Description and characteristics of the LG G2 Mini phone

Many first-tier manufacturers continue to produce “mini” smartphones that look similar to the current flagship gadget. But only externally: apart from the recognizable exterior, they have nothing special to brag about. Such devices are sold primarily due to the big names of their older brothers. The unlucky buyer thinks: “My smartphone is almost like substituting the name of the flagship of some Korean or Taiwanese company, only cheaper and a little smaller.” Well, in fact, the next Mini, in terms of its characteristics, turns out to be more like a budget gadget, while manufacturers do not hesitate to charge extra money for a big name. An exception to this rule is the Sony Xperia Compact series smartphones: they only have reduced body dimensions, and the technical filling is comparable to the hardware of the corresponding flagship model. True, they cost almost the same.

LG also often uses the name of the flagship in the names of simpler models and also charges money for this, but this manufacturer has a much wider range of such devices, and it includes quite decent options - for example, LG G3s. The name, frankly, is not the best: the letter s most often indicates that the device (or car - this also often happens to them) has become faster, more powerful and simply better than the original model. However, this is definitely not about the G3s. The technical content of the device is quite modest: a display with HD resolution, a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 system-on-chip, an 8-megapixel camera. But the device received not only a recognizable name and design, but also some of the “tricks” of the flagship LG G3, for example, a very convenient proprietary software shell and laser autofocus.

⇡#Technical characteristics

Description of the advantages and disadvantages of the G3 S phone

The dimensions of the LG G3 S are 69.6 mm wide, 137.7 mm long and 10.3 mm thick. With such dimensions it is convenient to operate the device with one hand. In addition, the weight of the device is about 137 g. Even if you operate the device with one hand, its weight is almost not felt.

If we evaluate the overall ease of use of the phone taking into account the size and weight, then there will be no problems with everyday use.

The smartphone is equipped with a 4-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 MSM8926 processor, which is made at 28 nm. technical process.

The smartphone has only 1 GB. RAM, which is quite small. Instances of low RAM will occur regularly, so even when using light applications you will experience instability in operation.

The storage capacity of the device is 8 GB, and if the smartphone is mainly used for correspondence and social networks, then there will be no problems, but if you are going to use it for photography, video shooting and games, you should look at a device of a higher class.

The phone is compatible with SD cards, so you can easily expand its memory. So you probably don't need to worry about storage capacity.

The G3 S has a 5-inch display diagonal. The display is large enough that you will rarely have problems with its size. However, this display is not suitable for writing long texts.

The smartphone has a high-end display and any graphic content you display on it, including videos and games, will be displayed clearly.

The main camera of the phone has 7.99 megapixels, which should be enough in most cases. However, you may be slightly unsatisfied with the quality of the photos.

Also, the smartphone has a front camera of 0.92 megapixels, which is low. If you care about the quality of your photos, you should consider a higher-end smartphone.

The battery capacity of the LG G3 S is 2540 mAh, which is a typical capacity indicator. Compared to other smartphones, the battery life of the LG G3 S is average. You don't have to worry about anything during daily use. However, if you spend time surfing the internet or playing games, you might be a little underwhelmed by the battery life.

⇡#Appearance and ergonomics

Briefly about the appearance of the LG G3s: the same smartphone as the LG G3, only a little smaller. Indeed, the difference in dimensions is by no means as significant as it could be. The G3s display is only half an inch smaller than the G3 screen, the frames, on the contrary, are wider - accordingly, the dimensions of the devices are similar. The engineers managed to save literally a few millimeters in length and width. Nevertheless, the device is quite comfortable to use with one hand - the thumb can easily reach all four corners of the display. There is no need to hold the device and place it in your palms.

LG G3s LTE – front panel

The thickness of the case is quite large - 10.3 millimeters. However, the G3s doesn't look "chubby" at all. Its back back is rounded on the sides. This makes the device appear thinner than it actually is. A very winning visual illusion. The device weighs moderately – 134 grams. From time immemorial and to this day, iPhone owners consider such a mass to be ideal - not heavy, and not too airy and incorporeal.

LG G3s LTE with screen on

There are no hard keys on the front panel - LG prefers on-screen buttons. At the top of the panel there is an LED indicator, a front lens, a 1.3-megapixel camera, a speaker and a proximity sensor.

