The Nokia Lumia 800 is the first Windows Phone handset to spring from the Microsoft / Nokia tie-up announced in February, and we've got our hands on an early sample to check it out.
The Nokia Lumia 800 shares its exterior styling with the previously substantially less hyped Nokia N9, a Meego-based smartphone, although the screen size is reduced from 3.9" (854x480 pixels) to 3.7" (800x480 pixels) to conform to the Windows Phone spec list.
The Nokia Lumia 800, although being the more expensive of the two Nokia Windows Phone offerings (the other being the budget Nokia Lumia 710) shares the Nokia N9's 16-bit AMOLED ClearBlack display whereas the Nokia Lumia 710 sports a 24-bit ClearBlack TFT.
This being said, even though the colour depth is theoretically deeper than in the Nokia Lumia 710, AMOLED screens are seen as better than the older TFT technology due to the more vivid colours and better contrast ratios.
Moving away from Nokia comparisons, the Lumia 800 also has to compete with the likes of the HTC Titan and HTC Radar Windows Mango phones. When we compare screen size we find the Nokia Lumia 800 feeling a little small with the HTC Radar and HTC Titan entering the fray with 3.8" and 4.7" screens respectively although all competitors are limited to the same 800x480 pixel resolution.
Obviously the iPhone has managed to be a success with a smaller screen at 3.5-inches, but the trend towards bigger displays is increasing all the time, and we have to say we're fans of those over four inches thanks to the improved internet and media experience.
This means that the pixel density on the Lumia 800 is a little sharper, but in our side by side comparisons we noted very little difference between the three, and even the Lumia 800 displaying text with a little less clarity.
When it comes to internal storage the Nokia Lumia 800 and HTC Titan are equal with 16GB of fixed internal storage, with the Nokia Lumia 710 and HTC Radar weighing in with 8GB a piece.
Based on the two manufacturer's product specs it soon becomes apparent that the Nokia Lumia 800 is intended to compete against the HTC Titan and the Nokia Lumia 710 with the HTC Radar.
When compared dimensionally with the HTC Titan (131.5mm x 70.7mm x 9.9mm and 160g) we note that the Nokia Lumia 800 (116.5mm x 61.2mm x 12.1mm and 142g) cuts a very slim profile, with a lighter yet reassuring weight.
The physical appearance of the Nokia Lumia 800 is a dream to observe and handle, with its smooth curves fitting snugly to the hand both with and without the protective case provided in the purchase packaging.
First impressions of the phone are mixed. If you're used to handling the current crop of super slim handsets doing the rounds in today's phone shops, you can't help but feel the Lumia 800 is a little on the chunky side, even compared to the iPhone 4S thanks to it being around 10% thicker.
However, that's not to say it isn't an attractive device, with its large 3.7-inch OLED screen pushed to the sides of the chassis and a cool curved polycarbonate shell gives the phone a very premium feel indeed.
Nokia has worked very hard on the unibody design here, making the battery inaccessible and using top-mounted flaps to cover the charging port and SIM slot - intriguingly, we're seeing a microSIM here, which seems to be the fashion for the next wave of smartphones.
It's a slightly odd system, and one that some will find a little bit difficult to get used to - but it does lend a certain sleekness to the design.
One area we can see getting consumers annoyed is on the back panel - as you can see the demo sample we tried was already scratched up, and the same thing has already begun happening on our review model.
Interface:
The major difference between Nokia Lumia series and other Nokia phones is the fact that it uses the Microsoft Windows Phone operating system. The system itself is nothing new, of course, releasing its latest incarnation (WP 7.5) on the HTC Titan and HTC Radar earlier this year.
A major point for and against WP7 for some is that it looks completely different to iPhone, Android, Symbian and Meego as the concept of application grids is nowhere to be seen.
Instead of the more standard homescreen, or "Start Screen" in the case of Windows phone 7.5, the Nokia Lumia 800 uses "Live Tiles", fitting a 2x4 grid (although Calendar and Pictures tiles are full screen width) of tiles on the screen, vertically scrolling to display as many tiles as you wish to add.
