Home > Consumer Reviews > LG KE970 Sim Free Mobile Phone - Shine Silver

This phone is really good value for money - in my opinion it's the best compromise between style, quality and money on the market, which is why I decided to buy it. It looks really nice, has a stunning display system and is quite user friendly. It's also metal not plastic - a positive feature, which, however increases the weight of the phone to some extent. Found it difficult to text at first but easy to get used to. Another drawback (besides weight) might be the speaker system/volume: even when set at max. volume set for ringing tone it's difficult to hear!

I've only had this phone for a week and I can't comment on whether it's worth the money as it was a free upgrade. It is however a very nice piece of kit!

Firstly it feels like a quality item, the front and back are made from brushed metal which gives it a weight and a class that you just don't get from the more common plasticy mobiles around. The scroll wheel navigation although a bit odd to get used to at first is brilliant! (if a tiny bit slow to react) and the camera although only being 2mega pixels is much much better than I thought.

My only slight complaint is that the sound quality on calls is ever so slightly tinny. You can still hear what the other person is saying clearly but it just doesn't have enough depth for me.

That aside, highly recommended!

There's no denying that this phone does look really nice, i thought that when i first saw it. It looks good, its stylish and its a head turner. But when i got the phone, it was summer, it was very difficult to read the screen due to the mirror. Great, having a mirror - very handy, but when it came to reading texts and looking at photos it was rubbish.

I think one of the biggest let downs is the battery life, it ran out every day, it would get low really easily - so if your looking for a phone that has a great battery life - this simply wouldnt be for you. Its not the sort of phone you can go and stay at a friends with without the charger, you simply would be screwed.

I brought a memory card for the phone, to have more room for my music. The music didnt go very loud - although i realise if i want to play music i should just do it on a cd player or mp3 player - it would still be nice to have the same kinda volume as a sony ericson.

Overall opinion, looks great, but its a shockingly bad phone - sorry to dissapoint.

i got this phone on contract from orange in june i had many problems with unlocking the sim and such things but they were problems with orange and not the phone.

the packaging on the phone is great. the accesories are useful and the phone itself is very pretty you have to agree.

my old phone (MotoPEBL) had a very poor battery life so i was looking forward to having a good battery, for a month or so the battery was just as bad but after that it got gradually better, now it is average, not as good as sony ericcson but not at all as bad as motorola phones. you can prevent the battery going down as quickly by not using the mp3 player or camera as much, also not sending alot of texts or calling other numbers, turning off your bluetooth connectivity and not having the backlight on constantly.

the lg shine stores many pictures, which is good as i take alot, but it doesnt have much memory for anything else, i only have 5 songs on my mp3 player. the lg shine is also one of the only new phones to not come with a memory card which i find annoying as this phone could very much use some more memory, and this means i have to buy one.

the camera is good but blurs sometimes, the flash practically eats the battery life if you leave it on for a minute or so.

the outside of the phone is simply gorgeous, LG made this phone for its looks and it has come out very well, leave it on a surface and it gleams and shines. the mirror is unnessecary but adds to the nature of the phone which i like, even though it does get dirty LG provide you with a cleaner accesory which is kind of addictive :) but does the job very well.

the scroll feature is useful but not much more than usual buttons, for a while it is hard to use but when you get used to it, it is easy, it is like getting used to a touch screen, but not as hard. texting on the phone is a doddle, the T9 dictionary is not as good as it could be but that doesnt stop me using the predictive text feature.

something that is also different about the LG shine from other slide phones is that the call and end call buttons are on the text keypad, some people may find this difficult to use and impractical but it depends if you have had a different slide phone in the past, and i have only had a flip phone. i find it easy to use and it doesnt make it a worse slide phone than samsung's.

the LCD screen is fabulous it is big and easy to read, also if you wanted to set a picture as the wallpaper i would advise you to take the photo landscape so that you can turn it vertical to make it a full screen wallpaper which blew me away because it looks like the screen is the whole front of the phone.

the home screen shortcut is useful but sometimes blocks the wallpaper, you can set it so that it is not shown but still online, so that you can still use it but you cannot see it on the screen. the shortcuts are quite easy: scroll up for inbox and voicemail, scroll down for sounds, press the left side button for contacts and the right for favourites.

the USB connection has been average since i got it, but only just now when i plug it into my computer, my computer crashes and i have to restart it which is obviously annoying. i dont know why it crashes but it is lucky that i have bluetooth on my apple mac so that i can connect the phone to the computer that way.

before my motoPEBL i had an old LG candybar type phone i liked it alot but it annoyed me that when alerts come up on the phone they stay there for much too long, alerts such as: MEMORY FULL!, Press Yes To Unlock and BATTERY LOW!, are included. this means you have to wait for ages to do anything else on the phone. i have found this the same on the LG shine and undoubtedly it probably happens on all LG phones.

OVERALL::

PROS: Looks, Camera & LCD Screen.
CONS: Battery, USB Connection & No Memory Card.

If you are looking for a fashionable phone with quality and class then i highly recommend this phone.

If you are looking for a phone that is more classic and practical then i recommend choosing a different phone..and also staying clear of LG phones in the future.

I am happy with my choice of phone, it suits me fine.

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I have not had any problems with the battery unlike the previous review. For the first charge with a new battery, leave it to charge for 18 hours without touching the phone. I did this and usually get 3-4 days worth of use from the phone before needing to recharge.

The phone itself is a joy to use. Very easy to navigate, and feels like a quality product with its metal body. Before I bought the phone I knew about needing to be careful not to touch the screen in order to keep it clean, and the sliding mechanism is a little tricky as the phone's design doesn't provide anything to push against. The choice is there, a great looking phone that needs a little tlc, or something more functional. I'm very happy with my choice.