By Krishna Sinha Chaudhury
New Delhi, Sep 20 (IANS): South Korean tech major LG has always been a darkhorse in the flagship smartphone race in India, in a market that is essentially dominated by the likes of Apple, Google and Samsung -- not to forget top Chinese smartphone player OnePlus.
The company's focus has been to present their smartphones in a rather hushed tone in the country, often minus the limelight.
Its recently-launched G7+ ThinQ is no exception. It was introduced in the country for Rs 39,990 amid no fanfare with specifications as good as any other flagship smartphone.
What makes the G7+ ThinQ different from LG's other smartphones is the "ThinQ" branding is the fact that the device can be used along with some of the other Artificial Intelligence (AI) products from the company.
With a premium-looking body and a top-notch processor, the South Korean tech major has cleverly pitted the G7+ ThinQ in the sub-Rs 40,000 price segment that competes with the likes of the affordable flagships, such as the OnePlus 6 and the Asus Zenfone 5Z.
At a first glance, LG's latest offering G7+ ThinQ looks like a dependable smartphone. But, is there more to it? Let's find out.
LG has made use of glass and metal to render a surprisingly light and ergonomic feel to the G7+ ThinQ. It is worth mentioning that despite housing a 6.1-inch IPS QHD+ display, this is one compact flagship available out there now.
The screen has 1000nits of brightness, which makes for an impressive sunlight legibility at this price point.
There are two vertically-stacked 16MP+16MP cameras at the rear, which are almost flush with the device. The dual-lens AI snapper categorises subjects and automatically tune its settings to click better shots via Machine Learning (ML) technology.
The camera's AI feature was useful but we found it a bit overwhelming when it scanned the frame and added a filter or adjusted the colour exposure automatically.
Images taken in the daylight condition had a good amount of detail and punchy colours. The close-up shots turned out better than the landscape photos. Snaps shot in low-lighting conditions came out equally good.
Below the rear cameras lies the fingerprint sensor which was snappy during the authentication.
The 8MP sensor at the front is a significant camera upgrade from LG. The self portraits were neat with just enough details.
The overall performance of the smartphone was good and we didn't notice occasional hiccups, given the 6GB RAM and 128GB onboard storage.
LG has made the device weather-proof with IP68 certification for dust and water resistance. Interestingly, the phone is also shock-resistant to an extent thanks to the military standard (MLT-STD-810G) certification.
A dedicated AI button lies on the left side of the phone and unlike its South Korean rival Samsung, LG is not forcing its own smart assistant into our daily lives.
Pressing the key fires up the Google Assistant but the feature can thankfully be disabled.
Just like LG's previous flagships, this device also has additions like "Quad-DAC" and "DTS:X 3D" surround sound up its sleeve. The earphones bundled in the box offer decent audio quality.
The phone comes with Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0, which gave us around 40 per cent juice in 30 minutes of charge.
What doesn't work?
The smartphone is fueled by a 3,000mAh battery which, we thought, would deplete easily if you're a heavy gamer or browse videos a lot.
It was unusual to see the phone heat up on few occasions, such as using the camera app or updating apps on the Google Play Store.
Conclusion: LG G7+ ThinQ isn't a flashy smartphone but it woos the user with competent cameras and ergonomics. The aggressive pricing and solid performance make it a good value-for-money buy.