KF300 is a new, recently introduced model from LG. The phone is a slim clamshell, thin enough to be comparable with Sony Z770, although far behind Motorola’s RAZR in this area. What’s remarkable about the KF300 is how easy it is to use for people with big fingers. You will surely like this model if you hate the small keys on most mobile phones – but we’ll talk about this a bit later.The front panel is made from plastic; a transparent layer, and under it another textured one which gives the phone’s face cover a nice reflection effect under light. A downside is the front panel being prone to finger marks – then again, it’s a problem of most modern phones.
There’s a small metal stripe located at the top of the front cover, which in my opinion doesn’t fit the overall design very well. Not that it looks bad or anything – it just feels like something’s missing when you look at the front panel of the KF300. There also are similar metal stripes with chrome finish along the edges of the phone. The back panel is made from soft-touch plastic, pleasant to touch and nothing out of ordinary. Now for the problems we noticed. First of all, the back cover stays a bit loose. Second, the memory card slot is located unconveniently under the battery, so you need to turn of the phone to swap it. Typical problems with many LG models, these two. Another problem we encountered was the color chiping off the volume control buttons on the side of the phone after fairly short time of use; hopefully this will be corrected in commercial versions, although I’m afraid it might stay this way, too. As for the inside of the phone, it looks very interesting. First thing you notice is the keypad with simply enormous (for a modern mobile, anyway) buttons and big, clear labels on them. The KF300 would obviously be a good choice for a present for an elderly person who won’t be using it for anything much besides phone calls and will appreciate the ease of dialing a number. The navigational buttons are also proportional in size to the number keypad and large enough to be used comfortably by almost anyone. What’s more, the KF300 has separate buttons for launching what LG thinks are the most important functions of the phone. I agree with the choice of Alarm Clock, but I’d question whether Organizer will be widely used by the consumers the phone is targeted at. There’s also a button for Images and one for Favorites, which allow you to add any function you want to the list.
Software
Now let’s move on to the menu. What I’d like to note right away is one of the LG “things”: the company has good concepts in their phones, but they’re incomplete. That’s the case with the KF300 as well: while the keyboard is big and easy to read, and the clock displayed on the external screen is huge, the menu font is tiny (be it menu icons, messages or anything else). You’d think they would go all the way in making the phone as accessible as possible, but like I said – good idea, yet not realized to it’s full potential.As for the menu itself, it’s very similar to that of KF320, but the menu choices are arranged differently and the applications are located in different submenus. That’s usually the case with LG models, where the menu varies slightly from one model to another, depending on what the company considers the most important features of the phone are (these are usually put forward as the first menu icons). I don’t really think that’s the right strategy, because a fan of LG phones would probably like to find his new device from the company as familiar and easy to use as his old one, like it is with Nokia, Sonny Ericsson, and to an extent, Samsung phones.
Conclusion
LG KF300 is a standard mid-range model with a 2 megapixel camera, player application and FM radio. If you don’t need superior multimedia functions, and mostly use the phone for calling or writing SMS messages, you should find the phone interesting. The reason is first and foremost the big, comfortable keyboard; the 2.2” display is large enough too. Besides, the design is not bad either. Personally, I’d only buy such a phone as a present for an elderly person, or someone who has a bad eyesight and is primarily interested in using the phone for talking or writing messages.
