The LG Wave comes with a small but functional 1.25-inch diagonal external screen right on the front. It displays all the typical information like date, time, battery life, signal strength, and caller ID. Since it supports 65,000 colors, the display also supports photo caller ID plus act as a camera viewfinder. It also displays the currently playing track when the music player is activated. A few tiny icons along the top of the screen indicate whether you have a new message, whether the phone is on vibrate, and whether you're in a roaming zone.
When the music player is activated, a row of touch-sensitive music player controls will appear underneath the display. These glowing red keys consist of the rewind/track-back key, the play/pause key, and the fast forward/track forward key. You can configure the sensitivity of these keys plus add sound effects to them so you know when you've pressed the right key. We haven't been huge fans of touch-sensitive keys, and it's no different here. We really miss the feeling of tactile keys, and it's kind of a pain to unlock the keys every time you want to change a track. The least they could've done is to have a vibrating or haptic feedback for the keys, but even that isn't present.
A camera lens sits above the external display, but there is no flash. On the left spine are a headset jack, a volume rocker, and a dedicated music player key, while the right side is home to a microSD card slot, a dedicated camera key, and the charger jack. You can unlock the aforementioned music player keys by hitting any of the keys on the side.
Flip open the phone and you'll find a simple 2-inch diagonal 262,000 color display. The screen is bright, colorful, and shows off the phone's animated menu icons. You can adjust the display's backlight time, the menu style, font styles, and dialing font sizes, but there is no brightness setting. The Celltop menu interface is especially enticing; it consists of interactive, changeable windows, or "cells," that act as shortcuts to things like your call log or message in-box. There are even other features, such as displaying weather or news information. You can read more about the Celltop feature in our review of the Samsung SCH-u520M.
Underneath the display is a navigation array that consists of two soft keys and a circular toggle that act as shortcuts to the contacts list, Axcess Apps, the browser, and the music player. There's also a dedicated speakerphone key, a dedicated camera key, a Back key, and the Send and End/Power keys. We thought the keypad felt rather slick and slippery, with a rather crowded array as well. That said, there was enough textured delineation between each key so you could dial by feel if you wanted.
Features
The LG Wave has a number of features that would please anyone looking for a midrange phone. The address book holds about 5,000 contacts with room in each entry for five phone numbers, a couple of e-mail addresses, and a memo. They can also be categorized into groups, paired with a photo for caller ID, or one of 36 polyphonic ringtones. Other basics include a vibrate mode, text and multimedia messaging, a speakerphone, a memo pad, an alarm clock, a tip calculator, a notepad, a calculator, a stopwatch, a world clock, and a unit converter. For those who want a little more out of their phone, the LG Wave also has stereo Bluetooth, a voice recorder, voice command, PC syncing, USB mass storage, a wireless Web browser, and EV-DO support. The LG Wave also has built-in GPS for location access support. As a multimedia phone, the Wave comes with both a 1.3-megapixel camera and a fairly basic digital music player. The camera is able to take pictures in five resolutions (1,280x960, 640x480, 320x240, 176x144, and 160x120) and three quality settings, with a slew of other settings that include 10x zoom, brightness, night mode, a self-timer, white balance, color effects, different shutter sounds (with a silent option), and multishot mode. Picture quality was decent, but with a slight overcast look and an orange tinge, so it wasn't too impressive. There's also a built-in camcorder with two different resolutions (176x144 and 128x96), plus brightness settings, white balance settings, up to 10x zoom, and two recording times (15 seconds for multimedia messages and 1 hour for regular recordings). Video quality was rather shaky and pixelated, with blurry images, but that's to be expected for a camera phone. Thankfully, there's a microSD card slot for additional storage.
The built-in music player is fairly basic, with a generic interface that displays the typical music controls plus an option for playlist creation. There's a music library, where songs are immediately organized by artist, genre, album, and recently played. We did like that it has a customizable equalizer with 6 preset equalizer modes. You can transfer music onto the phone via a microSD card. Other multimedia features include Alltel's Axcess TV and support for XM Satellite Radio.
Personalization options include a variety of wallpapers, screensavers, and the customization of the home screen with calendars and clocks. You can also download more graphics, alert tones, and sounds via Alltel's web browser.
Performance
We tested the dual-band (CDMA 800/1900; EV-DO) LG Wave in San Francisco using Alltel's service. Though call quality was pretty good, callers could still hear slight background noises, and reported that our voices sounded a little tinny. Speakerphone volume level was fine, though there was still an audible metallic echo effect. That said, we could still hear each other clearly. We paired the LG Wave with the Plantronics Voyager 520 without any problems.
The LG Wave has a rated battery life of 3 hours of talk time, which seems rather low. However, our tests did reveal a talk time of 4 hours. It has a rated standby time of 8 days. According to FCC radiation tests, the LG Wave has a maximum digital SAR rating of 1.08 watts per kilogram.
General
Cellular technology
CDMA2000 1X
Band / mode
CDMA2000 1X 1900/800
Weight
3 oz
Wireless Interface
Bluetooth
Standby time
Up to 140 h
Combined with
With digital camera / digital player
Memory
Phone Book Capacity
500 names & numbers
Phone
Service provider
Alltel Wireless
Vibrating Alert
Yes
Voice Recorder
Yes
Speakerphone
Yes
Alarm Clock
Yes
Calendar
Yes
Additional Features
Memory card slot
Digital Camera
Still image resolution
1280 x 960
Video recorder resolutions
176 x 144 (QCIF)
Messaging / Data Services
Voice Mail Capability
Yes
Short Messaging Service (SMS)
Yes
Internet Browser
Yes
Messaging / Data Features
Text messages, Multimedia messages (MMS)
3G Services / Included Services
GpsOne
Digital Player / Recorder
Digital player supported digital audio standards
AAC, MP3, WMA
Digital player/recorder type
Digital player
Display
Display Type
LCD display
Color Support
Color
Power
Battery installed
Lithium ion
Talk time
Up to 180 min
Cellular
Phone style
Folder type phone
Caller ID
Yes
Volume Control
Yes
Ringer Control
Yes
Physical Characteristics
Width
1.9 in
Depth
0.8 in
Height
3.7 in
Antenna
Integrated
