Looking forward to getting the LG Optimus G? Well, we have some potentially bad news for you. An LG representative has now confirmed that the Optimus G will not ship with an unlocked bootloader. If you’re the average smartphone user, who does not really care about terms like Root, and Custom ROMs, this is probably inconsequential to you. But if you’re the curious type, like me, who has to check out at least one new Custom ROM each week, till you settle down on the one that works best for your device, this might make things a bit gloomy.
It’s definitely not the first time that an OEM has locked down the bootloader for a device, HTC & Motorola for instance. But both HTC and Motorola, offer an easy and more importantly official way to unlock your bootloader, using tools from their own website. Sometimes, the developer community can find a workaround pretty quick, that makes flashing custom ROMs and other tweaks possible, but it certainly won’t be as as easy as it would with an unlocked device.
LG had originally been pretty open with their Android devices, but with the Optimus 4X HD and the Optimus VU both shipping with locked bootloaders again, it appears that LG is taking its stand on device security pretty seriously. Sure, there would be lot of people, in fact most people, who couldn’t care less about flashing Custom ROMs, but restricting the ability to do so kinda defeats the purpose of Android being an open platform and all.
Flashaholics may want to wait for the LG Nexus 4, which is based off the Optimus G, and has more or less the same hardware, but will have an  unlocked bootloader in line with the Nexus principles. But if you are still keen on this boy, be prepared to spend countless hours refreshing the Optimus G Android Development section on XDA. We have no doubt in our mind, that some great soul from the dev community will eventually find his way to crack the lock wide open, like it happened for the AT&T HTC One X yesterday, but till then, we’ll have to wait and watch.
LG Nexus 4, anyone? It’s already up for pre-order at Carphone Warehouse in the UK.
