Nokia N95 8GB Review

Last year, after reviewing Nokia's N95, I thought it will take the Finnish company a long time to surpass its performances. Fortunately for Nokia fans, N95 8GB, the sequel to the older N95, has been announced in a moment when the latter already conquered the mobile phones market, which didn't take too long at all. Sales of the device registered some of the highest numbers in Nokia's history and stocks of the device were replenished more often than Nokia expected. Anyway, the announcement was made just in time to arouse the interest of the mobile freaks, not too early, to enable N95 handset to sell until all the mobile market reached a certain level of saturation, but also not too late, to keep up the interest of the N series' fans. Nokia N95 8GB received a whole range of improvements compared with its predecessor, which made it a totally different device and not just an upgrade of the N95.Announced in August 2007, Nokia N95 8GB has been made available 2 months later, in October. The moment N95 8GB hit the market, Nokia N95's price lowered with at least 20%, which made the 8GB the most expensive N series handset sold for about 1,000 USD. Lately, both devices registered another serious drop in price, and N95 8GB can be bought now for only 800 USD.




DesignNokia's N95 8GB design kept the same dual slide form factor, but its screen got bigger and its color changed to pure black. In terms of weight, N95 8GB got fatter, weighing 128 grams (including battery), as compared with the N95, which weighs only 120 grams. The rest of the measures are the same in both cases (99 x 53 x 21 mm), but the 2.8'' display of the 8GB version gives the impression that the whole handset is a little bit bigger than the standard version.




The sliding mechanism has been slightly improved and won't permit the phone to slide up or down when it's kept in a tight pocket. That doesn't mean that your N95 8GB won't slide by mistake, but at least the probability has been lowered considerably. The grip that powered on the camera by opening the protective lenses has been removed, thus the possibility to start the camera by mistake when you put your phone in your pocket has been totally eliminated. The layout of the external keys has been also kept the same. The right side of the phone gets all the external buttons, such as: volume control, camera and gallery buttons. The left side of the phone only features the infrared port and the 3.5 mm audio output jack.



There are also two stereo speakers that can be used to listen to the radio or to the music player. On the bottom of the phone we can find the miniUSB port and the small charge port (AC4 adapter). The only thing left is the usual power button which is placed on top of the device. The back of the phone bears the Nokia logo and the 5 Megapixel camera with flash that features Carl Zeiss lenses.

The keypad looks pretty much the same as its older brother's ? N95. The 5-way control key is flanked only by two other keys: the menu key and the one that controls the multimedia features of the phone. Edging all three are the usual contextual keys found in any Nokia slider. All keys are visible in dark areas through the backlighting system. When you slide down the phone, you will be able to notice the music keys used for controlling the music or video player.

Unfortunately, the same problem that I have faced with the N95 model is still troubling me now: when you slide down the phone, the screen turns to landscape mode, but when you slide it back the screen won't revert to the usual portrait mode. The only possible way to revert it back is to slide up the phone and then back, which is kind of annoying. Overall, the phone looks stylish, but serious at the same time, thanks to its black color. Anyway, those that intend to buy the 'multimedia computer' do it for features mostly and not for its look.

Display and CameraThere are few handsets that feature such a good display as Nokia N95 8GB. If you previously owned the 'older' model, N95, then you will find they are both the same: TFTs supporting 16 Million colors and 240 x 320 pixels resolution. Nevertheless, there is a 0.2" difference in size between the 2 devices, in the favor of the 8GB version. Even if small in size, the difference is huge in quality, especially as the phone comes with the Spiderman 3 movie. Overall, except for the fact that it easily catches fingerprints, the screen is probably the best on the market. The images displayed look quite amazing, while the visibility maintains above average and is not affected by strong sunlight.