Since the second half of 2012, many flagship phones have used the Qualcomm APQ8064 platform. Its advanced quad core Krait architecture CPU and the new Adreno 320 graphics processor provide strong performance support for these phones. On CES2013, Qualcomm released a new Snapdragon 600 Platform to replace APQ8064 Location of. As the first Snapdragon 600 mobile phone, Optimus G Pro is also expected. We will discuss its actual performance through this evaluation.

LG Optimus G Pro Parameters

Model: LG F240L (Korean version)

CPU: Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 APQ8064T quad core 1.7GHz

Operating system: Android 4.1.2

Screen: 5.5 inch 1920 * 1080 resolution IPS screen

SIM card type: microSIM

Storage space: 32GB (supporting TF card expansion)

RAM：2GB

Connection: Bluetooth ®, Wi Fi ® IEEE 802.11 a/b/g/n, Micro USB, 3.5mm audio interface

Camera: 13 million pixel backlit F/2.4 aperture, 2.1 million front.

Battery: 3140mAh detachable

Others: NFC

Size: 150.2x76.1x9.4mm

Weight: 172g

From the parameter point of view, LG Optimus G Pro undoubtedly represents the highest level of mobile phones today. Of course, the highlight of the whole machine is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 processor, which is code named APQ8064T. From the model point of view, it is also known that it is a "twin brother" with our common APQ8064, and Adreno 320 in terms of GPU. While the CPU core is upgraded from Krait 200 of APQ8064 to Krait 300, Qualcomm claims that the performance can be improved by up to 40%. Of course, these are nominal values, and the actual level depends on the actual use experience. In addition, the screen of Optimus G Pro is also a highlight. It uses a screen of the same size as the Samsung Galaxy Note II, but with a resolution of 1920 * 1080. In addition, it uses LG's own True HD IPS+, which is absolutely the top level of today's screen in terms of display effect.

Appearance design

From the front, Optimus G Pro and Galaxy Note II are the same. They both have a 5.5 inch large screen, with an entity Home key at the bottom and two touch keys beside them. Optimus G Pro is more brilliant in design, and uses the ultra narrow border design ▼

The earpiece is also similar to LG's flagship Optimus 2X. Next to the earpiece are distance sensing, light sensing and front camera ▼

The Home key is very narrow compared with the Galaxy Note II, and the touch keys on both sides are also opposite to Samsung's design. Return to the left, and the menu is on the right ▼

The Home key also has a "hidden function", which is the signal light. The effect is gorgeous and it is colorful ▼

From the back, the design of Optimus G Pro is very similar to that of Samsung Galaxy S III Nexus 4 Similar grid flicker pattern, which is also a common design of LG flagship in recent years ▼

The back horn and flash light are listed on both sides of the camera ▼

There are noise reducing microphones, infrared and 3.5mm interfaces ▼ on the top

At the bottom is the microUSB interface and the main microphone ▼

On the left side of the fuselage is a shortcut key (customizable function) and volume key ▼

The right side is the key opening and a cover opening groove ▼

After opening the back cover, it can be seen that the silver design is used inside, the battery area is large, the capacity reaches 3140mAh, and there is NFC coil ▼ on the back cover

Support tf card expansion, with micro SIM card ▼ beside it

Display effect

One of the selling points of Optimus G Pro is the 5.5 inch full HD IPS display screen, which is also the LG original screen with good reputation. The following is the performance of this screen, with gorgeous colors ▼

Screen of running full HD game ▼

Unfortunately, the screen of Optimus G Pro is not the full fit that is popular now, and the black frame around the screen is relatively wide, which is not very good with the white body ▼

Although it is 5.5 inch, the resolution is up to 1080P, so the PPI has reached 400, completely surpassing the "retina" level, and the fineness is very high ▼

The visual angle of the IPS screen is still very good, but there is still some color deviation on the "death diagonal" ▼

This performance of "blue on the left and yellow on the right" is also called by many netizens as an important feature of identifying LG mobile phone screen.

System UI

Since LG has made a lot of efforts on its own UI, which is very impressive, this evaluation will describe the UI of Optimus G Pro in detail. LG's UI feels very similar to Samsung's TouchWiz interface, but there are still many differences in the handling of some details.