LG G3s LTE with screen on

The power and volume control keys are located on the rear panel. This arrangement of buttons may seem strange to those who are not familiar with LG G series smartphones, but Koreans have been using it for several years now - it is quite successful. It is convenient to press the keys with your index finger, no matter in which hand the smartphone is held. True, it is still better to place the device in your pocket with the display facing you to avoid accidental pressing of physical keys. You should also remember that the smartphone can also be unlocked by double tapping on the screen - in this case there is no need to press a hardware key (this is called KnockOn, and there is also a combination of tapping on different parts of the screen called Knock Code). Above the button block is the peephole of the main eight-megapixel camera with a single LED flash and a laser focus sensor.

LG G3s LTE – rear panel

The back panel of the device is removable, and it is made of fairly thin plastic and bends like a real acrobat. The cover fits tightly to the smartphone body - there are no backlashes or gaps, and it is not prone to breakage.

LG G3s LTE – plastic back cover

Under the “back” of the device there is a removable lithium-ion battery of 9.65 Wh (2540 mAh, 3.8 V) - significantly less than that of the LG G3. If necessary, replacing the battery is not difficult. At the top, one above the other, there are slots for Micro-SIM and microSD cards.

LG G3s LTE with back cover removed

At the top end of the case there is an infrared port designed to control household appliances - usually simpler models are deprived of this option, but in the G3s, fortunately, it remains. The Micro-USB interface and a universal 3.5 mm audio jack are located at the bottom. The sides of the device are empty.

LG G3s LTE – side ends

The device is assembled well. When the sides are compressed, no colored streaks appear on the matrix - there are enough stiffening ribs in the structure. True, the plastic creaks a little, but this is quite normal. The appearance of the LG G3s, subjectively speaking, is very pleasant - among devices in the mid-price category, such nice gadgets are rare.

LG G3 S: alternative

You can get the Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini by paying about 1,000 rubles less. This smartphone has an extremely clear 4.3-inch OLED display, a powerful 1.7 GHz dual-core processor, 8 GB of built-in (expandable) memory, an LTE module and a good 8-megapixel camera. The S4 Mini is an overall better and more compact smartphone than its LG competitor.

⇡#Display

The smartphone has a five-inch display with HD resolution (1280 × 720 pixels). The pixel density is moderate at 294 ppi. On the one hand, this value is very close to the psychological barrier of 300 ppi, after which, as is commonly believed, individual points are not visible to the human eye. On the other hand, the screen on the G3s is still grainy, especially compared to the fantastically sharp screen on the G3, and there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s easy to see individual dots on the display – just bring the device closer to your eyes. Small fonts “float” a little – you can, of course, read from the LG G3s screen, but it’s not very comfortable. Multimedia content, on the contrary, looks moderately sharp - not Quad HD, but I don’t want to swear. Probably, for a device at the level of the LG G3s, this is the optimal resolution - less, of course, is not necessary, but the weak system-on-chip will not be able to cope with more.

The device uses an IPS type matrix. True, it’s not the best: if you look away from the perpendicular, the picture noticeably loses contrast. So much so that the black color becomes dark grey. Because of this, say, watching videos on a smartphone together is not very convenient. But the screen is very responsive: the device quickly and accurately responds to touches and recognizes gestures without problems. The gadget supports only up to five simultaneous touches – this is enough for comfortable work, but is a sign of the “budget” origin of the display. But the smartphone understands touches with loose gloves.

LG G3s LTE – AnTuTu MultiTouch Test results

Further - sadder. Firstly, there is an air gap between the protective glass and the matrix itself, which is why the screen glares in bright light. Secondly, the display fades mercilessly in the sun - it does not have a polarizing filter. And thirdly, to the touch the surface of the front panel resembles window glass - there is no oleophobic coating here either, so the glass turns out to be quite easily soiled, it quickly collects fingerprints, and getting rid of them is not so easy. Perhaps everything except what is described in this paragraph is rather good in the screen, but there are also plenty of shortcomings - such displays usually go to very budget devices.

