Nokia N95 Review
Nokia has built a reputation upon producing quality and
stylish telecommunication devices. The company does not disappoint with its award
winning high-end Nokia N95 smart phone.
Looking at the amount of features the N95 cell phone boasts,
it's not surprising that it has been one of the most coveted smart phones since
its first announcement in September 2006. It has class leading 5-megapixel
camera, advanced multimedia features, and built-in GPS and wireless
connectivity, making the Nokia N95 phone one of the most feature-packed smart
phones on the market.
Design
With all the features that are packed into the Nokia N95,
you would expect it to be quite hefty, but it's not. The N95 measures a compact
99 mm (3.8") long by 53 mm (2.1") wide by 21 mm (0.8") thick and
weighs in at only 120 g (4.2 ounces). This is largely due to the N95's
innovative two-way slider design, which allows you access to the relatively
spacious alphanumeric keypad and the media player controls by sliding the front
cover up and down respectively. The N95's matt silver and plum color scheme is
a good match, making the N95 an attractive phone. In addition, the soft-touch
finish on the back of the phone also gives it a very pleasant rubber feeling
while making it easier to grip and comfortable to hold.
The front of the phone is dominated by a gorgeous 2.6-inch
QVGA TFT screen with a 16 million-color output and 320x240 pixel resolution.
This huge screen isn't a touch screen but it does provide exceptional image and
text quality, with deep color saturation and sharp definition. An ambient light
detector keeps the display readable in various lighting conditions by adjust
the backlighting. The display can also be customized. You can change the theme
of the home screen, font size and backlighting time. When you slide open the
multimedia controls, the screen automatically switches to Landscape mode,
though it does not switch back when you close the media controls. Below the
screen are the N95's navigation controls, which consist of two soft keys, Talk
and End buttons, Menu and Multimedia buttons, a Clear key, an Edit key, and a
four-way toggle with a center select button that are easy to use. Slightly
above the screen is a small, secondary camera used for video calls.
I've already mentioned that sliding the N95's front cover up
reveals the alphanumeric keypad. The alphanumeric keypad has fairly large,
tactile buttons with bright backlighting. The buttons are also raised above the
phone's surface, making it easier to dial by feel. The multimedia controls,
which can be accessed by sliding the front cover down are not as tactile and
require a bit of pressure. Opening the multimedia controls also switched the
screen to Landscape mode and launches Multimedia menu with Music player selected.
Sliding the front cover back to its standard position automatically locks the
keypad. The movement is quite smooth and is supported by a spring mechanism.
However, a locking mechanism to keep the cover in its standard position is
missing. This makes it fairly easy for the front cover to slide open in your
pocket or your bag. The font cover is also a bit loose and tends to rattle a
little but no where near enough to be irritating.
At the back of the phone you'll find the 5 Megapixel Carl
Zeiss Tessar autofocus camera with a built-in LED flash. The N95's camera lens
and flash is protected by a manually controlled cover. Opening the cover
automatically launches the camera application. The camera activation button is
located on the right side of the phone. This requires that you hold the phone
horizontally when using the camera, mimicking the look and feel of a digital
camera. Below the camera is the battery cover which houses Nokia's new BL-5F
950 mAH battery providing 160 to 240 minutes of talk time and 200 to 225 hours
of standby, depending on radio access technology used, operator network
configuration and usage.
In addition to the camera activation button, you'll also
find a shortcut to your photo gallery and the volume control on the right side
of the camera. On the left side you'll find a 3.5mm headset jack so you can
plug in your favorite pair of earbuds or headphones, an infrared port and the
microSD expansion slot.
Features
As a multimedia smart phone, the Nokia N95 boasts camera and
video, and a music player with radio, as well as built-in GPS and wireless
connectivity, not to mention the cell phone features.
Mobile Phone
The Nokia N95 is a quadband GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz),
WCDMA 2100 MHz phone first and foremost It includes a speakerphone, speed dial,
conference calling, voice-command support, a vibrate mode, and text and
multimedia messaging. The N95's address book is only limited by the available
memory, while the SIM card can store an additional 250 contacts. The phone
allows for multiple phone numbers, work and home addresses, e-mail addresses,
birthday, and other details for each contact. It also allows you to assign each
contact a photo, one of 44 ringtones, or a group ID.
Imaging
The Nokia N95 has an impressive 5-megapixel autofocus camera
with a Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar optics (f/2.8, 5.6 mm, 10 cm ~ infinity focusing
range) and 1/1000 ~ 1/3 s mechanical shutter that makes it one of the best
phone camera available. It also has an impressive amount of customization and
editing options that allows it to compete with a stand-alone digital camera!
The N95 has seven shooting modes and five quality settings that you can choose
from, including close-up, sports, and night portrait. You can also adjust the
brightness, contrast, white balance, color tone, ISO light sensitivity, and
exposure value to get the best picture possible. In addition, the camera also
has a red-eye reduction option, a self-timer and a sequence mode for multiple
shots. The only thing that's missing on the N95 is optical zoom!
