Hi guys, so i just updated my phone from previous s7 edge tp the lg v30+ unlocked us998 version , just want to share my usage and to help people decide with this phone
so for my background , i am a tech geek phone lover. I always buy used phone since 2010 and always go after cheap high performance phone. My previous phone was mostly samsung , s7 edge, note 4. The last LG phone i was used was lg optimus 2x on 2012, and that's thx to tegra2 hype back then.
Okay, so why i upgrading to my phone because, i want a large new display to play games, ragnarok mobile , anyone? haha and so i listing mi 8 and note 8 to my next target phone back then few months ago. And i was nearly buy the note 8 back then. But the 18,5:9 ratio is turning me off. it was to tall slim skinny screen and thx to the edge it look not to good for my taste. The first time i see a lg v30 is when 3-4 months ago, my friend was using it. The screen is great big and 18:9 ratio looks good and not turning me off, but after reading it have a bad camera 1um pixel, i just auto not to buy this phone back then. Reading news article was my hobby , and that time i read about gcam port than magically make the lg v30 usable, woalah. it actually not look to good when i see the image example on the gcam port review. And the other thing, this thing was cheap for a used one, costly approximately 250 us dollar in my country vs note 8 used which is two times the price. And so my mind was swinging whetever to buy this phone or not. Shortly i brought this phone and sell my s7 edge , LoL
So for my lg v30+ spec is unlocked us998 with oreo. I think i got lucky because the phone is on mint condition with power button like new, giving a strong tactile feedback. i think this was used few weeks than returned, and just got in my hand few months after
okay , lets go enter the review :
Display
So my impression with the display it have a large good propotional 18:9 screen with large SRGB and color space, also with the HDR video support. It easily on par with s8+/note 8 screen and supercede my s7 edge display. On sunny day, the screen have roughly same brightness with my s7 edge display, with s7 edge , slightly have better color and luminance, Other than that the lg v30 display on sunlight is good. For blue shift issue, it's only show up on all white image, so you won't notice it for 99% most of the time except all white image/ui display. it does appear when you see it on all white display and noticeable, but on most daily ui app and games , there's no any noticeable things on my experience. Other than that there's no issue with the screen as ext reviewer said, luminance and brightness is balance and no area is brighter than the other on the screen, like some ext website review said.
On temperature said, the screen does look little bluish, i change the temperature with slider all goes to warmer and turn the blue color to the most left, voila it became very wamer now. I also change the screen to fhd+ to save battery life and performance, and the screen look fantastic, no pixelation can be seen,
Camera
Camera , Camera, the stock camera app for front camera is obviously the worst ever stock camera app i ever use, period. the screen color is very strange, like they have bug on pre prod and no fix. Seriously LG. Most reviewer will judge and said the front camera is terrible, i said yes because of the software, outside software wise, its very good!. Now the back camera using stock app with Oreo is quite good, but it's still hit and miss. Sometimes the image look blur, sometimes it have a great detail on all side of the image. For AI cam, it only bring better colour and exposure from my exp so that maybe a little plus. Changing to googlecamera port is absolutely amazing experience, all low light and good light photo is superb with excellent detail. You can zoom peep to 200% and get nice detail with text clear to readable with almost all lighting condition. Front camera also take a blow with google camera port, there's HDR and a great detail to it, some reviewer said it fix the front camera, i said it makes the front camera look very great with superior HDR color and detail. For video , i wont said much , but as you can read on most reviewer said it have great features that beat other phone. The only annoyance to me is the shaky effect when you walk, not too bad , look s natural but still look strange. The Google camera does fix this a little bit using 1080p and EIS.
Now comparing to s7 edge, the only advantage with my old phone is faster auto focus and high bright photo, other than that the lg v30 is absolutely an upgrade to meeee, the detail photo using gcam on lg v30 beat's quality of s7 edge, any text or image when zoom till 200% is clearer and better due to resolution advante with googlecamera app handling all the processing. For brightness you can play with setting on gcam port + edit brightness to make dark image look brighter as the s7 edge.. Now the s7 edge faster focus is a hit and miss for my exp, sometimes look like you taken a picture on stable but the image appear blurry, this is also the case with gcam, sometimes i need to hold a stable few second to get a good shot that was not blur.
