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Full review of the most powerful Symbian smartphone Nokia N8.

A complete overview of the most powerful

Symbian smartphone Nokia N8

Now for the final part of our review of Nokia N8, which is undoubtedly the most talked about smartphone this year. One of the main features of which is a 12 MP camera, which we have already tested and as a result of checking the quality and capabilities of the N8 camera, we concluded that it can easily replace a miniature camera in the middle class. And as proof of comparison with Nikon's Coolpix S220 cameras, the Sony HX5v clearly demonstrated this.

Content

- Contents of delivery

- Characteristics

- Design

- Screen

- Camera

- Battery

- Communication

- Hardware platform

- Software

- Multimedia capabilities

- Opinion

Now is the time to talk about the design features of this smartphone and how the new version of the OS, Symbian 3, has shown itself? If we repeat about the key features of the smartphone, then this is: a high-quality AMOLED screen with glass protection and multitouch plus a hardware 3D accelerator and the ability to shoot video in HDTV quality, sound recording is carried out in stereo mode and much more. The flaws that were present in the flagship of last year N97 have been corrected here. Nokia N8 has pulled itself up to the level of advanced models of other companies in terms of software organization and, in addition, received a good camera - 12 MP with a xenon flash, nice additions, such as a USB output (for connecting a flash drive or hard drive), the ability to view video in mkv, avi format in 720p without converting it, Dolby Mobile 5.1 sound, HDMI connector, 16 GB internal memory and a slot for flash cards, metal body. At the same time, the starting price is less than $ 780.

Contents of delivery

­­

─ Directly the phone itself

─ Battery BL-4D Li-Ion 1200 mAh

─ Wired stereo headset WH-70

─ HDMI cable

─ USB cable

─ Mini-USB to USB adapter

─ Recharging

─ Management

Characteristics

Display: AMOLED 3.5 ", touchscreen, capacitive with multitouch, with a resolution of 640x360 pixels, 16 million colors

Network support: GSM / GPRS / EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 UMTS / HSDPA 900/1900/2100

Battery: BL-4D, 1200mAh

Camera: Carl Zeiss 12 MP with autofocus, video recording 1280x720, 25 fps, xenon flash

Memory: built-in - 16 GB, support for flash cards micro-SD

Communication: Bluetooth 3.0, Wi-Fi 802.11 b / g / n, USB 2.1, HDMI (TV-Out)

Built-in GPS module, Ovi Maps -free navigation

· USB on the go

3.5 mm headset jack, Dolby Mobile 5.1

Standby time - up to 400 hours

Operating time in player mode - up to 50 hours

Talk time - up to 12 hours

Size: 113.5 x 59.1 x 12.9mm

Weight: 135g

· Price: 780$

Design

In the design of the phone we see a new design concept with beveled corners, minimalistic design, the texture of the metal is also noticeable. N8 can be called the first-born in this style, similar variants are expected a little later, of which E7 is the first. If earlier the same type of design was found within the same series, as an example - E51-E66-E71 or the N78-N81-N86 series, now there has been a change in the naming system itself and the devices refer to series only based on their characteristics. This is where similar devices from different lines come from, which are united only by the release time.

In general, the N8 is clearly a big step forward in comparison with the previous N-series made of plastic, with the exception of the newest model N97 mini. The smartphone has a metal case made of a sheet of aluminum with only small plastic inserts in the color of the case on the top and bottom. The case is offered in 5 colors: black, orange, green, silver and blue. For Nokia, such a number of color solutions is a new trend, and most of the devices have got bright colors, which is good news for the boring standard black, white and silver colors are pretty boring.

The phone has an excellent build quality, there are perfect gaps between the body parts without gaps, which are unfortunately present on some other devices. As well as a plus in terms of build quality, this is a one-piece case, although in this regard, the battery cannot be removed without disassembling the case.If necessary, you can restart Nokia N8 by holding down the power button for 8 seconds, but during use and testing there was not a single hang-up.

The slot for the SIM card and the flash memory card are located externally and are closed with caps, and the cards can be changed without turning off, but the operator's network is searched after a reboot. On the left side is a micro-USB connector with a small LED. At the bottom there is a charging slot - 2 mm, it is compatible with old chargers.

The buttons for adjusting the volume, as well as the key for the photo / video camera, are located on the right side, here is also a sliding key for locking the keypad. Above is a 3.5 mm headset jack, a mini-HDMI output under the lid and a power button. The connectors are located quite conveniently, they are convenient to use, the only plugs for the SIM-card and the flash memory card are slightly harsh.

In addition, there is only one button on the front - the menu button. To accept / hang up a call, virtual buttons are used, which is not very convenient - for example, to break a GPRS connection by holding the hang up button in this case will not work.

