LG GD910Now for some information regarding the new LG GD910 watch phone. Cue the inevitable Dick Tracy references. It seems that any article or blog post regarding the new LG watch phone, and its Samsung rival the S9110, has to make at least one mention on the 1950’s comic book hero. Why? Perhaps this is the easiest reference to watch phones and a good way to get an article moving, but anyway I am pretty sure there are plenty of other cultural references that can be pillaged instead.

But this post is not about Dick Tracy, it is about the new LG GD910 watch phone. This is not the first watch phone to be released; in fact they have been around for a number of years. This may come as news to you, you may have never come across a watch phone before – but this is no great loss. If you have never seen a watch phone before it is for a reason; they were always shoddy and disappointingly crude, a far cry from the Dick Tracy fantasy that many a young comic-reader often hoped for.

The LG GD910 is noteworthy for this very fact; it is the first watch phone that is actually feasible and worthwhile owning. With the recent developments in touch screen phones, high speed data transfer and video calling the watch phone is more and more aligning itself with the mental image people have of such a device. Being able to communicate face to face with someone through a gadget strapped to your wrist is something that was once merely consigned to laughable sci-fi films in the bargain bin at BlockBuster, or an unconvincing piece on yesterdays Tomorrows World.

Touch screen technology is also another advancement that makes the whole having-a-phone-on-your-watch idea a lot more appealing, as now the whole face of the watch can be dedicated to the display, rather than having to compete for space with physical buttons. The technology used here is the more favourable capacitive (made famous on phones like the iPhone) that provides greater sensitivity while not requiring you to apply excessive pressure onto the screen.

Having a watch that can make video calls (as well as ordinary calls of course), send and receive text messages, play music and take photographs is something most people will rightfully get excited about – Dick Tracy fan or not. Sure there are limitations – things the GD910 can’t do that an ordinary candybar phone can; but even then there are many features to be found on the GD910 that are not even found on many standard non-watch phones.