Nokia N8: specifications and reviews

Although Symbian is very popular in some countries of the world, this platform is not very well known to us, because it lags behind competitors in usability and functionality. Operating system Symbian 3 is a good attempt to correct these shortcomings, and Nokia N8 is the first smartphone running on the updated OS. Such necessary improvements are visible at first sight - a simplified touch interface and enhanced multimedia capabilities.

Nokia N8 - specifications of the device

N8 is also one of the best cameraphones that are on sale today, and also provides good communication quality and long battery life. Nevertheless, it still does not reach its competitors in a number of areas, including ease of use, navigation and integrated services. All this, combined with an expensive price tag of $ 549, does not make it a mass gadget. Despite the fact that the Nokia N8 is a good smartphone, consumers often choose devices on Android or iPhone.

Design

For the most part, Nokia always produces quality equipment, and the N8 is no exception. Once you take it in hand, you will notice a sturdy yet beautiful body with metal inserts and a glass display. The gadget has the following dimensions: 4.47 inches in height, 2.32 inches in width and 0.51 inches in thickness. This is a good size for a smartphone: it's big enough to have a large screen, but it's slim and compact enough to easily carry it with you and hold it in your palm. On the rear panel is a slightly convex camera, a little out of the streamlined design, but this does not create inconvenience.

Nokia N8 screen

The front of the phone is decorated with a 3.5-inch AMOLED-capacitive touch screen. With a resolution of 640x360 and support for 16.7 million colors, the display looks bright and clear. Nevertheless, the image does not look as sharp as some of the newest smartphones. Compared to such devices as HTC Evo 4G and Samsung Galaxy S series, the text and images do not appear so harmoniously, and the pixels are more noticeable. This does not interfere with the use of the phone, but you will definitely notice the difference.

The display offers a built-in accelerometer and support for increasing the click of your fingers. The performance of both functions is a bit contradictory. Sometimes the response can be instantaneous, and in other cases there may be a slight delay. This also applies to the operation of the touch screen as a whole. Scrolling lists and desktops is not quite as smooth as in some other competing phones.

To enter text on the screen, the keyboard is displayed in portrait and landscape modes, but the QWERTY option is available only in landscape orientation. This means that if you want to enter any messages in portrait orientation, you will have to type them on an alphanumeric keypad.

Other controls

In addition to the touch screen, the device has a pair of controls designed to help you navigate and perform other functions. Below the display there is one button that switches to the main menu or to the main screen if you are in another application. On the right side there is a paired volume button, a lock switch and a camera activation / capture button.

What else does the Nokia N8 have? There is a power button, an HDMI port and a 3.5 mm headphone jack on the top of the device. On the left side there are slots for SIM-card and microSD, and also a port of micro-USB. On the rear panel you will find a 12-megapixel camera with a xenon flash. Curiously, unlike other phones, the Nokia N8 does not have a replacement battery. Therefore, the battery for Nokia N8 is not replaceable.

Completeness

The N8 comes with a good set of accessories, including a charger, USB cable, HDMI, USB On-The-Go adapter, a wired stereo headset, and reference materials. Although the charger has an international adapter, the phone can be equipped with a charger with a micro-USB connector. N8 is available in five colors: dark gray, blue, green, orange, silvery white. In addition, if you want, you can choose a cover for Nokia N8 any color.

User interface

One of the main disadvantages of the Symbian S60 platform is its "poor" user interface. The ascetic appearance, archaic menu and not very convenient navigation - all this contributed to a great disappointment among users. Symbian 3 fixes a number of these drawbacks and makes the N8 mega-modern compared to previous Nokia smartphones. Nevertheless, it still lags behind competitors in a number of functions and amenities. In order to change anything in the device, you will need a security code for Nokia N8.

Symbian 3 now offers a single control model through the user interface, so you now do not need to go through several stages to complete a simple task or exit the menu. This single system has made the phone easier to use, but still there is not enough quick access to functions inside the application. For example, to reply to an e-mail message on the Nokia N8, you must first select "Options", and then only include the answer. In Android, a similar option is located on the same email page.

