LG PRADA KE850 Phone Review

Interface:

Just like its design, the phone’s interface is in the PRADA style: very simple, just in black and white without any other colors. When the phone was first promoted, some people even thought that its display was not full-color. However, this is just a theme and the phone features three more themes, rendering it a different aspect with colorful backgrounds and icons. For us, these do not look as elegant on the phone as the black and white theme. They are not so stylish, but they are more fun.

The Home Screen displays system information, a big clock showing the date and four shortcuts in the back: to Menu, Dialing Screen, Messages and Phonebook. An interesting interaction happens when you ‘get’ the clock and ‘push’ it with your finger, so that it moves. If you touch it, you activate the alarm setting, but you have to go to its menu, in order to use its options.

Two of the themes add, respectively, a butterfly and a fish to the home screen; they move on the screen in the direction that you’re pointing.

The main menu is rather interesting: in is divided into four categories, located as tabs to the right: phone, multimedia, organizer and settings. In each tab you find big, round, easy-to press icons, displaying texts about their functions. It is easy to make out the menu, which is logically arranged. The sub-menus are visualized as a list, sometimes you have to scroll to them. You can ‘get it and move it’ or to press on another position, so that it moves.

	searching

Phonebook:

The phonebook can memorize up to 1000 contacts on the phone’s memory. The contacts are visualized in a vertical list, showing 4 contacts at a time and the phone number of the selected one. We do not like the big title „Contacts” on the top of the screen, as well as the system information. If those were missing, 2 more contacts could have been visualized (50% more!). If you have more contacts on your list, you’ll have to scroll a lot. What can help you here is the searcher, which we do not like, because it can only look up a contact by the first word and not by the second (surname).

When adding contacts, you can memorize up to 4 phone numbers, email and memo, to allocate a personalized ring tone and picture and to include the contact in a group. There are 6 groups, which can be renamed and personalized with icons and a common ring tone.

Alarm clock	Calculator	World Clock
Calendar
Memos		Voice recorder

Organizer:

You’ll find the complete organizer of the PRADA phone in the third tab of the main menu. Arranged there are the different options, sporting a nice-looking interface, completely merging with the menus, irrespective of which of the four topics you’re in.

The alarm can be set to go off 0/10/20/30/60 minutes earlier than the set time, which can be on a particular date or Mon-Fri/Mon-Sat/Everyday. Its ring tone is easily changed, and so is the text that shows when it goes off. The problem is that there is just one alarm and you cannot use a few alarms to go off at different times.

The Calculator will offer you a convenient interface with fairly large letters, but you can also access scientific options, where you can calculate degrees, Cos/Sin, etc., if you have to. To convert measurement units, you can use the converter.

The World Clock uses the world map, but, unlike most other phones, it does not open it before you, but shows you a 3D model of the planet that you can turn round with your fingers, in order to select a continent and a specific location on it. This is definitely not the most convenient navigation and we miss the possibility to search by name; it is nevertheless a very beautiful feature, fully in the style of this phone.

The Calendar can be viewed for a particular month and the big figures help you to see clearly which date is marked with a note and which date is selected. You can add a Schedule for each date for a particular period of time or for the whole day, by posting a note, setting the alarm (with seven options) and the possibility for repetition (Daily/Weekday/ Weekend/ Weekly/Monthly/Annually).

You can use Memos for notes that you do not want to attach to a particular date.

You also have a voice recorder, which records from the phone’s mike without limitation I the duration of the recording.