In addition to the above, I would like to add an excellent surface finish. During testing of several devices, not a single scratch appeared on their surface.

Screen

The device has a high-quality 3.5-inch screen, which is similar in size to the N97, but has a number of advantages - it is built using AMOLED technology, has glass protection, a capacitive type and much more. The screen resolution is 640x360, qHD screen, in comparison with the WVGA screen, the picture is not so smooth, but in any case the pixelation is imperceptible and this resolution suits well for such a screen.

The smartphone has high-quality color reproduction, and the advantage of using the AMOLED matrix is ​​wide viewing angles. When you buy, the Nokia N8 screen will most likely seem perfect to you, or at least almost perfect. Nokia in this model was able to fulfill its task 100% and, as a result, an excellent example in terms of screen quality. In the sun, the screen behaves also stably, the information is read in full.

Everyone has already seen the comparison with the screen from Samsung Galaxy S, so let's show a comparison with Sony Ericsson Satio, the screen of which has the same resolution and size, and TFT technology. You can clearly see the advantage of Nokia N8 with more natural colors and without overexposure in bright areas.

There is a light sensor, but there is no custom setting, since the phone independently adjusts the brightness depending on the illumination to save energy.

Camera

The Nokia N8 has the longest list of hardware options among the best camera phones to date. 12MP camera with traditional Carl Zeiss optics, 1 / 1.83 ”oversized sensor, xenon flash, 28mm wide-angle lens, mechanical shutter, HD video recording and dual microphone system, stereo sound, speed work is fast and without delays. The camera has been tested and compared with competitors in terms of shooting quality, for a detailed review and conclusions about the Nokia N8 camera you can find in a dedicated article:

Review of Nokia N8 camera capabilities and comparison with Nikon Coolpix S220, SE Satio

Battery

The device is supplied with a BL-4D rechargeable battery with a capacity of 1200 mA * h, which meets the standards of the series. The phone has a good charge reserve, in MP3 playback mode - 45 hours, during video playback - more than 6 hours, in game mode - 4 hours, using Wi-Fi - 6 hours and in GPS navigation mode - 5 hours.

In comparison, the previous type of battery had a capacity of 1500 mA * h, but here it is compensated by the last optimization of energy consumption. And now it is already clearly seen that in this area Nokia is in the lead, at least when using the N8 after having been using an Android smartphone for a long time, we can only rejoice in the positive battery life of this device.

During testing, it turned out that when using the device in an average user load mode, it can work stably for 2 days, which means listening to music for 2-3 hours a day, using the camera in photo and video mode, actively using widgets, Wi-Fi, GPS and much more. That for such a functional device is a fairly good result. And when using a smartphone is not so active, the operating time increases to 3 days.

Communications

The built-in Wi-Fi module now supports 802.11 n in addition to the traditional b and g standards. There is also a simple assistant for setting up a WLAN Wizard connection. From the options, you can list a proposal to create a connection when any operator's network is detected, by default it is an access point, there is also the ability to filter networks. Supported security standards - WEP, WPA and WPA 2. In the settings, you can specify the scan time to detect WLAN networks.

The USB port has a 2.0 Full Speed ​​standard, at which data transfer occurs at a speed of about 4 Mb / s, which corresponds to the level of other Symbian devices, in particular the N97. It can be noted that there is support for the Mass Storage mode, in which you can choose whether the smartphone will be used in PC Suite mode, disk drive, Media Player or Image Print. When using disk storage mode, the memory card appears as a removable disk, as does the built-in 16GB memory. As already mentioned, there is the go's USB function which was used for the first time for a phone and allows direct connection of an ordinary flash drive to a device... Many will like this option, especially since there are no similar offers from other manufacturers yet. It is also worth noting that in addition to a USB flash drive, it is possible to connect hard drives using the FAT 32 format, although it is possible that NTFS support will be added in future firmware.

Bluetooth in accordance with the specification has version - 3.0 plus EDR, support for all major profiles. Apart from Nokia N8, this modern version of Bluetooth is installed only on a single phone - Samsung S8500 Wave. The biggest plus is the ability to transfer data at a significantly increased speed, however, the receiving device, in turn, must also support this technology. In the meantime, there are not so many similar phones on the market.

One of the striking advantages of Nokia N8 is the ability to transfer video directly to the TV screen, and even home theater using the mini-HDMI output. And this is not an exaggeration at all, on the Internet you can easily find videos with an overview of this process. An HDMI cable is included with the smartphone, no special settings are needed, you just need to connect the device with a cable to the TV and enjoy watching any video, photos or displaying games. Moreover, the present Dolby mobile 5.1 system allows you to get sound in 5.1 channel when watching a video, which naturally gives an excellent effect and, of course, high-quality sound.

