Superphone wars: LG Optimus G vs. other flagship smartphones

It has been a bit of a surprise as to why the LG Optimus G has come to India after such a long wait. It was launched globally in Aug-Sept last year, but has been officially announced in India only yesterday. Having said that, the specification sheet is not lagging behind at all, and is more than capable of standing up to the major players in the high-end Android smartphone segment. We have a spec comparison between these phones to see who stands where.

	LG Optimus G E975	LG Google Nexus 4	HTC One X+	HTC Butterfly	HTC One	Sony Xperia Z	Samsung Galaxy SIII
Approx market price	Rs 30990	Not officially in India. Rs 25000 approx from U.S.	Rs 38500	Rs 43000	Not launched in India yet. Expected price - Rs 45000	Not launched in India yet. Expected price - Rs 43000	Rs 29990
SoC	Qualcomm APQ8064 Snapdragon	Qualcomm APQ8064 Snapdragon	NVIDIA Tegra 3 AP37	Qualcomm APQ8064 Snapdragon	Qualcomm APQ8064T (Snapdragon 600 chipset)	Qualcomm APQ8064 Snapdragon	Exynos 4412 Quad
Cores	4	4	4	4	4	4	4
Clock Speed (GHz)	1.5	1.5	1.7	1.5	1.7	1.5	1.4
RAM (GB)	2	2	1	2	2	2	1
Display Size	4.7	4.7	4.7	5	4.7	5	4.8
Display resolution (pixels)	1280 x 768	1280 x 768	1280 x 720	1920 x 1080	1920 x 1080	1920 x 1080	1280 x 720
Display type	IPS Plus LCD	IPS Plus LCD	S-LCD2	S-LCD3	S-LCD3	LCD - Reality Display	Super AMOLED
Pixel density (Ppi)	318	318	312	441	469	443	306
Graphics	Adreno 320	Adreno 320	GeForce 2	Adreno 320	Adreno 320	Adreno 320	Mali-400MP
Internal Storage	32GB	8GB / 16GB	64GB	16GB	32GB / 64GB	16GB	16GB / 32GB / 64GB
Expandable memory?	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Primary Camera	13MP	8MP	8MP	8MP	4MP UltraPixel	13.1MP	8MP
Battery	2100mAh	2100mAh	2100mAh	2020mAh	2300mAh	2330mAh	2100mAh
Platform	Android 4.1.2 (Jelly Bean)	Android 4.2.1 (Jelly Bean)	Android 4.1.1 (Jelly Bean)	Android 4.1.1 (Jelly Bean)	Android 4.1.2 (Jelly Bean)	Android 4.1.2 (Jelly Bean)	Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean)

The Optimus G has exactly the same power package as the Google Nexus 4 made by LG, and that could be a bit of consolation for the very limited but very noisy crowd of Nexus fanboys. From this table, you can clearly see that Samsung needs to bring out the Galaxy S4 (or whatever it is called) rather quickly. But at the moment, it does give the SIII a serious price advantage for those who prefer the Samsung phone based on its “tried and tested” label and the much better service setup and accessory ecosystem.

In terms of the sheer numbers, the Galaxy S III seems fairly dated. The Nexus 4, the HTC Butterfly and the upcoming Sony Xperia Z have the same processor, each paired with what seems to be standard now, 2GB of RAM.

The HTC Butterfly and the Sony Xperia Z have a bigger 5-inch display, while the Optimus, the Nexus 4 and the HTC One X+ have the same 4.7-inch display size. Display types are very different though, and that makes a huge difference in the overall quality. At the moment, among the phones that have been launched in India, the HTC Butterfly with the 1080p resolution is by far and away the best display. The Xperia Z seems to be promising, again with the 1080p resolution, and might give the Butterfly some competition. With the 720p displays, it is pretty much an even fight, with personal preferences taking precedence in the ranking – which we will leave to your judgment.

LG has packed in 32GB internal storage on the Optimus G. But there is no card slot for memory expansion. The HTC One X+, incidentally, offers 64GB internal storage, but again, no memory expansion slot. The Nexus 4 falls behind in that regard.

All said and done, it does not take away from the fact that the Optimus G is already late in the market. Which is why we have seen a price correction with 24 hours of it going on sale – Rs 35500 (MRP) as against Rs 30990 (on Flipkart and Saholic) market price at the time of writing this. For a phone that has seen a Rs. 5,000 approx price drop in one day, the future does not seem to be very bright!