With the smartphone LG BL40 newchocolate it is all coming down to design: Because of the slim form factor and the black double clear-coat finish the LG BL40 newchocolate is a real looker. For a good reason: The LG BL40 stems from the first cell phone of the Black Label series, LG KG800, which was very popular at its time. The handset’s dimensions of 51 x 10.9 x 128 millimeters are as unusual as the 21:9-format touchscreen with a 4.0-inch diagonal and a resolution of 345 x 800 pixels. The oblongness of the phone also brings the older Communicator handsets of Nokia to mind. The LG BL40 newchocolate feels solid and well built. In Germany, the new smartphone by LG is available for prices beginning at EUR 350.00 without contract.

The bright, capacitive touchscreen with multi-touch support and almost takes all the space on the handset’s front side with just two buttons below for opening the task manager and main menu. Because of an accelerometer the menu, pictures and websites can be displayed in landscape and in portrait mode. The ultra-wide format of the screen has several blessings: In landscape mode all icons of the main menu are visible on one screen, it is possible to view movies with a true cinematic 21:9 aspect ratio, and visiting websites with the LG BL40 newchocolate is pure pleasure. The ultra-wide format also allowes for a split-screen view in the messaging or media player applications. But: The touchscreen does not always respond to fingertip entries.

Just as the LG Arena or the LG Crystal, the LG BL40 newchocolate runs the S-Class user interface developed by LG which features widgets, cover flow-style mode in media galleries, an one-touch cut-and-paste system and a rotating virtual 3D cube for swapping between four different home screens. Thus, there are different ways to access certain menus or start certain tasks. The smartphone is multi-tasking so that, for example, the music player can also be used when writing emails. My impression: The Qualcomm processor slows down certain applications.

For mobile data transmissions the smartphone supports HSDPA with a maximum download speed of 7.2 mbps. The smartphone also supports WiFi (with DNLA support) for connecting to the internet at hotspots and A-GPS for location based services such as geotagging or navigation. The Access Netfront browser seems a little slow when opening websites. The email client supports POP3, IMAP and SMTP and Microsoft Exchange Activesync. For writing messages in landscape there is a user-friendly virtual QWERTZ keyboard, in portrait mode a standard mobile-phone keypad with multiple letters per key appears.

The quality of pictures shot with the 5-megapixel camera with a lense by Schneider-Kreuznach and autofocus is reasonable, except for chromatic noise when shooting indoor pictures. The camera menu offers different settings, smile shutter, a macro mode and three different focus modes. Videos can be recorded with a resolution of 640 x 480 pixels with 14 frames per second, the length of the video clips is only limited by the storage capacity. With a microSD card the storage capacity of the smartphone can be extended by 32 GB. In addition to the common mobile-video formats such as 3GP, AVI, DivX, H263, H264, MPEG4 and WMV, the LG BL40 newchocolate supports the DivX and Xvid formats. Because of TV out, videos can also be transferred to and shown on a TV screen.

The music player supports usual audio formats such as MP3, WMA, AMR, MIDI, AAC, AAC+, e-AAC+, AC3 and WAV and offers basic features such as playlists or sound presets. The handset is equipped with a standard 3.5-millimeter headphone jack, audio quality of the music player is good. The LG BL40 also sports Bluetooth A2DP support for wireless audio streaming to stereo headsets with an FM radio and an FM transmitter in order to transfer music to the car stereo.

The LG BL40 newchocolate can be used on GSM-networks of 850, 900, 1,800 and 1,900 MHz. The phone offers a good reception and voice quality. The phonebook offers one-touch access to all contact details. According to LG, the smartphone comes with a speaking time of up to 5.5 hours, however, the battery does not live up to these expectations.

My conclusion: Because of its shape and its touchscreen the LG BL40 newchocolate is a particular smartphone, but – compared to other recent high-end smartphones – additional features are just standard level. Weaknesses are a short battery life and a slow performance.

Pictures: GermanPhoneGuy / teltarif.de

Product Summary of the LG BL40 newchocolate:
Operating System: LG OS
GSM Networks: 850, 900, 1,800, 1,900 MHz
Data Transfer: GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA 7.2 mbps
Connectivity: Bluetooth, USB
Screen: 4.0-inch Touchscreen with 345 x 800 pixels resolution and 16.7 million colors
Keyboard: virtual QWERTZ
Camera: 2,560 x 1,920 pixels with autofocus and video capture
Storage: 4 GB microSD
Size: 128 x 51 x 10.9 mm
Speaking Time: 5.5 hrs

Read more about the LG BL40 newchocolate at www.teltarif.de.