Apple iPhone 5 vs LG Optimus G
The cultural implications smartphones imposed on people is quite amazing to study. There was a time where you had to make contact with a person through post and then came the age of fixed telephones which moved on to mobile phones. Subsequently the whole inter-personal interaction was readily transferred to websites and social networks. This was accelerated exponentially with the increased use of smartphones. Back in the days, you had to be home with the PC or Laptop to log in to a social network and check what’s new. But now, all you need is a good smartphone and world is at the tip of your hand. People consider calling as an outdated commodity and consider text messages, emails and social networks are the new way of developing inter-personal interaction. It is not our place to evaluate the pros and cons of this and the impact on the society because of this. We are here to talk about how that boosted the use of smartphones and made more money for the smartphone manufacturers. If you look at the smartphones today, every single one is deeply integrated with Facebook, Twitter and other prominent social networks. This act as a strong incentive to buy a smartphone because people are already hooked up with these social networks anyways. Hence today we chose two smartphones to be compared with each other. Apple iPhone 5 was released today after a long duration of anticipation. It certainly seems a great match for our next opponent LG Optimus G which was also recently announced in US. Let us look at them individually before comparing them at the same level.
Apple iPhone 5 Review
Apple iPhone 5 that was announced on 12th September comes as the successor for prestigious Apple iPhone 4S. The phone was launched on the 21st of September to the stores, and already getting some pretty good impressions by those who have put their hands on the device.. Apple claims iPhone 5 to be the thinnest smartphone in the market scoring a thickness of 7.6mm which is really cool. It scores dimensions of 123.8 x 58.5mm and 112g of weight which makes it lighter than most of the smartphones out there in the world. Apple has kept the width at the same pace while making it taller in order to let the customers hang on to the familiar width when they hold the handset in their palms. It is made entirely from glass and Aluminum which is a great news for artistic consumers. No one would doubt the premium nature of this handset for Apple has tirelessly engineered even the smallest parts. The two tone back plate feels genuinely metallic and is pleasing to hold on to the handset. We particularly loved the Black model although Apple offers a White model, as well.
iPhone 5 uses an Apple A6 chipset along with Apple iOS 6 as the operating system. It will be powered by a 1GHz Dual Core processor that Apple has come up with for iPhone 5. This processor is said to have Apple’s own SoC using ARM v7 based instruction set. The cores are based on Cortex A7 architecture which was previously rumored to be of A15 architecture. It is to be noted that this is not the Vanilla Cortex A7, but rather an in-house modified version of Apple’s Cortex A7 probably fabricated by Samsung. Apple iPhone 5 being a LTE smartphone, we are bound to expect some deviation from the normal battery life. However, Apple has addressed that problem with the custom made Cortex A7 cores. As you can see, they haven’t increased the clock frequency at all, but instead, they have been successful in increasing the number of instructions executed per clock. Also, it was noticeable in the GeekBench benchmarks that the memory bandwidth has been significantly improved, as well. So all in all, now we have reason to believe that Tim Cook wasn’t exaggerating when he claimed that iPhone 5 is twice as faster as iPhone 4S. The internal storage would come in three variations of 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB with no option to expand storage using microSD card.
Apple iPhone 5 has 4 inch LED backlit IPS TFT capacitive touchscreen featuring a resolution of 1136 x 640 pixels at a pixel density of 326ppi. It is said to have 44% better color saturation with full sRGB rendering enabled. The usual Corning gorilla glass coating is available making the display scratch resistant. Apple CEO Tim Cook claims that this is the most advanced display panel in the world. Apple also claimed that the GPU performance is as twice better compared to iPhone 4S. There may be several other possibilities for them to achieve this, but we have reason to believe that the GPU is PowerVR SGX 543MP3 with a slightly overclocked frequency compared to that of iPhone 4S. Apple has apparently moved the headphone port all the down to the bottom of the smartphone. If you have invested in iReady accessories, you may well have to buy a conversion unit because Apple has introduced a new port for this iPhone.
The handset comes with 4G LTE connectivity as well as CDMA connectivity in different versions. The implications of this are subtle. Once you commit to a network provider and a specific version of Apple iPhone 5, there’s no going back. You can’t buy an AT&T model and then transfer the iPhone 5 to Verizon or Sprint’s network without buying another iPhone 5. So you will have to think rather carefully on what you want before committing to a handset. Apple boasts of an ultrafast Wi-Fi connectivity as well offering Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n dual band Wi-Fi Plus cellular adapter. Unfortunately, Apple iPhone 5 doesn’t feature NFC connectivity nor does it support wireless charging. The camera is the regular culprit of 8MP with autofocus and LED flash that can capture 1080p HD videos @ 30 frames per second. It also has a front camera to make video calls. It is worthwhile to note that Apple iPhone 5 only supports nano SIM card. The new operating system seems to provide better capabilities than the old one as usual.
