If ever you wanted a basic phone that did its job, you're not going to be looking at the LG dare. The LG Dare’s release was announce on June 11, 2008. Since then, I asked my father near everyday if I could “please, please, pretty please” have the phone.Finally. Success.
The Dare measures 4.1 inches down, 2.2 inches across, and is half an inch wide. It weighs in at 3.75 oz and features a 3 inch touch display.
Touch Screen:
It takes a bit of time to get used to using. For one, I found that using the tips of my nails to hit the screen made it far easier to use. My friends without, made do with either jabbing at the screen repeatedly until it did what they wanted it to, or resorted to using a stylus to navigate my phone. It is also equipped with handwriting recognition. For a touch phone, that makes sense. I’ve used it once or twice when trying to send a text. Honestly, you’re better off ignoring the function altogether. It’s frustrating because half the letters you write end up as something entirely different.
Camera:
The camera in the phone is a 3.2 megapixel camera which actually shoots decent photographs. It has both flash and a zoom function. The flash is great. I just wish that there was a way to convert and use that thing as a flashlight. My complaints with the camera lie solely with the zoom. If you have the image size set to the highest it can go, you can’t use the zoom function. You can only use the digital zoom when you drop down the image size. To be honest, it’s utterly pointless. I’ve printed several pictures taken with my phone, and while not OMG DSLR quality, they’re not half bad. For me, the camera is dependable as a back-up, especially since I seem to have lost my camera’s battery charger.
Multimedia:
The LG Dare functions both as a video and music player. It supports MP3, AAC, AAC+, and WMA file formats and the sound quality is good. It’s clear and loud enough to be heard by the people in your vicinity. Admittedly, if you’re in the library, please use the 3mm headphone jack that’s located on the upper left hand corner of your phone.
As far as applications go, you can download near anything on the LG Dare. It installs right away and you can use it at will. One of my favorite Verizon applications is the Backup Assistant. It automatically backs up all of your contacts, so should you ever need to change phones, you need only download the application to the new phone, input your PIN, and watch as your contacts are stored in the new phone. Verizon also waives the monthly charge for that application if you are a MyVerizon user. It’s an amazing alternative to people inviting you to their new “I lost my phone and need your numbers” Facebook group.
Themes:
The LG Dare has two basic decorative themes to the phone. White or black. The black theme is more rigidly structured, where all of the tabs and icons in the menu are set up appropriately in rows and columns. The white theme leaves your icons strewn about in an organized chaos. There are several fonts available to change and personalize the appearance of your phone. There are the typical “serious” fonts and two “fun” (rather, more fun) fonts to use: Joy and Script. Script looks like Bradley Hand ITC and Joy...just looks...spunky.
Battery life:
No one’s battery is as good as it was when you first bought the phone. The Dare’s battery is equipped to be able to hold 4.5 hours of talk time and almost 360 hours of standby time (15 days). My battery now, even as abused as it has been since February, still lasts me through the day. Unless you’re trying to have marathon talk times on this phone, a standard battery should last you a full day. Otherwise, consider getting yourself an extended battery or a spare normal battery that you can keep charged and on hand. It’s actually a good idea if you don’t have a car charger and you frequently go on longer trips.
3G capable:
The LG Dare can process email, can browse through the internet, has a calendar that you can store all of your “most important dates”, alarms, notepad, etc. This phone is NOT equipped to take the place of a smart phone, but it can be used in place of one if you aren’t ready to take that step yet.
Call Quality:
This phone takes great calls and has a decent sound quality. My only complaint seems to stem more from Verizon and its service rather than anything the phone does. There’s a strange thing some Verizon phones will do at some point whilst you have them. You can hear your voice echoing back. Some people find it to be a minor nuisance that is easily ignored. I hate hearing my voice played back to me. It makes me want to, happily, chuck my phone out of the nearest window. There is another flaw as well. Some Verizon calls are picked up or sent with a horrid amount of static. Just hang up and redial. Fixes the problem right away.
Bluetooth capable:
Yes. It is. Good news: hands free driving. Bad news: you will need to invest in a quality headset. The cheaper ones have far too much background noise and are NOT worth getting.
Cons:
The LG Dare has a strange system glitch that will make your phone power off and power back on while using certain applications. Or, the entire phone will freeze outright. Verizon’s said there was a system update that fixed that. Bollocks. It made mine worse. I just finally hauled into a store and asked them to replace my phone with another. No problems thus far. So, maybe I just got a glitchy phone.
Overall:
The LG Dare is a great phone for everyday use and for someone who definitely doesn’t want to hit the smart phone market yet. It’s versatile and light. It’s capable of handling a fair few of the smart phone applications without being as technically and usage broad as a smart phone can be. If not for that, it’s cute.
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