horrible phone, low battery life, bad GUI
First I'll mention the pluses with this phone. First its very cheap. It has a very strong body, stronger than even my Nokia. The vibrator on it is also fairly strong (most phones have a weak vibrator that I rarely feel).

Now for the bad stuff . . .
1) It has port covers that look very fragile (for battery, etc). None have broken after 2 months use, but I've been very careful.

2) The battery drains *very* fast when you have low or no signal. For example, despite not using the phone, spending 8 hours at work in a no-signal basement literally drains 50% of the battery. The phone feels very warm to the touch whenever in low/no signal areas. A fully charged battery will die in under 24 hours if your phone is in a no-signal area (ie go camping, spend time in subway, basement, etc.) I keep my phone off 50% of the time for fear I'll be stuck with a dead battery (happens all the time with this phone). I have to charge this phone almost daily, where on my 4 year old cheap motorola phone I haven't once replaced the battery, and it still holds a weeks worth of charge!

3) The 'airplane mode' is very useful. I use it to turn off my phone to prevent the battery from dieing in low/no signal areas.

4) The top LCD that displays time is horrible. I can't see it outside even on a cloudy day, and it doesn't update the time unless your phone has a signal. It also displays the last time you checked it for about 1 second before displaying the current time (requires a button push).

5) The GUI is absolutely horrible. It takes 3x more button clicks to get anything done compared to all my other cheap phones I've owned. No customizable hotkeys.

5) My four year old ultra cheap Motorola cell phone can run Java 10x faster. The Flare takes minutes to load up a simple Opera browser.

6) You have to read the same message twice for it to stop telling you that you have new messages.

7) Internet sucks on it. Virgin had me go through this 3 phone call multiple day process trying to get it to work, and finally they said 'its a known problem and engineers are working on it, call back in 72 hours'. Well, I've called them once every 4 days for an entire month, and they kept saying the same thing. Two months have passed, still no internet. On very rare occasions, say 5% of the time I try, I can get a connection. But its *very* slow. Way slower than on my 4 year old cheap motorola phone.

8) No SIM card. Doesn't work with any phone backup software I've tried.

Garbage. I'm buying a new phone.

Pain to setup Pain to maintain Pain to cancel

I thought Virgin Mobile would be great. I was wrong. It took forever on the phone to setup with customer service. They have this minute pack drama you have to add every month and convert. The phone charger runs hot even though the phone is nice, so don't keep the charger plugged in. When you cancel you need a pin. That is my fault, at least they texted it to me. Avoid Virgin Mobile if you don't want a high maintenance pre paid cellphone plan.

Amazing Phone
This is one of the best virgin mobile phone I have ever bought!I just bought it because I needed a new one.When looked at the picture it looked OK.I didn't think it would be over the top great.I opened the package it looked shiny and nice.It is loaded with cool stuff and graphics.I had this phone for since septemberor october of 2008.I reccomend this phone to all ages.I was very satisfied with this product.

An OK phone COULD BE MUCH BETTER
I just purchased the phone.

Did NOT want to . Using it under 2 years my other Virgin Mobile phone just quit on me

Phone is cheap, light weight plastic

TO ME A REALLY LARGE PLUG IN CHARGER It gets really warm & SO CAN THE PHONE while charging. I think that is a safety issue You ARE FORCED to move a piece of the plastic in order to input the charger to the phone WHOEVER THOUGHT THIS STUPID IDEA UP instead of just having an open spot to connect the charger SOMETHING MORE TO BREAK & MORE UNNECESSARY WORK TO DO

Comes with only FEW terrible ring tones & wall papers You have to go to Virgin to hopefully find ones of interest to you

Graphics on it are good

Not enough games, other decent extras

You are supposed to get WEB access on it. THE INSTRUCTION BOOK GIVES NO INFORMATION ON THIS

Virgin has no posted info or prices for this use.

The LG Flare Prepaid Phone could be better
When I bought this phone back in Sep. 08, I expected great results from the phone. After all, I figured, 'It's an LG'. Little did I know, months later, that I would run into all sorts of problems like not being able to dial overseas and constantly running out of minutes (which always felt more than (asin:B0012DA8F6).20 a minute). These turned out to be my pet peeves because I bought the phone for those main uses but when they didn't work out as planned, I kept thinking that I should have kept my regular Sprint phone plan, rather than to buy this nearly useless phone. I found that since Sep., when I first bought the phone, I've "topped up" or filled up my prepaid phone minutes ( for 200 minutes, for 400 minutes, for 1,000 minutes) more than I wanted to or even expected to- 5 or 6 times, rather than just 3 or 4 times.

Don't get me wrong. The phone's got some good features like easy text messaging, some limited internet access, and up to 3.5 hours of talk time which would temp any new buyer. Unfortunately, the phone does not use cell phone minutes wisely. It eats them away like those cheap, overrated calling cards. If you're a big talker who likes to keep in touch with friends all the time, your best bet is to get a monthly plan, maybe with a company other than Virgin Mobile. Buy this phone only if you're more of a clam and use the phone rarely like asking about the occasional bill or calling 911 for something. Maybe then, you can make those cell phone minutes worth every overrated penny of what they're worth. In fact, if I know then what I know now, I think I would've strictly gotten a phone card. Think twice before buying this phone!