LG's been on a bit of a roll with new product announcements lately. First the company introduced the G2 in early August, then it wrapped that month up with the debut of the G Pad 8.3 tablet. September has seen the Life's Good crew promoting the U.S. variants of its flagship G2, and this morning we get to add another new device to the list.
The LG Vu 3 is now official, complete with the same large, 4:3 display as its predecessors. That type of screen gives the Vu 3 a bit of a square design, though LG has tweaked the Vu 3's look a bit from previous models by giving it rounded corners. Another way in which the Vu 3 differs from its older siblings is its built-in stylus; the first Vu models came with styli but no slot on the device to store them in, even though the pen was one of the Vu's main features.
Diving into the raw specs for this new Vu, LG says that its latest square phone sports a 5.2-inch 1280x960 IPS display, which is slightly larger and higher-res than the 5-inch 1024x768 screen found on the first two Vus. Also included is a quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor that's clocked at 2.26GHz, 16GB storage, a microSD slot for additional space, 2GB RAM, LTE-A support, NFC and a 2610mAh battery that's powering the whole package. Rounding out the Vu 3's spec sheet is a 13-megapixel rear camera as well as a 2.1-megapixel front-facing shooter.
The Vu 3 will come preloaded with Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean along with a custom LG user experience similar to the one found on the G2. That means that users can expect to see features like KnockON, which turns on the device's display when its double-tapped, and a Plug and Pop setting that can allows the device to automatically open a selected app when it senses that headphones are plugged into it.
In addition to the Vu 3 itself, LG also took the wraps off of a special QuickView Case for its new square phone. The case can display information like the date and time as well as any notifications, allowing the user to quickly view his or her alerts without having to actually open the case and check the phone.
The LG Vu 3 is slated to launch in Korea on Sept. 27 in white, indigo black and mint color options. LG doesn't say when or if the Vu 3 will be released in other territories, so for now we'll just have to settle for ogling it in these official images.
LG's Vu line is known for its unique 4:3 displays and squarish designs, and while the phones may not have taken off in some parts of the globe, they're obviously proving popular enough for LG to keep cranking out new models. The Vu 3's got a pretty respectable feature set thanks to the inclusion of a Snapdragon 800 chip, high-res display and LTE-A support, and the inclusion of a built-in stylus is a welcome change from previous models. The phone's size and square shape are still likely going to turn some folks off of it, but for those that are into the design, the Vu 3's rounded corners ought to make handling the device a bit more comfortable. You can get a closer look at the Vu 3 and its 4:3 screen in the image gallery below.
