Nokia N81 8GB Review

First of all a big thank you to the team at WOM World for letting me loan a review Nokia N81 8GB so quick after it’s official release.

The N81 comes in 2 different formats depending on your price range and what you want your phone for. The basic model offers a small internal memory with a MicroSD memory card slot for adding cards when and if you need them. Then there is the other model which lacks the memory card slot but packs in 8GB of internal flash memory meaning right out of the box you can transfer over 1000′s of your tracks for when you really need them. This is a huge plus for the 8GB model but does come in at a higher cost.

Device with slide open

Ok so a quick overview of the handset. When you look straight on at the N81 8GB there is a lot to get used to with the buttons, so many in such a small space. At the top of the slide you get the video calling camera, the speaker and 2 buttons which are to be used when in gaming mode. You then have the large, bright QVGA screen which is easy to read in sunlight too (another big plus). Now comes the hard part. You have a green (call) and a red (end) button as normal now on Nokia N-Series devices, 2 softkeys, a menu key, cancel key, back, forward, play and stop buttons for the music player, a silver square which can also be used like a scroll wheel like on an iPod, a middle select button and a new ‘Ovi’ key….. phew!. Cutting a long story short that is a huge amount of keys packed into a small space and this can sometimes cause a problem.

Slide the phone and you get a normal traditional keypad layout as you expect. The left side of the device is pretty plain with only a speaker there, the right side has another speaker (for stereo sound), the volume keys and a camera button for 1 touch access to the camera feature. The top has the on/off button, a 3.5mm audio jack for standard headsets and also a slider button to lock the keypad when not being used. And finally on the bottom you have the standard thin Nokia charger and a mini-usb used for the data cable in the box. The back is pretty plain also with a standard 2.0 fixed camera lens and a photo light for slight improvement of shots.

From my personal view there seems to be way too many buttons on this 1 device and this will cause many people to get frustrated very quickly.

Where the N81 8GB seems to excel for me is in the battery life. Using as my only phone I was making about 30mins of calls on average a day, sending 50-60 texts, checking for my emails and using the camera and somehow still managed to get 2 days and a bit battery life. Those of you who read my original N95 review know how bad that battery was so the N81 8GB was a breath of fresh air not having the same worry.

Close-up of the 16 main buttons

Another outstanding feature of this phone was the audio quality when on either speakerphone or on a headset listening to music. Even at top volume the sound was crisp, clear and sounded very good. Plugging in a decent noise cancelling headset was a real joy and brought out the best in the music player. Talking of Music, Nokia have announced a online music store you can access from your N81 to buy tracks and download straight onto your phone. The range is pretty average having just launched and the 80p a track tag is only 1p more than iTunes charge but with many networks offering their own download service whether the Nokia Music Store takes off if yet to be seen.

As I mentioned in the overview, this phone packs a 2 megapixel fixed camera too. Captured images are clear and good contrast but will never be compared to the N73, N95 etc… mainly due to the lack of megapixels and the fact the camera has no auto-focus so images are not as clear. It also lacks the Carl Zeiss lens but this phone was not built for the camera, it is all about the music.

It is true the N81 lacks HSDPA of any sort, however it does make up for this by including 802.11b WiFi internet and with McDonalds now offering free WiFi in their stores there are now even more places to get hooked up to when you need. There is 3G of course on this phone which does it’s normal job and allows for music to be downloaded pretty quick from a network, although the Nokia store over WiFi is defiantly the quickest way. There is Bluetooth 2.0 support also for your connectivity needs which seems to be a standard now.

Side of the device

Nokia also has 1 more trump card to pull out when needed and that is the brand new N-Gage platform they are working on with many devices from the N95 to the N82 but this also includes the N81 both normal and 8GB models. Do you remember the original N-Gage platform?.. What can only be described as a cornish pasty shaped device that was not practical for using as a mobile at all, games that had to be bought on memory cards and put in UNDER the battery meaning a reboot was needed to change games, slow data speeds at only 2.5G and the games were not cheap either often costing around £20 a time. And then of course you have to carry them around with you!. Not ideal but at the time was a near ground-breaking device (and I admit I owned 1). Then came the N-Gage QD which fixed the memory swapping problem and the pasty look but everything else was a problem.

Now Nokia have their eyes on the gaming market by building in great 3D graphics into their latest phones and allowing N-Gage downloads. Games get downloaded over the air using either WiFi or your 3G connection and get saved straight onto your phone. These 3D games include Fifa 2008 which is very addictive and on the N81 due to the stereo speakers the sound quality is really cutting edge.

N-Gage is due to go live in December as a download on latest phones but until then there are some demo games available for free to give you a small taste of what to expect. I tried 3 games and think once this service launches the N81 will be even better than it is now with nearly unlimited possibilities.

The 2 megapixel camera

I have been using the Nokia N81 as my only handset to really test how good it is and have had mixed results.

After using the Nokia N95, my last N-Series device I was let down with it’s very poor battery life. However it was not the same case with the N81 and I found this phone to have an outstanding battery life. With average call use, email and texting I got at least 2 days of of the battery when I would then top it up just to make sure it does not run out when I need it most. Another great feature was the graphics used on the N-Gage games which were very addictive and a great way to use any spare time. Without doubt the feature I was most impressed with was the music player & speakers. I have never heard audio so clear from a mobile phone and at times with the right music it was better than an Apple iPod it was that clear!. Great work from Nokia.

However the biggest letdown of this phone is the amount of buttons under the screen. 16 in total to be exact which is way too many for such a small area. It was also disappointing that the phone felt too plasticy and some of the buttons made a horrible clicking noise when pressing them (not to mention the rattle in the phone). If these were addressed and Nokia threw in HSDPA for good measure the N81 8GB would be 1 of the best phones on the market and a sure iPhone beater but these small yet nagging issues effect what could have been a great Nokia device.

Anyone want to place bets on a N81i?

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