But the screen’s brightness reserve is quite high: the maximum luminosity of the white field is 422 cd/m2, the minimum is 17 cd/m2, that is, in the dark the device is very gentle on the eyes. Unfortunately, the high brightness margin is not able to compensate for the abundance of glare. For indoor use, the brightness is enough for the eyes, but outdoors the screen can glare so much that the information on it will be unreadable. The G3s does not have automatic brightness adjustment, because there is no corresponding sensor; the backlight level will have to be adjusted manually. It’s also unusual - this option is most often found in smartphones for this kind of money.

The luminosity of the black field at the maximum display backlight level is moderate - 0.43 cd/m2. Blacks only lose a little depth at maximum brightness. It turns out that the screen of the G3s is quite contrasty, especially by the standards of devices in the mid-price category: its contrast value is 981:1.

The grayscale color temperature of the LG G3s screen exceeds the reference value of 6500 K - it averages 8200 K, and, which is not very great, it is not uniform - darker shades turn out to be cooler. And in general, the deviation is quite large - the colors on the smartphone display are cold, and this is noticeable to the naked eye. Unfortunately, software adjustment of white balance is not provided here.

The screen is not calibrated very well. All gamma curves have a noticeable bend along their entire length relative to the reference curve. This means that both intermediate shades of primary colors and shades of gray on the G3s screen do not look bright enough - the picture is somewhat underlit. This is not to say that the deviation is critical - to the eye the image looks quite tolerable. However, those who work with color should take this into account.

LG G3s LTE - smartphone screen color gamut (yellow triangle) compared to sRGB reference space (white triangle)

But the color gamut of the display almost completely coincides with the sRGB color space - this is great, neither add nor take away. The colors on the display are displayed as saturated as the content authors intended - most existing images are adapted specifically to the sRGB standard.

⇡#Hardware and performance

The smartphone is equipped with a well-known and already tired system-on-a-chip – Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 MSM8926. This is perhaps the most popular solution for mid-priced devices from first-tier manufacturers. The problem is that it is already quite old - this platform turned two years old in February. This is a very long time for the mobile device industry. Accordingly, one cannot count on a high level of performance, especially since the 400th Snapdragon was initially positioned as a middle-end solution. Let us remind you, in case anyone has forgotten: this platform includes four 32-bit ARM Cortex-A7 cores operating at a frequency of 1.2 GHz and Adreno 305 graphics. The chip is made using a 28-nm process technology.

In the general synthetic test AnTuTu Benchmark 5, which checks all the main “nodes” of the gadget, the LG G3s LTE scored less than eighteen thousand points. By modern standards, this is not a lot at all, or even just a little. The result, by the way, is very strange. For example, ZTE Star 1, running on a similar system-on-a-chip, but equipped with a display with Full HD resolution (and not just HD), scored more - 21 thousand “parrots”. Why this is so is unclear. Probably, the proprietary LG shell takes away too many computing resources from the G3s, which in this case are worth their weight in gold. We will regard this as another reminder that the use of a particular system-on-a-chip in combination with a screen of a certain resolution does not make it possible to accurately predict the performance of the device.

However, during everyday use, the device tries by hook or by crook not to slow down and render the picture smoothly. In general, the Snapdragon 400 is quite capable of “pumping up” an HD screen without slowdowns – we have seen this more than once while testing various budget smartphones and tablets. True, with the G3s the picture is no-no, and it jerks out of the blue. The small amount of RAM can have an effect - the device has only one gigabyte. The amount of built-in flash memory is also small - eight gigabytes, but at least if necessary, it can be expanded using a microSD memory card.

The role of the graphics controller in the device is played by the Qualcomm Adreno 305 module, operating at a frequency of 450 MHz. This graphics is as old as the Snapdragon 400 itself, and now it is only suitable for watching movies in standard definition and running resource-intensive arcade games: three-dimensional games have already outgrown it. In the simple Basemark 2 Taiji gaming test, the device showed an average of 29.6 frames per second - plus or minus the same as its classmates. There is nothing special to brag about here - modern smartphones show in this test, if not 60 FPS (vSync limit), then at least more than forty-five.

