Nokia N97 First Impressions

After about a day of using the Nokia N97 I won in the “Nokia Search for N” competition I thought I would give some of my thoughts on the phone. Bearing in mind that my last phone was a Nokia E71 and before that a first gen iPhone so as such I’m quite a phone buff. I was also given a week with the Nokia 5800 so I’ve fiddled with the new Nokia touchscreen version of the Symbian operating system.

First up in the box you get the phone, a 1500mAh battery (it’s the same one as the E71 so you’re assured of a long battery life), stylus (which isn’t actually critical), headphones, remote for the headphones, a USB cable and a charger. What’s interesting to notice is that Nokia has finally realised how useful charging a phone via USB can be and as such there’s only one input (micro USB) for both charging and connecting to a PC. While I’m used to Nokia phone’s coming with a tiny power charger this one comes with a slightly larger adaptor that has a micro USB connector at the end as opposed to the normal Nokia plug. Included in the box is also an adaptor that plugs into the micro USB and allows you to connect either the original Nokia charger or the newer, smaller Nokia charger. This is fairly useful as I have a Nokia car charger so I will be able to still use that with the N97.

Physically the device has a 3.5-inch touchscreen with a keyboard that slides out of the side. The downside of the screen is that it’s a resistive rather than capacitive touchscreen meaning it’s not as sensitive and precise. Frankly this hasn’t bothered me yet and all seems very tolerable with regards to the touch. My one initial gripe is that the keyboard is awkwarly layed out with the spacebar on the right hand side of the keyboard. I’m used to it being in the middle as it is on my E71 and this seems like a really silly layout choice. Initially I was extremely slow at typing but this seems to be getting faster with practice. Another issue that might bug some people is that you cannot use this keyboard with one hand and while this not an issue it might be something to keep in mind when chosing this phone over a traditional candybar QWERTY phone.

Unfortunately there is no iSync plugin as yet for the N97 so I had to use a PC to transfer all my contacts. This for me is something Nokia really should look at. I know in a few weeks there will be an iSync plugin but Nokia really should release the plugin before the phone comes out. Possibly this is a symptomn of early adoption but an annoyance if you’re on a Mac. Using a PC however it’s particularly simple to sync your contacts, appointments and even emails if you desire. If you’ve used the Symbian operating system on most new Nokia’s then you’ll be comfortable with the device and how to use it. Since I’ve had two Symbian phone’s this isn’t really an issue. The system is cleverly modified for a touchscreen but I tend to use the directional pad located next to the keyboard as I’m not the biggest touch fan. In terms of build quality it’s quite plastic in comparison to my E71 with a big of chrome around the screen but it’s generally plastic. This isn’t a bad thing but the back of the phone where you insert the simcard tends to squeak a bit when you push on it. Hardly an issue but if this is the Porsche of phone’s then I wouldn’t expect issues like this. I suppose this is the difference between the E-Series and the N-Series Nokia’s.

Taken at the Elephant Santuary with an N97

Feature wise the phone has a 5 megapixel camera that takes some extremely clear photo’s thanks to the autofocus. There is also 32-gigs of memory built in meaning you can take tens of thousands of photo’s and have a fairly substantial music collection as well. On the topic of music the phone has a built in FM tuner so you don’t need any cables or attachments to play music in your car. Something that is slightly bothering me is the lack of the Ovi store in South Africa so I cannot seem to download more widgets or applications. Speaking of widgets, you get up to five on the home screen which can be your contacts and various other widgets such as Facebook. Personally I’d find a Twitter widget really useful and I eagerly await. There’s also a GPS which I haven’t had time to use yet but I’m hoping that it takes quicker to find a GPS satellite than my E71 although this might be more to do with my network when it comes to A-GPS.

A lot of people have said that the phone is underpowered but I’ve noticed no slowdown when running multiple programs or swapping between portrait or landscape. Speaking of programs the phone comes with a nice array of extra software such as a Guiter Hero style game, Joikuspot (turns your phone into a wi-fi hotspot), Qik (allows you to create streaming video from your phone), Facebook, Amazon and both normal and finacial news software.

So far, after a day I’m quite enjoying this phone with its mix of great new features and multimedia slant as opposed to my E71 which is very business focused. I think however that the N97 provides a mix of business and multimedia with it’s great camera and 32 gig file space while at the same time offering email via Exchange. Once I get used to the keyboard I’m sure this will be a great device that despite some minor flaws makes an excellent flagship for the Nokia range.

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