I am able to write this since the announcement is official. I was fortunate enough to have access to the phone for two days since I worked on the launch.
I will try and keep this in bullet point form for easier reading
Build quality: Very well built. it is plastic but not creaky like some Nseries phones. Size and weight wise I felt it to be very comfortable to hold and use. While not so thin 15.5mm, it fits in the hand and quite pocketable.
Sound quality: This might be the loudest phone I have heard. Comparable to the old IDEN phones. Will not have your ringtones set to max for sure. Speaker quality is decent, no distortion.
Camera: Hmm..okay I will say this as a disclosure, the phone 's software is still under development so to speak so somethings didn't work well. Camera is one of those. Pics in sufficient light worked well, dark areas not so good. Sometimes had problems processing images. Heavy noise as well. I would say its on par to the E71camera at this stage. R&D said they will be fixing the bugs before release and are aware of the quality issues.
Video is at 30fps which is good.
Pics that did work, processed quite quickly, faster than the N95.
UI: Okay here is the big one, If you are used to S60 you wont have a problem navigating through the phone. There are some changes to the home screen which Have been documented in the videos like the contacts bar. This is a nice feature but I found myself accidentally dialing contacts sometimes due to the one step touch to call method.
Having said that it, it is nice to have all the ways to communicate with your top contacts one touch away. Basically a suedo social network set up.
You cannot have more than 4 top contacts at one time. This I wish was different, but so far only 4. To contact any of your other contacts you must touch the contacts icon and search the standard way.
The media bar is a great feature, and accessible no matter where your at in the phone. These icons are set so you cannot rearrange them. Music, images, share on Ovi, Video and Web. Since they are really pushing this as a music media device having these icons accessible is a great idea.
Sharing pictures and video is quite easy. Minimal time from taking to uploading. Works best with Ovi but will work with other sites as well.
Messaging: Okay, well we got landscape qwerty which is a great addition. response is good, (will get to touch screen later), but no predictive text in this mode
I asked about it since keys are a bit small. Might be added on later though, depending on feedback.
Mini Qwerty I find is almost useless, due to size but is there as an option. Basically its full qwerty only in portrait mode.
Handwriting option I liked because you can train the phone to your own handwriting. There is a setup process where you go through the entire alphabet to teach the phone how you write. Very clever.
Numeric input is standard but works well for someone that wants to text one handed. Predictive text is in this mode.
Many options when you message someone to insert pics, sounds video ect. I find this more intuitive than lets say the E71's message system.
Touch screen: Here is the big one, if you have an iphone it will not be the same, it requires more effort and it is not as smooth. scrolling is a bit jumpy, especially when scrolling web pages or menu's. many people kept selecting other apps accidentally while doing this while scrolling through the menu.
I found I had better luck using the stylus or the guitar pic, which is meant as a stylus to scroll. Zooming the same thing, double tap hyper zooms. A bit annoying. there is a plus sign in the web or images section that gives you a scroll bad but even then just using the finger didnt respond well.
Haptic or tactile Feedback works as designed, you have four settings, each at a different level of intensity, the fourth option is to have it off completely.
Screen resolution: Okay specs are 640x360 16million colors, real world usage is decent. Nokia hasn't really optimized the phone's UI to really take advantage of the screen resolution. Video looks pixelated and not as smooth as lets say the iphone. Icons look a bit better than other devices but still not at their full potential in my opinion.
Connectivity: Wifi works well, can access it from the menu or by tapping the signal bar at the top of the screen. Bluetooth is not hindered in any way, so sharing files works well. Its 2.0 ADR by the way. Also works when playing games.
Oh one thing to mention is that yes the phone goes from landscape to portrait on most screens quite easily but it is hyper sensitive. If the phone is held at a slight angle, the sensors can't stabilize and keep transitioning the screen even if the phone is held still. The phone needs to be held vertically in each position to lock in. I found this to be annoying. Hopefully will be fixed upon release.
Memory card compatibility: comes with 8GB, supports 16GB and will even support 32GB when that is released
Overall I like the phone, its not a bad first entry into the touch world, but with this much time since the iphone's introduction, I would have liked them to come into the market with a stronger product.
**I have not disclosed some things like release date, marketing etc. due to confidentiality.
Any other questions feel free to ask
Oh Bonus info: I got to play with the N85, great phone!!I like it better than the N96. Screen is amazing and picture quality is very good. UI is snappy and size and weight is what the N95 should have been. Build quality is also much better.
10-04-2008, 00:31
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