Nitro HD vs iPhone 4S: Will LG True HD Display be Enough to Overpower Apple’s Thunder?

AT&T has said that Nitro HD smartphone from LG will be made available through its stores and online from Dec. 4 for $249.99 with a two-year contract. LG Nitro HD is expected to feel immense pressure from Apple iPhone 4S.

LG recently announced that LG Nitro HD (also known as LG P930) would be released by December. LG Nitro HD, featuring a 4.5-inch True HD AH-IPS display, is the first smartphone in the AT&T portfolio with a true high definition screen. It becomes the third 4G LTE smartphone for AT&T customers.

Taking advantage of LG's new proprietary True HD technology, Nitro HD's 4.5-inch AH-IPS (Advanced High-Performance In-Plane Switching) display supports resolutions up to 1280 x 720 pixels and offers unrivaled color accuracy, brightness, battery efficiency and performance.

LG said Nitro HD's 500 nit display luminance allows for clear viewing in direct sunlight and RGB stripe pixels deliver incredibly accurate true-to-life color rendering.

LG Nitro HD, which runs on Google Inc.'s Android 2.3 Gingerbread OS that could be upgradable to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, is adorned with dual-core 1.5 GHz Scorpion processor, 4.5-inch True HD AH-IPS display, 1 GB of RAM, 4 GB of internal memory plus 16 GB microSD card included, 8-megapixel rear-facing LED flash camera with 1080p video capture and a secondary front-facing camera for video calls.

On the other hand, Apple received overwhelming positive responses for iPhone 4S, which was unveiled Oct. 4. The smartphone missed some prominent specs like edge-to-edge design, a larger display, 4G LTE and Near Field Communication (NFC) technology. However, iPhone 4S featured some important upgrades that were rumored to be a part of the imaginary iPhone 5, like the 1GHz dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor, PowerVR SGX543MP2 GPU, an Apple A5 chipset and an 8-megapixel camera. It also has a 3.5-inch TFT Retina multi-touch display and is loaded with the latest Apple operating system iOS 5.

The Apple smartphone also comes with alternating antennae for better call reception, CDMA and GSM support, a personal assistant called Siri, iCloud and Bluetooth 4.0 wireless technology. The phone has a Li-Po 1,420 mAh battery, with 8 hours of talk time on 3G networks and up to 14 hours on 2G networks (GSM).

Let's look at the specifications of Apple iPhone 4S and LG Nitro HD.

Display: Nitro HD touts a 4.5-inch True HD AH-IPS (Advanced High-Performance In-Plane Switching) capacitive touchscreen with 1280 x 720 pixels resolution at about 326 ppi pixel density. iPhone 4S, when compared, has the same 3.5-inch TFT Retina multi-touch display that may give a resolution of 960 x 640 pixels at 326 ppi density.

Size: Nitro HD comes with 5.27 x 2.67 x 0.41 inches dimension and weighs 4.5 ounces, while iPhone 4S comes with 4.5 x 2.31 x 0.37 inches and weighs 4.9 ounces.

Processor: iPhone 4S, which comes in an A5 chipset, is powered by 1GHz dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 CPU, PowerVR SGX543MP2 GPU. On the other hand, Nitro HD features 1.5 GHz dual-core Scorpion processor with 1GB RAM.

Operating System: Apple's iPhone 4S runs on the newest iOS 5 that comes with 200 new features that will include an improved Notifications System, Newsstand and iMessage. On the other hand, Nitro HD runs on the Android 2.3 Gingerbread operating system.

Nitro HD could be upgraded to the latest version of Google Inc.'s smartphone operating system, Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, in the future. Ice Cream Sandwich is a combination of Gingerbread and Honeycomb in one unit. Android Head of Engineering Mike Claren announced that the new OS is Google's most ambitious release to date.

The newest features arriving with Android 4.0 include widgets in a new tab, a customizable launcher, Gmail with offline search with a two-line preview and new action bar at the bottom, better voice integration, improved copy and paste and a new tabbed Web browser that allows up to 16 tabs.

Camera: Both the smartphones sport a rear-facing 8-megapixel LED flash camera with 1080p video capture capability. For video calls, iPhone 4S comes with a secondary VGA camera, while Nitro HD will come with a 1-megapixel front-facing camera.

3G: Apple iPhone 4S has HSDPA 14.4 Mbps, HSUPA 5.8 Mbps support and also has CDMA EV-DO Rev. A (800, 1900 MHz) technology, while Nitro HD will come with HSDPA 21 Mbps, HSUPA 5.76 Mbps and supports 4G LTE.

Storage: iPhone 4S has fixed 16/32/64 GB internal storage, while Nitro HD has a fixed 4 GB internal storage. Nitro HD will come with a 16 GB microSD card included in the package that can be expandable up to 32 GB.

WLAN/Bluetooth/USB: iPhone 4S has Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n and Wi-Fi hotspot while Nitro HD has Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi Direct, DLNA, and Wi-Fi hotspot. The LG smartphone has Bluetooth 3.0 version with A2DP and HS along with microUSB 2.0 version while iPhone 4S has advanced Bluetooth version 4.0 with A2DP along with USB version 2.0.

Battery: The Apple smartphone has a Li-Po 1420 mAh battery, with 8 hours of talk time on 3G networks, up to 14 hours on 2G networks (GSM) and a standby time of 200 hours. On the other hand, Nitro HD comes with a standard Li-ion 1830 mAh battery.

Pricing: Nitro HD will be priced at $249.99 with a two-year AT&T contract. With a two-year contract from AT&T, Sprint and Verizon, iPhone 4S costs $199 for the 16GB model, $299 for the 32GB model and $399 for the 64GB model.

Additional Features: Nitro HD comes with multi-touch input method, proximity sensor for auto turn-off, accelerometer sensor for UI auto-rotate, touch-sensitive controls, gyroscope sensor, Compass, SMS (threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Mail, IM, RSS, WAP 2.0, HTML, xHTML, A-GPS support, HDMI port, SNS applications, MP4/H.263/H.264/WMV player, and MP3/WAV/WMA/eAAC+ player.

On the other hand, Apple iPhone 4S comes with scratch-resistant oleophobic surface, multi-touch input method, accelerometer sensor for auto-rotate, Three-axis gyro sensor, proximity sensor for auto turn-off, iMessage, SMS (threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Email, HTML (Safari), A-GPS support, GLONASS, micro-SIM card support only, scratch-resistant glass back panel, active noise cancelation with dedicated mic, Siri natural language commands and dictation, iCloud cloud service, Twitter integration, Digital compass and Google Maps.