LG hasn’t exactly been hitting smartphone home runs lately and is known more for (LG Optronics) supplying the ‘Retina Display’ of Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone 4 than its own products (especially here in the US).  It does however, seem to have at least one hit on its hands.  The LG Optimus One phone which is a lower-tier candy bar form factor phone with Qwerty keyboard just rocketed past a million units in 40 days.  That’s the fastest selling phone, smartphone or featurephone, in LG’s history.

With a nod to style-conscious users, LG’s new smartphone comes in a wide range of color schemes including black, wine, titan, blue, silver and purple. Exact color availability will vary from market to market. With the global roll-out still under way, the Optimus One will soon be available via 120 carriers and partners. LG expects Optimus One to be its first 10 million-seller smartphone.  In the United States also known as Optimus S (Sprint) and Optimus T (T-mobile) with Vortex™ (Verizon) to be launched on November 18.

Clearly Motorola (MOT), Samsung, Sony (SNE) and Dell (DELL) should all take a lesson from LG who make mediocre hardware but have gotten Google’s (GOOG) latest Android release on their phones.  You can’t just put out sleek hardware and a poor software effort and expect to sell.  Dell and Sony are still shipping phones with Android 1.6 while Motorola and Samsung seem in no hurry to upgrade the bulk of their lineup from Android 2.1 to Froyo.

Consumers clearly want the latest Android builds on their phones and with an open market of choices out there will head to the carrier and manufacturer who keeps their software fresh.