Videos can be viewed directly from either a flash drive or a hard drive, which means that it is not at all necessary to upload video files to the Nokia N8 memory ... By and large, for the first time a device has appeared that combines such characteristics. Astute observers may argue that before the Nokia N8 there were phones with HDMI (for example, Motorola XT720, Acer Stream), but can they do the same when it comes to video playback? No, they do not know how, and this is a fact that is difficult to argue with.

In addition, the N8 has a built-in FM transmitter. It can broadcast sound to compatible equipment, for example, to a car radio.

Hardware platform

I would like to draw your attention to the hardware platform of Nokia N8. You may recall that when using Nokia N97, the smartphone could not cope with many operations, and the speed when performing tasks was unsatisfactory.If we talk about the processor of the Nokia N8 phone, then it is completely different, absolutely adequate and will easily solve most problems. The ARM processor itself is 11.680 MHz, and due to the work of the Broadcom co-processor, the Nokia N8 has ideal graphics acceleration and occupies a leading place, overtaking most modern flagship phones. Redrawing and scrolling occurs at 60 fps, which is about 4 times faster than N97 and other Symbian ^ 3 phones!

The RAM has a capacity of 256 MB, the amount of memory intended for running the application and the size of the Java application that is run is unlimited. The built-in memory has a volume of 512 MB, 360 of which are available for use, in addition to this is installed flash array 16 GB and also supports memory cards up to 32 GB (micro-SDHC). By modern standards, this is absolutely sufficient memory size.

There is an accelerometer to automatically rotate the interface, depending on the tilt of the device. the process of muting calls is the same as on the N97 and other Nokia models. But, in comparison with the others, the interface floats smoothly, and the reversal occurs accurately and without slowing down,

There is a GPS module, and also there is Ovi Maps in version 3.04 (in the future version 3.06 will support multitouch when zooming maps) and plus free voice navigation. And here we can only say one thing - maps in Nokia devices + free voice navigation is a good tradition of the company, which cannot be said about other companies.

The new version of Maps is much faster and more stable than the N97, which suffered from very slow performance. Ultimately, we can confidently say that the N8 is not bad at all in terms of its navigation characteristics. In general, given the free navigation, this is a very appropriate addition to Nokia phones, especially if you are abroad, where the use of Google Maps or similar services is simply meaningless due to roaming tariffs.

Software security

The main differences from the user's point of view are the 4 times faster scrolling speed, a one-click system and a modified task manager. Most applications have been redrawn, and the total number of changes is over 250.

The first acquaintance with Symbian3 showed that the new OS performs most of the tasks without any problems and is far ahead of the N97 with its S50 5th Edition. The speed of work has noticeably increased, the menu has smooth scrolling, there are no delays, the choice of the desired item is one-touch (the previous system in two clicks is gone into history), most applications have been redrawn, the number of desktops is now equal to three and widgets can be placed on them. As a nice addition to the smartphone, there is a free full-fledged navigation and offline Ovi maps, which are installed in the phone's memory, as well as a very convenient call service, unlike Android phones, which are not convenient for this quality.

Nokia N8 has 3 desktops, which is the first difference from the first generation Symbian. This number is considered optimal and is sufficient to accommodate the necessary widgets and shortcuts. The order and number of widgets located on the screen is fixed and is equal to five windows, both for vertical and horizontal arrangement, with a fixed sequence. You can choose offline mode, or online, in which widgets update the necessary information in an automatic manner.

In addition to widgets, there are also common icon panels for quick access and a panel of selected contacts. Quick access icons are located in two panels of 4 tabs and two contact panels.

The style of the main menu remains the same with icons very similar to those of the first-born smartphones with a touch screen - Nokia 5800 XpressMusic. But unlike it, on the N8 AMOLED, the screen has a higher brightness and gives a more pleasant image, including the appearance of icons.

A good change is the reworking of the horizontal mode, and now the location of the virtual soft buttons is at the bottom and does not cover a considerable part of the screen on the right side, which was earlier on Symbian ^ 1.

The application manager has undergone changes and is now a little less convenient (due to the simultaneous placement of only one of the running programs on the screen), but at the same time it has become more beautiful and informative. Its call, as before, with a long press on the menu key.

Typing. The convenience of typing from the virtual keyboard does not deserve any praise, since the system has practically remained the same from Symbian ^ 1. There are several shortcomings regarding usability, such as the lack of a special button for changing the one-touch input language, there is no convenient QWERTY layout with the vertical screen position, as well as the lack of at least some punctuation marks on the main keyboard, except for the period. As a result, the N8 is far from ideal in terms of ease of text input, such as, for example, HTC.

Browser. The basis of the browser, as before, is the Konqueror project, has support for HTML 4.01, JavaScript 1.5, RSS, CSS 1, 2, flash-content. The browser has support for 46 different languages, but the set of supported languages ​​depends on the country in which the phone was sold. The browser interface has a classic design and if a couple of years ago it looked modern, today it has a clearly outdated, lagging look.

