Hands-on with LG's Touch-Screen Voyager

Remember those spy shots of the TV-ready LG enV-like clamshell from a few weeks back? Well, now it's official, and I got a hands-on look in New York yesterday. Set for Verizon Wireless, the upcoming LG Voyager will indeed have a jumbo touch screen, along with the enV's QWERTY keypad hidden beneath the flip. Also included: Verizon's V Cast Mobile TV and a two-megapixel camera.

Slated to arrive in November (no pricing details yet, although I'm guessing it'll be in the $200-$250 range, with service), the Voyager comes with a slick, Flash-powered touch screen, complete with a quartet of icons along the bottom of the display, kind of like...oh right, the iPhone. The icons and menu screens morph, shrink, and slide as you tap the screen, a nice change from the dull, static menus you'll typically find on Verizon phones, and you can compose text messages on the touch display—although you'll have to use a 12-button virtual keypad to do so.

Opening the Voyager reveals its full QWERTY keypad, along with an internal LCD (non-touch) that looks a bit larger than the enV's main display. From here, you can access your e-mail accounts (I'm guessing there's support for major consumer e-mail services, but not Exchange e-mail), plus instant messaging, V Cast music (a microSD expansion port allows for up to 8GB of storage), and about eight streaming channels of V Cast Mobile TV. There's also support for stereo Bluetooth headsets, plus a two-megapixel camera for on-the-go snapshots.

Verizon also had a few other phones to show off yesterday:

• LG Venus: A nifty slider with dual external displays—the bottom one has touch-sensitive navigation controls, while the top has Flash-based animated menus. Available in November (no pricing yet, but should be a bit cheaper than the Voyager), the Venus also comes with V Cast Music/Video access (although just streaming video clips rather than full-on V Cast Mobile TV), up to 8GB of expandable memory, stereo Bluetooth, and a two-megapixel camera.
• BlackBerry Pearl: Basically a CDMA version of the old Pearl, except this time with EV-DO support, making it the first 3G version of the popular handset.
• Samsung Juke: Here's a strange one—a long, narrow phone that swivels open like a jackknife, revealing a small screen and a glossy keypad. The budget music phone doesn't support 3G, so no full-track music downloads; instead, you side-load your tunes using Windows Media Player. Also on board: a VGA camera, 2GB of internal memory (no memory expansion), and support for stereo Bluetooth. Look for the Juke to arrive this month for about $100.

Update: So the big media outlets are picking up on the LG Voyager story and calling it an "iPhone rival"—a thought that honestly never occurred to me, mainly because there's little comparison beyond the external touch-screen display. Frankly, the Voyager strikes me as a warmed over enV, and its interface, while snazzier than the standard Verizon menus, can't hold a candle to the iPhone's truly ground-breaking UI. And yes, the Voyager has EV-DO access, but lacks the iPhone's Wi-Fi abilities. All the "iPhone killer" talk sounds pretty empty to me.