The first is the system launcher. The style is also very similar to TouchWizh. Even the icon of the application's secondary menu is placed on the lower right side of the desktop. However, compared with Samsung, LG's secondary menu icon supports custom location, not only in the lower right corner ▼

The special effects of the system launcher are also very rich, supporting customization, and the animation transition effect is very gorgeous. It also supports the switching of the system theme, but the number is not many ▼

Add a plug-in launcher plug-in. There are not many featured plug-ins ▼

At first glance, desktop icons don't seem to have many features. In fact, LG has spent a lot of effort on icons. Some of the system's own applications support icon resizing and icon replacement. It still seems very humanized ▼ to give users enough customization options

Since the Optimus G Pro in my hand is a customized version of the Korean operator, a large number of customized software can be found in many places of the system, and many of them can be deleted ▼ only after root

Some system software can be uninstalled immediately through the application manager ▼

The secondary menu is relatively conventional, not very different from other mobile phones ▼

The drop-down bar has many functions, and also has a strong Samsung style. Shortcuts can be edited. In addition, brightness adjustment and QSlide apps are special functions ▼

QSlide apps are shortcuts to some programs set in the drop-down list, but it does not support adding custom applications. Only a few system software can support this mode ▼

What's more, the programs in QSlide apps can support multiple windows (at most two floating windows), and the position of the window can be moved freely, and the size of the window can also be defined by itself. The following is the floating window demonstration ▼ of calculator and browser

The unlocking interface of Optimus G Pro is very diverse, and a variety of unlocking animation effects can be set, as shown in the figure. This is often seen in some third-party locking software, and LG's animation transition is very natural. There are also many options for screen lock clock, including digital clock, analog clock, calendar, weather and other different screen lock contents ▼

The setting interface is more conventional, more just the change of color matching, of course, it also adds some special functions, and the system is based on Android 4.1.2 ▼

Long press the Home key to display the multi task switch and task manager, and the available RAM is about 1G ▼

Network settings, supporting global roaming settings. Optimus G Pro has NFC coil on the back cover, which supports the function of NFC, which is also one of the necessary functions of the current flagship model ▼

There are many changes in display settings. In addition to supporting Samsung's "smart screen" (that is, the screen remains open when the eyes are looking at the screen), you can also set the touch light and the Home key LED. The backlight of the Home key can support setting, but unfortunately you cannot customize the color of the backlight ▼

Gesture and one hand operation, these two functions are suspected of imitating Samsung ▼

One hand operation supports dialing keyboard and LG full keyboard ▼

There is a QButton button on the side of the fuselage. You can customize the function of this button and quickly start any application ▼

Other functions

Optimus G Pro has a strong video processing function, supporting the splicing of video, pictures and audio ▼

It also supports video splicing, sound effect adjustment and other functions, which is very suitable for users with special requirements for video ▼

You can also use Optimus G Pro to remotely control TV, air conditioner, etc. through the infrared on the top of the fuselage. The figure below shows the remote control TV ▼

performance

Performance is undoubtedly the focus of this evaluation. As the first mobile phone with Snapdragon 600 processor, we are also full of expectations for the actual performance of this SoC. Previously, many games under APQ8064 and 1080P screens have experienced different degrees of "stuck". Will Snapdragon 600 be significantly improved? The Snapdragon 600 processor model is APQ8064T. It uses a Krait 300 core 1.7GHz quad core processor and is matched with Adreno 320. The overall performance is at the top level of the current SoC. We will also conduct a more comprehensive test of the performance of the Snapdragon 600.

Theoretical performance

Anthare evaluation (3.1.2), although this is a very "entertainment" software, we can see some problems from it.

In the initial test, the score was not very good, "only" about 20000, which is similar to many APQ8064 processor phones, and even lower in graphics test scores ▼

GLBenchmark 2.5， This is an old brand graphics processing test software. The results of Optimus G Pro are not very different from those of APQ8064 mobile phones（ The most reference value of Egypt HD is 29 frames, and the APQ8064 mobile phone is also about 30 frames ）It seems that Adreno 320 of Snapdragon 600 is not much better than APQ8064 ▼

Anthare 3D test, which is a special test separated from Anthare evaluation, has a more accurate evaluation of mobile phone GPU performance. Optimus G Pro plays well, Achieved an average score of 22.6 frames For Adreno 320+1080P, this is a very good result ▼

Web page performance test

According to the author's test, even if we use Chrome Beta and Baidu browser, which are "dedicated to running scores", the scores are often inferior to the browser provided by Optimus G Pro. This is obviously a browser optimization problem, so we use the browser provided by Optimus G Pro in the test.

