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LG G5 and Friends: Hands on with the new unibody modular flagship [Video]

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The LG G5 is a huge departure from the company’s usual all-plastic affairs. And it’s finally here. What I love about this phone on first impressions is the way it feels in hand. The smooth metal finish combined with the rounded corners and edges help create a phone that looks and feels fantastic.

Compare that to last year’s G-series flagship’s right-angled corners and sharp design, and you’ll notice a stark contrast in approach…

The all-metal unibody finish reminds me a lot of the Nexus 6P from Huawei, but the software experience is far removed from stock Android. Still, on initial browsing, it’s much better, cleaner and sharper than LG’s previous UI. That’s something that’s needed changing for a long time. I can’t help but feel a little annoyed at the lack of an app drawer though. That’s not something I want to see as a trend in official third party Android skins even if Android N is rumored to take the same approach.

There are a couple of notable features here. Firstly, that dual camera setup on the back is made up of a regular 16MP camera with OIS and 4K video, partnered by an 8MP wide angle lens. Rather than have a case which adds an external lens to give wide angles, LG built one right in to the phone. Also, there’s that modular design which lets you remove the battery and bottom edge, and swap it out for the LG Cam Plus (a manual camera control module with built-in 1000mAh battery) and the LG Hi-Fi Plus with B&O Play. This portable Hi-Fi DAC audio player offers both 32-bit Hi-Fi DAC up sampling and 32-bit 384KHz high definition audio playback

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZbKYvWmEu4&feature=youtu.be]

Additional companion products include the LG VR headset which plugs in to the phone via USB, the 360 VR Cam for taking 360-degree pictures, and the LG Rolling Bot remote-control Robot with a built-in camera.

Turning our attention back the phone. It features a power/sleep button on the back, which acts as the fingerprint sensor, a 5.3-inch Quad HD display with the ‘always on’ portion which effectively uses 1/3 of a panel and around 0.8% of your battery every hour.

Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 820 is inside, paired with 4GB RAM and 32GB internal storage (expandable).The 2,800mAh battery is Quick-Carge 3.0 compatible and can get 83% charge in 30 mins. There’s a Type C connector too.

When it launches, the LG G5 will come in four colors, including the gray, gold, pink and silver/white.

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