Worried about the camera lens cover

[Mike Dee]

I am having second thoughts about getting the V20 since it has a similar camera set up to the G5.
The glass protecting the camera on my G5 broke without dropping the phone. At first I thought maybe something hit up against it in my pocket but now I see that this another common problem. I doubt LG will cover the repair.
I certainly hope they use better glass on the V20, however it may also be easier to replace since the back cover comes off.

 

[Almeuit]

I am not worried about it. Since my phone sits by itself in a pocket nothing should hit or cause it to break.

 

[Mike Dee]

I am not worried about it. Since my phone sits by itself in a pocket nothing should hit or cause it to break.

There are cases where it has cracked by itself....the good news I found an alternative way of replacing without taking apart the phone. The lens is just glued on and the replacements are cheap on EBay. Also the V20 back comes off so that makes it just as easy if it did break.

 

[nickname303]

I'd be more worried about how long it's going to take the V20 to bootloop and die rather than if the camera glass will break

 

[Mike Dee]

I'd be more worried about how long it's going to take the V20 to bootloop and die rather than if the camera glass will break

I'm not worried about the bootloop issue. That would be like worrying about how every Samsung might blow up from now on.

 

[nickname303]

I'm not worried about the bootloop issue. That would be like worrying about how every Samsung might blow up from now on.

I get what you're saying, it's just that the G4, G5 and V10 have all reportedly had bootloop issues. That's not a very good trend for LG to be having with their phones. I've been tempted by LG phones in the past, but i personally can't realistically consider buying one until they stop putting out phones that terminally die for no apparent reason. Every phone that's released will have defective units of course, but like I say, it seems to be becoming a worrying trend that LG's phones have the same major fault every time. I would have thought they would have solved the problem by now. Let's hope they do eventually, then maybe I can add them to the list of potential purchases

 

[Morty2264]

I feel like there is risk involved with purchasing any new phone - be it a bootloop, camera lens, screen cracking, etc. I guess that's one reason why carriers sometimes pressure us to buy insurance on these things!

Hopefully the camera lens/bootloop issues do not occur here!

 

[Mike Dee]

I get what you're saying, it's just that the G4, G5 and V10 have all reportedly had bootloop issues. That's not a very good trend for LG to be having with their phones. I've been tempted by LG phones in the past, but i personally can't realistically consider buying one until they stop putting out phones that terminally die for no apparent reason. Every phone that's released will have defective units of course, but like I say, it seems to be becoming a worrying trend that LG's phones have the same major fault every time. I would have thought they would have solved the problem by now. Let's hope they do eventually, then maybe I can add them to the list of potential purchases

I have not heard of many G5 bootloop issues. No more than random ones that happen to any phone. I have two friends at work that have G4s for over a year and no bootloops but obviously the G4 has a history of more than their fair share. In all honesty when I lose confidence in a product or it just doesn't suit me I avoid it. There are very few phones that I will consider but the V20 is one of them. Some of that credit goes to the performance I experience in the G5. Its blazing fast and I have had little issues except initial trouble with the GPS which was fixed and now the camera lens which I can repair for few dollars and quite easily,

 

[nickname303]

I have not heard of many G5 bootloop issues. No more than random ones that happen to any phone. I have two friends at work that have G4s for over a year and no bootloops but obviously the G4 has a history of more than their fair share. In all honesty when I lose confidence in a product or it just doesn't suit me I avoid it. There are very few phones that I will consider but the V20 is one of them. Some of that credit goes to the performance I experience in the G5. Its blazing fast and I have had little issues except initial trouble with the GPS which was fixed and now the camera lens which I can repair for few dollars and quite easily,

I'm not too sure of the scale of the bootloop issue with the G5 to be honest. The V10 has only recently had reports of bootloop problems as far as I know, so I suppose it remains to be seen how big the problem is with that. It may be a case of everybody honing in on the bootloop problems with LG phones now because of the big problem the G4 had. My girlfriend had a G4 and hers succumbed to the bootloop problem the same as many other people's. It's not acceptable in my opinion for an expensive phone to terminally die within 12 months like hers did. It's cost me alot of money to buy her that phone and then an iPhone 6s to replace it when it died.

Like you say, because of this I've lost confidence in LG which is a shame as their phones have always looked generally appealing to me. It makes it all the more frustrating that their phones would be a potential purchase for me if it weren't for the bootloop issues. The V20 isn't an option for me anyway as I'm in Europe.

 

[nickname303]

I feel like there is risk involved with purchasing any new phone - be it a bootloop, camera lens, screen cracking, etc. I guess that's one reason why carriers sometimes pressure us to buy insurance on these things!

Hopefully the camera lens/bootloop issues do not occur here!

Yeah, I'm by no means saying that there are any perfect phones out there. All will have their own problems and idiosyncrasies. It's just that the LG flagships over the last couple of years seem to suffer from the same terminal bootloop problem. I think the G4 was worst affected but there's still reports of it happening with the G5 and now the V10. Like I've said earlier to Mike Dee, it may just be that after the problem with the G4 everybody is now looking out for (and reporting) any further bootloop issues with subsequent LG phones. Maybe it's not such a big problem now than it was with the G4. But I still feel I can't trust LG at the moment and risk having an expensive doorstop within a few months.