LG Optimus G Review
LG Optimus G is the new addition for the LG Optimus product line which is their flagship product. We have to admit that it doesn’t carry the looks of a high end smartphone, but believe us, it is one of the best smartphones in the market today. The Korean based company LG has truly enticed the customer base by including some new features that haven’t been seen before. Before talking about them, we’ll have a look at the hardware specs of this device. We call LG Optimus G a powerhouse because it has 1.5GHz Krait Quad Core processor built on top of Qualcomm MDM9615 chipset with the brand-new Adreno 320 GPU and 2GB of RAM. Android OS v4.0.4 ICS is currently governs this set of hardware while a planned upgrade would be available to Android OS v4.1 Jelly Bean. The Adreno 320 GPU is purported to be three times as faster compared to the previous Adreno 225 edition. It is reported that the GPU can enable seamless zooming in and out of a playing HD video, which shows its excellence.
The Optimus G comes with a 4.7 inches True HD IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen that features a resolution of 1280 x 768 pixels at a pixel density of 318ppi. LG has mentioned that this display panel recreates a life-like fashion with high color density more naturally. It has in-cell touch technology which eliminates the need to have a separate touch sensitive layer and reduces the thickness of the device substantially. There is also a rumor saying that this is the type of display LG is manufacturing for the next Apple iPhone although there isn’t any official indication to back that up. Confirming the thickness reduction, LG Optimus G is 8.5mm thick and scores dimensions of 131.9 x 68.9mm. LG has also improved the optics to 13MP camera that can capture 1080p HD videos @ 30 frames per second along with 1.3MP front camera for video conferencing. The camera allows the user to snap photos with a voice command which eliminates the need for a countdown timer. LG has also introduced a feature called ‘Time Catch Shot’ enabling the user to choose and save the best capture among a set of snaps taken just before the shutter button is released.
LG Optimus G comes with LTE connectivity for high speed internet along with Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n for continuous connectivity. It also has DLNA and can host a Wi-Fi hotspot to share your high speed internet connection with friends. The 2100mAh battery included in LG Optimus G may be sufficient to get through the day and with the enhancements LG has introduced, the battery might last longer. Optimus G has asynchronous symmetric multiprocessing technology that enables the cores to independently power up and down contributing to an improved battery life.
A Brief Comparison Between Apple iPhone 5 and LG Optimus G
• Apple iPhone 5 is powered by 1GHz Dual Core processor that is based on Cortex A7 architecture on top of Apple A6 chipset while LG Optimus G is powered by 1.5GHz Krait Quad Core processor on top of Qualcomm MDM9615/APQ8064 chipset with Adreno 320 GPU and 2GB of RAM.
• Apple iPhone 5 runs on iOS 6 while LG Optimus G also runs on Android OS v4.0.4 ICS.
• Apple iPhone 5 has 4 inch LED backlit IPS TFT capacitive touchscreen featuring a resolution of 1136 x 640 pixels at a pixel density of 326ppi while LG Optimus G has 4.7 inches True HD IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen featuring a resolution of 1280 x 768 pixels at a pixel density of 318ppi.
• Apple iPhone 5 is smaller, thinner and significantly lighter (123.8 x 58.6mm / 7.6mm / 112g) compared to LG Optimus G (131.9 x 68.9mm / 8.5mm / 145g).
• Apple iPhone 5 has 8MP camera that can capture 1080p HD videos @ 30 fps and images simultaneously while LG Optimus G has 13MP camera that can capture 1080p HD videos @ 30 fps.
Conclusion
The initial impression when you compare the specs of both would be that LG Optimus G would be way faster since it features a Quad Core processor and 2GB of RAM compared to the Dual Core processor featured in Apple iPhone 5. However it is a common misconception we see in comparing smartphones with different architectures. Apple has engineered this new dual core processor on their own instruction set based on ARM v7. The cores are based on Cortex A7 architecture while LG features Qualcomm’s customized Krait architecture. It seems that Apple has increased the number of instructions executed per clock cycle which means they don’t necessarily have to increase their clock speed in order to improve the performance. They have also dramatically improved the memory bandwidth which may bring the iPhone 5 in to par with LG Optimus G which has 2GB of RAM. The display panels seem to emanate the same glow despite the slight reduction in resolution of iPhone 5. When you look at the exterior, Apple iPhone 5 has a grandeur appearance which can’t be matched by LG Optimus G. However, the price may contain a similar spike as well. So what we suggest is this, if you are indeed looking for a smartphone with great performance and a grand look which gives you prestige to hold on, Apple iPhone 5 is your device. However, if you are looking for a smartphone with great performance and yet you can surpass the idea of having the Apple logo embossed in your back plate, LG Optimus will be a great choice.