Nokia N96: Review and Comparison with N95

I tested Nokia N96 for over a month thanks to Digital-PR that made the testing available to me and here are my impressions.

I wanted to particularly check the differences on Nokia N95, which I myself paid for, in order to evaluate if it effectively constitutes the natural evolution to its predecessor.

What I liked most

Finally, the GPS has turned usable. I mean the Nokia Maps integrated to the cell phone and not the third parts.

The integrated GPS antenna finally gets the satellites information in acceptable time and it is rather reliable even when walking in impassable areas (it was tested in Rome’s alleys), or even driving in rural roads.

I’m aware that other bloggers have shown distrust towards the N96 GPS, but the tests have been satisfactory for me.

Another improvement is about the hardware resistance increasing under stress conditions. The N95 mobile streaming with QIK has frequently proved to be unreliable: the phone would get heated and blocked after 5/6 minutes of use compelling me to restart it after removing the battery. N96 seems to be more reliable: it gets heated with less frequency and shows more stability.

The photo camera is more sensitive under low light conditions and its antenna is more sensitive when compared to its predecessor. I spent New Year’s Eve in a ranch where there was no signal for N95, only for N96 instead (look the picture).

Here are some photos shot with N96 during daytime.

The memory is another improved feature: 16 Gb integrated in the cell phone, taken as Flash memory by the computer.

Unfortunately, the pros end here.

N96: the cons

Usability and ergonomics

Two malfunctions, to begin with, that annoyed me from a practical point of view (leaving aside technological resources): the slide opening mechanism and the keyboard.

The phone is not ergonomics at all and to slide it open, you must press the thumb against its surface. As a result, you’ll get a permanently dirty display.

Once it’s open, you’ll find out that the tactile references on the numerical keyboard disappeared: you need to look attentively at the keys in order to type the phone numbers.

From an ergonomics point of view, holding N96 or a little brick feels the same: it bothers.

Energy consumption

One of N95 weaknesses was related to battery length. I longed for an improvement on this feature, but Nokia did worst: it equipped N96 with a battery 950 Mah kind (with lower capacity compared to the N95 second series).

It is a fact that some improvement on the system consumption resources has taken place, but equipping this telephone with a less durable battery than the one on N95 is an unexplicable choice.

UMTS/GPRS Connection

I believe mobile connectivity features to be important on new generation phones. It’s a fact, now USB keys do exist, but if I have to carry the phone around with me, why not use it to connect myself with the notebook not having to carry extra objects during a trip?

Here’s the speed test video: