LG = Life’s (not so) Good

LG is a company that I want to like; they are not as big as Samsung or Sony, and their products have been fairly inovative.  However, I funally ralized their products are unreliable and their customer support is less helful than Comcast support (my former worst support). 

I am on my thrid- and last- LG cell phone.

The LG G3 moved the volume buttons to the back of the phone- and that was amusing for a while.  The phone itself was slow and chewed through batteries.  I used this phone for ~6 months and ‘upgraded’ to the LG V10.

The LG V10 had a second screen for noticicaitons and an enahcned DAC for better sound.  It was also ‘ruggitized’ for duriability.  It had the rear volume controls around the power button and a fingerprint sensor in the button.  The first issue I had with this device is the fingerprint sensor would not work if the phone is in a case…

The GPS was unreliabe; several times I could not get a GPS lock while driving down the interstate in GA.  A reboot usually temporarily fixed this- but this also lead into its second issue: the battery would drain much faster than anything could charge.  On several occasions, I would try to use Google Maps for directions and the phone would steadly creep down the battery percentage while connected to a QC 2.0 charger.  I happily returned this phone when my ‘lease’ ended with T-Mobile.

More recently I purchased the LG G5.  I loved the phone for the size, the performance and the USB C charging connector.  I picked up the LG G5 Camera addon and the LG 360 camera (more info my prior posts) accessory.  It seemed to be the perfect phone- until the volume control became intermittiant.  I am unsure if it is a hardware or software issue, but it usually stops working after I connect to a bluetooth audi device (headphones, car, etc).  A few reboots sometime fixes this, but is yet another LG pain-in-th-ass.

I have LG several chances to make me like them and have received poorly designed (and seemingly untested) devices complimented with poor support and broken support websites; my next phone will be a Google Pixil or a Samsung.