Sunspider， This is a common web page Javascript performance test to test the CPU's single thread capability. Optimus G Pro performs very well, The total score is 894.1ms (reference machine Xperia Z: 1296ms, the lower the value, the better) This is also the Qualcomm processor with the best performance tested by the author, which is completely comparable to Exynos 4412 ▼, which is famous for its general CPU performance

Google V8 javascript Test, Optimus G Pro played well in this test, The score is 2174 (reference machine Xperia Z: 1788) ▼

Vellamo， This is a software launched by Qualcomm to test the HTML performance of mobile phones. Optimus G Pro still performs well in this test, HTML5 score is 2481 (reference machine Xperia Z: 2210) ▼

Game Test

The conventional score test is a bit too theoretical. Many users who buy high-performance mobile phones will try large games. Therefore, game tests are also added here to detect the frame number with the frame number detection software fps meter.

Top Speed Car 17

EA's classic racing game has the highest picture quality and high load in mobile games, Optimus G Pro only has 18 frames (reference machine Xperia Z: 21 frames), which is not smooth , even worse than some mobile phones that use APQ8064+1080P ▼

Real Racing 3

The newly launched high quality racing game of EA company has very high requirements for GPU, Optimus G Pro only has an average of 16 frames (reference machine Xperia Z: 20 frames), and its operation is not smooth ▼

Wild drag racing 7 (1.0.5)

The reason why the 1.0.5 version is emphasized is that this latest version has re evaluated the image quality of the Qualcomm GPU. In the past, the Qualcomm GPU was in low special effects, but this time it finally turned over. Adreno 320 has excellent image quality in this version of Wild Racing 7. Optimus G Pro averages about 20 frames in this game (reference machine Xperia Z: 27 frames), which is extremely unsmooth ▼

wild blood

Wild Blood is a great action game in 2012. However, due to the poor optimization of Android devices, no device can run smoothly so far, Optimus G Pro also only has an average of 22 frames (reference machine Xperia Z: 24 frames) ▼

Blade Slinger

This is a newly launched action game, which is praised as the best picture quality of mobile games. From the picture, it is really the best mobile game. Optimus G Pro has finally ushered in a large game that can run smoothly, Frame number 30 frames (reference machine Xperia Z: 30 frames ）▼

Modern Warfare 4

Since this game has not been updated as the Wild Racing 7, the support for Adreno 320 is still insufficient, and the overall image quality is at a relatively low level. Although the image quality is not high, Optimus G Pro is still stuck, The average number of frames is only 22 (reference machine Xperia Z: 32 frames) ▼

Epic Citadel， This is a display game with its own frame test. Optimus G Pro has also managed to save face, The number of frames is 55.9, which is already the top level of 1080P equipment ▼

Some netizens may question the accuracy of the frame count software. It is true that opening the frame detection software will reduce the game performance to a certain extent, but is it possible for a mobile phone with less than 20 frames in the test to run smoothly in practice? We use the simplest and most direct method to verify this problem. In the test, the average number of frames of Jipin Feiche 17 is about 18. When the frame detection software is turned off, the mobile phone starts the game directly from the cooling state, and at the same time, another mobile phone is used for timing. As can be seen from the figure below, even if the external interference is eliminated and the Optimus G Pro runs completely normally, it will take 1 minute and 45 seconds to complete the actual 1 minute and 21 second game ▼

Frequency reduction problem

As for the frequency reduction problem, there have been many mobile phones in the previous generation product APQ8064. There are frequency reduction problems in Nexus 4, Optimus G, Z5 and other products. The specific performance is that the CPU frequency will decline to varying degrees after a period of use, even in normal temperature daily use. Let's test the frequency reduction problem.