As you would expect from a 5-megapixel lens, the quality of
photos taken with the N95 are superb. The pictures have vibrant colors and
sharp lines and edges. The camera phone also does a good job with nighttime
photos, though they were still a bit dim. In addition, the N95 doesn't require
you to have a super steady hand to get a clear shot.
But the Nokia N95 is not only a great still camera; it's
also a great video recorder. It can record MPEG-4 video at a maximum VGA
(640x480) resolution at 30 frames per second. It also records in 3GP for
multimedia messages. The video clip length is only limited by the available
memory. There aren't as much editing options as in camera mode, but you do get
shooting modes: automatic and night; as well as white balance and color tone
settings. In addition, the N95 has a digital video stabilization feature to
reduce camera shake while you're recording video. Video quality was also quite
good and does not have any of the graininess that are on some video clips shot
by camera phones. You can use Video editor and Movie director to edit and
enhance recorded video clips. Again, the only thing that's missing is optical
zoom, although there is a 4x digital zoom at VGA resolution. It's not
surprising then that the Nokia N95 has won the 2007 TIPA Award for Best Mobile
Imaging Device in Europe!
Multimedia Palyer
The N95's integrated video and music player is equally
impressive. The video player is a RealPlayer media player with support for mp4 (MPEG-4), H.264/AVC, H.263/3GPP, and RealVideo
8, 9 and 10. The music player has support for MP3, WMA, W4A, AAC, AAC+, and
eAAC+ formats, as well as OMA DRM 2.0 and WMDRM protected music files. It also
has a built-in equalizer. In addition you can also create playlists on the
phone, and can categorize the tracks in the music library by artist, album,
genre, or composer. The N95 also has a standard 3.5mm headphone jack, which
makes the multimedia experience that much better and a Visual FM radio
(87.5-108 MHz), although you have to use the included headset to access the
radio as it acts as the tuner. Both audio and video are of very good quality
with the N95's built-in stereo speakers generates high quality stereo sound.
The N95 also supports A2DP (Advanced Audio Distribution Profile), allowing you to
stream stereo music to stereo Bluetooth headphones.
Wireless Connectivity
The N95 features a built-in GPS receiver with a mapping
application. The GPS receiver is quite sensitive thought not as sensitive and
accurate as SiRF Star III based receivers. Nonetheless, the N95's GPS receiver
will continue working indoors and under heavy foliage once it has obtaining a
satellite fix. In addition to the usual Landmarks and Position applications,
the N95 also features Smart2Go software that shows you information about the
total distance, time, average speed, and so forth. However, navigation and city
guides services must be purchased as extra options.
The Nokia N95 also includes integrated Bluetooth 2.0, Wi-Fi,
and an infrared port in addition to GPS. The N95 smart phone has support for a
number of Bluetooth profiles, including wireless headsets, hands-free kits,
wireless keyboards, and A2DP for Bluetooth stereo headsets. On the Wi-Fi side,
the N95 is 802.11b/g compatible and has support for Universal Plug and Play,
which allows you to connect to a compatible wireless access point, PC, printer,
or home entertainment system via Wi-Fi.
Software
The N95 is a Symbian OS 9.2 S60 3.1 (3rd Edition Feature
Pack 1) phone and is fully compatible with all existing S60 3rd Edition
software. Preinstalled software includes QuickOffice which allows you to view
Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents. The application optimizes the pages for
the phone's screen, so you don't have to scroll left to right to read the text.
However, if you want editing capabilities, you have to upgrade the preinstalled
copy of QuickOffice. For messaging purposes, the N95 supports IMAP4, POP3, and
SMTP e-mail accounts with an attachment viewer. There's also the new version of
Nokia's excellent OSS web browser, which now supports both WWW and WAP, and
includes auto-completion for form data fields, video plug-ins, support for
favicons, Flash Lite 2.0, RSS and Atom feeds, password manager, support for
landscape orientation, toolbar, background sounds, offline browsing, operator
cache, visual windows manager and user agent profile.
Performance
With all the features it needs to support, the N95 is a bit
sluggish, but not enough to be annoying.
Menu operations, image processing, video recording and playback, 3D
graphics in games and web browsing are fast. Music playback through the N95's
stereo speakers is quite good for smart phones, though it still lacks deep
bass. Video playback is also smooth with accurate audio and video
synchronization. The one area where the Nokia N95 does disappoint is the
battery life. The Nokia BL-5F 950 mAH battery is rated for four hours of talk
time and up to nine days of standby time but we were able to get eight hours of
talk time in our battery tests. However, battery time was reduced to just over
a day when using the different features on the N95.
Summary
The Nokia N95 is a great looking multimedia smart phone with
decent performance. It has a huge screen with 2D/3D graphics and video
acceleration, all connectivity and data transmission options including HSDPA,
WLAN b/g, UPnP, USB 2.0 and Bluetooth 2.0 EDR, a fantastic video and still camera,
great music and video playback capabilities, TV out connector, built-in GPS
receiver and good mapping software. In short everything you would want from a
smart phone, multimedia player, and a digital camera!
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