When performing more complex gaming tasks - 3DMark Ice Storm Unlimited and GFXBench T-Rex - the device slowed down noticeably, the picture twitched. The same thing happens when launching “heavy” toys. And here neither freeing up RAM nor reducing graphics settings to a minimum can help.

In other words, with the help of LG G3s you can surf the Internet, read books and other electronic documents, watch videos with SD resolution and play arcade games like Angry Birds. The technical stuffing of the device is simply not enough for more.

Detailed technical specifications

Make and model

Make and model of the device, and alternative names (if any).

Design

Appearance of the device including dimensions, weight, volume, colors and materials.

System on a Chip (SoC)

A system on a chip, a single-chip system (System on a Chip, SoC) is when several systems performing different device functions are connected on one chip.

Central processing unit (CPU)

Graphics Processing Unit (GPU)

Random access memory (RAM)

Built-in memory

Most mobile devices have built-in Flash memory, which is used as a storage for system data, the operating system, as well as user data - photos, videos, recordings and much more.

Operating system

A mobile operating system (OS) is pre-installed software with a well-thought-out interface for user control of device functions.

Battery

To operate autonomously, a mobile device requires a battery that powers all its components.

Screen

The screen (display) is the main element for displaying graphic information.

Main camera

The main camera, usually built into the rear of the device, is designed for creating photo and video content.

Front-camera

The front camera of a mobile device (selfie camera, rear camera) is a camera on the front part, which is usually used for video communication, recognition of gestures or faces, and selfie photographs.

Memory card

A memory card (flash card) is an external data storage device that is used in many devices to increase memory capacity.

SIM card

Subscriber Identification Module (SIM) used in mobile devices to identify subscribers in cellular networks.

Mobile networks

This is a system in which communication and data transfer is carried out between subscribers, the location of one or more of which changes. This section lists the supported mobile communication standards and frequencies.

Mobile network data standards

What data transfer standards in cellular networks are supported by the device, as well as their speed.

WiFi

Wi-Fi (Wireless Fidelity) is a technology for wireless data transmission over a local network among devices based on IEEE 802.11 standards.

Bluetooth

Bluetooth (BT, bluetooth (z), “blue tooth”) is a short-range wireless network (up to 10, sometimes 100 meters) operating on radio waves to transmit voice and data between devices.

Sensors

Modern devices have many sensors that help in measurements, trigger functions, and make using the device more pleasant.

Audio

Audio - characteristics and capabilities of a mobile device in terms of sound.

Radio

The radio in a mobile device can be built-in by the manufacturer (catch local radio channels, no internet required, often works only with headphones (as an antenna), but not always) or installed as an online application (requires internet, but more channels and often better quality) .

Navigation and location

The location is determined by satellite navigation systems that track the device's autonomous geospatial location at multiple points. The most common satellite navigation systems are GPS, GLONASS, and the Chinese BeiDou.

USB connector

USB (Universal Serial Bus) is a serial interface for connecting peripherals to computers, smartphones, laptops and much more. The interface allows you to exchange data and power a peripheral device with energy, as well as connect several peripheral devices to one USB connector at once.

Headphone jack

A TRS headphone jack (or jack) is a common standard of connectors used for transmitting audio signals. By diameter there are jack (6.5 mm), mini-jack (3.5 mm) and micro-jack (2.5 mm). In mobile devices, the 3.5mm jack was considered the most popular and widespread, but recently they began to be removed, leaving only USB connectors, through which headphones are connected with a corresponding plug or using adapters.

Connection and synchronization

Options for synchronizing your mobile device and connecting it to other devices.

Browser

A browser is a browser program for viewing sites and their content on the Internet. Through the browser, you can open websites, search for information, download necessary files, watch streaming videos, play browser games, etc.

Audio file formats/codecs

Mobile devices support many audio file formats, as well as codecs for playing them.

Video file formats/codecs

Video file formats that the device supports and is capable of decoding and playing.

⇡#Communication

Until recently, almost every company had only one flagship smartphone (versions for different markets do not count). The user only needs to decide on the amount of built-in flash memory when purchasing a flagship model. For “mini” flagships the situation is completely different. Manufacturers often offer several versions of mini-devices. The difference mainly lies in the number of SIM cards supported and the presence (or absence) of LTE. G3s, for example, has two different versions - both of them are officially sold in Russia. To make it easier to understand the difference between them, we drew a sign.