The desktop screen currently consists of three panels that can be configured with various widgets, including for messages, social networks, music player, favorite contacts, RSS feeds and so on. Widgets can provide you with a quick view of the latest information, and if you want to view more, you can click on it to launch a separate application.

The main menu pretty much repeats the previous models, representing a grid of your applications (you can change the appearance of the display to the list). There is a useful feature - if you hold down the menu key at the bottom of the screen for a long time, it will arrange the icons of all your running applications. From there, you can scroll through the list to switch between tasks or exit the application.

Features

N8 Nokia offers the functions of hands-free, speed dial, conference calls, voice dialing, vibrating alert, text and multimedia messages in the form of a chat and much more. The address book of the phone is limited only by the amount of available memory, additional contacts can be provided only by the SIM card. In the directory there is a separate item for storing several phone numbers, work and home addresses, e-mail, birthday and other important information in each contact. You can also assign each photo a photo, group ID or custom melody, which is very convenient according to the users.

Unlike devices on other operating systems, the Nokia N8 (original) does not automatically synchronize information from your email accounts and social networks. You will have to use features such as the Ovi service or the ISYNC plugin, which is not very convenient.

N8 is compatible with several e-mail protocols, including Exchange, Lotus Notes and POP3 / IMAP, and offers HTML and folder support. At the same time, access to mail options is not always simple and understandable. For example, if you want to reach your folders, you need to click the Inbox tab at the top of the screen, and then select the one you want from the drop-down list. This is not the biggest problem, but it all goes back to the question of usability.

Connectivity

Wireless options are well represented with Bluetooth 3.0, Wi-Fi (802.11b / G / N), GPS and five bands of 3G support (WCDMA 850/900/1700/1900/2100). The WebKit browser, integrated into the N8, is quite worthy. It offers support for Flash Lite 4.0 and several windows, and the pages open quite quickly. Navigation, however, judging by user feedback, could be much better. Such a simple task, like entering a new web address, requires launching a separate menu and entering a URL followed by a click on "Go." In fact, this should not be so difficult.

Multimedia

The Nokia N series has always been known for its multimedia capabilities, and the N8 continues this tradition. In Symbian 3, the integrated music player gets a nice bonus in the form of Cover Flow - an interface for watching music. It offers such basic functions as playing in random order and repeat modes, creating playlists on the fly and supporting MP3, WMA, AAC, eAAC, eAAC +, AMR-NB, and AMR-WB. Also there is FM-radio. Since the battery for Nokia N8 is quite powerful, you can watch videos and listen to music for several hours in a row.

Camera

We can say that the best feature of the N8 is its 12-megapixel camera. Equipped with Carl Zeiss optics, Xenon flash, and numerous editing options, it allows you to obtain images of excellent quality. In this part, the smartphone is much ahead of its competitors. Images made by this camera have bright and rich colors, as well as clear details that are not visible on most photos taken with the phone. The camera is also able to successfully cope with shooting in various environments - indoors, outdoors, on the move (the reviews confirm this).

In addition to photos, the camera can record high definition video and high quality. Unlike some other smartphones that offer HD video recording, the N8 creates clips that are obtained without any nebula or yellowing. A pre-installed video editor, as well as a photo editor, will allow you to trim the video or add music and text. The received clips you can share on HDTV via HDMI-port. There is also a front-facing VGA camera, which you can use to make video calls in applications such as Fring.

Available apps

Other integrated programs for the Nokia N8 include the QuickOffice suite, a PDF reader, a ZIP manager, a voice recorder, a dedicated YouTube app, a Maps Ovi service (which offers free navigation). In addition, you can find and download more applications from the Ovi Store. The catalog of the store totals about 15 000 items. Of course, this is a very small choice compared to 80,000 applications in the Android Market and 250,000 applications in iTunes, but Nokia has done a good job of updating the interface of the store. The N8 offers 16 GB of internal memory and an expansion slot that accepts cards up to 32 GB.