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CNET editors' rating:
stars
Very good
Detailed editors' rating - Average user rating: 1.5 stars out of 22 reviews
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Product summary
The good: The LG CE110 is a simple lightweight camera phone with some nice advanced features like instant messaging and Bluetooth. It's also very affordable.
The bad: The LG CE110 has a lackluster screen plus disappointing photo quality. It also lacks an external camera key.
The bottom line: The LG CE110 is a decent and affordable basic camera phone with some nice added features.
Specifications: Band / mode: GSM 850/1900 (Dual Band) ; Talk time: Up to 190 min ; Combined with: With digital camera ; See full specs
CNET editors' review
- Reviewed on: 10/11/2007
LG doesn't manufacture too many cell phones for AT&T, especially not for the low-end market. The LG CE110, however, is an exception. A basic camera phone, the CE110 comes without a lot of features and is probably considered a "starter" handset. The camera is VGA and screen quality is pretty poor, but the CE110 does come with a few advanced features like Bluetooth, a speakerphone, and a wireless Web browser. Best of all, AT&T is currently offering it for free with a two-year contract. For a price like that, the LG CE110 is probably one of the better basic handsets to hit the market. To find accessories for this phone, see our cell phone ringtones and accessories guide.
Design
The LG CE110 is quite an attractive package as far as basic phones go. Measuring 3.52 inches by 1.85 inches by 0.82 inch, the CE110 has a slim and slender figure with curved corners all around. It has a nice feel in the hand, and weighing 2.86 ounces, the CE110 won't weigh you down when placed in a pocket or purse. The clamshell hinge opened and closed pretty smoothly, as well.
As with all flip phones, we really appreciate it when there's an external screen, and the CE110 is no exception. It's only a 0.9-inch diagonal monochrome display, but at least it displays all the basic information like battery life, signal strength, date and time, and caller ID when available. You can't view photo caller ID, however, since the black-and-white display doesn't support it. Also, you can't use it as a camera viewfinder since there's no external camera key. The camera lens sits above the screen. On the left side of the CE110 is the volume rocker while the headset/charger jack is on the right.
When you flip open the CE110 you'll find a pretty decent 1.5-inch diagonal 65,000-color TFT display. It's certainly not the best screen we've seen, with muted colors and smudgy images, but it's serviceable for such a basic device. You can adjust the brightness, the backlighting time, and the menu style.
There's nothing too exciting about the CE110's keypad. You get the standard navigation array, which consists of two soft keys and a five-way toggle that doubles as shortcuts to text messaging, instant messaging, the contacts list, the My Stuff folder, plus the wireless Web browser. There's a dedicated camera key, and a shortcut key that leads to the graphics folder. As usual, there's the Talk and End/power controls, and a Clear/Back key. On the whole, the keypad seemed pretty well spaced apart, with tactile keys that were easy to dial.
Features
The LG CE110 comes with a generous 1,000-entry phone book with room in each entry for two numbers, an e-mail address, and a memo. You can also organize the entries into groups, or pair them with a photo or one of 11 polyphonic ringtones. Other essentials include a vibrate mode, a speakerphone, voice recording, text and multimedia messaging, instant messaging, an alarm clock, a calendar, a notepad, a calculator, a tip calculator, a world clock, a unit converter, a wireless Web browser, and access to mobile e-mail from Web e-mail services like Yahoo and AOL. A nice bonus for a basic phone like this is the inclusion of Bluetooth support.
The CE110 comes with a pretty basic VGA camera, which takes photos in two resolutions (640x480 and 320x240). Other camera options include three quality settings, a brightness setting, digital zoom, a multishot mode of up to three shots at once, a self-timer, five white balance settings, four color effects, and three shutter tones. Unfortunately there's no silent shutter option. Photo quality is quite poor, with blurry images and washed out colors. The CE110 does not record video.
You can personalize the CE110 with a variety of wallpapers and ringtones, and you can always shop for more options from AT&T via the Web browser. The CE110 comes with three games (Pac-Man, Midnight Pool, and Tetris) as well as two applications (My-Cast 5 Weather and Mobile Email), but you can always download more if you wish.
Performance
We tested the dual-band (GSM 850/900) LG CE110 in San Francisco using AT&T's service. The CE110 does offer pretty decent call quality. Callers could still tell we were on a cell phone, but it wasn't too bad. We didn't get a lot of static or noise in the background, and volume level was fine. Speakerphone calls were alright as well, though callers did want us to speak up a bit more. We paired up the LG CE110 with the Plantronics Voyager 855 successfully, and Bluetooth calls went similarly well.
The LG CE110 has a rated battery life of three hours talk time and 10 days standby time. Our tests revealed a talk time of 3 hours, 5 minutes. According to FCC radiation tests, the CE110 has a digital SAR rating of 1.22 watts per kilogram.
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- Average user rating: 1.5 stars out of 22 reviews
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