In general, the user can purchase a version for two SIM cards and be content with third-generation networks, or pay an additional thousand and a half and purchase LG G3s with LTE support. True, it only has one SIM card slot. Otherwise, these two devices - D724 and D722 - are absolutely identical. Creating several versions of one smartphone allows the manufacturer to fully satisfy the needs of each specific user and reduce costs - it is cheaper than creating a new smartphone.

We received a version with 4G support for testing. The maximum theoretical download speed is 150 Mbit/s (LTE Cat. 4), in reality it is, of course, less. The coverage of supported frequencies is such that the device can operate in the fourth generation networks of all Russian operators. The device maintains a stable connection to the network and does not lose it for no apparent reason. It’s convenient to talk on the LG G3s – your interlocutors certainly won’t complain about poor hearing. The smartphone has an active noise reduction system implemented using two microphones. The only drawback is that the earpiece volume reserve is not very large. In particularly noisy places like nightclubs, you can’t hear your interlocutor very well.

The set of wireless interfaces on the smartphone is quite mature. The gadget supports Bluetooth 4.0, Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n at 2.4 GHz, NFC, and it also has an infrared port for controlling household appliances. The proprietary Quick Remote utility is offered as an application for the virtual remote control. It is very simple to use: just select the type of equipment used and its manufacturer, check the code proposed by the system for functionality and save it in the application memory. Just a classic scenario for setting up an infrared port.

The navigation module installed in the LG G3s can work with GPS and GLONASS satellites, and it does it very quickly. Half a minute after the “cold” start, the gadget detected as many as nineteen satellites and was guided by twelve of them. The navigation error radius was around seven to eight meters, that is, very small. The device really quickly and accurately navigates the terrain - using it as a car navigator is quite convenient.

⇡#Camera

The smartphone's camera set is quite budget-friendly: 8 megapixels on the back and 1.3 megapixels on the front. Using the webcam, you can make video calls and take self-portraits only in good lighting - otherwise the picture will become covered with digital noise and become almost unreadable. Of course, the front camera has neither autofocus nor, especially, a flash.

The rear camera of the device is equipped with a laser autofocus system and a single LED flash. In conditions of good and medium illumination, the gadget is aimed at the subject very quickly - significantly faster than its classmates. LG claims that laser autofocus works best in low light, but in these conditions the G3s focusing system fails: the gadget focuses noticeably slower and occasionally makes mistakes. True, the percentage of focus defects in test images was minimal, but nevertheless it occurred. In general, no matter what LG marketers say, laser autofocus is not a panacea.

LG G3s LTE

See all images (9)
In good lighting conditions, the main camera takes very good photos - bright, rich, contrasty and detailed. Their color rendition is quite realistic. In pictures taken indoors, there is a noticeable drop in contrast and the appearance of slight background noise - but this is not critical. The only thing that stumps the G3s main camera is shooting in the dark. Here the camera is absolutely powerless - you shouldn’t even try to shoot in difficult conditions. The device can record video in Full HD format.

Autonomous operation

The battery in the device is quite large, at least for this class of smartphones - 9.65 Wh (2540 mAh, 3.8 V). It is removable, if necessary, you can replace it yourself in half a minute - just remove the back panel of the case.

LG G3s LTE – battery

The hardware in the device is not too power-hungry: a display with HD resolution and a system-on-a-chip with four economical Cortex-A7 cores do not require much energy. Thanks to this, you can safely expect that your smartphone will last a full working day even under high loads. During the week of testing, there was not a single day when the device arrived home discharged, although the author of this review sometimes stayed until one or two in the morning. The gadget stood up to this and did not ask to be charged. In standby mode, the device consumes virtually no energy - in ten hours of “sleep” only four percent was consumed. In theory, if you use your smartphone only for calls, it can last two working days on a single battery charge. It takes approximately three hours to fully charge the battery using the included 0.85 A device.

In continuous HD video playback mode with data updating in the background, the device was discharged in five hours and twenty minutes. It probably would have lasted much longer if we had not used a video for this test in HD resolution, which is difficult for the four hundredth Snapdragon. And don’t forget: to get a more impressive result, just lower the screen brightness level - and the device will last longer.