There is no normal work with a couple of open windows, bookmarks as well as pop-up submenus are inconvenient to use. In general, the browser does not shine with good work, but what can please it is a full-fledged multitouch and excellent perception of flash content with fast loading of objects, no interruptions.

Social networks. Already in the kit there is an installed client for social networks facebook and twitter, plus a widget for it. Considering that this is a long-awaited and new feature, the client has several drawbacks, such as a small number of downloaded messages, there are also no settings, but it has a beautiful design.

Active Notes... Standard functions for notes have been expanded and now, in addition to printing and sending, using the Active Notes application, you can add video, audio files, pictures, contact information, other files with the XHTML type of the received file to notes. The note can be sent via Bluetooth, SMS, MMS, and also opened via an Internet browser.

Office... There is QuickOffice - an application for opening Microsoft Office documents and presentations: Word files with the ".doc" extension, Excel tables with the ".xls" extension, PowerPoint presentations with the ".ptt" extension. Considering the development of computer technologies, the supported versions of Microsoft Office - 97, 2000, 2003, are clearly not the newest, and may not suit many users. Also embarrassing is the lack of the ability to edit documents, which is only available in the business series Nokia Eseries, and therefore to edit documents on the Nokia N8 device, you need to perform full and paid activation! versions of QuickOffice.

Other applications installed on the phone are useful and convenient, including ZIP archiver, YouTube client, Adobe PDF, dictionary, photo and video editor, custom search within the device, as well as Internet search.

Among other things, there is also an official Skype client, and today there are already more than 20 different games that use a 3D accelerator. Good applications have already appeared for the new Symbian 3 OS, and as other smartphones using this operating system appear, their number will grow steadily.

Multimedia capabilities

The music player interface has undergone quite significant changes. This is a display of the album thumbnail in a horizontal version and the album cover in a vertical position, in general, the visual display has become an order of magnitude higher. As before, there is sorting by album, artist, composition. The functional features have not changed much, everything is clear and convenient, from the settings to enable repeat, equalizer and much more.

In the minimized version of the player, it is possible to display on the desktop a small panel with virtual buttons that can be used to control playback. The name of the artist and the title of the song are displayed on the same panel, which is quite convenient to use.

One of the significant advantages of the Nokia N8 is the excellent sound quality.... Comparing it with the N97, we get almost equal sound quality, in other words the phone becomes practically the best on the market. During testing, I listened to music in the same headphones on the N8 and on the iPhone 4G, and Nokia showed itself worthy, if not outstripping, then definitely not worse. In general, an ideal musical version, and in the playback mode the N8 showed a record runtime of 45 hours, although 50 hours pass in the official specifications. In comparison, the Nokia 5800 will play music for about 30 hours, while the iPhone 4G will play even less about 24 hours. The kit for the smartphone contains a stereo headset with a remote control, when using which there were no problems. Plus, the N8 actually has 2 charges, this is 2 mm standard and recharging via micro-USB, which makes the device more versatile.

Opinion

Many articles about Nokia N8 have already been written on the F.ua website, in which the corresponding conclusions were drawn, but in this detailed review, only the main points. As for the connection quality, we can only say that there were no problems with using, the signal on the N8 was clear and even a little better in comparison with the iPhone 4G or N97 mini. The loud speaker provides excellent audibility of the interlocutor during a conversation, even if you are in a noisy environment.

The N8 kit also contains a black silicone case, which allows you to protect the case and not slip the device out of your hand. In Ukraine, there should be five variants of phone colors on sale. All Nokia N8 colors are interesting, and it's up to you to choose which one to choose, but I liked the light green color, which clearly shows the metallic texture. Black and orange colors look interesting, but they liked less - blue and silver. However, regardless of the color of the case, the color of the case is invariably black.

The Nokia N8 is priced at $ 780, making the N8 the best smartphone in the segment today. And the disadvantages that were listed in the review (inconvenient virtual keyboard and outdated browser) cannot influence this fact too much. In general, we can say that Nokia N8 came out with an almost perfectly balanced smartphone in all respects, and most likely it will remain one of the best offers for a long time to come.

Pros:

- Supports Wi-Fi 802.11 n

- Bluetooth 3.0

- Ability to quickly replace SIM-card and memory card

- The presence of three desktops

- FM radio with transmitter

- Updated and functional player

Minuses:

- When transferring large files via Bluetooth, sometimes the connection will be disconnected

- Not too comfortable keyboard

- Due to the one-piece housing, access to the battery is only possible by disassembling the device.

You can buy the Nokia N8 smartphone in our F.ua online store at the lowest price.

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