LG Dare Review

This cell phone market today is full of touch screen phones with HTML browsing capabilities and more innovative features. The LG Dare is one of the latest touch screen phones to enter the market. And I'm sure the one question everyone is asking is: Is it as good as the iPhone?

I will tell you this now. No phone is going to beat the iPhone. Could anything beat the iPhone? Of course. I bet some companies could top the iPhone. But will it happen? I don't think anytime soon.

The LG Dare is probably the best phone out there in terms of iPhone competition. It boasts some similar features, like an accelerometer, so you can use some features either vertically or horizontally, a touch screen QWERTY keypad, and the wonderful full HTML browser.

The recognition on the touch phone is pretty good. Everytime you touch the screen, you get a little tactile feedback vibration, basically confirmed that your touch has been registered. It's awkward when having tactile feedback on your phone, then going to a touch phone that doesn't have that feature. But not awkward in a bad way.

The LG Dare is feature packed, but one of the biggest parts of the phone is it's 3.2 mega-pixel camera, with a built-in photo editor, flash, and probably the best video recorder on a phone. Compared to other touch screen phones, it easily has the best camera, and probably one of the best camera's on any phone on the market right now!

The LG Dare has other features that seem to be almost standard for Verizon phones. V Cast Videos, VZ Navigator, Music play back, and more. The speaker on the phone is pretty decent. It's definitely not the best out there, but it isn't bad. Comparing it to the iPhones, I'd say it's just as good, probably better.

Call quality is excellent. Of course, this is what you should expect from Verizon. The speaker phone works well, and another interesting feature that is also on the iPhone is that when you put the phone up to your ear to talk, the screen turns off to save battery life. Of course when you take the phone away from your ear it will light up again.

Of course one of the most innovative features is the ability to customize the icons on the front screen. You can pick what icon you want on the front screen, and you can place it where ever you like.

Messaging works pretty well, with mobile AIM, Yahoo Messenger, and Windows Live Messenger. You can send videos and pictures, access your email. Of course, I do believe the touch screen QWERTY key board was decent, it's still not quite the best. It may be better then most phones on the market, but it may just be touch screen key boards that aren't always the best.

And finally, the web browser. Now, I've read many places that people are "disappointed" with the web browsing experience. Now, I say that it is probably the best web browsing experience you will get, next to the iPhone. With EV-DO Rev. A, pages loaded up very quickly. Of course, it does hurt that Wi-Fi is not included, which I still don't understand why, but the browser is all around great. Scrolling through pages is very smooth and fluid, and it really is great. Although I do admit trying to click on links and text boxes can be tough sometimes, it's still a great overall web browser.

If you are looking for a good touch screen phone, I do suggest the iPhone. But if you don't want to switch to AT&T, then I definitely recommend the LG Dare. It is the best alternative, and although I do wish they added some more features, it's still a great phone.

Overall - 9.5 (out of 10)