LG's Windows Phone 7 phone caught in the wild, looking good

Been wondering how that LG proto unit debuted on The Engadget Show is doing? Pocket-lint got to see the QWERTY slider up close and personal in London yesterday, and their takeaway from the meetup was that the device and OS are well on their way to stardom. Calling it the LG Panther, they delve into its deep Facebook integration, which throws up status updates when you hit on a contact in your address book, ability to recognize addresses and provide relevant links to Bing maps, as well as its quick and clear Zune media player. The latter was accompanied by confirmation that the Zune Store will be hitting the UK in time for Windows Phone 7's release, which could happen as early as September -- it all depends on who you talk to. Hit the source for more imagery and impressions.

[swirv Posted May 20th 2010 10:22AM]

Please, please, please make it so it doesn't feel like I'm putzing around with my phone in order to do all the fun stuff (e.g. Zune).

[joshai Posted May 20th 2010 10:51AM]

Im not a hater...I like must microsoft. But this UI is unattractive and basic looking.

[n11 Posted May 20th 2010 11:25AM]

Man I'm not sure if LG has a curse on them, making nearly all their phones identical, or similar. I often mistake LG's other phones for my dar, yikes.

[sonicwind Posted May 20th 2010 11:58AM]

There's so many things wrong with that UI.

[TGriffTTU Posted May 20th 2010 12:59PM]

I was at one of the MS's Launch 2010 Dev events on Tuesday, during which we got an in depth look at the UI as we got the development overview (on an actual prototype mind you...although, it wouldn't make much difference using the emulator, since it's not really an emulator at all, but a virtual machine). I think the UI is smooth, clean, and intuitive, not unlike the Zune software (windows and mobile).

The specs for this are locked down, so you won't see ANY OEM devices with more/less than 3 buttons, lower resolution, lower performance, etc. than what is required by MS. The OS will not be tailored to each OEM, aside from mayyybe a default app or two Which means, competition will only drive this thing forward. No dinky phones trying to push the OS to tailor to a cheaper demographic or BS like that. Only way to compete will be to add or boost hardware specs. I for one, loove that idea.

All I can say is haters be damned, I have an iPhone and before Tuesday I was pretty intrigued by the prospects of the WinPhone7, but now I'm on the cusp of jumping ship to this thing. I'm stoked about it.

[timotim Posted May 20th 2010 1:26PM]

I feel this UI that MS came up with puts most phone OS UIs to shame - really. Samsung, Apple, Google, RIM... they all try to make these flashy, eye catching "home" screens with these elaborate colorful (static) icons/shortcuts as if most of your time is spent on these screens. MS has done the exact opposite. Their Home Screen acts as a true home screen in that it allows you to actually see info that might be important to get to the things you care about faster.No flashy, no crayon box just a simple dynamic interface that just looks to work. You can also pin/remove apps, websites, albums, playlists, contacts, radio stations etc to your home screen for even faster access.

The Hubs IMO, are the best thing to happen in phone OSs thus far. Unlike the simple folder idea of iPhone 4.0 where your just grouping "apps" much like files on a PC, the Hubs group not just apps but services tied to specific categories... to me its a like like a bunch of mini Media Centers. Having Netflix, zune pass music, TV and movies, pandora all feeding me info and content in one place keeps me out of the "Sea of Apps" dilemma you get on iPhone and Android and makes things flow much better.

I think the real "flashyness" with this OS comes from the apps themselves... when you look at the Hulu app, or the AP app, or NBA Tracker app... style is everywhere but it retains that same simple Zune HD like navigation interface. This OS to me is both simple and stylistic, but its simple AND informative where it needs to be most.

[mrgandi Posted May 21st 2010 2:48AM]

lmao

amen to that.

[duncanleung Posted May 21st 2010 5:32AM]

I'm not quite sure what use Xbox live integration into the phone would bring? Can anyone clarify?

[crichton007 Posted May 21st 2010 2:17PM]

Wow, that is one big phone!

[Johnny Rockets Posted May 21st 2010 9:42PM]

I still don't understand what people find good-looking about WP7.

It's (another) black background, yet they actually managed to out-ugly iphone OS. Instead of icons, now it's just... squares.

A home screen of squares is impressive... why?

[Aaron CT Posted Aug 13th 2010 11:15PM]

Just noticed this has a keyboard! I was beginning to think the only option out of the gate for that was the Dell Lightning.