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Full user review
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39 out of 41 people found this review helpful
4.5 stars
"LG Dare is sublime"
Pros: Sexy, sleek look, full of features, great network
Cons: On screen QWERTY could use some updating
Summary: After 7 Voyagers and 3 Glydes, I have found my dream phone. The LG VX9700, aka the LG Dare. Having spent some serious time with the phone, I have yet to find a feature I don't like. Let's take a look, step by step!
The look:
The phone is sleek and sexy. Slimmer than the Voyager, sexier and sleeker than the Glyde. It measures 4.1 inches long by 2.2 inches wide by 0.5 inch thick. The back is soft and smooth, and is easy to grip. The silver border (according to cnet) is stainless steel.
Touch Screen:
The touch screen on the Dare is wonderful. It is a pressure sensitive touch screen, but works far better than the Voyager's touch screen. It is very intuitive, and you are able to do things like drag a drop items to the home screen, and move them around. It is worlds better than the touch screen on the Glyde, and at 3" with 240x400-pixel resolution, its a delight to see and use. The phone comes with an internal accelerometer, which detects how the phone is being held and adjusts the screen accordingly. It is used while messaging, browsing the web, browsing pictures, using VZ navigator, and watching video. It is a smooth transition when changing position, similar to *DUN DUN DUN* the iPhone. It also comes with a light sensor which detects brightness and adjusts the screen brightness accordingly. This saves battery life. It also has a proximity sensor which detects when an object is within 3 cm of the phones screen, and the screen turns off. No more pressing buttons accidentally with the face while making a call.
Messaging:
Messaging on the phone is a breeze. You can message in three ways: t9, on-screen QWERTY, and using the advanced hand writing recognition capabilities. So far, I have found using t9 to be the quickest mode of texting. While the onscreen QWERTY works well and is slightly easier to use than the Voyagers, it does not have predictive txt like on the iPhone, which is unfortunate. If you make a mistake, it is a bit of a task to correct it. Using the hand writing form of texting is fun, and if you know what you're doing, quite easy and convenient. You don't have to write each letter at a time for it to register--you can in fact write entire words at once. The only hassle is that you have to switch between Caps, lower case, numbers, and symbols by selecting the respective icons--the phone is not capable of recognizing all these different inputs on one setting. The phone is capable of sending SMS, MMS, has EMS, and Voice Messaging. The phone does not have threaded texts, but it is able to sort text messages by date, size, or sender. If you sort by sender, it puts all txts from each sender under that senders name, and you can then search for a specific sender. This is a nice feature, if a little time consuming to get to.
Camera:
The phone comes with a 3.2 mega-pixel camera, the best camera on any US phone from Verizon. The camera takes exceptional pictures and video. The quality is crystal clear, and is comparable to my Kodak digital camera. The camera comes with various features, including smart face, smart pic, a flash, and photo editing software. With smart face, the camera detects faces and adjusts lighting accordingly. Taking a smart pic allows the camera to adjust lighting for any kind of picture. You are able to take panoramic photos very easily--you can take 3 pictures to create a panoramic view, and the phone shows a light copy of each picture taken so you can line it up evenly. With the photo editing software, you can add borders, add fun images, doodle on the picture using a stylus (not included) or your finger, crop pictures, and adjust settings like color, brightness, contrast, etc. Recording video is easy, and like the Voyager can record up to 30 seconds for sending, or record as long as the phone memory allows otherwise. You can record video at 120 fps, allowing for slow motion play back, which is fun. By far the best camera on any Verizon phone.
Multimedia:
The Dare comes with a music player unlike any other Verizon phone. The interface is no longer the old red back ground and boring images. The interface is sleek, shows album covers, and you can scroll through songs using either landscape or portrait modes. Again, the interface is similar to the iPhones, though scrolling through songs is not quite as smooth. There are various sound settings, including concert hall, hip hop, electric, dance, r&b, and more. Beginning June 30th, you will have access to over 2 million songs via Rhapsody. This will prove to be far better than the old Vcast method, but will have a monthly cost of $14.99. However, you will have unlimited song access for that price. The phone comes with a 3.5 mm headphone jack (praiiiise jebus). You can also multi-task to the extent of playing music while using other applications (except the camera).
Web browser:
You will see varying opinions on the web browser, but my experience has been wonderful. It is smoother than the Voyagers browser, and far better than the Glydes. You can view web pages in either portrait mode or landscape mode, and you don't have to spend forever scrolling through large pages-- you can use the "Page Overview" feature, which allows you to look at full pages and scroll over any section with a red box. For large pages, this feature is great. You are also able to view pages full screen, and on the 3" screen its wonderful. The browser uses the EVDO Rev-A, which is the fastest on the 3G network. Pages render quickly (howardforums.com loads within 7 seconds with full bars). mobile youtube also works with no problems
Call Quality:
Excellent! That's all there is to say about that.