Comparing to my friend s9 plus phone with newest software that contain note 9 camera algorithm, is absolutely great also. the 12 mpx limited res image on s9+ kicked by all the detail that the gcam port given, Sure the s9 plus color and brightness is better than s7 edge, but the gcam photo looks very natural and detailed. Even with telephoto camera lens on s9 plus, the zoomed 200% main camera with gcam still give a good fight,albeit loses on clarity and detail. I even said that my 1/3 prices phone is killing the s9 plus device LoL and he surely tempted
All the above review is using gcam app, with stock lg is a hit and miss. , you need several hit to get a nice pict. Overall with gcam the camera is greatttt
Now front camera wise, the s7 edge have lower aperture and better um pixel size, comparing apple to apple stock camera is absolutely wins to s7 edge, but use the gcam port and you get absolutely amazing image. The s7 edge with beautify off is still applying beautify picture, image doesn't look sharp with smoothing effect going on , this is same behaviour with the lg front camera stock app, only worseeeeee. Using the gcam, the quality is killing the s7 edge front camera, even with superior spec, the s7 edge smoothing the skin makes the image look less sharper vs gcam on lg v30 front camera giving a lot of detail. When you take a image on day light with a lot of strong light on the backgroud the HDR will help you show all detail your backside without any lens flare hiding it, while s7 edge front camera will blow up, if there's too many light and can't see anything. Now comparing the lg v30 front cam with gcam vs note 8/s9 plus camera i think their can have a a par quality, surely the note 8/s9 camera have better resolution,spec and auto focus, but the lg v30 have a very wide angle lens camera, so you can selfie or vlog and show things you want to share on your side with the camera still cover it up for you. So i can say wide angle vs narrow angle, is your choice.
p.s : i didn't post any picture due to limited quota internet bandwith
Battery
The battery life is so amazing, it can easily get 6 hours SOT just like others youtube review said. since 2010 i always buy a used phone and the battery life already drop the first time i use it. The lg V30 is the best smartphone that i buy with very good battery life, the s7 edge only hit around 3-4 hour sot with all efficient setting turn on. Also fast charging temperature is almost low , only 2/3 c higher than standard charging, thx to qnovo adaptive charging tech, usb c technology that make the heat transfer lower than micro usb cable and lg charge tech? it only warm while fast charge. My s7 edge usually become hot while fast charging, easily hit 45c on battery temp, while the v30 hit 39.7 for the highest battery temp.
Loud speaker
The volume quality is very good, just like gsmarena said, loud enough on loud env and clear balance sound, More louder than my s7 edge. While s7 edge speaker gives bass sound effect, the lg v30 speaker is very balanced and clearer, is this due to lg v30 speaker tuned by B&O ? this is still a question with no answer LoL. But i notice that the volume different on 80 vs 90-100% is very huge, when you move to 90 or 100% you get very loud sound, while move to 80% will reduce the vol a lot, i think this is a tweaking done by LG
Audio Quality
One of samsung strengh with music is there is adapt headset app to optimize your earphone, Every people use different headset/iem from the cheapest and the expensive one, using samsung adapt headset program the music quality on s7 edge is great while feel balance. The hifi quad dac on lg v30 does enhance the audio big, it can be felt and the sound become very different everytime i change the eq on the hifi dac mode. For this one as i'm not an audiophile, i give the advantage to lg v30, the only bad thing i need to play with the eq to find the best setting, while samsung one just optimize and play. FYI i'm using c100 jbl , a cheap 6 us dollar iem.
