The huge worldwide success of the Chocolate phone has clearly prompted LG to continue pushing the envelope in handset design and cellular technology. Its latest candy-bar phone, the KG320, is neither the slimmest nor the smallest cellular offering in the market. But what it is is a simple yet petite mobile that's being touted as a portable multimedia device. At just S$198 with a two-year mobile contract, the affordable price tag may be the KG320's biggest selling point.

Design
The company touts this as its card bar phone, and quite possibly that's true. Most handsets would look plain chunky when placed side-by-side with this 95.5 x 45 x 9.9mm Lilliputian. The phone is a lightweight 90g, which makes it great not just for tight pockets, but also hung round the neck.

Interestingly, the KG320's display takes up a good half of the real estate. Combined with a streamlined keypad design, the overall effect is to make the LG seem more like an MP3 player than a phone.

At a glance, some users may find the KG320 rather plain-looking, given its minimalist appearance. But pick it up in hand, and immediately the impression changes as you'll find there's much to like about the clean lines, feel and solidity of the handset. In keeping with its minimalist look, there's just one button on the right that serves both the MP3 and camera function. On the left is a covered port.

The numberings on the keypad are huge and should appeal to even the most myopic, and prove responsive and comfortable to the touch. The navigation pad is intuitive and easy enough to access, with our only gripe being the center button. This is simply too flushed with the navi-pad to offer any tactile feedback when pressed.

We certainly like the 176 x 220-pixel display on the KG320 which, as we mentioned earlier, takes up almost half the phone's real estate. Images are also crisp with good color reproduction, thanks to the 262K colors supported.

Like the Samsung Ultra Edition 6.9, the KG320 comes bundled with two batteries. The package also includes a standard AC charger as well as a charging box for standalone battery charging. Audiophiles will be pleased to note that the handsfree headset comes with a 3.5mm audio jack, which means you can plug in your own earphones to enjoy music playback. Other items in the box are a leather case, USB cable, handstrap, user manual and driver CD.

Features
The KG320 comes with a decent selection of wireless connectivity options, from Bluetooth and USB to triband GSM support. So it shouldn't have any problems autoroaming overseas. There are two built-in games and a Java game CD which allows users to download yet more titles into the phone.

Pressing the button on the right side gives instant access to the multimedia features on the phone comprising the camera, video camera and MP3 player. On the opposite side, you will find the proprietary port, which can be used for music playback on the headphones, for data transfer via the USB or for charging the phone.

We like that LG has included a sliding lens cover for the KG320. Like the Sony Ericsson Cyber-shot phones, the sliding cover protects the lens from scratches and dirt, as well as acts as an activation switch for the camera function. Simply slide the lens cover down and you're ready to shoot. The onboard 1.3-megapixel camera takes both stills and videos. The flash light beside the lens does help to illuminate objects at close range, but the mirror piece is just too small for effective self-portrait shots.

The KG320's music player is compatible with most of the common audio file formats including MP3, AAC, AAC+, M4A, WMA. It also comes with onboard support for MPEG-4 video playback. What's missing, though, is an FM tuner.

To accommodate all the images, videos and music files, LG has included a generous 128MB of built-in memory on the phone. While this amount of storage may suffice for everyday users, those hoping to make better use of the multimedia functions on the phone will find the onboard RAM inadequate, with no expansion options to increase the memory.

Performance
While testing the KG320, we did not find any problems with reception. Phone call quality was clear for both parties. However, the handset battery lasted shorter than expected, requiring a recharge in less than two days of moderate usage. This could possibly be due to the small 600mAh capacity, though LG has made up for the shortcoming with the second battery.

While the sound quality from the onboard loudspeaker and headphone was good, the image quality from the 1.3-megapixel could only be rated average at best. As with most camera-phones, pictures shot in daylight turned out sharp, but the night pictures were mostly unacceptable, even with the flash light on.

Like the KG800, the earphone connector doubles as a charging and USB port. This can be restrictive for the phone as you are able to perform only one task at any one time.

The installation disc that came with the phone was easy to install, but the PC synchronization application was a little buggy. In our initial tries, we encountered several issues when we tried to transfer files between the phone and the PC, using USB as well as Bluetooth.

Overall, we found the user interface of the LG phone easy to navigate. There are shortcut keys on the directional controls to take you to different menus. Each item in the menu is allocated a number accordingly on the keypad, so you can access that function instantly without having to scroll to the relevant line. We did, however, find the user interface a little too sluggish at times, which can be rather frustrating.