LG's Chocolate a dud in the reviews anyway

Last week, I wrote about how Chocolate (LG's Chocolate smart phone in this case) never tasted so C.R.A.P.-py.  Now, the early reviews are in and the folks at CNET Reviews have rightfully given it a lukewarm reception.  For me those, some of the problems they cite are dealbreakers anyway (not to mention the DRM issues I mentioned in my post).  Here's what CNET's Kent German had to say:

It's not uncommon for the introduction of a new cell phone to be preceded by a ton of hype. Take for instance, the LG VX85000. Otherwise known as the Chocolate, the VX8500 became the talk of the mobile world after its stateside debut last April at the annual CTIA show. Rumors flew back and forth regarding when we'd see it with a U.S. carrier, and finally this week, after being available in Europe and Asia for several months, the Chocolate has landed at Verizon Wireless. After so much speculation, we were eager to find out just what type of chocolate the Chocolate really is. Is it Hershey's or Godiva? The answer seems to lie somewhere in between. By all means, it's beautiful and offers decent call quality, but the keys and controls take some getting used to. And though it has stereo Bluetooth, a megapixel camera, a digital music player, and support for Verizon's 3G video and music services, it doesn't do much that other cell phones don't do already. And more to the point, it lacks a speakerphone, something even the most basic cell phones offer.....

Later in the review, German gives the details on the Chocolate's unintuitive user interface and notes that in his tests, the phone came in at a full one hour less than the phone's officially rated talk time of 3.5 hours.  The Chocolate support Bluetooth and has a SAR rating of 1.13. See my recent post about mitigating the risks of cell phone cancer for my coverage of SAR ratings and links to other important posts on the issue.