The smartphone has a low power consumption mode. It activates automatically when the battery charge level drops below a certain level. In this mode, a number of “gluttonous” functions are disabled - auto-synchronization, vibration alert, LED indicator, wireless interfaces, and the display brightness is reduced. Using this mode, you can extend the life of your gadget by a couple of hours.

Camera

The LG G3 S has two camera modules - one front-facing and the other main. In the first case, the resolution is 1.3 megapixels, and in the second - 8 megapixels. The camera interface has an ascetic design and provides only the most necessary functions and settings. There are only a few shooting modes, timer shooting, HDR and a few other functions.

Autofocus and shooting speed are at a good level - there are no complaints about them. Photos taken in good lighting come out quite high quality. Color reproduction is correct and the level of detail is quite high. Noise and distortion are kept to a minimum. When there is insufficient lighting, as expected, detail and clarity drop, and noise also appears. But at the same time, night photographs are also of good quality - they certainly cannot be called bad. At the same time, the smartphone accurately focuses on objects and is able to distinguish them even in difficult conditions.

Photos

Plants photographed with a smartphone

Close-up

Panoramic photography

The front camera is subject to completely different criteria, which it copes with quite well. The picture quality during video calls is acceptable, and such a camera is also quite enough for you to get good quality “yourself.”

Overall, we were pleased with the camera. It’s very nice that such a high-quality module is installed in a fairly cheap device.

⇡#Software

The smartphone runs on the Android 4.4.2 KitKat operating system. On top of it is installed the proprietary LG shell with many interesting software options. We encountered the same “launcher” on the flagship LG G3, we talked about it in detail in a separate article, so we won’t repeat it. Let us just note that the shell is quite nice, but on the G3s hardware it slows down a little.

The package of pre-installed applications includes all Google services, proprietary LG utilities, including the SmartWorld application store, a notes service and a file manager. In general, nothing superfluous - only useful utilities. It is assumed that the user will download everything necessary independently from the Play Market.

Test and review of the LG G2 mini smartphone: not too compact, and not a flagship at all

Table of contents

• Introduction
• Packaging and kit
• Appearance and materials
• Display
• Hardware platform and performance
• Software and firmware
• Multimedia
• Wireless Interfaces and Communications
• File system
• Battery life
• Camera
• Comparison with competitors
• Conclusion

Introduction

Competition in the mobile device market is intensifying every year, if not month.
Guided by the Olympic maxim “Faster! Higher! Stronger!" Manufacturers strive to make each of their new flagship products more productive, more technologically advanced and more functional. Along the way, this leads to an increase in the size of top-end smartphones. Nowadays, devices with five-inch screens have become the required minimum in this segment. For those for whom this is too much, all leading vendors offer smaller versions of their flagships. This segment was opened by Samsung, and it’s even surprising that the second largest Korean manufacturer, LG, held out for so long with the answer: all the main ones already.

However, sales of the LG G2 mini smartphone are starting today in many countries (including ours). As you can easily guess from its name, this smartphone is positioned as a smaller version of LG’s current flagship – the G2 model. Based on the results of our review, this smartphone left a pleasant impression. Let's hope that the mini-version will not disgrace the honor of the “big brother”.

Without further delay, let’s immediately list the specifications of the LG G2 mini.

Specifications

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Ryzen 4000

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The price of memory has been halved in Regard - it’s more expensive everywhere

Alas, from the performance characteristics it is immediately clear that it will not be possible to get a complete copy of the flagship in a compact case: this is a typical representative of the middle class of smartphones with two SIM cards.

The main surprise is that the smartphone is not so small. The screen diagonal is 4.7″, which is four-tenths of an inch larger than its main competitors: Samsung Galaxy S4 mini, HTC One Mini and Sony Xperia Z1 Compact. At the same time, the display resolution, like that of the weakest of this trinity – the Samsung device, is only qHD.

However, the battery capacity is very good. And the recommended price looks more than adequate. So the LG G2 mini is quite worthy of a review.

Packaging and kit

Our laboratory received a test sample without packaging or kit, so we can only judge the contents of the delivery based on information from the official website.