 

[Morty2264]

Yeah, I'm by no means saying that there are any perfect phones out there. All will have their own problems and idiosyncrasies. It's just that the LG flagships over the last couple of years seem to suffer from the same terminal bootloop problem. I think the G4 was worst affected but there's still reports of it happening with the G5 and now the V10. Like I've said earlier to Mike Dee, it may just be that after the problem with the G4 everybody is now looking out for (and reporting) any further bootloop issues with subsequent LG phones. Maybe it's not such a big problem now than it was with the G4. But I still feel I can't trust LG at the moment and risk having an expensive doorstop within a few months.

I definitely see what you're saying. It's worrisome to spend so much money on a phone - it's a long term investment! - only to have something like that happen to it. Hopefully LG can get a handle on this.

 

[Mike Dee]

Found an easy repair solution to this common problem and it does not require opening up the phone. You can buy the glass on Amazon or eBay and simply pry out the old one and any old adhesive and pieces of glass if any. The replacement has the adhesive attached and you just press it into place.

 

[Morty2264]

Found an easy repair solution to this common problem and it does not require opening up the phone. You can buy the glass on Amazon or eBay and simply pry out the old one and any old adhesive and pieces of glass if any. The replacement has the adhesive attached and you just press it into place.

That's awesome news!

 

[damev]

V20's camera glass will not break.

For LG G5, the camera glass was a single large glass that covered everything: both cameras and the area around the cameras.
Conversely, the V20 has an entirely different camera glass design. If you see the images from the V20's back, you can see that each camera has it's own small camera glass, therefore it's much less prone to break.

As you know, it's a simple physics: the larger the glass (or any material) surface area the more likely it will break.

 

[Mike Dee]

V20's camera glass will not break.

For LG G5, the camera glass was a single large glass that covered everything: both cameras and the area around the cameras.
Conversely, the V20 has an entirely different camera glass design. If you see the images from the V20's back, you can see that each camera has it's own small camera glass, therefore it's much less prone to break.

As you know, it's a simple physics: the larger the glass (or any material) surface area the more likely it will break.

I'm no longer concerned either way because it's an easy repair. Contrary to how LG performs the repair you don't have to take the phone apart. You can remove the lens from the outside with a little ingenuity and replacements are cheap

 

[jimmy allen1]

Good to know

 

[Mike Dee]

V20's camera glass will not break.

For LG G5, the camera glass was a single large glass that covered everything: both cameras and the area around the cameras.
Conversely, the V20 has an entirely different camera glass design. If you see the images from the V20's back, you can see that each camera has it's own small camera glass, therefore it's much less prone to break.

As you know, it's a simple physics: the larger the glass (or any material) surface area the more likely it will break.

I went and double checked.....it still has one solid glass piece covering the cameras as far as I can tell.

 

[Mike Dee]

V20's camera glass will not break.

For LG G5, the camera glass was a single large glass that covered everything: both cameras and the area around the cameras.
Conversely, the V20 has an entirely different camera glass design. If you see the images from the V20's back, you can see that each camera has it's own small camera glass, therefore it's much less prone to break.

As you know, it's a simple physics: the larger the glass (or any material) surface area the more likely it will break.

Here's a picture.....one solid oval glass covering.

 

[damev]

I went and double checked.....it still has one solid glass piece covering the cameras as far as I can tell.

Sorry, I was wrong. V20 has one big piece of glass that covers the camera. It's a simple physics that the larger the surface are, the more likely it will break. It is a design flaw of LG V20 and G5 phones. (Yes, there are several reports of cracked G5 camera glass.)

If LG used metal or plastic around the cameras with two cutout for the lenses, so if each camera had it's own small glass/lens, then the camera glass would not be fragile.

I was watching the photos of V20's back in GSMArena's review. From the photos of the back of LG V20, the camera glass protector foil misled me. The camera glass protector foil looked like a metal which gives a few mm thickness around the cameras which separates the camera glasses. So it looked like each camera has individual small glass instead of one large glass piece.

For example a photo from the GSMArena's review:
http://cdn.gsmarena.com/imgroot/reviews/16/lg-v20/review/phone/-1024x768mw1/gsmarena_015.jpg

 

[damev]

I went and double checked.....it still has one solid glass piece covering the cameras as far as I can tell.

Sorry, I was wrong. V20 has one big piece of glass that covers the camera. It's a simple physics that the larger the surface area, the more likely it will break. It is a design flaw in LG V20 and G5 phones. (Yes, there are several reports of cracked G5 camera glass.)

If LG used metal or plastic around the cameras with two cutout for the lenses, so if each camera had it's own small glass/lens, then the camera glass would not be fragile.

I was watching the photos of V20's back in GSMArena's review. From the photos of the back of LG V20, the camera glass protector foil misled me. The camera glass protector foil looked like a metal which gives a few mm thickness around the cameras which separates the camera glasses. So it looked like each camera has individual small glass instead of one large glass piece.

For example a photo from the GSMArena's review: