The Optimus is LG’s second Android phone, after the GW620 InTouch Max, and will go some way towards cementing the manufacturer’s reputation as the go-to provider of budget Android handsets.

Style and handling on the LG Optimus GT540

There’s no slide-out QWERTY keyboard here as there was on the InTouch Max. The LG Optimus is primarily controlled using the three-inch screen, except for the call, home and call end buttons and side buttons.

The LG Optimus most resembles LG’s Viewty Smart, with rounded edges that look pretty and feel good in the hand. It’s slender and light too.

Between the hard keys and screen sit two touch-sensitive virtual keys: menu and back. Unfortunately they don’t work too well here: we had to adjust our thumb position and press several times to make sure our commands were recognised.

The touch-screen itself, though, is pretty good, despite being resistive instead of the superior capacitive model found on more expensive handsets. It’s responsive, though, with fluid finger navigation. In fact, if we’re going to nitpick, it’s almost too responsive – once or twice we found ourselves hitting hyperlinks when we only wanted to scroll through a page.

Accelerometers auto-correct the screen at super-quick speed when you move from portrait to landscape mode and vice versa.  Landscape mode gives you an on-screen QWERTY keyboard, while portrait presents a vertical T9 keyboard, which was too fiddly for us to write text messages with.

Customisation on the LG Optimus GT540

The LG Optimus is unquestionably an Android phone, but LG has added plenty of its own features too; you can even revert from the standard Android format to LG’s to take advantage. The LG home screens are very different. At the bottom of each are virtual keys for calling and messaging, and you access the main menu by pulling up a tab, also at the foot of the screen.

The best bit is that you can divide your menu into subsections of your choosing; for example, you can save all your favourite options to a folder and name it favourites, or put all the media functions into one grouping. It can be fiddly to set up – you have to press the menu key every time you wish to add or remove an icon instead of the more simple drag and drop option – but works well once you get there.

The other advantage of the LG screens is that you can choose up to seven screens – Android only has three – and dedicate all seven to different functions, if you wish. To switch between LG and Android, just hold down the home key. Add widgets and shortcuts in a similar way, but by holding your finger down on the home screen.

Social networking on the LG Optimus GT540

The Social Networking Client allows you to sync the phone with Twitter, Facebook and Bebo. You can opt to display your own status updates and tweets, see those of your contacts, or display private messages. Click on any of these and you will be taken to the relevant site. Be aware, though, that you can’t have multiple feeds on top of each other, so if you want run more than one feed, make sure you have the space.

Internet on the LG Optimus GT540

Web browsing is lightning fast over both HSDPA and Wi-Fi, even with lots of browsing windows open simultaneously. You will be prompted to allow Google to use your current location, which means that searches will be location-specific, such as restaurants or train timetables.

The resistive screen means there’s no multi-touch function for zooming, and you can’t double-tap either; but moving your fingers sideways reveals the zoom key, and a virtual key in the left-hand corner helps you navigate around the page. Press it to magnify a section of the page that you can move around until you find the bit you want to look at. It’s not bad, but every time we lifted our finger off the screen, it zoomed in whether we wanted to or not. An extra tap for zooming in would have prevented this.

No onboard Flash player means that, despite the big screen and Wi-Fi connectivity, you won’t be able to use BBC iPlayer or other embedded videos that need flash support. But You-Tube is smooth and quick, with no annoying buffering.

Camera on the LG Optimus GT540

The three-megapixel camera has good points and bad. On the one hand, there is a host of useful features including smile detection, panorama mode, multiple face detection, which helps maintain sharpness, and beauty mode, which gets rid of those annoying spots and blemishes. Uploading photos to social networking sites and YouTube is easy as pie too.

The downsides are that it takes an age for the camera to launch, eradicating the possibility of spontaneous snaps, and there is no flash. A stingy 130MB of storage space means that you will have to invest in a microSD card to store more than a handful of photos. Once you have the card, though, you can view your photos in a 3D gallery that looks great and makes locating particular pictures far easier. You can also tag your photos so you can find your friends in your albums quickly.

One rather good feature of the Optimus is the search key, which is on the right-hand side of the handset and represented with a little magnifying glass icon. Press this then type in anything – from an internet search term to a feature on the phone – and it will bring up a list. For example, we typed in CAM and were presented with access to the camera, followed by a Google search on Cameron Diaz. It’s a nifty little feature that could end up saving you time.

The verdict on the LG Optimus GT540

The LG Optimus has good intentions but several flaws that mar the experience. The resistive touch-screen isn’t as satisfactory as a capacitive screen, and having to buy our own memory card really annoyed us. But as a budget phone, the Optimus is great. The curvaceous body, big screen and social networking capability exceed expectations at this price point, and you have access to Android market and other Google goodies. Overall, the Optimus proves that you can do Android on a budget.