This would be N95 number 2 for me, since I upgraded from the original N95 to this one, since it has a bigger capacity, and was also simlocked (using an unlocked N95 is a nightmare because half the features won't work). I was a big fan of the original and I saw nothing here that would dissuade me from remaining a fan of the Nokia N series. For many years the Nokia N series has, in my opinion, produced some of the absolute best phones on the market. Ever since I got my first N series phone I have never used anything else. So, does this one continue in that vein?
COST
Well, I got it on 3, and the contract was 400 minutes and 200 texts for £27 a month. This is quite pricey by 3 standards. 3 used to offer the cheapest contracts back when they were desperate for customers, but now they seem to have fallen inline with other service providers. The phone can be bought sim free for as little as £300 brand new if you shop around. What with the release of the N96 this figure will probably fall faster in due course.
APPEARANCE
Well, the N95 8GB has a much bigger screen than the original. It is also made from a black matte plastic that almost feels rubbery. I personally prefer the phone in black, since marks don't show up on it. It has a 2 way slide - one way presents you with a keypad and the other way puts the phone in media mode, where you have play, pause, fast forward and rewind buttons. The buttons on the face are silver and in
the centre is a 5 way control button. It's a simple layout designed to be used with one hand. However do bear in mind that this phone is not exactly svelte - it's a bit of a brick.
DURABILITY
Here's where I whinge. I complained about the old N95 feeling delicate and the same is the case here. The two way slide will eventually feel very loose after a while and for some reason this affects the speaker. With two seperate N95's I have lost all sound from the speaker and have had to resort to putting the person on loudspeaker to hear them. The two way slide thing was a cute idea but one that makes the phone unreliable. Hopefully things will have changed with the N96.
People have complained about the battery life but to be honest, when a phone does as much as the N95 it's bound to drink electricity a little more vigorously. I find the battery life perfectly reasonable - if you need the phone to stay on for a long time, then simply avoid fiddling with the camera and all the other gadgets on it.
CAMERA
This phone has one of the absolute best cameras on the market. It's 5 megapixel and records video at 30 frames per second. You can adjust exposure, it has a flash and digital zoom, and with the scart lead (included) you can hook your phone up to the TV and watch your videos as you would with a camcorder. If you get a phone based on its camera, you cannot be disappointed with this phone. However, unlike the original N95 the Carl Zeiss lens has no cover, so you have to be careful to not get it dirty.
FEATURES
Well, this phone uses the S60 operating system which is available on most high end phones now, and it is ridiculously easy to use. The main menu offers you one touch access to text messages, the internet, GPS and music, and these fast access icons can be changed to whatever you want.
Obviously, you get an mp3 player too, and with 8gb to play with you can pack a great deal of music on your phone. The phone also uses the Nokia N-GAGE gaming system so you get amazing 3D graphics on the games.
The phone comes with wi-fi, so you can browse the net to your heart's content for free if you're near a wireless network you can access. The phone supports "proper" internet, that meaning you can bring up any page you could on a normal computer. Also, in media mode the screen flips horizontally, so you can see more.
GPS makes a welcome return as well. While you do have to pay extra for the full satnav service with the husky woman's voice, you can still do a great deal for free, such as locate where you are, highlight different points of interest around you (good if you're lost in London and looking for a cash machine I've found), and you can still get directions from one place to another. You just don't get the sultry lady telling you how to go about doing it.
You can also read .pdf and word documents, and it comes with the standard mobile phone goodies such as calculator, converter, bluetooth and so on.
One small complaint with the S60 system is that you have to manually close down anything you open on the phone by exiting properly (rather than just skipping back to the main home screen on the phone). If you don't it will eventually tell you that memory is low and you can't do anything until you shut down all the things you've been using.
But by far my biggest complaint is the lack of expandable memory. Yes, 8gb is a lot of memory. But I for one would rather have half the capacity and the ability to use a Micro SD card. It makes life so much easier for transferring data and contacts. You can connect the phone via USB and use it as a mass storage device, but this system just isn't as flexible as having memory cards that can be taken out and swapped.
OTHER STUFF
You get a rather posh looking headphone and volume controller with the phone, as well as the Nokia software on CD, a USB connection cable and cables for hooking it up to the TV. Some places also offer the phone with Spiderman 3 preloaded onto it so you can watch films on the move, and thanks to having just a regular jack plug socket, you can use any headphones with it.
RECEPTION
The phone is quad band and I've yet to find anywhere outside of a train tunnel where I've not been able to get a signal. It also works just fine if you're overseas.
OVERALL
The N95 8gb is a definite step up from the original N95. The bigger screen is fantastic, the extra memory is a welcome addition and the GPS is much more user friendly. The camera is as good as ever and none of the features have been sacrificed to accommodate all these extras. However, it still feels delicate and the lack of expandable memory is a nuisance.
But having said that, this is still an amazing phone that will inevitable become much cheaper soon thanks to the arrival of the N96, which as far as I can tell only offers 16GB memory and rounded corners by way of improvement - everything else seems to be the same.
I would still recommend it, but only to those who aren't prone to breaking their phones and who want a camera phone that could rival a digital camera.
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
Advantages: Easy to use, Gorgeous phone, amazing features. Disadvantages: As the keyboard is small it is hard to find some symbols, screen glares the light.
RaverbabyMiranda 14.07.2009 ·
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: somewhat helpful
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Oct 2nd, 2008
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