LG GW620

The basics

2010 is going to be a massive year for big-hitting Android handsets. While LG’s GW620 InTouch Max might reside at the opposite end of the spectrum from the Google Nexus One, it remains a decent enough first stab at Android from the Korean manufacturer.

The good

The LG GW620 InTouch Max scores points with its slide-out QWERTY keyboard. The GW620’s girth isn’t radically inflated due to the inclusion of this – in fact, it’s one of the smallest Android devices we’ve seen so far.

Also in the plus column is the 3.5mm headphone socket and the fact that the microSD card slot is located on the side rather than being secreted deep inside the battery compartment, so you can hot-swap your storage media easily.

The bad

Given the LG GW620 InTouch Max’s budget placement, it's no surprise that LG has made a few concessions in the design of its handset – the resistive touch screen is passable, but we would have preferred capacitive. The 3in screen is also a little on the small side.

The GW620 is also packing LG’s own OS – an off-shoot of the S-Class interface seen on the LG Arena and Viewty Smart – so it can only be updated by LG itself. The GW620 is therefore lagging behind with the archaic Android version 1.5. To put the gulf into perspective, the Nexus One has version 2.1.

The bottom line

It might be far from being the perfect Android phone, the LG GW620 InTouch Max’s budget price point and pleasing form factor make it well worthy of consideration if you’re watching the pennies.