Adding tiles to the Start screen is as easy as left swiping to the apps list, long pressing an app and selecting "pin to start", with removing a tile requiring a long press on the tile on the Start page and then tapping the drawing pin with a line through it.
Moving tiles around is just as easy, requiring a long press and then dragging them to the desired location.
At first we were unsure about the large tile based layout, finding it a little cumbersome and poor screen real estate usage, but within a couple of days our opinion changed. The major advantage is speed of use. You don't need to be looking as closely at your phone to use it as the chances of miss pressing are greatly reduced.
Going forward, there will also be more advantages to the system as the Live Tiles as applications are able to show dedicated information instead of an icon - for instance, the BA app will turn into a QR code when you're about to board a flight which can be used in place of a boarding pass.
The other section of the home screen is the apps list, which is quite standard, and somewhat antiquated in some ways as it is just an alphabetical list of your apps, or app groups in the case of Office and Games.
In its defence this form of app list layout is, again, easy to navigate, knowing exactly where an app will sit in the list as done in the Windows PC start menu. This is further aided by the soft search button on the left hand side of the list providing a live filter of the list based on text entry.
This all means that folders are long gone, but after a while you realise that in this format, you don't need them – although as you fill the phone with apps, we would like the ability to sort them into little groups. Being able to search by letter isn't enough - we want customisation in the same way users are able to group together contacts and pin them to the start menu.
A backward step in WP7 is that the top status bar is not interactive like we have become accustomed to with other operating systems.
To toggle Bluetooth, WiFi and Flight Mode on/off you have to go through Settings, which was a major frustration until we found an app on the Marketplace called Connectivity Shortcuts which brought this functionality to the Start screen as Tiles.
Another frustration is that the status bar often only displays the time meaning you have no knowledge of connectivity or remaining power until you swipe down from the top of the screen to see these elements.
Microsoft thinks this cleans the screen up, but given knowing your signal is a pre-requisite for a lot of applications, we'd at least like the option to keep it there constantly - plus too many applications don't support the swipe-down method.
On a more positive slant, the repeated use of familiar icons throughout the user interface for specific functions, means that you know what a button does at a glance without having to read it. In this way the GUI feels intuitive rather than learnt.
Another feature Symbian users have become accustomed to over the years is the use of profiles to quickly switch between different scenarios in their daily life like, General, Silent, Meeting, Outdoor, Pager and Offline. Sadly, these are all gone except for Offline, which is now Flight Mode, and the ability to put the phone into vibrate only mode.
Although profiles have been around for many years their usefulness has increased more recently with the invention of location and time based auto profile switching apps and this is what will be really missed.
Another thing we became accustomed to was repeatedly hitting the back button to be able to close Internet Explorer and other apps as there is no Close/Exit button. The current WP7 coding means that apps close via the back button, but only from a specific screen which has to be navigated back to before the app can be closed/exited.
Even long pressing the back button to open the task manager does not provide an option to close open apps, but only permits switching between apps. This said, however we did not note any speed reduction with six apps showing in the Task Manager.
This is assisted by the fact that only a very select set of the apps on WP7 devices can run in the background and the rest are suspended (disabled) when not on top – we were very impressed with the speed of the Lumia 800 throughout testing.
One major problem we did note: sliding your finger across the touchscreen would sometimes be inexplicably registered as a tap, opening an app or zooming into the text. We thought this would be fixed with the software update, but to no avail.
Battery And Connectivity:
The Nokia Lumia 800 we were provided for this review lasted a day before showing the critical battery warning. It lasted marginally longer when we updated the software, which was supposed to fix the issue completely, but in practice it's still a lot worse than other phones on the market.
We were using the Mix Radio a fair bit, and on occasion enjoyed a movie session - but even then, the battery drain was too high, with around four hours of video obliterating the power pack to critical levels.
When we compare the specifications the competition is interesting with the Nokia Lumia 800 achieving 780 minutes GSM talk time and 265hrs GSM standby in comparison to 410 minutes and 460hrs from the HTC Titan.