Battery life:
So far battery life has been good. I used the phone heavily, and it lasted all of Friday and into Saturday night before needing a charge.
Other fun stuff:
The phone comes with the standard LG tools, and more. It is a cool little drawing pad that you can use to sketch ideas or maps or messages, and you are able to send them to your friends via MMS. As I mentioned before, you can drag and drop items from a short cut menu onto the home screen--this is convenient for apps that you use often, and its easy to set up the home screen to your liking. Cleaning up the home screen is also a breeze. Unlike the Voyager, you can set the notepad/drawing pad as a short cut, as well as many others. Along the bottom of the home screen, you have shortcuts for messaging, dial pad, main menu, contacts, and a button for favorites. In the favorites section you are able to add 9 of your 'favorite' contacts. From here, you can drag their pictures three sections on the bottom of the screen; txt messaging, calling, and info. Its like a fun version of speed dialing. Searching for contacts in the phone book is a breeze--you can search by name, or scroll through letters using a bar at the top of the screen. The phone comes with some cool wall papers, my favorite being a wall paper with water droplets that expand to show the date and time (this way, my screen isn't cluttered with a big clock display). You also have the option of using two themes: white, which has a fun interactive main menu screen that allows you to drag and drop icons to your liking, and a black theme, which lines up the main menu screen.
All in all, the Dare is the best of Verizon's three touch screen phones. It is easy to use, has a great looking UI, and has excellent features. It is not fair to compare everything on this phone to the iPhone, particularly because it is not a smart phone. However, having used a Voyager, a Glyde, and an iPhone, I will say that I prefer the Dare over all. While the iPhone has a great look and the ability to use a multi-touch interface, it lacks too many basic features for me to ever really consider it as a phone that I would use. In my opinion, the Dare is the best phone on the best network. I wouldn't Dare use anything else :^P
- 11 replies to this review
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Proximity sensor? Senses objects within 3 cm of the screen? I don't believe that this is physically possible. Do you suspect that it senses vibrations in the air as an object nears its screen? Do you suspect that it detects body heat emitted by the object about to touch the screen? Isn't it more likely that the phone shuts off after some period of non-use that may or may not coincide with when objects near its screen?
Aside from that, I appreciate your straight forward and genuine thoughts about this phone. -
Thank you for your review. I just ordered the Dare ten minutes ago, because I have had the Glyde and hate it. Reading your review makes my dission that much better to switch to the Dare. Thank you again.
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Great review thx a lot really helped deciding between the dare voyager and glyde so over all nice review thx
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Good review. I was at the Verizon store today to handle my top 3 contenders, and after reading your review and finding it validated my own thoughts, I'm getting a Dare. An iPhone would be nice, but I keep reading about and hearing about less than good call quality in our area, which tends to be fringe, and I have to have good reception. I'm with an affiliate of Verizon now, and it works for me where we are.
BTW, you didn't say nuttin' about no Mobile TV on the Dare. Someone else said the Voyager had it. Now the peasants seem to be all up in arms... -
i've gone thur 6 enVs. ha.
i have a question.
can i buy this phone w/o having internet subscription?
or do i have to pay for that in able to activate the phone?? -
Nice review.
How in God's name have you gone through 7 Voyagers and 3 Glydes?!?! Work phones? Clumsy? Lemons? Otherwise, more money than sense? j/k, hehe -
SEVEN VOYAGERS????!!!
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Thanks also, for your opinion on this product. I'm a LONG time Verizon client. Recently lost my EnV at a sporting event (NEVER lost a phone before!). After some Serious research, I replaced it with the Voyager. Although the Voyager IS a Great phone with some unique features (Mobile TV namely), along with the HTML browser, and touch interface of other phones, I'm not 100% sold on it. After reading your review, I'm going to go with my gut and return the Voyager. Think I'd be much happier with the Dare for many reasons...(More Compact, better camera, better contact registry, better UI, and so on...)...Thanks again for your review....
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Where did I say it had mobile tv?
Yup, I went through 7 Voyagers, each one had a defect. -
Thanks for the very thorough and thoughtful review. My current LG 8600 isn't ready to give up the ghost yet, but as soon as it does I'm seriously considering the Dare. Just curious though - did you really go through 7 Voyagers and 3 Glydes? Did they keep breaking? I think I would have given up after my second Voyager. Glad you got the Dare - sounds like it will work out great for you. Thanks again for the helpful review.
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The Dare is not a Verizon TV/Mobile TV enabled phone. That feature is not available on the Dare. It is also stated on VZW's website that the Dare does not have access to Mobile TV...... I mam wondering where you are using the phone.....
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