First, we entered Anthare (3.2.1), continuing LG's "good tradition". At the moment of entering Anthare, the CPU frequency was automatically locked to the highest frequency, even if we did not turn on Run Score, it would still be locked to the high frequency. This problem has been discussed by the author before. This is a common method of "running score optimization", not cheating. As shown in the figure, the CPU share is very low, but the highest frequency of all four cores is ▼

Then start the rabbit test, When the test reaches 41%, the CPU frequency drops to 1.1GHz From this phenomenon, it is not difficult to explain why it is better than Snapdragon 600, but its score is only over 20000 ▼

Then we conducted a freezing test. The environment was a refrigerator, and the score increased significantly, exceeding 25000 points, reaching the highest level of the current score ▼

Add a score run of the latest version 3.2.1. It is still a score run in the frozen environment. The score is lower than that of the old version. This may be a problem with the software algorithm and test error ▼

Next is the refrigerator test. The test software is GLBenchmark 2.5.1, and the project is Egypt HD. The test result is higher than that under normal temperature, There is 2fps lifting, reaching 31fps ▼

Some netizens may question that running score software as a test does not explain the problem. The author also uses practical applications to confirm this problem. BSPlayer 1.8 is used to test the soft solution video. The video format is 1080P 60fps ref=16 MP4 video. At the beginning of playing the video, it is still running "full blood", The average number of frames reaches about 30 , even comparable to Orion 4412 ▼

But when it was played for more than one minute, the annoying frequency reduction phenomenon appeared, which was directly reduced to 1.1G, The number of frames also drops to about 20 frames in a straight line ▼

Use CPU SPY to detect the frequency change of CPU. Only when a small video is played, The CPU frequency is often reduced to 1.1GHz, or even 918MHz. It can be seen that the frequency reduction problem of Optimus G Pro is very serious ▼

Additional Tests

In LG's previous devices using Qualcomm SoC, there will be a "resolution reduction" setting. In the system, it is described as "correction of aspect ratio". In fact, it is a forced reduction of resolution (down to 800 * 480) for the specified application. The original intention is to avoid the compatibility problem caused by 16:9 screen. We can also open this setting to see whether the original unsmooth game can increase the frame count ▼

Real Racing 3

By forcibly reducing the resolution, the number of frames has been greatly increased, and the game can be basically run smoothly, Number of frames 29 (16 frames under 1080P) Of course, if you start the game like this, there will be black edges on the left and right sides of the screen, and the quality of the game will also decline ▼

Top Speed Car 17

After the resolution is reduced, the number of 17 frames of the best speed car is greatly increased, Over 40 frames (18 frames under 1080P) ▼

Appendix: Comparison chart of game frames (30 frames are the basic smooth line)

Demo video

Video decoding

For a 1080P mobile phone, it is undoubtedly suitable to play full HD video. What about the ability of Optimus G Pro in video decoding? Since Optimus G Pro uses a full HD screen, all videos tested here are 1080P videos, and BSPlay 1.8 is used as the player. The following is the playback situation

Clannad OP，MP4，1920x1080，H.264 High Profile L5.1

Video frames: 24 Actual playing frames: 23.84 (hardware decoding) ▼

Female warrior god in the battlefield 3 OP, MKV，1920x1080，H.264 High Profile L4.0

Video frames: 30 Actual playing frames: 29.51 (hardware decoding) ▼

Microsoft WMVHD official video, WMV ，1440x1080，VC-1， MP@HL

Number of video frames: 23 Actual number of playing frames: 23 (software decoding, hard decoding with player) ▼

Fate/Stay Night OP，FLV，1920x1080，H.264 High Profile L4.0

This video is a bit too difficult for mobile phones. The purpose of testing it is to see whether Optimus G Pro will also experience frequency reduction during the video soft solution. From the actual situation, Even if the video is soft decoded, Optimus G Pro still uses a single core for decoding, and sometimes even fails to reach the maximum frequency ▼

From the test, it can be seen that the video hardware decoding capability of Optimus G Pro is quite powerful. It can hard decode 1080P MP4, MKV and WMV files. With a 5.5 inch full HD screen, the video experience is very good.

In addition, Optimus G Pro has a built-in 32G Rom, and the usable capacity is about 23G, It also supports single files above 4G, and the external TF card also supports exFat ▼

photograph

Optimus G Pro uses a 13 million pixel back lit camera with an aperture of F2.4. LG's mobile phones have always been poor at taking photos. This time Optimus G Pro continues the 13 million pixel camera on Optimus G. What will be its actual performance? Let's take a look at the photographic performance of Optimus G Pro.

