KU990 Viewty for £140 on Vodafone PAYG? Surely not!

[Hands0n]

The Viewty is something of a dated handset by today's standards. It must be at least two years old. But it is still a very well equipped and capable handset.

The Viewty was the first 5MPixel cameraphone with a touchscreen when these things were very new.
The LG Viewty's camera screams 'professional' with its Schneider-Kreuznach Lens and Xenon flash. The result? Your pictures are captured in crisp, high-quality detail.

If you don't mind the colour red, and you're on the Vodafone network, you could do a lot wronger than getting one of these for this price. Check out the Viewty for £140 on PAYG at http://shop.vodafone.co.uk/shop/mobile-phone/lg-viewty-payt

Good value? SIM free these seem to be going for around £225 on the Internet. An unlock code for the Viewty is around £35, possibly cheaper.

[Ben]

That does seem pretty good value. It still doesn't make me want one, but for the money it has to be worth a look.

[getti]

The price is right too, i have seen it in Vodafone stores for £140.

For a 5 megapixel touchscreen with flash and HSDPA, £140 is good value!

[3g-g]

The LG Viewty's camera screams 'professional' with its Schneider-Kreuznach Lens and Xenon flash. The result? Your pictures are captured in crisp, high-quality detail.

Hmm. I'd have to disagree having had one. While the price may be attractive I never thought much of the camera quality. I even bought this handset with the idea of not needing to hike my proper digital camera around, I was disappointed on so many occasions. Grainy, poor colour, flash never made any difference to lighting a subject. On well lit, stationary (and I mean dead still) objects the picture could be ok, but just ok. It never had a patch on the other 5MPX camera-phone of its time, the N95. Oh yeah, the touch screen was crap too.

But apart from that, £140, suppose you could do a lot worse!

[miffed]

£136 inc £10 credit on o2 here ,

http://www.mobiles2yourdoor.co.uk/PAYG_Offer_Details.asp?ItemKey=186848&MPItemKey=250161

[Hands0n]

I swear, I really don't know how miffed does it :confused:

The next time I'm shopping he's coming with me!! :p


Edit: Its available in Black at the same location http://www.mobiles2yourdoor.co.uk/OfferDetails.asp?ITK=15&ItemKey=174572

[Hands0n]

The Viewty is now £99.99 (plus £10 top up if you don't already have an active O2 SIM) from Carphone Warehouse. Now that has got to be an astonishing offer. So much so that I've finally decided to pick one up as a spare, occasional, WHY ...

I cannot imagine these coming down much more, although I think I thought that when I posted the original article here.

The Viewty is offered at higher prices on Orange, T-Mobile and VirginMobile networks, curiously it is not offered on a Vodafone connection. But the O2 price is unbeatable for this handset, although cheaper can be had on eBay they will be without the usual warranty from CPW, for that thats worth.

I have never been a fan of LG, I have to say. I tried their Prada predecessor to the Viewty when it came out and wasn't disappointed with my disappointment. It was bang on schedule. But I've not had my hands on the Viewty and it has had some good (and not so good) reviews in its short lifetime. But it is most certainly a dated handset although it did break new ground with its 5Mpxl camera.

Interestingly enough the camera records video in Divx format at 30fps and 120fps(!) for those who are that way inclined.

The manual says that it uses Transflash memory cards with a limit of 2GB. That is a bit of a shame really, but no doubt this handset presceded HCSD technology by a year or so. 2GB in those times was an unimaginable quantity of Flash storage.

And so, here it is, a bit of old tech (!!) that is looking positively dated against the current breed of smartphone. LG itself has moved on with its handsets, although I remain to be convinced that they've really upped their game.

The LG KU990 Viewty, at £99.99 a bit of a bargain?

[Ben]

It's hard to say. For someone like you, who wants the handset to gauge the tech and the industry, to experience the device, yes I think it is a bargain. I think only you will be able to tell me whether it'd be a bargain to the man on the street...

[Hands0n]

These handsets from CPW are Unbranded and SIM-free (unlocked) to all networks.

The handset is running firmware KU990_V10g this is the last version released and is the unbranded version.

I have just used an O2 and Vodafone SIM without any trouble at all!

I did wonder as the barcode label on the box made no mention of any specific network. Usually if they're SP-locked the label will state to which network. These labels look as if they're straight out of the factory and without any fiddling.



People! £99 for a SIM-free Viewty!!

[Hands0n]

I think only you will be able to tell me whether it'd be a bargain to the man on the street...

:) Well, far be it from me to make judgement calls for the man on the street. Especially as I am no particular fan of LG's operating system. But I have to say that the KU990 is a respectable not-so-little handset.

I think that £99 for a PAYG of this calibre has got to be pretty good. As a replacement for a Contract handset that has been damaged it is even better value still.

The icing on the cake is for to be for a SIM-free and unbranded handset, and that has to be extraordinary quality. Expansys are currently knocking the same unit (http://www.expansys.com/p.aspx?i=162099) out for £289.99.

I showed the Viewty to daughter who previously had my old Prada after me and she was quite taken with it.

Going by some of the [Viewty] forums commentators the handset is not particularly easy to live with. Some problems relating to how it does not calibrate to the battery very well have caused masses of grief. Others seem not to be able to deal with the touchscreen - but maybe these couldn't handle any touchscreen, some just need to keep banging the rocks together.

I'd have to say "Yes", the Viewty at £99.99 is an astonishing bargain for someone who wants that kind of handset on the cheap. But, and there is a but, as soon as I pick up my iPhone the realisation is that these two devices are universes apart :)