Signal and reception
The phone does have same quality signal reception with s7 edge, but the stepping frequency jump is better. Currently i m using mobile operator with low signal quality on my country, but have cheapest packet for mobile data etc, the signal on lg v30 jump faster per step than s7 edge, this is good to optimize signal and prevent bad signal searching to save battery.
so for my background , i am a tech geek phone lover. I always buy used phone since 2010 and always go after cheap high performance phone. My previous phone was mostly samsung , s7 edge, note 4. The last LG phone i was used was lg optimus 2x on 2012, and that's thx to tegra2 hype back then.
Okay, so why i upgrading to my phone because, i want a large new display to play games, ragnarok mobile , anyone? haha and so i listing mi 8 and note 8 to my next target phone back then few months ago. And i was nearly buy the note 8 back then. But the 18,5:9 ratio is turning me off. it was to tall slim skinny screen and thx to the edge it look not to good for my taste. The first time i see a lg v30 is when 3-4 months ago, my friend was using it. The screen is great big and 18:9 ratio looks good and not turning me off, but after reading it have a bad camera 1um pixel, i just auto not to buy this phone back then. Reading news article was my hobby , and that time i read about gcam port than magically make the lg v30 usable, woalah. it actually not look to good when i see the image example on the gcam port review. And the other thing, this thing was cheap for a used one, costly approximately 250 us dollar in my country vs note 8 used which is two times the price. And so my mind was swinging whetever to buy this phone or not. Shortly i brought this phone and sell my s7 edge , LoL
So for my lg v30+ spec is unlocked us998 with oreo. I think i got lucky because the phone is on mint condition with power button like new, giving a strong tactile feedback. i think this was used few weeks than returned, and just got in my hand few months after
okay , lets go enter the review :
Display
So my impression with the display it have a large good propotional 18:9 screen with large SRGB and color space, also with the HDR video support. It easily on par with s8+/note 8 screen and supercede my s7 edge display. On sunny day, the screen have roughly same brightness with my s7 edge display, with s7 edge , slightly have better color and luminance, Other than that the lg v30 display on sunlight is good. For blue shift issue, it's only show up on all white image, so you won't notice it for 99% most of the time except all white image/ui display. it does appear when you see it on all white display and noticeable, but on most daily ui app and games , there's no any noticeable things on my experience. Other than that there's no issue with the screen as ext reviewer said, luminance and brightness is balance and no area is brighter than the other on the screen, like some ext website review said.
On temperature said, the screen does look little bluish, i change the temperature with slider all goes to warmer and turn the blue color to the most left, voila it became very wamer now. I also change the screen to fhd+ to save battery life and performance, and the screen look fantastic, no pixelation can be seen,
Camera
Camera , Camera, the stock camera app for front camera is obviously the worst ever stock camera app i ever use, period. the screen color is very strange, like they have bug on pre prod and no fix. Seriously LG. Most reviewer will judge and said the front camera is terrible, i said yes because of the software, outside software wise, its very good!. Now the back camera using stock app with Oreo is quite good, but it's still hit and miss. Sometimes the image look blur, sometimes it have a great detail on all side of the image. For AI cam, it only bring better colour and exposure from my exp so that maybe a little plus. Changing to googlecamera port is absolutely amazing experience, all low light and good light photo is superb with excellent detail. You can zoom peep to 200% and get nice detail with text clear to readable with almost all lighting condition. Front camera also take a blow with google camera port, there's HDR and a great detail to it, some reviewer said it fix the front camera, i said it makes the front camera look very great with superior HDR color and detail. For video , i wont said much , but as you can read on most reviewer said it have great features that beat other phone. The only annoyance to me is the shaky effect when you walk, not too bad , look s natural but still look strange. The Google camera does fix this a little bit using 1080p and EIS.
Now comparing to s7 edge, the only advantage with my old phone is faster auto focus and high bright photo, other than that the lg v30 is absolutely an upgrade to meeee, the detail photo using gcam on lg v30 beat's quality of s7 edge, any text or image when zoom till 200% is clearer and better due to resolution advante with googlecamera app handling all the processing. For brightness you can play with setting on gcam port + edit brightness to make dark image look brighter as the s7 edge.. Now the s7 edge faster focus is a hit and miss for my exp, sometimes look like you taken a picture on stable but the image appear blurry, this is also the case with gcam, sometimes i need to hold a stable few second to get a good shot that was not blur.