The overall standby times may be down to the Nokia Lumia 800's 1450mAh battery compared with the HTC Titan's 1600mAh offering.
Charging of the Nokia Lumia 800 is achieved via its single micro-USB connector enabling charging via mains adaptor or PC USB, keeping things simple. A nice touch is the offset hinge rocker mechanism on the micro-USB cover making opening the cover a lot easier than previous devices.
Press on the raised area next to the headphone socket and the other end of the cover pops out. No more trying to hook your fingers under a tiny ridge.
To aid battery management there is an option in the phone settings to turn on battery saver automatically when the battery level drops below a preset figure, switching certain services off like automatic email retrieval and background applications.
Connectivity
As usual the Nokia Lumia 800 comes packaged with a USB to micro-USB cable for charging and physical connection for synchronisation and data transfer.
In addition to its hard connectivity the Nokia Lumia 800 supports Bluetooth 2.1 +EDR, and WiFi 802.11b/g/n with the usual WEP, WPA, WPA2 (Enterprise & Personal) methods available.
The first time the Nokia Lumia 800 is connected to a PC the standard automatic driver setup occurs followed by a request to install Microsoft Zune software which is Microsoft's response to iTunes providing access enabling synchronisation of music and video between PC and phone.
The Nokia Lumia 800 is a very attractive device with a nice weight and when the on contract price is free, it's even better. We've now overhauled our review with a score thanks to our updated software, and we're happy to announce a few marked improvements.
We liked
The size, shape and weight of the Nokia Lumia 800 provides a quality feel, and is a unique shape compared to many other phones on the market.
The GUI feels intuitive with a very impressive speed of response, providing a continuity of feel between applications.
The pre-installed Internet Explorer 9 is a super zippy browser, although not the fastest around - although we are impressed with how much of an improvement Microsoft and Nokia working together have made.
The use and merging of multiple cloud sources for contacts, calendar and social apps is well executed, and is actually one of the easiest to use when it comes to linking contacts together.
The Games are with its integration with Xbox Live is a excellent with the ability to transfer game progress between console and phone.
We disliked
No profiles and this automated profile transitioning as provided on Symbian^3 and newer devices - although this is a problem many smartphones have nowadays.
The phone speaker is disappointing based on previous Nokia devices with a quite tinny sound quality, certainly not among the best on the market, especially in loud conditions.
Battery performance is poor compared with other recent Nokia devices - none of the Finnish bullet-proof battery life we used to be able to rely on.
Video recording is not up to recent Nokia standards with no zoom whilst recording and poor light and focus response worsening further in low light environments.
Mix Radio's lack of download options still really galls, and the touchscreen issue, though intermitten, rankles when it disturbs what you're trying to do.
Verdict
Although we had our doubts during initial familiarisation with the Nokia WP7 environment the transition from the Symbian environment is much less painful than expected. In less than 48hrs we went from wanting to return to our old phones to not wanting to let go of this one.
Whereas the start screen tiles initially felt a little unwieldy and wasteful of the display real estate the reasoning behind the GUI styling soon became apparent such that we realised it is all about simplicity and intuitiveness.
Start screen icons are large to minimise the chances of incorrect icon selection. The phone dial pad screen only has what it really needs to make a call. The alphabetical apps list is the easiest way to find apps as we all know our A-Z.
We did note a number of issues with the review device, and while many were rectified with a software update, some remained. The biggest stumbling block of these being the poor video capture and lack of zoom during recording.
The result of our time with the Nokia Lumia 800 has left us wanting more. The big question you have to ask is: do you buy the Nokia Lumia 800 with WP Mango installed or do you wait and see what devices Nokia release on the next and Nokia influenced WP8 devices next year?
However - we can't look at the phone as just a list of specs. It's the best Windows Phone device out there, but there is room for improvement. We said the same thing with the last crop of WP devices, and while we're happy to wait a little longer, we hope that we start seeing some Microsoft-fulled superphones in the near future.
Also See : Nokia Lumia 800 Specs
No comments:
Post a Comment