfer music to the card just find from the PC using the USB cable or bluetooth. But I just could not get the phone to actually play any of the music on the memory card.
        - I took it to the Verizon store and they kept insisting the card wasn't bad and neither was the phone. They put in a 256 meg card into the phone with music on it and it played that card. They point blank refused to even consider that it may be a 2 gig card issue.
        - I spent 2 hours on the phone with Verizon tech support trying to get them to verify this. Their answe was that there will be a new version of software to fix this issue (still not admitting that it might be a defect in the phone or the 2gig mem card), but they did not have an ETA on when the fix might be ready.

        Verizon also only gives you 15 days within which you can get a full refund for your purchase (Cingular gives you 30 days but their phones suck - no Ericcson 800i in my service zone and the 300i just sucks), so I promptly returned the phone and all accessories to the store and told them I want my money back.

        In addition, the memory slot and charger slot covers are crappy and break easily. The power and usb charger connecter are proprietary and also break with the slightest bad angle when putting them in.

          • c
          • coopz
          • iLM
          • 05 Sep 2006

          I am about to get this phone (on order for this saturday) I have read many mixed reviews on the phone. But thrufully, only incredibly expensive phones have amazing cameras and MP3 space. This Phone has pratical software and it makes phone calls and texts, which are what phones are for! I looks amazing, I'm so excited to be finally getting it!

            • j
            • jonh
            • PTn
            • 02 Sep 2006

            dear can ay1 tell me HOW MANY SONGS we can capture in this phone
            i'm just concern abt songs

              • l
              • luxxx
              • mbx
              • 01 Sep 2006

              I have the chocolate KG 800 and I really love the design.
              of course some things aren't perfect, but what the heck..
              The chocolate inspired me to make some animated wallapers, like a red Matrix animation :]
              http://luxxx.tv

                • R
                • ROJAS
                • PcQ
                • 30 Aug 2006

                3/5 stars. Excellent desing... but.... poor functions. Esta chingon el telefono pero las funciones estan para niños de primaria. The "alert sounds" i cant hear it. No suena ni vibra chido. I recomended only for desing. Se los recomiendo solo para presumirlo y ya.

                  • m
                  • martha
                  • Ghf
                  • 25 Aug 2006

                  pls discontinue model as soon as you can, i understand that the look and packaging of the phone that is not all the market want, what about the features of the phone. either review the features to save customers an on going trip to repair centres

                    • L
                    • Lg phone
                    • jR4
                    • 24 Aug 2006

                    LG Chocolate is a great review of the USA version of the phone

                      • P
                      • Peter
                      • 4rS
                      • 15 Aug 2006

                      Disregaurd my last post. This thread is on the LG KG800 Chocolate. I was talking about the LG8500 Chocolate. Looks like americans get a newer version. Sweet.

                        • P
                        • Peter
                        • 4rS
                        • 15 Aug 2006

                        Ok guys... i dont know what you are talking about... Let me explain why i am lost.

                        Basically this is the part aboutthe LG Chocolate that has me confused: let me just take a momement to explain that the chocolate has a slot for up to 2gigs of microSD memory that you can get, so i dont know why you are all complaining about there being only so little memory. I mean it is in fact expandable, there is a small port on the lower right side. At least on the American release of this phone, which I might add looks a bit different then the one pictured in this artical... they moved the buttons a bit and gave it more of an Ipod layout.

                          • ?
                          • Anonymous
                          • 4{i
                          • 13 Aug 2006

                          By far the most stylish phone I ever owned. It is simply breathtaking. Nice features and surprisingly good camera. Beautiful screen. Touch sensitive buttons are impressive. The only drawback in my opinion is that it doesn't have speakerphone mode. I still wouldn't trade this phone for anything else though. :)

                            • B
                            • Bird
                            • jst
                            • 12 Aug 2006

                            I want i want i want .basically there is arage on fashionable phones. that does not live up to its name and expensive price(razr)i need to have 1 of these...

                              • M
                              • Mike
                              • jRX
                              • 12 Aug 2006

                              I just bought this phone; I love it but it feels like the touch pad is a tad too sensitive.

                                • E
                                • E
                                • my1
                                • 07 Aug 2006

                                i have just one question, is the phone worth all that money?

                                  • ?
                                  • Anonymous
                                  • my1
                                  • 06 Aug 2006

                                  im about to get this phone is it good ive heard good and bad things about it. what does speaker mode mean?

                                    • q
                                    • quikslipper
                                    • 4TR
                                    • 30 Jul 2006

                                    Got the Chocalate yesterday! I must admit, THE nicest and most appealing phone I've had yet. It's very sleek and super stylish. As far as features go, it's pretty basic, but I would say, it adds a little flare to it too. Reception-wise, haven't experienced anything on the downside. The phone overall is great, just gets a lot of fingerprint marks on it. The touchpad is super sensitive, but works nonetheless. The only thing I am unimpressed about this phone is the fact that it doesn't have that much memory to start with and there is no slot to put an external card in there and there is no speaker phone to use. On the other hand, I'm loving this phone a lot. It's just right for the right person. Texting too, by the way, ain't that bad either. It's pretty userfriendly...UI is quick which I think is a big plus! For those looking to get a new phone, check this one out, because I know I did and I'm happy with it! "To each their own!"

                                      • D
                                      • David
                                      • PAy
                                      • 29 Jul 2006

                                      I work in a mobile phone store, and have (obviously) experienced a wide variety of different mobiles from all manufacturers.
                                      The LG "Chocolate" Phone is a nice design, but the reception ability of the phone is very unimpressive, and the touch-pad like keys on the front are very sensitive - sometimes overly so.
                                      Very nice looking phone, but not the best in regards to features or day-to-day operations.