Comparing to my friend s9 plus phone with newest software that contain note 9 camera algorithm, is absolutely great also. the 12 mpx limited res image on s9+ kicked by all the detail that the gcam port given, Sure the s9 plus color and brightness is better than s7 edge, but the gcam photo looks very natural and detailed. Even with telephoto camera lens on s9 plus, the zoomed 200% main camera with gcam still give a good fight,albeit loses on clarity and detail. I even said that my 1/3 prices phone is killing the s9 plus device LoL and he surely tempted
All the above review is using gcam app, with stock lg is a hit and miss. , you need several hit to get a nice pict. Overall with gcam the camera is greatttt
Now front camera wise, the s7 edge have lower aperture and better um pixel size, comparing apple to apple stock camera is absolutely wins to s7 edge, but use the gcam port and you get absolutely amazing image. The s7 edge with beautify off is still applying beautify picture, image doesn't look sharp with smoothing effect going on , this is same behaviour with the lg front camera stock app, only worseeeeee. Using the gcam, the quality is killing the s7 edge front camera, even with superior spec, the s7 edge smoothing the skin makes the image look less sharper vs gcam on lg v30 front camera giving a lot of detail. When you take a image on day light with a lot of strong light on the backgroud the HDR will help you show all detail your backside without any lens flare hiding it, while s7 edge front camera will blow up, if there's too many light and can't see anything. Now comparing the lg v30 front cam with gcam vs note 8/s9 plus camera i think their can have a a par quality, surely the note 8/s9 camera have better resolution,spec and auto focus, but the lg v30 have a very wide angle lens camera, so you can selfie or vlog and show things you want to share on your side with the camera still cover it up for you. So i can say wide angle vs narrow angle, is your choice.
p.s : i didn't post any picture due to limited quota internet bandwith
Battery
The battery life is so amazing, it can easily get 6 hours SOT just like others youtube review said. since 2010 i always buy a used phone and the battery life already drop the first time i use it. The lg V30 is the best smartphone that i buy with very good battery life, the s7 edge only hit around 3-4 hour sot with all efficient setting turn on. Also fast charging temperature is almost low , only 2/3 c higher than standard charging, thx to qnovo adaptive charging tech, usb c technology that make the heat transfer lower than micro usb cable and lg charge tech? it only warm while fast charge. My s7 edge usually become hot while fast charging, easily hit 45c on battery temp, while the v30 hit 39.7 for the highest battery temp.
Loud speaker
The volume quality is very good, just like gsmarena said, loud enough on loud env and clear balance sound, More louder than my s7 edge. While s7 edge speaker gives bass sound effect, the lg v30 speaker is very balanced and clearer, is this due to lg v30 speaker tuned by B&O ? this is still a question with no answer LoL. But i notice that the volume different on 80 vs 90-100% is very huge, when you move to 90 or 100% you get very loud sound, while move to 80% will reduce the vol a lot, i think this is a tweaking done by LG
Audio Quality
One of samsung strengh with music is there is adapt headset app to optimize your earphone, Every people use different headset/iem from the cheapest and the expensive one, using samsung adapt headset program the music quality on s7 edge is great while feel balance. The hifi quad dac on lg v30 does enhance the audio big, it can be felt and the sound become very different everytime i change the eq on the hifi dac mode. For this one as i'm not an audiophile, i give the advantage to lg v30, the only bad thing i need to play with the eq to find the best setting, while samsung one just optimize and play. FYI i'm using c100 jbl , a cheap 6 us dollar iem.
Signal and reception
The phone does have same quality signal reception with s7 edge, but the stepping frequency jump is better. Currently i m using mobile operator with low signal quality on my country, but have cheapest packet for mobile data etc, the signal on lg v30 jump faster per step than s7 edge, this is good to optimize signal and prevent bad signal searching to save battery.
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