The photo interface is very clean, and various options are not difficult to understand, but they are still similar to Samsung's style. The following is a comparison of some settings, which shows that the layout is generally similar, but LG's options are more graphical (LG at the top, Samsung at the bottom) ▼

Comparison of shortcuts (LG above, Samsung below) ▼

Although the style of the photo menu is similar to that of Samsung, the photo taking of Optimus G Pro has its own characteristics. In addition to supporting the volume key shutter, the biggest highlight is that it supports the "manual focus" function, which is relatively rare in the built-in camera. However, for ordinary users, it is believed that the "fool like" mobile phone photography is preferred ▼

From the perspective of picture quality, Optimus G Pro feels similar to LG's previous style, with average sharpness and serious smear marks. Here are some photo samples (click to view the original image) ▼

The white balance of night photography is not correct, and there are many noise points (click to view the original image) ▼

In general, compared with LG's previous 8 megapixel mobile phones, Optimus G Pro has improved to a certain extent. However, compared with competitors' products of the same level, Optimus G Pro still has a big gap. I hope LG will do better in photo optimization in the future.

temperature

Many APQ8064 mobile phones have average temperature performance and high heat. This time, the APQ8064T has higher frequency. Qualcomm claims that the power consumption will be better due to the improvement of the processor core. We also verify this statement through actual tests.

After the 20 minute game test, the maximum body temperature of Optimus G Pro is about 34 degrees (non handheld, mobile phone empty) The temperature is not high. Of course, we should pay attention to the serious frequency reduction problem, so the low temperature is also expected ▼

Endurance

Optimus G Pro uses a detachable 3140mAh battery to support the huge power consumption of 5.5 inch screen and high-frequency quad core processor. From a practical point of view, the Optimus G Pro has a good endurance performance thanks to its large battery capacity. After 20 minutes of large-scale 3D games and 30 minutes of wifi Internet access, 82% of the power is left. The built-in power management and power consumption trend prediction of Optimus G Pro follow this rule, Normal medium strength continuous use time can be close to 5 hours ▼

In addition, the endurance test of GLBenchmark 2.5 (100% brightness, 60FPS high intensity test) is added. It can be seen from the chart that the CPU with more severe frequency reduction will perform better in endurance than the CPU without frequency reduction. In addition, the large capacity battery of Optimus G Pro, so the endurance ability is stronger ▼ in this test

signal

Since this is the Korean version of F240L, it is a pity that mobile EDGE is not supported. Therefore, if users use this mobile card, the network speed will be worse. Unicom users can use 3G network normally. In terms of signal strength, Optimus G Pro performs satisfactorily, The signal strength at the same position is 5~6dBm, 2~3asu stronger than that of Galaxy Note II ▼

summary

Optimus G Pro is a surprising and disappointing mobile phone, which shows LG's sincerity in terms of appearance, UI design and configuration. Compared with the products in the Optimus 4X HD era, the workmanship has made great progress. Although the UI design has Samsung's shadow everywhere, it has its own characteristics in many details. In terms of hardware configuration, the first Snapdragon 600 processor really looks gimmicky, and the 5.5 inch 1080P screen performance is amazing. However, in terms of actual use, Optimus G Pro is really sorry for its configuration and price. The most serious problem is the frequency reduction of the CPU. Even the soft video at room temperature will have exaggerated frequency reduction, which is a bit unreasonable. In actual tests, it also performs poorly in some large games, which is related to its own CPU frequency reduction and GPU performance. Unfortunately, Optimus G Pro often needs to be in an ultra-low temperature environment to give full play to the performance of Snapdragon 600. In terms of photography, Optimus G Pro continues the style of LG, and the standard is really unsatisfactory. As LG's first 1080P mobile phone, Optimus G Pro originally appeared as the "Galaxy Note II Killer", but in fact, in addition to some features of screen performance and UI, Optimus G Pro is generally inferior to Galaxy Note II. Judging from the progress of LG's own products, Optimus G Pro is still a rare and sincere work. I hope it can gradually improve the frequency reduction and photography algorithm problems through future firmware upgrades, and give play to the real strength of Snapdragon's 6 million and 13 million cameras.

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