LG CU500
Average Ratings
Great Voice and Data Device
For all you users that complain and moan about that this phone doesn't do ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING they want... NEWSFLASH- No phone does. Not a BlackBerry, not a Treo, NONE. Suggestion- Manage your expectations
Why does nobody do this read the manual? Any initial misunderstandings usually come from NOT reading the manual. Suggestion- Read the ____ing manual!
One to my rebuttal of some of the STUPIDEST reviews I've read by far... (dawjr-I'm looking at you)
1. "Turn on the speakerphone to turn it on..." The soft button says "Spr ON", press it and it TURNS the SPEAKERPHONE ON! How simple is that, or rather, how simple-minded must you be to NOT understand that?
2. "Turn off the speakerphone to turn it off..." See #1, simpleton.
3. "Add multiple numbers to a name..." The phone does have the capability to change icons on the multiple numbers. After entering the number you want to save, the middle soft key displays "TYPE". There are five options... Mobile, Home, Work, Fax, Other. CHOSE ONE!
4. "External display turns off..." Unless you want to carry around a device the size of an old brick phone, the manufacturers have to save battery life somewhere. Guess what? Press a side button and the display kicks back on. ALL PHONES with color displays do this.
5. "My finger hurts because I had to press the volume button NINE TIMES! Press * on the keypad for 2 seconds to put the phone into vibrate. Did you read the reviews before purchasing this phone?
6. "Camera lens is angled up..." OMG its a swivel camera, you can SWIVEL it!
Pros-
mp3 CAPABILITY- THIS IS A PHONE, NOT A DAP.
Stereo speakers
HSDPA/Cingular Video/MobilTV
Great speakerphone
Ergonomics
20 Meg memory standard (Treo 650 only has 12mb more)
Cons-
No auto delete of text messages
Can't use recorded sounds as ringtones(allows Cingular to sell ringtones)
No voice dialing- Bad for Bluetooth headsets
No Flash
All in all, a great HSDPA phone from LG.
You Know People Shouldn't be sooo Rediculous
It seems that people expect sooo much from a device that is supposed to just ring and make calls. I work in the Wireless Industry, time and again people seem to be full of complaints. I'm sorry but it is a cell phone, NOT A DESKTOP PC! The internet and what not are going to limited. The advances made with this phone and other manufacturers devices are amazing. To think that not that long ago most people had Rotary Dial phones and now we can access the internet, play games and what not on a phone is truely astounding. If you would like a tip on how to keep your phone working well, STOP SLAMMING THE PHONE SHUT! The wires in the hinge are delicate and can be compromised when you do this. It is an electronic device. Would you slam your laptop shut and then wonder why the screen is having problems? NO! Also as for the ascending ring? CAN YOU PEOPLE JUST BE A LITTLE MORE PICKY? GOOD LORD! You know you might find that handy when you forget to put your phone on silent and are in a meeting and have to dig it out of your pocket or purse before you annoy everyone in the room. And don't try to tell me that you have never forgotten, because your human and we all do. I think that everyone prefers different manufacturers. I personally was always a Sony Ericcson fan. But with this phone I can watch Mobi TV. It is friggin awesome. I am in a non 3G market and my phone is fast. So in closing. Stop complaining, get a life and remember all phones are different and maybe you should have gotten the Samsung Sync if you don't like the set up of this phone.
Overall One of the best phones I've used...Phone not PDA
Great Quad Band Phone for people who need a phone....not a pda.
Overall could be the best out there with a few minor improvements.
Pros
Excellent Call quality
Excellent reception...as good as any phone I have ever used
Good signal strength...I Live in a very rural area of Louisiana, with cingular service
Easy menu to navigate
Great Features
Volumn is excellent.... Loud ear piece, very easy to hear....this is one of very few phones that I have had to turn the volumn down on.
Clarity...Clear and Clean
- Fast Camera, the rotating lens is great
Fast Internet. 3G is amazing if you have it in your city.
Awesome vibrator mode...very strong, easy to feel
Stylish. I like the phone's style a lot.
Bright internal and external screens. Great color depth.
Buttons were easy to push and overall build quality was top notch.
Easy to use with one hand.....not slippery like the razr
Overall im very impressed with this device. With LG's previous reputation of being no better than sony ericsson, this phone gave me a new opinion of lg
cons
Battery life descent
Only ascending ring
I need the original LOUD ring that the LG 1400 had ... that woke me up the in the morning!
Needs to have larger font size for incoming calls....very hard to see unless you have excellent eyesite...Young...two font sizes for dialing.
Multi-task key and volume keys to small and hard to find.
Great, but could use some work
First of all, this is the most feature packed phone you can get for the money, and all the positive reviews here that I have read are right on. 3g has not been unveiled yet in Cincinnati, but even when operating on EDGE the phone is lightning fast. Overall LG made a very good phone, but could have hit a home run with the CU500, but here are a few things that drive me NUTS about it that keep me from giving it a 5:
-Every time you delete something, change a setting, send a text message, etc, there is an obnoxious confirmation sound that you CANNOT disable or change
-While the increasing ring would be a nice OPTION, you cannot disable it, and I'm not a fan
-There is no way to use a customized alert for a text message, or even set the phone to vibrate when a message is recieved, you also cannot turn up the volume for a message alert (very annoying)
-I'm not sure if this is my phone in particular or every CU500, but it seems to have some filter on the (call) speaker where if it has been silent then someone says something, it kind of fades in, usually cutting off the first word that someone says
Cingular's Best
Let me start out by saying that this phone is awesome. I was a little hesitant about upgrading since I was holding off for the Nokia 6126, but that got canceled. The phone has all of the options that anybody could be looking for, minus voice dialing.