Presumably, the following accessories will be included with the smartphone:

• Micro-USB cable;
• Documentation;
• Charger;
• Wired stereo headset.

Moreover, as for the latter, let’s hope that the manufacturer will still include good branded headphones, which we saw in the LG G Flex review:

Appearance and materials

The LG G2 mini is a typical all-in-one touchscreen design. The corners of the case are strongly rounded, the back panel is sloping, which, coupled with the rather modest dimensions of the smartphone (66 x 130 x 10 mm) and adequate weight (121 g), allows it to lie quite comfortably in the hand. Except that the thickness is far from record low – but this is the price to pay for the fairly high battery capacity.

The frames on the sides of the screen are very thin, about 2.5 mm. And there is practically no space either above or below the display - it occupies the vast majority of the front panel. This, in turn, is a consequence of the lack of hardware buttons. The navigation keys here are on-screen (as in all recent LG models, they are customizable).

There are no side buttons either, but there are no controls at all. Like the older model, here they are concentrated on the back cover, under the main camera module.

The cover is plastic. We tested a white device; it also comes in a black version. In both cases, the front panel is painted the same color as the back, and the side insert is always silver.

Fortunately, the plastic of the lid is not glossy; it is textured: it looks interesting and provides a reliable grip.

When enlarged, its texture looks like this:

The camera module is neatly placed in the body, no traces of glue are visible. Presumably, lenses with a single layer of coating are used. The manufacturer does not directly indicate the aperture ratio of the optics and the type of matrix. I will be careless and assume that a BSI CMOS matrix is ​​used, similar to the one we could see in the LG Nexus 5, only without image stabilizer.

On the side of the lens there is a “flash” LED. It is visually removed from the general block of the camera and buttons.

The latter do not protrude much beyond the body, although it is not difficult to feel them blindly. At the same time, you won’t be able to accidentally press something by placing the smartphone on a hard surface – for this purpose, there are two edges that protect the power/lock key from accidental operation.

It is glossy, and the volume buttons located above and below it are painted in a matte metallic color.

It's a shame that the power/lock button is no longer an LED indicator, like in older products. LG G2 mini is completely devoid of visual event indication.

One might think that the indicator “moved” to the front panel, but no, there are only light sensors, proximity sensors and the front camera to the right of the earpiece.

Its grille is designed in a rather interesting way: there is a false panel on top, and underneath it, in a recess, there is a speaker grill itself. The latter, in turn, has very fine perforations, so it won’t be difficult to clog it with dust.

There are also complaints about the build quality - the fit of parts is not ideal. Thus, the bend of the back cover does not coincide with the bend of the edging, painted “to look like metal”. On top of that, we're once again seeing unassuming seams around the corners, as recently seen in our review of the Alcatel OneTouch IDOL X+.

The design of the device is collapsible, the cover can be removed with sufficient effort. It is very thin, completely devoid of stiffening ribs and bends perfectly.

Small latches, at first glance, do not inspire confidence, but in fact they perform their task of securing the lid well.

And the thin lid fits securely to the rest of the structure: I couldn’t push it through until it creaked. The smartphone also withstands the torsion test decently – this is a test for the build quality.

SIM cards are installed on the sides of the case. Both slots are in Micro-SIM format. The right one is combined with a slot for a MicroSD memory card.

Each SIM card has a separate 3G antenna on the top of the smartphone. Those. “dual-SIM” is real here – great!

An IR sensor is hidden at the top. Unlike the LG G Flex, to work with it, it is better to hold the smartphone as a remote control.

The entire structure is held on by ordinary Phillips-head screws, so if you wish, you can try to disassemble the device yourself.

All slots are made closed, so it is quite difficult to check the quality of soldering.

The LG G2 mini is completely devoid of side keys, which feels quite unusual in the first minutes of acquaintance. The headphone output is located at the top end and is noticeably shifted to the left. There is also a hole for the microphone of the noise reduction system and an infrared port. The charger connector is located at the bottom.

In general, the design does not have serious flaws, but the fit of parts could have been done more precisely, and you wouldn’t expect to see seams at the corners in a smartphone that is positioned as a compact version of the flagship.