Review of the LG EnV Touch

The LG EnV Touch is fairly new in the Verizon Wireless phone lineup. First released in early summer 2009, the phone has held its own. For Verizon customers wanting easy access to e-mail, Word, and other business and home computer type programs, the smart phones including Blackberry and various other makes, are very pricey. It costs at least thirty dollars a month just to have the smart phone activated...and that does not include an unlimited data package for e-mail and internet use on the phone. Therefore, it is worthwhile to investigate Verizon's high tech basic phone options.

Out of Verizon's regular cell phones, the LG EnV Touch takes the cake. It has not only a fully-functioning touch screen, but also a convenient clamshell design with full QWERTY keyboard. The attached QWERTY keyboard does make the phone a bit heavier than other touch screen models, but it is great for texters. The keys are nicely spaced apart and the design is very user-friendly. The EnV Touch has several stand-out features. In addition to full-spectrum Bluetooth capabilities, it has a document viewer which is great for business people and students. Though Word and PowerPoint documents cannot be edited from the document viewer, they are still downloadable from a computer to the phone. Extra memory from a card may be needed for adding on multiple large documents. Students can use the document viewer to look over class PowerPoints, while businesspeople can use the viewer to practice presentations and view quarterly reports. The document viewer supports at least the file types .doc, .xls, .ptt, and .pdf . LG's EnV Touch is currently the only basic phone offered at Verizon with a document viewer-making it the closest thing to a smart phone without paying the much higher price. Also, with a smaller unlimited data price ($9.99 a month) than a smart phone ($44.99 a month), users can surf the web, access e-mail, and listen to music. The touch screen is easy to use with zoom in and out features as well as a scroll panel to allow for full viewing of web pages. Shortcuts to Facebook, Myspace, and other favorite websites can be placed on the phone's main screen.

Adding to EnV Touch's features are a drawing pad, notepad, and notebook. A notepad icon can be added to the main touch screen. It displays notes and memos at a glance. The larger notebook, found in the tools section of the phone menu can hold much larger notes. Continuing, the 3.2 mega pixel camera is not bad. It has enhanced photo features to perfect images. Also, the touch screen camera mode allows the user to take a photo from multiple angles.

Music listening is a breeze on the EnV Touch. The side of the phone's headphone jack fits all standard headphones. Many cell phone models need some sort of adapter for music because the headphone jacks are too small for standard headphones. Using a memory card, the phone can hold all kinds of music files. Video viewing and making is also accessible through the phone's multimedia section.

Overall the LG EnV Touch should be rated a 4.8 out of 5 stars. As with all touch screen phones with only a touch-lock screen feature, dialing contacts can happen accidentally.