PROS
Great Sounds/Speaker
MP3 Ringtones
Design
High Speed Internet
Fast OS/Menus
Battery
Price
CONS
Ascending Ringtone - I wish I could turn this off
Lack of Voice Dialing
Aside from the very minor cons, this phone is the best phone out there. The ascending ringtone is really not that big of a deal, I just think it is silly to not have an option to change it. Otherwise, this phone would get a 5.
Much better than the CU320.
I got this phone on Friday and I absolutely LOVE it. I am coming from a CU320, so most of my comparisons will be made against it.
Pros:
Excellent reception
Brighter and clearer screen than CU320
Full color and easy to read external screen
A2DP Bluetooth support
Connects to PC as USB storage drive when you use a data cable
HSPDA is sooooo much faster than plain UMTS
Phone feels much more solid than the CU320
Sound quality of music is simply unbelievable. The phone actually sounds better than my laptop speakers.
Cons:
No flash of any kind for the camera
No video conferencing
NO VOICE DIAL YET AGAIN :(
Transflash slot is under the battery, but this isn't that bad since the phone shows up as a drive on your computer.
No more "Ask once per session" option when you run a non-Cingular web enabled Java application
All in all, this is by far the best 3G phone that Cingular is offering at this time. It blows away the CU320 which blew away the ZX-10. I was lucky enough to find a store that would sell it to me on the 14th instead of the 15th, so I got it a day early. :) I will definetely be hanging on to the phone for quite some time and I highly recommend it to others.
It would have gotten a perfect 5 stars from me, but I can't quite get past it's lack of voice dialing capabilities.
Very nice phone, but not perfect
I bought this phone to replace my old lg VX3200 that I had on Verizon. My service with Verizon was great, but I chose to switch for the benefits of customization on Cingular/ATT, because I didn't want to pay verizon $200 for a new phone, and for the rollover minutes. I also liked the phone choices better.
I did A LOT of research on which phone to get before purchasing this phone. It had all the features I want and it sounded like a pretty sure bet from all the reviews I had read.
It's a huge upgrade for me, the phone is pretty nice. Unfortunately, it does have a few flaws.I have had bad service in the surrounding cities of where I live (Salem, MA)... Including Swampscott, Marblehead, and the Boston T.
One thing i can't seem to figure out is why my old phone get 99 speed dials and this much newer phone only has 9??
The other phone I was considering was the Krzr K1. the k1 also only has 9 speed dials. why?
I finally choose the CU500 mainly because of it's size. Although I also considered the fact that it is coated with metal while the krzr's have glass and are notorious for shattering.
Pros:
-the camera is great.
-good mp3 player
-picture ID
-you can edit the photos
-voices sound almost like they would in person
-there is a shortcut button with 8 spaces
-front and side keys to use features w/o opening the phone
-option to use 2g or 3g service
-video recording
-plenty of other tools and things to fool with
-allows plenty of memory and file use with bluetooth or USB.
-the mutli-task feature is great
Cons:
-volume keys kind of small
-the dual band feature is kind of annoying as the bars constantly change unless disabled through using the engineer settings (dial 277 634 #*#)
-dropped calls and spotty service in some locations
-uncomfortable to hold for long peiods due to it's square shape
-cannot change the shortcut keys
-cannot record
-too many features are designed around pay services
I use mp3 editing software to cut ringtones, saves money and you can use whatever songs you want
I LOVE IT
I have had this phone for a week and a half. I love the sound quality. This phone sounds like a stereo. I like that that ring tone starts out low and gets louder gradually. I love the music ID as well. You can put the phone up to the radio on any song and it will identify the song and then you have the choice to download the ringtone. great feature. Fun. Overall, I am going to have a lot of fun with this. We have ordered our son the same phone, we like it so much.
Awesome phone!!!!
I've had this phone for two months now and I absolutely love it. Both screens are pretty clear. I know people think the side buttons should be more extruded, but I like the way they are. I love the menu setup and keypad. Camera not top notch, but that not why I got this phone. I get complemented on it all the time especially the speakers sound. I recommend this phone to any person interested in it, A+++++++++
LG's Prodigy
This LG phone sets itself apart from all other phones in it's price range. It even out-performs some phones that are more expensive. The phone has an attractive design mixed with great features and only a few downfalls.
The few things that I don't like about the phone are not particularly important with one exception. The main flaw would have to be the lack of voice-dialing ability. Voice-dial is often a standard feature even on less expensive phones. For some reason LG opted to leave this convenient feature off of the phone. Another one of the cons is more of a nuisance than a flaw. Whenever you send a text message or change a setting the phone makes a chime sound that cannot be turned off, the only way to silence this noise is to have your phone on vibrate or silence all. Other than those two things there is nothing that I don't like about this phone.
On to the features that make this phone the best out there. The most obvious features are the media player and 1.3 mega pixel swivel camera. The phone has 3 external buttons below it's outside display that allow you to access your music library without opening the phone. You can also access the camera and video camera via the external buttons. Unlike other bluetooth capable phones this one is not limited at all. I have successfully sent entire mp3 music files to a nokia 6102, razr, and an Ericsson 525. The multi-tasking ability just adds to the already impressive phone. I can surf the web with lightning speed while listening to music, and if somebody calls me I can answer the phone and continue to surf the web. I live just south of Indianapolis and have at least 2 or 3 bars everywhere I go. I tested the phone as a modem on my laptop and desktop computer. If your computer doesn't have bluetooth capabilities then all you need is a usb cable. I was averaging download speeds of 750 kbps while talking to someone at the same time.
The LG 500 for obvious reasons is currently the best UMTS phone available.
