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Battery life
The LG Optimus Black's 100mAh battery life is fair to average. We definitely had to charge it every day, which isn't ideal, although that was after heavy usage, including a few hours of Wi-Fi. It seems on a par with its more powerful brethren, the LG Optimus 2X and daily charging has become standard for most smartphones, including the Samsung Galaxy S2.
The battery is drained significantly by running games, even for 10-15 minutes. If the NOVA screen is saving battery consumption, we'd hate to see it without that technology.
On the upside, it charges quickly and if you're less of an internet browser and networks addict then perhaps you'll squeeze a little longer out of the battery.
Connectivity
The LG Optimus Black is fairly full of connectivity options, including micro USB (but no HDMI port), HSDPA (to 7.2 Mbps), Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n and standard Bluetooth 2.1. The 3G is enough to keep you browsing at a decent rate if you're in a good spot for signal. The Wi-Fi is also strong and will speed up the browser upload rate no end.
The LG Optimus Black is also loaded with Wi-Fi Direct technology (just like the Samsung Galaxy S2), which in theory allows you to transfer files up to 20 times faster than Bluetooth if you can find other Wi-Fi Direct capable devices. The handset can also be used as a Wi-Fi Hotspot.
Connecting the phone to a PC seems easy enough – just plug in the USB and be eased through the setup menus. It became a little tedious when we were guided through umpteen installation screens, but eventually we were set up and ready to go with a simple drag and drop.
Connecting the LG Optimus Black to a Mac was a little more difficult, as the Android File Transfer app only works for those devices running Android 3.0, whereas the Optimus Black runs 2.2. Once installed, however, it's a simple drag-and-drop game and is easy to transfer files.
One glitch we did come across, however, was with the microSD card. After adding a movie no problem, testing it and deciding to switch it for another one, we deleted the first film file from the SD card, only to be met with a series of 'Memory card full' error screens.
To remedy this, we had to remove all images and files from the card that we wanted to save to and then reformat it, after which it worked fine. This isn't ideal, especially if it were to happen every time you swapped the files around on your handset.
